Different scholars have defined mass communication in different ways depending on their understanding and views. Some of the profound definitions that I find to explain mass communication well are "the mechanism whereby media organizations create and communicate information to the general public and where the public seeks, uses, understands or influences such messages." According to Hanson (2016) , mass communication "is one of the communications systems at the social level that is easily defined by its institutional features." In summary, communication is the transmission of messages to all company recipients, generally with any expense or charge (advertising) for the sender, through media or technology-driven networks. "The transmitter is often an individual within a broad media organization, the messages are distributed, and the public is broad and diverse." However, these concepts do not consider the growing opportunity of individuals to deliver messages to broad audiences through media platforms as outlets such as YouTube, Instagram, Facebook, and text messages arrive. This paper, therefore, will present the steps social media has taken to reach this far.
Mass communication is gradually becoming more embedded into our lives. This "metamorphosis" is symbolic of the integration between us and technology (Hanson, 2016) . in which we are not so far from mass media as we have in the past. More and more ways are being offered to use mediated contact to meet interpersonal and social needs. Many generations after generations had long wanted and desired to discover appropriate means of reporting the environmental hazards and benefits. They tried to circulate their opinion, information, and insights. The transmission of knowledge, history, and love was also a dream. The main challenge was to find opportunities for as many people as possible to convey their messages. Our need for information has led to creative means of communicating to the masses.
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Evolution of Mass Communication
Hundreds of years have gone by since the era of intertwined and overlapping data networks. The people mostly interacted face to face before the dawn of mass media; they met most of the time with people like themselves and had no external interaction (Hanson, 2016). However, people increasingly developed networking networks using interpersonal platforms, print media, mobile media, and digital media. This segment explores how different networking networks have evolved in the media culture we all live in over the years. In the early 1880s, various landline wires crisscrossed the multiple cities of New York, which could send messages faster through multiple places and across the country and extend to the world's parts.
Before Mass Media Communication Networks
The first significant communication network in the western world was founded before the mass media by the Roman Catholic Church. During that time, letters flowed from the Vatican in Italy to priests in cathedrals and villages worldwide through the cardinals and the bishops. The letters then eventually reached congregations through pulpit preaching. Years passed by before books were introduced as a source of information. In particular, the advent of the imprinting machine, the discovery of mobile kind in the 1450s, and subsequent mass processing of printed materials was the first significant expansion of communication since the Church (Hanson, 2016). Mass publishing made it impossible to spread from their country of birth to the whole of Europe and the rest of the world massive societal reforms, including the Protestant Reformation. Although the press permitted mass knowledge processing, the printing process remained relatively slow, and publications remained very costly. The addition of steam power to the printing press significantly improved the reproduction of printed content in 1814.
The communication field later evolved to the electronic networks; the arrival of electronic communication complicated the world of media considerably. This method of correspondence started in 1844 with the completion of the first telegraph line from Baltimore, Maryland, to Washington, D.C (Hanson, 2016). In 1866, telegraph cables spanned the Atlantic Ocean, breaking a nearly insurmountable obstacle that had previously prevented transoceanic communication. The two people on the opposite side of the ocean could conduct a telegraph dialog rather than deliver a letter which took long before feedback was obtained. In the 1880s, in the mass production disks of three minutes of a song, Emile Berliner patented a gramophone or phonograph. The gramophone allows musical performances to be recorded and repeated, as did print books, encourage the preservation and spread of ideas. At the end of the nineteenth century, radio liberated electronic communication from telegraph wiring's limits. Messages could arrive at any moment and to the recipient almost at no expense. It all took a radio to receive an infinite array of cultural contents, news, and another programming.
The film was projected in the late 1890s and early 1900s in nickelodeon theatres and developed in an entertainment industry that sold movies worldwide. On a day in London, Ohio, and London, England, young couples might watch the same film, copy the same dress styles, and maybe even practice the same kisses they saw in the movie. The television landscape has become a community of entertainment exchanged for the benefit of big media companies, thanks to radio and film. In 1939, customers no longer had to sit down for radio broadcasts from Yankees games on the Polo Grounds in the New York neighborhood taverns (Hanson, 2016). Instead, on a pedestal behind the counter, a thin, black-and-white T.V. showing a tiny flickered picture of the game. T.V. had gained prominence over the radio after a series of delays caused by World War II. It was also a bolt of an uproar when people waited at home to see any photos it provided.
People majorly relied on oral traditions to pass on knowledge or information before writing existed. Many people started accessing the Internet or media in the early 1900s according to Oxford's English dictionary, and some years later, around the 1950s, communication took another channel. Still, the points that stand out clearly, media are much older than that (Hanson, 2016)." In ancient civilizations, oral and written speech played an important part. These oral cultures record the past and communicate cultural values, traditions, and wisdom through history. With the development of alphabets in the world more than about 5000 years ago, how cultures interact began to modify written language with alphabets based on images like hieroglyphs.
Finally, the information age substituted the industrial era ideals. The P.C. was named the first 'Machine of the year' in 1983 by Time Magazine; just over ten years later, computers sold T.V.s. Time Magazine named you then in 2006 as the person of the year to expand your communication with technology (Hanson, 2016). "The changes in global media have been taken advantage of by you." You, your friends, and your family likely spend hours communicating based on data such as email, text, or other social media. The Internet has changed how we operate, approach others, access information, our degree of privacy and how we spend our time. In recent years social media have also had a significant influence on social movements worldwide, supplying the ordinary consumer for the first time in history with the tools to access broad audiences around the world.
