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Chapter 2
Understanding How New
Communication Technologies Work
Online Communication
In this chapter, you will learn:
A brief history of cybernetic machines;
The features that identify the Internet;
The common features of online communication;
How time is experienced on the Internet; and
How reading is affected by hypertext.
Online Communication
Online Communication
technological determinism:
a perspective that our growing ability to alter or replace nature provides a central reason for most personal and social trends
Cybernetic Machines
Charles Babbage’s analytical engine
The Jacquard Loom
Norbert Weiner’s popularizing of cybernetics
ARPANET
Internet
Online Communication
Online Communication
Norbert Weiner (1954) wrote The Human Use of Human Beings and began to popularize the notion that information is an exchange of data necessary for one system to influence the behavior of another system.
Cybernetic Machines
Online Communication
The government-backed and military-endorsed Advanced Research Projects Agency (ARPA) founded the network of computers that began as the ARPANET and grew into the Internet.
Cybernetic Machines
The Internet . . .
Is linked together through a global
address system;
Uses a common form of transmission
protocol; and
Allows public and private communication.
Online Communication
Features of Online Communication
Packet-switching
Multimedia
Interactivity
Synchroncity
Hypertextuality
Online Communication
Newhagen, J. E., & Rafaeli, S. (1996, March). Why communication researchers should study the Internet: A dialogue. Journal of Computer-Mediated Communication, 1 (4), <http://www.ascusc.org/ jcmc/vol1/issue4/rafaeli.html>.
Online Chronemics
synchronous communication:
the exchange of messages in real time
asynchronous communication: the exchange of messages with significant lag time between them
Online Communication
How Hypertext Challenges Reading
From linearity to multilinearity
From centrality to links
From hierarchy to cooperation
Online Communication
Landow, G. P. (1992). Hypertext: The convergence of contemporary critical theory and technology. Baltimore, MD: Johns Hopkins University Press.
A Brief Review
1. What influences supported the rise of the Internet?
2. What three characteristics define the Internet?
3. What five features distinguish online
communication from other forms?
4. How can time influence communication?
5. What three issues does hypertext introduce to
reading?
Online Communication
