"While a decade ago much of the discussion of new media in Asia was couched in Occidental notions of Asia as a "default setting" for technology in the future, today we are seeing a much more complex picture of contesting new media practices and production. As "new media" becomes increasingly an ever
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yday reality for young and old across Asia through smartphones and associated devices, boundaries between art, new media, and the everyday are transformed. This Handbook addresses the historical, social, cultural, political, philosophical, artistic and economic dimensions of the region's new media. Through an interdisciplinary revision of both "new media" and "Asia" the contributors provide new insights into the complex and contesting terrains of both notions." (Publisher description)
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"This article presents the attitudinal response of rural villagers in Papua New Guinea to mobile telephony, based on a threshold study made during the early stages of its adoption. The research indicates that the introduction of mobile telecommunications has generally been viewed positively, with mo
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bile phones affording social interaction with loved ones. Nonetheless, negative concerns have been strongly felt, notably financial costs and anxiety about mobile phones aiding in the coordination of extramarital liaisons and criminal activities. The communities investigated previously had scant access to modern communication technologies, some still using traditional means such as wooden slit drums, known locally as garamuts. The expansion of mobile network coverage has introduced into communal village life the capability to communicate dyadically and privately at a distance. Investigation into the adoption of mobile phones thus promotes understanding about traditional means of communication and notions of public and private interactions." (Abstract)
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"Based on 15 months of ethnographic research in the city of Alto Hospicio in northern Chile, this book describes how the residents use social media, and the consequences of this use in their daily lives. Nell Haynes argues that social media is a place where Alto Hospicio’s residents – or Hospice
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ños – express their feelings of marginalisation that result from living in city far from the national capital, and with a notoriously low quality of life compared to other urban areas in Chile. In actively distancing themselves from residents in cities such as Santiago, Hospiceños identify as marginalised citizens, and express a new kind of social norm. Yet Haynes finds that by contrasting their own lived experiences with those of people in metropolitan areas, Hospiceños are strengthening their own sense of community and the sense of normativity that shapes their daily lives." (Back cover)
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"A qualitative study was conducted in Indonesia and Sri Lanka to understand the varied perceptions on the use and ownership of mobile phones [...] The study was conducted amongst four groups of people (urban men, urban women, rural men, and rural women) in each of two countries. The study found that
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: Gender does have some effect on how the phone is used. Women use it more for coordination. Men on the other hand seem to use it more for livelihood activities and for making and maintaining social connections. Men in general have greater decision-making power in a phone purchase even for their spouses. The most significant difference in the utility derived from mobile phones between urban and rural dwellers is the fact that, for the latter, the ability of the phone to help connect to needed infrastructure and services was more important. This was less of a concern for urbanites since essential infrastructure and services were generally close by, unlike for those rural dwellers." (Executive summary)
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"The percentage of Pakistanis using the Internet increased by 37.5% between 2009 and 2013, though overall internet penetration remains very low with only 11% of the population having access to the Internet". (Page 9) "Heavy internet users in Pakistan are very young (72% under 30 years of age), large
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ly male (59%), and highly educated (72% with at least some university schooling). Light users are much more likely to be over thirty years of age (42% for light compared to 18% for heavy users), women (47% for light vs. 36% for heavy users), but more highly educated (38% of light users have graduate degree vs. 31% for heavy users) [...] Television news is by far the most popular source of information among Pakistani Internet users, with 80% of survey respondents selecting this communication channel as one of their three top sources of information. After television news, social networking sites are the most commonly cited source of information used by Pakistani Internet users with 55% of respondents selecting it as one of their top three sources." (Executive summary)
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"En Argentina hay más de 13 millones de niños, niñas y adolescentes (NNyA). 6 de cada 10 se comunican usando celular y 8 de cada 10 usan Internet. La tecnología atraviesa su existencia, impacta en sus modos de conocer, aprender, expresarse, divertirse y comunicarse. Para los chicos y chicas, los
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medios digitales son un modo habitual de comunicación y de interacción con el mundo. Construyen su identidad interactuando tanto en la vida “real” como en la virtual. Actividades como chatear, jugar en línea, buscar y compartir información y contenidos, son acciones cotidianas en sus vidas y, en definitiva, del ejercicio de su ciudadanía digital. Así, este estudio busca recabar información que permita obtener un estado de situación actualizado sobre el vínculo de los adolescentes con la tecnología, y generar evidencia para la toma de decisiones en las políticas del sector, especialmente las vinculadas con la ciudadanía digital de NNyA, la alfabetización digital y mediática y la concientización sobre el valor de un Internet sin riesgos y al servicio de prácticas positivas." (Página 6)
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"This report is the fifth in a series of annual reports designed to capture key developments and data related to usage of social media in the Middle East. The past year has seen the continued growth of visual-led social networks, especially in the more affluent Gulf region. Meanwhile, the discernibl