Online or The Interactive Communications
After many decades of television, residents had become accustomed to the expectation that news, information, and entertainment could almost magically be transmitted to their homes, even though they could only regulate the quality of this media by changing channels. Then evolved a new medium that readily interactive and enjoyable to both the receiver and the sender. In the 1990s, the Internet became a complete network of mass communication (though many people were unaware that the first nodes of this new medium were being linked together as far back as the late 1960s (Hanson, 2016). Modern computer networks have been developed for two-way networking rather than making it more straightforward for people and organizations, sending messages to a mass audience. Members of the audience are their messaging services.
The interactivity of online media has been the outcome of the movement to enable public members to monitor their world of contact. The rise in cable and satellite T.V. alongside the VCR had already helped the audience select between tens of channels without leaving their chairs, and the remote control provided them with more power (Hanson, 2016). There are significant consequences of interactivity. While a smaller and smaller number of multinational companies dominate the commercial media, as seen later, a vital medium for mass communication is available to everyday citizens in ways that have often never been feasible. Individuals can gain news and entertainment via social media and the World Wide Web with negligible investment in mobile devices and computers.
Some examples of the most interactive mass communication are described; to start Twitter, Twitter makes short messages of 140 characters or fewer (called tweets) for registered users. Tweets can be transmitted quickly to various users from any smartphone with an internet connection, be it from relatives, acquaintances, or followers (Hanson, 2016). The microblogging format of Twitter helps people to share their everyday thoughts and experiences on a large, often public scene. Twitter's versatility makes it a way to play and blog, organize social campaigns, and post news. It is also a tool for social movements.
Another example is the snap chat; every day, more and more people are using Snapchat as a new social media site. The Snap chat feature enables the user to submit a post, which expires within a few seconds, with a text option. It can be used in an old spy movie as a self-destructive digital message. In contrast to their counterparts, snap chat is less professionally used, which stresses humor and spontaneity concerning the efficiency of content. There is no need to pose or display your life, contrary to Facebook. It is like you gaze at the stranger on the street or talk funny with a good friend. Lastly, Facebook has become a global hub for social media. It is available for up to 500 million people in 37 languages. As a student at Harvard University, Zuckerberg founded Facebook in 2005 and universally transformed our way of communication (Hanson, 2016). Interacting and living with colleagues, families, and acquaintances. Many people say that there is a positive or an adverse profile for Facebook and can be used in social media as the digital footmark.
Media Effects
Written communication remained unclear and only reached the masses by forming a syllable alphabet describing sounds until the Greeks and Romans resolved this. However, written language was impractical without anything to write on. In China, paper production was finished, which extended through trade routes throughout Europe (Hanson, 2016). Mass communication was not quick but broad. This has changed forever how cultural awareness and traditions are saved and passed on. The invention and influence of print presses and mobile metals can be traced to every political or social revolution in the ages. Guttenberg was able to print more than one page of a particular text using his technology. Mass publishing is responsible for providing a voice to the masses and making information accessible to the ordinary public by making written correspondence more available for many people (Hanson, 2016). McLuhan argued that the creation by Gutenberg of the printing press as a means of mass media had a deep and enduring cultural impact, possibly the most significant innovation in human history.
Mass Communication, As Noted by Scholars
In 1949 a scholar named Carl and others published the book Mass Communications Experiments (Hanson, 2016). They watched two types of films used by the army to educate troops. They first looked at orientation videos and training such as the "Why We Fight" to show the soldiers truth and provide a constructive approach to the conflict. The studies showed how the soldiers from the videos, but particularly with tangible things, learned significantly. The army was deceived by the findings that demonstrated that the orientation films were not effective in creating favorable responses that the soldiers wanted. Imagine the people weren't ready to go to war.
Rise of Mass Communication/Society
Before the 1800s, most people living in the farming areas of Europe and North America had probably a common cultural, racial and religious heritage to their neighbors (Hanson, 2016). People knew their neighbors and learned them from their neighbors. People had minimal opportunity to improve their station or think a lot about the outside world throughout their life. In the 19th century, though, we began to see mass migrations from rural areas to towns and different countries to the U.S. due to the Industrial Revolution. When people came to the cities, they competed alongside people who were very different from them for wages in factories. Industrialization unites a significant population from tiny, tight villages where they all know the world from mainstream media outlets such as new cheap dailies, magazines, and paperback novels.
Many changes have taken place, and many journals have been written to explain the various transformation. Life without mass communication seems impossible in this era of digital saturation, endless news channels, high-speed linkages, and social networking referring to stories back in early years about letters being sent to relatives, families, and others? We can phone, fax, email, Facebook post, Twitter, and snap chat today; the opportunities are almost unlimited and constantly evolving. When we want to touch someone, we have different ways to reach them. Society today is in the middle of a transition in technology. A couple of years ago, households were complaining about landline internet cable use and the frequent delays from incoming phone calls. As of today, we can now navigate the Internet on mobile phones anywhere. Mass media has transformed how we think and communicate as people since the printing press. "New developments are so quickly assimilated into U.S. society that historical insights are always forgotten" we take for granted. What purposes does this serve for us with all this discussion and study on mass communication?
Reference
Hanson, R. E. (2016). Mass communication: Living in a media world . Sage Publications.
