Move, or get left behind. That seems to be the message, and the fear, in the digital media age. The race is on to own "mobile," even though no one has figured out how to own "social" or "online" before it, much less how to make a profit off of any of these disruptive technologies. So, I thought I might do a thought experiment, and track the various "disruptive" events in journalism (fact-based storytelling) through time.
1. Gestural Language
Probably the first form of communication. It also confirms to one human that there is an existence beyond their own brain. Gestures depend on a set of objects in the immediate vicinity ("I want that thing I'm pointing at") or a set of actions that correspond to known and accepted activities (You know I want food, because I'm pinching my fingers together and putting them in my mouth, the "I want food" sign.) Storytelling was usually simple and factual; fictional storytelling was restricted to lying. This was usually used between individuals: there was not much point in gesturing a crowd of hundreds that you want the piece of meat, when you just want Og to pass it over.
2. Spoken/Sung Language
Perhaps the biggest disruption for humanity was when we stopped relying on simple gestures to communicate, and learned to communicate through spoken language and song. This also opened up the potential topics for communication. Spoken language is a disruptive technology that allowed us to communicate about concepts, not just objects. Applies to both factual and fictional storytelling. This was more appropriate for communication from one person to a large group.
3.) Drawings/Images - Storage
Starting with cave drawings, humanity was no longer dependent on that "set of objects in the immediate vicinity"to communicate (See Spoken Language). Drawings also disrupted time: the messages were "sent" at a specific time, but would last as long as the drawing lasted. Again, both factual (historical) and fictional (mythological) storytelling was possible. Communication from one or many to one or many.
With those three in place, the first "multimedia" presentation would look something like the storytelling scene from "Mad Max: Beyond Thunderdome," which itself looks a bit like primitive theatre.
So, with those three innovations, humanity learned to communicate through visual and aural methods. Both methods are adaptable to both fact and fiction, and are suitable for messages from one or many, to one or many. In most cases, the "user filter" is simply to listen/observe or chose not to listen/observe. In the computer era (and later), you have more control over the types of content you chose to expose yourself to. In the mobile era, you can chose to only expose yourself to content that is or is about places nearby.
(We have also learned to communicate through the other five "traditional" senses: for example, many chefs think of a meal, or even a single dish, as a story told through taste and smell. Anyone who has experienced traditional (mostly non-Western) music knows it as much an experience in feeling the percussive beats as it is about the sound; same with an arena concert. For the most part, though, we will focus the rest of this article on communication through visual and auditory means.)
I believe that all subsequent innovations in storytelling were either improvements to efficency, storage, profit-making, or a combination of previous storytelling methods.
4. Text (Written Language) - Storage
On a very basic level, written language is a symbolic representation of gestures, spoken words, or drawings. At every step there is something "lost in translation," as there is something intrinsic about each of the three "base means" of communication that are lost when they are converted to written language. Written language in some eastern/Asian locations is a broad, but finite, set of symbols. In Western locations (and some Eastern) locations, written language consists of a small (relative to Western pictographic languages) number of units (letters) combined into a theoretically infinite number of larger units (words) which are then combined into larger units of meaning (sentences.)
5. Letters & Records
Written language led to written records, and to letters. I think of records as "thoughts to be used later," and letters as "thoughts to be used by someone else, at a different time and place." One-to-one communication.
6. Signs
One-to-many communication through text. Will lead to billboards, handbills, etc.
7. Monks/Painters Apprentices
Hand duplication of the Bible spread the word, and was the start of a long record of The Bible as the most "published" set of information in all time. Hand-crafted bibles included intricate artwork that was, in some sense, multimedia. Painters Apprentices often duplicated paintings, accomplishing a primitive "mass production."
8. Printing Press - Advertising
Mechanical reproduction replaces monks and painters apprentices. (Not immediately, but eventually.) This leads to commerce: books in the one-to-many communication area, newspapers in the many-to-many area. Note that newspapers eventually developed "in-line advertising," reducing the cost of the product to the consumer and replacing it with a charge to the ad-placer. In general, advertising penetrates the many-to-many side quite easily, and penetrates the one-to-many in more subtle ways.