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e growth in mobile social users(+66% notes the creative agency We Are Social) emphasizes the increasing primacy of the mobile social experience. For many users, mobile is the only way that they interact with social networks. Mobile platforms, for millions in the region, will also offer their first online experience. Recognizing this, companies like Facebook have launched Facebook Lite, an Android app targeting users on slow networks (and with small dataplans). Their Free Basics program allows customers on the Zain network in Jordan and Asia Cell, Korek and Zain in Iraq avoid data charges when using Facebook on their mobile devices. Will other providers follow suit? Yet, for all the positives, the social experience in some parts of the region remains beset with challenges. Networks and services can be blocked – both temporarily and permanently – and issues around freedom of expression persist." (Introduction)
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"It is too often assumed anyone can communicate via the internet or share in the benefits of easily available newspapers and free-to-air television or radio; this is not always true. Lower internet penetration and mobile broadband access in countries like Egypt and Tunisia, for example, stand in sha
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rp contrast to that of the UAE, Saudi Arabia, and Qatar. The 2016 report brings some good news about a narrowing digital divide between these countries, along with significant gains in internet connectivity in every country studied except Tunisia, where internet access has stagnated since 2014. Six in 10 Egyptians now use the internet, considerably more than the share of Tunisians online, but just three in 10 Egyptians have access to, or choose to use, mobile broadband. It is ironic that the two countries most closely linked to the Arab uprisings—Tunisia, where the uprisings began and Egypt, the location of the most publicized revolution—are still struggling to be fully enfranchised into the digital age." (Introduction, page 8)
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"Described as the biggest migration in human history, an estimated 250 million Chinese people have left their villages in recent decades to live and work in urban areas. Xinyuan Wang spent 15 months living among a community of these migrants in a small factory town in southeast China to track their
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use of social media. It was here she witnessed a second migration taking place: a movement from offline to online. As Wang argues, this is not simply a convenient analogy but represents the convergence of two phenomena as profound and consequential as each other, where the online world now provides a home for the migrant workers who feel otherwise ‘homeless’." (Back cover)
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"La sostenibilidad de los medios depende en gran medida de las nuevas relaciones que tejen con su audiencia poniendo la tecnología a su servicio. El desafío al que el periodismo y los medios se enfrentan es pensar cómo usar la información que capturan de los recorridos de sus usuarios en la red
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para planear sus prácticas narrativas. Las claves que se plantean en este informe buscan dar luces a manera de hipótesis que ayuden a entender la dinámica de las audiencias digitales en Colombia." (www.fnpi.org)
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"El estudio se ocupa de analizar la relación de los millenials con la tecnología desde diferentes ámbitos de interés de su cotidianidad, como el trabajo, la educación, el acceso a la información o las actividades de ocio, y presenta una serie de retos y oportunidades alrededor de cada uno de e
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stos escenarios donde son, cada vez más, influyentes y creadores de tendencias. Asimismo, se pone de manifiesto el imparable desarrollo tecnológico que hoy forma parte de todas las facetas de su vida y cómo los millennials continuarán aumentando su influencia con los años. En este sentido, son una especie de prueba piloto que nos ayuda a comprender el presente y nos ofrece pistas sobre lo que puede suceder con las generaciones futuras." (Contratapa)
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"The paper addresses the blurred understandings of what developing country mobile internet users feel they are paying for. The move towards increasing online news and music consumption around the world has resulted in low growth in paid content consumption and a digital advertising market that is no
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t highly favourable for news or entertainment providers. From a major study conducted on mobile phone based internet behaviours in Ghana, Kenya and Uganda in 2015, we find consumption in these countries reflects the trends observed in more mature markets where the decline in news purchase revenues and advertising rates raises fundamental questions about the business models of independent media. While users enjoy the personalized content benefits of the mobile web, they feel that paying for data (i.e. Mobile connection and data bytes) is sufficient and conflate it with paying for content (i.e. Content in an online newspaper or online music). We argue that deconstructing misunderstandings of paying for mobile internet access and paying for content (including ascertaining whether they are genuine misunderstandings) is important for understanding how to achieve a free and fair internet, where content is accessible but generates enough profit to be sustainable." (Abstract)
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"Tom McDonald spent 15 months living in a small rural Chinese community researching how the residents use social media in their daily lives. His ethnographic findings suggest that, far from being left behind, many rural Chinese people have already integrated social media into their everyday experien
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ce. Throughout his ground-breaking study, McDonald argues that social media allows rural people to extend and transform their social relationships by deepening already existing connections with friends known through their school, work or village, while also experimenting with completely new forms of relationships through online interactions with strangers. By juxtaposing these seemingly opposed relations, rural social media users are able to use these technologies to understand, capitalise on and challenge the notions of morality that underlie rural life." (Back cover)
