From Disruptions: Social Media Images Form a New Language Online
“This is a watershed time where we are moving away from photography as a way of recording and storing a past moment,” said Robin Kelsey, a professor of photography at Harvard, and we are “turning photography into a communication medium.” (Bliton)
I think that this is absolutely correct. We live in a society today where so much emphasis is put on social media. Facebook, for example, holds all of my photos from the last decade. Social networking companies are spending all this money to gain members and are making it easier and more convenient for us users to share our entire life in pictures and 140 characters or less.
I can remember as a child, taking photos with friends and family, mailing them out, waiting a week to get them back to see how they turned out and enjoy them. They were put in frames and scattered about the house or walls and tables. Now, we take 100 pictures with 100 different poses just to get THE PERFECT ONE (deleting the unflattering ones, of course) to post on Facebook in hopes of likes and comments.
I recently upgraded phones. Now I can upload pictures directly from my phone to Facebook. Someone said to me "welcome to the 21st century". I laughed, but it's true! In the blog post, it mentions simply sending a photo, completely omitting words, to tell someone where you are or what you're doing. This is common in my own life among my friends and family. It is easier to send one photo rather than type out exactly where you are and what you're doing.
Just in my lifetime I have seen an enormous swing in the way we communicate with one another regarding texting, pictures, and social media. And while sometimes I miss a good phone conversation or picture in a frame hanging on my wall, I keep up with the current technologies.
Is it fair to say that this new trend is making us lazy? Insulting our intelligence? Mocking the English language?... I don't know. But I do know that each time I discover something new, I can't understand how I did without for so long!
Talking Without Saying a Word
In this visual metaphor, I am comparing this common child's tin can phone to the way in which we communicate today. Supposedly, this 'phone' will allow you to communicate with someone whom you can't see. I personally was never successful at this. I never heard the voice on the other end of the line. I believe that this represents communication today; we have the all the necessary devices, but it's frustrating and it's lengthy and it doesn't always work the way it's supposed to. Let's skip all that hassle and send a picture. Besides, isn't a picture is worth a thousands words?
Resources:
Bilton, N. (2013, June 30). Disruptions: Social Media Images Form a New Language Online. Retrieved May 29, 2015, from http://bits.blogs.nytimes.com/2013/06/30/disruptions-social-media-images-form-a-new-language-online/?_r=1
We chose to highlight the same quote, and I also included a reference to the adage that a picture is worth a thousand words. We’re thinking along the same lines when it comes to images replacing text.
ReplyDeleteYour point about taking a hundred photographs to get the perfect one made me laugh and think that in the past with film, we had to settle for what we got. But, it got me reminiscing about it and I don’t recall being nearly as critical with the printed photographs as we are with digital photographs. Having the option to take as many as we want provides us with the chance to be more critical.
You mentioned that taking photographs was easier than sending a text but I wonder if it’s less about the ease of it, and more about the novelty or creativity that comes along with it. I also think that photographs can provoke more of a reaction than a text and if it includes our faces, it’s definitely more intimate.
I really liked your chosen photograph; sometimes when speaking with someone; it sounds like they’re talking into a tin can. It also made me think of telegraphs and telegrams, the original text messaging service!
I chose the same quote! I also mentioned the old saying "a picture's worth a thousand words." I agree with the saying; however, there are a few ways to interpret it. If you are looking at a picture from the past, it could trigger a memory and a story. If a friend posts or sends you a picture, you interpret the picture in your own way, which may not be the same as how your friend intended.
ReplyDeleteI can remember getting so excited as a child when the mail contained a Kodak package full of pictures. My mom carried a camera everywhere! We would get home and open the package and begin looking, remembering, talking, and laughing about the past. Then when the Polaroid was invented, we could view the picture in a matter of a minute or so (and for some reason, shaking it helped it develop). Now, it is so convenient just to pull your phone out and capture the moment.
Your visual metaphor of the tin cans makes me think of my childhood. I can remember trying this with my childhood best friend. We would pull the string tight and talk into the can, carrying on a silly conversation. We would stand pretty close to each other, so I’m pretty sure it wasn’t really working.
I absolutely LOVED reading your take on everything, as well as your visual metaphor! The "tin can" was such a creative idea & I loved your interpretation.
ReplyDeleteIt's so nostalgic to think about the way things used to be-the film that we waited to have developed. We truly have witnessed such a shift in technology just in our lifetimes.
I think as more technologies are afforded to us, we become increasingly creative in using them as a communication medium. For example, look at what we're doing with video now.
As we're reading in our text, our ultimate goal or overriding theme seems to be 'social communication.' We are very social creatures. No matter what comes along, social media will find a place for it.