Describe New Media

How can one describe "new media" well to me new media is a new form of technology that eases the process of publication.  Keep in mind this is not limited to what a person wants to tell the world... It's more like what a person has to share to the world whether it be an encyclopedia (which everyone helps put together aka collaboration 1st of 5 C's), an opinion, a song, a video, update of what's going on etc.(creativity 2nd of 5C's).  New media is interactive which means it allows people to comment on the original piece or reply to other comments left by others. Since anybody can leave comments (Communication, the 3rd of 5 C's) anytime it creates a dialogue between a group of people with similar interest thus forming a little community of peers (4th of 5 C's) where they can meet occasionally through the web and talk (convergence 5th of 5C's).

Technology that would be considered new media would be anything that's associated with the Web 2.0 movement.  This "refers to the second, more social generation of the Internet,"(CNN) where people get, creative, involved, work together on projects and share works they've completed.  The most well known Web 2.0 websites are facebook.com, youtube.com and wikipedia.com.

To distinguish new media from old media one must look at how the information is being shown to the audience.  Old media refers to print like books or broadcast like TV; the author is basically feeding you information.  Now on the other hand new media like blogs allow you to have a say in what you were just told.  In the case of blogs you can leave a remark and others would do the same and so on kind of like a good old chat but through text via the Internet.  Like what Melissa Gerry said in her article, Celebrity Blogs: The Impact of New Media, "Blogs are having an effect on where and how people are receiving information. Through blogs, people are able to write about topics that interest them and comment freely on what is going on in their lives and in the world around them."

Gerry, Melissa. "Celebrity Blogs: The Impact of New Media." Associated Content (2006): n. pag. Web. 14 Sep 2010. http://www.associatedcontent.com/pop_print.shtml?content_type=article&content_type_id=26280.
Sutter, John D. "English gets millionth word on Wednesday, site says." CNN (2009): n. pag. Web. 14 Sep 2010. http://www.cnn.com/2009/TECH/06/10/million.words/index.html?iref=mpstoryview.