Critical Analysis of Participatory Media Culture in Modern Society

This essay provides a critical analysis of participatory media culture, examining its evolution from a consumer-based model to one that encourages active participation. The author defines media as a crucial tool for communication, emphasizing the shift from one-way broadcasting to interactive exchanges facilitated by technological advancements. The essay explores the transition from a consumer culture, where audiences passively receive information, to a participatory culture, where individuals contribute ideas and opinions. It highlights the impact of digital technologies, such as the internet and social media, in enabling this shift. The author discusses the societal implications of this transformation, touching upon cultural, economic, and social dimensions, and addresses challenges like gender inequality, the potential for misuse, and the digital divide. The essay concludes by emphasizing the need to address these challenges to maximize the benefits of participatory media culture.

Running head: CRITICAL ANALYSIS OF PARTICIPATORY MEDIA CULTURE
CRITICAL ANALYSIS OF PARTICIPATORY MEDIA CULTURE
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Author Note

1CRITICAL ANALYSIS OF PARTICIPATORY MEDIA CULTURE
The advancement in the Globalized network demands high necessitate for effective
communication. The inter connection between individuals have been bonded by a series of
effective network of communiqué that brings the Media to the foreground as a medium of
effective communication. Media in other words is the effective medium of communication
between the conveyor and the audience (Berger 2015).
This essay deals in the critical analysis of the role of media and how it has
transformed itself into an effective both way communications rather that playing just the role
of conveying the message from the broadcaster or the speaker. The essay effectively justifies
the role of media from a consumer culture to a participatory culture. This essay helps
understand the dual roles that the media has started to play from the single role that it initially
was assigned for as well as critically analyse the impact of the adjustment on the society.
The purpose of the essay is to understand and clearly justify the rationale of the
participatory culture of media from a mere consumer culture and understand its impact and
significance.
Media is defined as a medium of effective communication that is being used an
important tool for delivering a significant message or data. With the revolution of
communication and emergence of newer methods of communication has effectively changed
the face of mass communication that has facilitated the easy exchange of interactions, opinion
and values (Hepp and Krotz 2014).
Initially the media was one way of communication such as television, radio and
newspaper that only facilitated the passing of message amongst the masses but with higher
expansion in the communication network, this gap has been slowly and gradually covered.
The media has been successful in not only meeting its purpose but it effective dealt with the
point of only one way communication (Horst and Miller 2013).

2CRITICAL ANALYSIS OF PARTICIPATORY MEDIA CULTURE
The initial phrase of communication through media was based on the consumer
culture. In other words the individual were only considered to receive and listen to the
message but with gradual upgrading in time and the median concepts, participatory cultures
have started to be prevalent among the masses. Participatory culture in other words is the
antonym of the consumer culture (Van Dijck 2013).
According to the concept of participatory culture the individuals can not only benefit
from the media as the consumers but the individuals can contribute to the process as well. In
simplified terms the individuals can be the participators or the contributors in the process of
communication. The advance in the technologies in terms of personal ownerships of private
information technologies such as computer and internet have facilitated them to participate in
effective communication via media and post their personal ideas and opinions regarding their
own aspect of interest (Hepp and Krotz 2014).
The higher access to the internet facilities has enabled a outgrowing number of
masses to use it in their own manner for the process of propaganda, work in a collaborative
manner in the dissemination of new, innovative and creative ideas as well as perception. The
newer generation has begun to use this medium of propaganda to respond to the messages as
forwarded by the sender, as well as astonishing the world with new concept and perspectives.
Although the participatory culture in media has elevated extensively in the recent
times by emergence of various broad casting medium especially the emergence of the internet
yet its originated long time before where young individuals used to hand write or type their
own publications that were forwarded to the various networks of people that interesting has
transformed to the social network in the modern times (Lipschultz 2017).
With the emergence of new platforms in the internet such as blogs, encyclopaedias,
podcasts, social networking websites, you tube, photo bucket has influence and encouraged

3CRITICAL ANALYSIS OF PARTICIPATORY MEDIA CULTURE
the propaganda of the participatory culture to a greater extent. The implications of the gradual
shift from the production to the prod- usage have been profound and have affected the society
to a great level based on the cultural, economic, social and demographic attributes (Hansen
and Machin 2013).
Progress in the generations and the development of the cognition of the younger
generation has transformed the perception of the individuals in such a manner that the people
are no longer vaguely influenced by the media or the individuals blindly consummate the
information that the bigger source of media distribute among the masses. Now a day, a larger
number of people have become the prosumers or the individuals who are the consumers as
well as the producers of their own media of communication and information. Billions of
people now have the access and the power to produce anything and everything they presume
to be fit to be displayed and served among the masses (Christians et al. 2015).
One of the main challenges that the current interface of the participatory culture faces
is the lack of potentiality to challenge the hegemonic dominance, legitimacy and the
rationality of the gender inequality. The reason for this is the dominance of the male
androgenic society to disarm and make the feminine segment powerless diminishing their
right to become prosumers despite being one of the pivotal part of the society and despite
having the proper knowledge as well as right.
The second major challenge of the participatory culture is its influence on the
consumers. The participatory cultures in most cases empower individuals to be the active
contributors or followers to be engrossed in meaningful personal activities as the drawback
lies in the coping of the fact of being an active contributor than being a prosumers in personal
irrelevant activities.

4CRITICAL ANALYSIS OF PARTICIPATORY MEDIA CULTURE
The third major challenge lies with the participatory culture is on educational
grounds. The main reason for the participation fissure or the digital divide is the lack of
accessibility to proper technology. In other words, it is the difference between the objectives
that an individual can accomplish through the usage of an obsolete technology and an
individual reinforced with a highly sophisticated and reliable piece of information
technology. These fissures are evenly widened when the talented, agile and young minds are
shredded apart from better and sophisticated technology that could reshape their talents and
capabilities.
The fourth major challenge lies in the principles of ethics. The problem lies with the
fact that an expert individual would take the liberty of influencing the masses with correct
and higher degree of learning but with the rising participatory culture individuals with basic
outline of knowledge regarding a specific field would step out to influence the masses that
can not only probe a threat to the receivers due to the dispensing of the misinformation but it
would eventually encourage the miscreants to escalate their actions to further levels (Ess
2013).
With the help of this essay, the influence and the emergence of the participatory
cultures in media has been explained. The new cultures in equally and advantage and also
posses its own drawback. The positive effects of this culture can be highly amplified if the
challenges that are met by the culture are met with efficiency and effectively.

5CRITICAL ANALYSIS OF PARTICIPATORY MEDIA CULTURE
References
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Hansen, A. and Machin, D., 2013. Media and communication research methods. Palgrave
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Hepp, A. and Krotz, F. eds., 2014. Mediatized worlds: Culture and society in a media age.
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Horst, H.A. and Miller, D. eds., 2013. Digital anthropology. A&C Black.
Lipschultz, J.H., 2017. Social media communication: Concepts, practices, data, law and
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Van Dijck, J., 2013. The culture of connectivity: A critical history of social media. Oxford
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