Product Description

How are new media born? How do they change? And how do they change us? Media Technology and Society offers a comprehensive account of the history of communications technologies, from the printing press to the internet.

Product Details

• Amazon Sales Rank: #327409 in Books
• Published on: 1998-04-16
• Original language: English
• Number of items: 1
• Binding: Paperback
• 392 pages

From the Publisher
"I loudly celebrate this important study and commend it unreservedly to all concerned with media, communications and the role of technologies in the world today" Frank Webster, University of Birmingham

From the Back Cover
Media Technology and Society offers a comprehensive account of the history of communications technologies, from the telegraph to the Internet.
Winston argues that the development of new media, from the telephone to computers, satellite, camcorders and CD-ROM, is the product of a constant play-off between social necessity and suppression: the unwritten 'law' by which new technologies are introduced into society.
Winston's fascinating account challenges the concept of a 'revolution' in communications technology by highlighting the long histories of such developments. The fax was introduced in 1847. The idea of television was patented in 1884. Digitalisation was demonstrated in 1938. Even the concept of the 'web' dates back to 1945. Winston examines why some prototypes are abandoned, why many 'inventions' are created simultaneously by innovators unaware of each other's existence, and shows how new industries develop around these inventions, providing media products for a mass audience.
Challenging t