Case Study:
"Increasingly, we demand access to our media when we want it, where we want it, and in multiple formats." (Campbell, Martin, Fabos, 2016, p. 54). What are the advantages and disadvantages of our ever-present digital and social media?
Combined qualities of its iPod digital music player and telephone and Internet service, all accessed through a sleek touchscreen. The next year, Apple opened its App Store, featuring free and low-cost software applications for the iPhone (and the iPod Touch and, later, the iPad) created by third-party developers, vastly increasing the utility of the iPhone. By 2015, there were about 1.4 million apps available to do thousands of things on Apple devices-from playing interactive games to finding locations with a GPS or using the iPhone like a carpenter's level. In 2008, the first smartphone to run on Google's competing Android platform was released. By 2015, Android phones (sold by companies such as Samsung, HTC, LG, and Motorola, and sup- ported by the Google Play app market and the Amazon Appstore) held 53.2 percent of the smart- phone market share in the United States, while Apple's iPhone had a 41.3 percent share; Microsoft and BlackBerry smartphones constituted the remainder of the market.18 The precipitous drop of the BlackBerry's market standing in just ten years (the company was late to add touchscreens and apps to its phones) illustrates the tumultuous competition in mobile devices. It also illus- trates how apps and the ability to consume all types of media content on the go have surpassed voice call quality to become the most important feature to consumers purchasing a phone today. In 2010, Apple introduced the iPad, a tablet computer suitable for reading magazines, newspapers, and books; watching video; and using visual applications. The tablets became Apple's fastest-growing product line, selling at a rate of twenty-five million a year. Apple added cameras, faster graphics, and a thinner design to subsequent generations of the iPad, as com- panies like Samsung (Galaxy), Amazon (Kindle Fire), Microsoft (Surface), and Google (Nexus) rolled out competing tablets. The Impact of Media Convergence and Mobile Media Convergence of media content and technology has forever changed our relationship with media. Today, media consumption is mobile and flexible; we don't have to miss out on media content just because we weren't home in time to catch a show, didn't find the book at the bookstore, or forgot to buy the newspaper yester- day. Increasingly, we demand access to media when we want it, where we want it, and in multiple formats. In order to satisfy those demands and to stay relevant in such a converged world, tradi- tional media companies have had to dramatically change their approach to media content and their business models. Our Changing relationship with the Media The merging of all media onto one device, such as a tablet or smartphone, blurs the distinc- tions of what used to be separate media. For example, USA Today (a newspaper) and CBS News (network television news) used to deliver the news in completely different formats, but today their Web forms look quite similar, with listings of headlines, rankings of the most popular stories, local weather forecasts, photo galleries, and video. With the Amazon Kindle, on which one can read books, newspapers, and magazines, new forms like the Kindle Single challenge old categories. Are the fictional Kindle Singles novellas, or are they more like the stories found in literary magazines? And what about the investigative reports released as Kindle Singles? Should they be considered long-form journalism, or are they closer to nonfiction books? Is listening to an hour-long archived episode of public radio's This American Life on an iPod more like experiencing a radio program or more like an audio book? (It turns out you can listen to that show on the radio, as a downloadable podcast, as a Web stream, on mobile apps, or purchased on a USB drive or on a CD.
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