A Close Look at Computer Mediated Communication and the Road it is Taking.
How diffusion of the Internet has forever changed the way people communicate in North America
11/11/2007
By: Heather Tufts, student # 2730556
Athabasca University
Communication Studies 421: Being Online, Tutor: Jayne Gackenbach
The Internet has opened up a wide range of new possibilities as computer mediated communication (CMC) has become a part of our daily lives. The diffusion of this technology has expanded faster than any other. In the following report, The CMC theory will be discussed along with the diffusion of Innovation theory as the two are deeply connected and explain some of the massive changes the Internet has introduced into human communication. Close analysis will be placed on online social networks and the popularity of blogging.
Research has suggested that CMC is not neutral: it affects the way people communicate with one another, and it can influence communication patterns and social networks. It creates a sense of community and can improve relationships. With new technology their follows new opportunities for virtual communities and social identities to be formed which result in the development of new boundaries and the breaking down of old ones (Shedletsky and Aitken, Human Communication on the Internet, Pg 95). This happens in education institutions, cities, towns, within companies, and in many other situations where groups of individuals have tied interests that potentially could benefit from enhanced communication, such as the Internet.
To elaborate more on how CMC is developing communities online, Shedletsky and Aitken’s work on polarization will be reviewed. The writers discuss how the Internet enables people to find others like themselves quicker than other traditional means, such as finding friends within a neighborhood for instance. They provide an arbitrary illustration of a neighborhood of approximately 100 people. They explain that of these 100 people, we can assume that 25 will be out of age range, 25 will simply be too different in respect to education and personalities and therefore not interesting, they estimate that 25 “probably [we will not] like the looks of [them]” which finally leaves 25 people that are interesting and have potential to become future friends. In contrast, in the “Internet neighborhood” there are millions of people that we can potentially interact with, and as we often cant match faces with names, that automatically eliminates the possibility of screening them based on appearance. They state that “time and space have different meanings online” and we can chat with anyone in the world at a time that is convenient to us. There are thousands of chat rooms available and have the opportunity to chat with people who have similar interests to us such as religious values, political views, gender topics, hobbies, nationalities, etc.
In the university context, educational technology has quickly become adapted and its use is now finally changing the ultimate direction of teaching methods and strategies. Based on current feedback being retrieved from both students and faculty members of various universities, it is becoming increasingly evident that web-based technologies are making learning more effective and efficient as these mediums have inspired increased communication and the value of relationships between students, alumni, faculty and staff. The University of New Brunswick in Canada, for instance, uses a web tool used in many universities, called Blackboard. The software is implanted onto a secure server and provides students with instant access to their course materials, marks, discussion forums, chat rooms, online tests, an internal email system, etc.
One of the largest online social platform websites, Facebook, provides users with the option to join a number of groups or what they refer to as “networks”. All universities in North America have Facebook networks as well as most high schools. Users can also join a regional network, which enables them to be instantly connected with others in their city and have access to event calendars, classified listings (the “marketplace”), photos submitted, discussion boards, etc. (www.facebook.com/networks/). The platform is also very popular in businesses. Co-founder, Chris Hughes has stated that Facebook currently has over 10,000 businesses online.
Another way CMC is changing how people communicate with one another is through Blogging. A blog, or in other words, a web log, is a website where entries are written in chronological order which is commonly displayed in reverse chronological order. The majority of blogs provide commentaries on politics, the news, entertainment or other particular subjects. A typical blog combines text, images, and links to other blogs or websites that are related to its topic. One of the most distinctive features of a blog, however, is its commentary application. Readers on blog sites can submit comments on entries and exchange their opinions with the author and other readers. A blog search engine called, Technorati, reported in September 2007, that there are currently more than 106 million blogs online. (www.technorati.com). The “world’s most popular blog” is acknowledged as being www.perezhilton.com. The writer, referred to as a “gossip gangster” has over 4.7 million unique visitors to his blog daily. (Nielsen/NetRatings) Each unique entry receives an average of 300 commentaries. His theme is celebrity gossip and it is a website that everybody knows of and speaks about as it is in the news on an ongoing basis. A successful blog clearly can unite millions of people together who share similar interests to participate together and become apart of a themed community.