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"This thesis is a theoretically framed and historically informed sociological analysis of how digital technology usage shapes religious identity in Pakistan. The development literature is dominated by assumptions of technologically driven progress towards secularisation and studies of technology pro
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jects, yet there are few empirical studies of everyday ICT day use, and religion remains significant in Pakistan. To explain this, I draw on theoretical literature, the Pakistan religious identity literature and twelve months of fieldwork (2014-2015) to present an analysis of how Facebook shapes the enactment of religious identity by young people in three cities in the Punjab, Pakistan [...] My empirical findings show that the new technologies of social media, mobile phones and mobile internet interact with public discourse and everyday practice to shape religious identity. First, I show this by describing how Facebook’s construction as a blasphemous technology strengthens existing discourses of religious nationalism. Second, I show how Facebook’s technological discourses of singular authenticity shape the enactment of religious identity with implications for religious minorities. My final analysis theorises how the use of Facebook shapes religious identity through the emergence of what I call ‘digital secularisation’." (Abstract)
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"Cyberpsychology is an emerging area of psychological study that aims to understand and explain all facets of online behaviour. This book brings together overviews from a number of leading authorities in the field, to suggest how academic theory and research can be applied to a variety of online beh
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aviours. Both positive and negative behaviours are considered, including topics as diverse as parenting the online child, age-related internet usage and cultural considerations in online interactions. Psychological research can no longer view online and offline worlds as different entities, but must consider online behaviours as equally distinct as offline activities. This is especially apparent when looking at online dating, the role that social networks play in organisations and online consumer behaviours, and in a consideration of the role that psychological research plays in underpinning the multi-billion pound gaming industry." (Publisher description)
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"The debate on Facebook raises questions about the use and users of this information service. This collected volume gathers a broad spectrum of social science and information science articles about Facebook. Facebook has many facets, and we just look forward above all to the use and users. The facet
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of users has sub-facets, such as different age, sex, and culture. The facet of use consists of sub-facets of privacy behavior after the Snowden affair, dealing with friends, unfriending and becoming unfriended on Facebook, and possible Facebook addiction. We also consider Facebook as a source for local temporary history and respond to acceptance and quality perceptions of this social network service, as well. This book brings together all the contributions of research facets on Facebook." (Publisher description)
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"The survey indicates that radio remains the most widely accessed broadcast platform in Sierra Leone. In all, eight out of 10 (81%) Sierra Leoneans have access to radio, and 47% listen to it daily. Radio listenership is fractured, however, with no single station able to reach a national audience. Ar
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ound 50 radio stations are currently broadcasting, with many of these having limited, local broadcast reach. This is reflected in patterns of listenership, with different stations popular in different parts of the country. Overall in the country, no station reaches more than one-third of adult Sierra Leoneans. Reaching a national audience through radio, therefore, requires working with a large number of broadcast partners. In contrast to radio access, just under half of Sierra Leoneans (45%) can access TV or DVD content and 13% can access newspapers. Access to mobile phones is high, now achieving a similar reach to radio: 83% of people report having access to a mobile phone. There is significant potential for leveraging this reach and the opportunity offered by 2G and 3G mobile phone platforms as a means of distributing media content to audiences. More than half of mobile phone owners (52%) have a basic feature phone."
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"Das Internet hat Auswirkungen auf die Persönlichkeit, auf Einstellungen und Werthaltungen. In der digitalen Welt kann sich jeder neu definieren, in die Anonymität abtauchen und ein neues Ich erfinden. Alle Facetten menschlicher Erfahrungen und Verhaltensweisen finden sich nicht nur wieder, sonder
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n werden gelenkt und verstärkt, im Guten wie im Bösen. Durch die physische Abwesenheit sinken die Hemmschwellen. Wie wollen wir in Zukunft damit umgehen? Wir brauchen die richtige Balance zwischen Allmachts- und Ohnmachtsgefühlen, zwischen Chancen und Risiken, wir brauchen die Medienkompetenz der Zukunft. Dazu ist ein großes Stück Mehr an Wissen über die Cyberpsychologie der Menschen nötig." (Verlagsbeschreibung)
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"Feminization of migration has emerged as a common livelihood strategy to alleviate poverty and escape difficult socioeconomic, cultural, and familial situations. Mobile phones have become the most crucial and pervasive communication device that enables migrants to be simultaneously mobile and conne
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cted, anytime and anywhere. Is the mobile phone empowering or disempowering as a new form of social control? Based on a longterm ethnographic research on global nannies in Paris, this study presents a case for the importance of the detailed investigation of everyday contexts and power relations to better understand the complexities of mobile phone use in work life. This study will argue that, far from an instrument of empowerment, the mobile phone can work to reinforce already existing power relations and mundane social structures, leading to more unequal and enslaving relationships in work life." (Abstract)
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