9. Photography/Film - Storage
Now you don't have to have any artistic skill to capture an image, or to tell a story with an image. Photography lead to film, which is a transformative storytelling technology. Both are reproducible, one-to-many storytelling media. When pictures and films are sold, they are not normally mixed with advertising (there is no ad in the middle of your photo, and the film doesn't stop for an advertisement in the middle (we had to wait for television for that innovation.))
10. Telegraph
After text was converted to Morse Code's dashes and dots, allowed the transmission of text over long distances. In many ways, the spiritual ancestor of telephony and the internet. One-to-one or one-to-many, not ad supported.
11. Audio Recording
Storage of spoken/sung storytelling. One-to-one or one-to-many, not ad supported.
12. Radio
The long-distance transmission of spoken/sung storytelling. One-to-many, generally ad supported. (U.S. law forbids "pay to play," so radio broadcasters make money by selling advertising. Satellite radio is subscription based, and generally has no advertising, and uses that fact as a selling point.)
13. Telephone
Spoken/Sung storytelling over long distances. One-to-one (generally), not ad supported.
14. Television
Visual and spoken/sung storytelling over great distances. One-to-many communication. Ad supported.
15. Computer
Visual, spoken/sung storytelling over great distances. Communication was generally one-to-many (the program/presentation writer/coder communicates a story to many. Think about the video game author communicating with the players. The coder to the people experiencing the program.) Not ad supported.
16. Internet
Visual, spoken/sung storytelling over great distances. Includes one-to-one, one-to-many, and many-to-many communication. In addition to subscriptions and advertising, internet content providers have figured out how to make money selling data about their users. Varying degrees of ad support depending on the specific method of communication. Let's break them down:
- Email: one-to-one or one-to-many text-based communication. (While you can now attach or embed a picture or audio file in an email, I contend these are not intrinsic to email). At origin, email was free or paid for by subscribers to connect to an internet service provider. (What about Gmail and its ads? I contend the ads are there so Google doesn't charge you for the interface that makes Gmail work: the skeleton email protocol is still free/subscription based.
- Bulletin Boards: many-to-many text-based communication. Supported by a combination of subscription fees and in-line advertising.
- Websites/HTML/CSS: one-to-many and many-to-many text, visual, audio storytelling. While some are free, most are supported by ads. A small but growing number are supported by subscription fees.
17. Portable Computing - Smart Phones/Tablets
This era marks an interesting reversal in trends. Innovation in the "computer" era was based on reduction in size and an increase in computing power. Each generation of computer is smaller than the previous one, but come with more memory and more computing power. Computer programs are able to accomplish more and more different tasks with each version. Smart phones started as computers that were able to run one program at a time, with a small screen. As smart phones evolve, they are actually becoming bigger, evolving into tablets. While each generation of smart phone/tablet does have more memory and more processing power, the apps they run are often slimmed-down versions of analogous programs for desktop computers, with inputs and outputs that are smaller. For example:
- Texting/SMS: not just stripped down email, this is a personal telegraph.
- Location based apps: building on the power of GPS, with location as a filter.
- Sensor-based apps: personal movement, temperature, direction, environment as input.
- Phone: at first, the apps were an add-on to the phone. After evolution, tablets no longer have a phone capability.
- Video/Photo: visual input in a way that is clumsy with a desktop machine.
Distance has been overcome for data transmission, and now a device that can handle any story-telling paradigm is portable. The latest area for innovation appears to be interaction based on the environment of the user, both the physical location (relative to other physical locations) and the current environmental conditions (temperature, barometric pressure, geographic orientation (what direction are you pointing?), ambient sound, etc.) Innovators will figure out new ways to combine old storytelling paradigms with environmental sensor inputs.
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