New Media and the Computerization of Culture

In his book 'The Language of New Media', Lev Manovich (2001, p.43) states that:“(…) today we are in the middle of a new media revolution—the shift of all of our culture to computer-mediated forms of production, distribution and communication.”. This new media revolution can be seen as the junction of the history of computing and the history of media technologies. According to Manovich, five main principles can be identified in order to distinguish New Media from old media: numerical representation, modularity, automation, variability and transcoding.

Although Manovich acknowledges that the principles of automation, variability and transcoding are predominantly dependent on the basic principles of numerical representation and modularity, he also acknowledges that transcoding is “(…) the most substantial consequence of media’s computerization.” (Manovich, 2001, p.63).  In technological terms, transcoding can be defined as the transformation from one format to another. However, when we define transcoding in more general terms, it can be understood as the computerization of culture.

In this respect, we have to think about New Media as comprising two layers. On the one hand, there is the cultural layer which reflects the perspective of the human mind. On the other hand, there is the computer layer which represents digital data or numeric codes. Given that computers are used to create and distribute New Media, it is anticipated that the computer layer will influence the cultural layer.  In this way, the representation of culture by the computer affects culture itself. An example of this would be the evolution from old web communities to social networks, which have a significant social impact on our daily lives. Moreover, this influence can be seen in both directions, resulting in the merger of computer and culture. It is a merger of how human beings see the world and how the computer represents it.  Nevertheless, the question remains to what extent this effect is substantially different from the impact of more traditional media.

Bibliography
Manovich, L. (2001). The Language of New Media. Cambridge, Mass., London: MIT Press.