Brett Oppegaard

Medium as frame: comparing mobile audio and video interactions in informal learning contexts

Concept-driven interaction design opens new pathways for research of information and communication technologies ICTs in educational contexts, between the particulars of a case study and the abstractions of theory. Explorative research in this project tested foundational theoretical ideas, such as medium specificity, through concrete designs in an authentic setting. During these separate but similar procedures, conducted a year apart, ordinary users were given representative tasks on mobile devices in order to examine the levels of involvement, social facilitation, and satisfaction generated by differing media forms within the mobile delivery system. From this perspective, direct comparisons could be made, for example, between audio and video forms. Enabling such comparisons has grown in importance with the advent of mobile and other convergent technologies that blend mediums to bring together media organisms to comingle. In the case of a smartphone, for example, mobile media designers now can choose which medium text, audio, video, animation, etc. they want to use within their master medium, which adds to the complexity of the design endeavour but also to the potential for new integrated and interactive forms to emerge as well as for more mindful context-tailored solutions.

Book Review: America Toons In: A History of Television Animation by David PerlmutterAmerica Toons In: A History of Television Animation. PerlmutterDavid. Jefferson, North Carolina: McFarland, 2014. 424 pp.

Restrictions that may not be part of a nation’s legal responsibility might still occur when individuals in the country acknowledge their own moral responsibility. Using the now defunct website Juicy Campus, he demonstrates the need for moral responsibility among anonymous gossip websites (current iterations still exist, such as Yik Yak). Cohen-Almagor shows how thousands of readers of a Vampire Freaks website should have seen evidence of abnormality in the posting of a 25-year-old before he went on a shooting rampage at Dawson College in Montreal in 2006 and killed one student and injured 19 others before killing himself. Certainly our legal system would never hold readers accountable, but a system that emphasizes moral and social responsibility might hold the audience to higher expectations. The text’s end materials will be quite useful to researchers. A 20-page glossary provides definitions for everything from common terms (such as Facebook) to less familiar ones (such as Platform for Internet Content Selection). The extensive bibliography lists hundreds of references, categorized by topic. Overall, the book will be very useful for anyone interested in online free expression issues.

55 pbk.

Proximity has helped practitioners and scholars to determine newsworthiness for generations. Emerging mobile technologies, though, with contextual-awareness capabilities, have been complicating many of the related issues and expanding the realm of journalistic content—as well as conceptualizations of timeliness—through growing digital tethers to place and use of that material in place. Those evolving complexities include the increasing possibilities for journalists to make connections to contemporary audiences through the customization of content based on matters of user location. In turn, where an audience member is located when media is delivered can matter greatly. Geolocation metadata has become ubiquitous and media delivery systems can sort that data to customize user experiences based on place. In terms of such tailoring, mobile devices allow novel kinds of personalized connections to journalism, prompted by a geographical nearness to physical stimuli. In response, this study examines the potential ...Proximity has helped practitioners and scholars to determine newsworthiness for generations. Emerging mobile technologies, though, with contextual-awareness capabilities, have been complicating many of the related issues and expanding the realm of journalistic content—as well as conceptualizations of timeliness—through growing digital tethers to place and use of that material in place. Those evolving complexities include the increasing possibilities for journalists to make connections to contemporary audiences through the customization of content based on matters of user location. In turn, where an audience member is located when media is delivered can matter greatly. Geolocation metadata has become ubiquitous and media delivery systems can sort that data to customize user experiences based on place. In terms of such tailoring, mobile devices allow novel kinds of personalized connections to journalism, prompted by a geographical nearness to physical stimuli. In response, this study examines the potential of proximity for impact on key factors of engagement, through the involvement, social facilitation, and satisfaction of users. This conceptualization of mobile journalism shows that media designers now not only can know precisely where their particular audience is but also adapt their messages to the situation as a way to generate more engaging experiences.