Computerization

Computing and Media Technologies begin as two separate entities converging together overtime through, film, photography and binary information. These technologies are developing through experimentation and the format in which the cultural collective forms for the needs of mass.
New media can be broken down into two distinct layers, Cultural Layer and Computer layer. The understanding of the cultural layer is to be known as the input information (user generated), whereas the computer layer is generated from the input information through automation and variations of the same. This transition from the user generated information to the media form and the transcoding for computer or digital information.

During the text of 'Language of New Media' as Manovich speaks of transcoding he states that "computerization turns media into computer data"  (Manovich, 2002, p.63). The computer storing and re distributing the media that it has been given. "In new media lingo, to “transcode” something is to translate it into another form." (Manovich, 2002 p.64)


Transcoding doesn't happen without another 4 principles of new media such as numerical representation, modulation, automation, variability. Each of which cross one path or another. Computerization requires numerical or coded information, binary or otherwise, Modulation through mixed mediums being digitized, automation, the process of creating the binary and coding into a visual or piece of spectral information. Variability the changing of the medium e.g. photograph into a video format. Although suggesting that all within the cultural layer has to be of human origin Manovich states a database "originally a computer technology to organize and access data, is becoming a new cultural form of its own" (Manovich, 2002 p.64), can be consequence of the principle transcoding. 

Manovich suggests that the "computer layer and media/culture layer influence each other" (Manovich, 2002 p.64) rather than have computer layer overpowering the cultural layer, they converge to develop each other further. With the development of computer and digital technology, new media continues to grow along side rather than being the technology. Is it suggestible that transcoding is changing the development of software and the skills required?


Bibliography

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

Critical response to Manovich’s principles of New Media ‘Numerical Representation’ and ‘Modularity'

Worth noticing in Manovich’s chapter on principles of New media are the sections ‘Numerical Representation’ and ‘Modularity’. This principles are correctly stated as being important elements of New Media. In the first section, the author states that the process of digitization involves making real life data, which is continuous, into discrete data. These discrete units, however, are not the units of meaning. The case is rather that they first have to form a interpretable concept as a whole by relying on each other and therefore, they do not affect the viewer separately (Manovich, 2002, pp. 49-50). With this comes the principle of modularity, where the author explains that all these separate elements, together combined into the large-scale object, have their own identity and are independent of one another (Manovich, 2002, pp. 51-52).
This might inhere some sort of contradiction. Although all of these units might seem independent, it could be more useful to say that they are related to each other to create a meaningful superstructure. Taking out one of the items would break the logical whole, and the meaning would change. As a consequence, this means that deleting ‘atoms’ of the new media object would interrupt the cultural and the overall meaning of the message provided by this specific new media, which then too has a significant consequence on the way the message would have influenced the society in which it is created. The influence of the medium happens in the extension of a specific meaning, which is created by the specific parts all working together to be meaningful in some sort of specific way. Take for example a photograph, consisting of pixels as being the units. With just a few pixels, taking out one of the ‘atoms’ or manipulating them in some sort of way does change the way people will interpret the photograph. One may be able to separate or interchange the units, but it will impact the meaning of the message.

Bibliography
Manovich, L. (2002). The language of New Media. MIT Press.