Shedletsky and Aitken have shown how enhanced communication enables people to traverse, and therefore potentially rise above, social borders by facilitating the production of virtual communities through computer mediated communication. They conclude that “due to the global scale of this technology and the fast pace of innovation, computer mediated communication (CMC) has a clear potential to breach boundaries of nationality, race, language, and ideology” (Pg 95, Human Communication on the Internet)
Now that it has been clearly demonstrated that the CMC theory does in fact change the way people communicate with others, the Diffusion of Innovation theory will now be explored as it is necessary to understand exactly how CMC has evolved in such a short period of time, comparative to other technologies. The Diffusion of Innovation theory is used to explain the way new technologies migrate from their original creation into the hands of the public. It is furthermore used to predict how various media provide information that ultimately influences opinion and judgment.
Everett Rogers, the writer of Diffusions of Innovations, compares change as a passing wave through society. His research on this theory is centralized on the conditions that tend to increase or decrease the chances that a new product, idea, or practice will be adopted by members of a given culture. With the internet, its diffusion in respect to the evolving way people communicate is discussed in close detail, as people no longer are using traditional means of communication.
The theory consists of four stages: invention, diffusion (or communication) through the social system, time and consequences. The information then flows through networks, but the likely hood that the invention will be adopted, will rely primarily on the type of networks and the roles that opinion leaders play in them. Rogers’ research attempts to explain the variables in innovation diffusion that influence how and why users adopt a new information medium, such as the Internet. Opinion leaders exert influence on audience behavior via their personal contact, but additional mediators referred to as change agents and gatekeepers are also included in the process of diffusion. A successful diffusion cycle is normally achieved by five different types of adopters, classified in order as: (1) innovators, (2) early adopters, (3) early majority, (4) late majority, and (5) laggards. These categories follow a standard deviation-curve where very few innovators adopt the innovation in the beginning (2,5%), early adopters making up for 13,5% a short time later, the early majority 34%, the late majority 34% and after some time finally the laggards make up for 16%. (www.tcw.utwente.nl). in most situations it is rarely clear in the beginning how a new medium of communication will be used. (Baron, 2000, pp 216-246). Rogers explains that the diffusion on innovation happens in such a way that is a natural part of social change. In relation to the Internet specifically, its diffusion is influenced by social economic political educational as well as personal factors. Shedletsky and Aitken claim:
One factor does seem certain, though: Regardless of how Internet use evolves, people who live in the United States are using the Internet more and more. In a study of American use of the Internet, researchers found that the use of the internet is growing rapidly. Two million more people join the ranks of new Internet users each month. These users include all demographic groups and all geographical regions. The majority of America is online. (Page 42)
It is without doubt that Americans are using the internet more and more. In the most recent world internet usage report, it is interestingly in North America where the most people have access to the Internet in comparison to all other continents. There are 334,538,018 North Americans and an amazing 234,788,864 of these people have Internet access making the continent the world leader at 70.2%. Following is: Oceania/Australia with 55.2% of their population online, then Europe with 41.7%, Latin America with 20.8%, the Middle East with 17.3%, Asia with 12.4%, Africa with only 4.7%. The world total of people with Internet Access is currently at 18.9%. (Internet World Stats, (www.internetworldstats.com/stats.htm)
The rapid growth of Internet usage surpasses that of all other technologies. Had technological change and innovation accelerated at today's rate during the fifteenth century in Europe when printing technology was first introduced, one can only wonder what the economic and political effects that its adoption and diffusion might have had on that era and succeeding history. It is very important, however, to note that during that era, communication technology was not sufficient enough to permit the quick expansion of new innovations through populations. The evolution of communication technology has been a timely process, but from the beginning, has been accelerating at a quicker rate with each new innovation. The internet requires a well developed telecommunications infrastructure, and as soon as this is achieved, the possibility of a completely interconnected world or better known as the “global village” will be born.
Based on the statistics presented by Internet World Stats, it is clear that we are far from being a “global village”. With only 4% of Africa’s population online, there is still a long ways to go. New developments are however showing promise that these statistics will be increasing in the near future. The organization OLPC in 2005 set up a mission to provide laptop computers to children in developing countries. (There are over 2 billion children in these countries that do not complete their schooling past grade 5). Their objective is to “provide children around the world with new opportunities to explore, experiment and express themselves” (http://laptop.org/vision/index.shtml). The organization has just started mass production of these laptops in the month of November 2007. Writers of the short film, Did you Know 2.0, Karl Fisch and Scott Mcleod claim, “kids who have never held a textbook will now hold the world”.
Based on the diffusion of the Internet, CMC has evidently changed the way we communicate. The global village awaits us as the expansion of online access is spreading at an accelerated rate, diffusing the minds of the human population.
