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Telecommunications, Telecommunications, Sociology, Media & Communications, Social & Cultural History
Media Technology and Society by Brian Winston β€” book cover

Media Technology and Society

by Brian Winston
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Overview

How are 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. Brian Winston argues that the development of new media, from the telegraph and the telephone to computers, satellite and virtual reality, is the product of a constant play-off between social necessity and suppression: the unwritten law by which new technologies are introduced into society only insofar as their disruptive potential is limited. Winston's fascinating account examines the role played by individuals such as Alexander Graham Bell, Gugliemo Marconi, John Logie Baird, Boris Rozing and Charles Babbage, and challenges the popular myth of the present-day "information revolution."

Synopsis

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.

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Editorials

Booknews

Offers a comprehensive account of the history of communications technologies, from the point of view that the development of new media is the product of a constant play-off between social necessity and suppression. Challenges the concept of a revolution on communications technology by highlighting the long histories of developments such as the fax (introduced in 1847) and the idea of television (patented in 1884). Examines why some prototypes are abandoned and why many inventions are created simultaneously by independent inventors, and shows how new industries develop around inventions. Annotation c. by Book News, Inc., Portland, Or.

Book Details

Published
April 1, 1998
Publisher
Taylor & Francis, Inc.
Pages
392
Format
Paperback
ISBN
9780415142304

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