Immediacy and Augmented Reality in a Digital Age

By: John Matthew Simon

Today’s April Fools joke may be tomorrow’s reality, and just this past April, the British newspaper The Guardian ran a bit of rhetorical tomfoolery on their blog, which may, within the not so distant future, nip them in the butt as a very real metamorphosis or firm cementing of digital media as the staple media in our every day lives. Print media has come to a near standstill in terms of technological advances, expeditious runs, and readership gains. However, digital media remains a frontier full of failure, tranquil success and endless possibility.  What The Guardian deemed as “Guardian Goggles” may be a satirist spin on Google’s ‘Project Glass,’ nevertheless Google Glass is a reality currently being test-run by individuals selected by Google to be the trailblazers of inevitable, and digitally altering, change. A change that Google hopes to implement by “free(ing) people up from” the distraction of technology through integrating our digital lives into our daily lives. Sometimes our finest jokes become our staunchest realities when they expose our naivety, unrecognized prescient speculation, predictable nuance and supposed, but yearned for, consensus. It may be to soon to declare early examples of augmented reality, such as the star chart applications on your Android or iPhone as permanent or demonstrable signs of the inevitable. Nevertheless, one thing is sure, digital is winning.

What is Google Glass you ask? Google Glass is “an augmented reality system that will give users the full range of activities performed with a smart phone — without the smart phone.” Wearing our smartphone, why? Accessibility would be the primary reason; nevertheless as we integrate technology further into our increasingly digital dependent lives, hands free or 'phone free' would clearly be the next technological innovation. While the Guardian may joke about a product that “will beam its journalism directly into the wearer's visual field, enabling users to see the world through the Guardian's eyes at all times.” This ultimately is the future of how we access our news, social networks, and ongoing digital footprints. For not to long ago, think ten years, we would have been hooting and hollering over the speculation of touch screens, 'smart' phones, tablets, readily accessed media, real time communication and sharing. Let alone the '1-hour' news cycle, and more. However, in the age of immediacy digital reigns supreme, assuming the role as the primary source for news and information for most youthful (millenials), tech-savvy, economically viable, globally connected and/or real-time driven Americans.

So why is print failing while digital succeeds? Besides the obvious reasons that print is failing, such as “ill-timed and executed news hole reductions, publishing cycle changes, staff cuts, and price increases combined with aimless redesigns, crazy Web strategies, and a lack of real innovation.”  It’s more than just the infrastructure and business models, which must symbiotically coexist, that are crumbling under external pressure and shrinking revenue. Rather it is a culmination of the exodus of talent to the internet, the accessibility of information, immediacy of information, desire for hardline news versus soft news readiness, and so forth that make print less desirable than its digital counter part. Digital is easier to create, cheaper to produce, relies on fewer individuals to execute the aforementioned production and more accessible. Why is it more accessible? It is mostly due to the advent of mobile platform proliferation, or the prevalence of cellphones in our daily lives. Everywhere you turn the news media is becoming more accessible through mobile platforms, even local TV news is following print media to mobile, according to the Pew Research Center. More advantages of digital over print are built in browser programs to define unknown terms, the ability to search for references and related material(s), the custom aggregation of articles to one source or access point like a tablet, the myriad of applications being created daily to assist with productivity and more. Digital media is ever-evolving and reshaping itself to fit the needs of its readers. And it would appear that digital media’s talons are firmly planted on the perch.

Another prime example of failure within print media was the inability for the leadership to see this directional change and inevitable business integration. It is analogous to the music industry’s failure to recognize signs of impending innovation and rampant digitalization of its retail platforms, business model and ultimately its products at the turn of the millennia. As David Carr of the New York Times put it in a recent interview on the Charlie Rose show, "What it makes me think of is music where people said, 'everything is going to change...' and then everything changed" in regards to the developmental changes of how television is devised and delivered at the moment. This failure to recognize disruptive technologies as not only a new means for revenue and expanded reach, but also as the ultimate modification in how media is delivered in a modern society was, and remains, cataclysmic. Carr went on to say, "Once the consumer decides, it doesn't really matter what companies decide, what government's decide, that they're the ultimate authorities." And this decision to further carry the caravan towards digitalization, and essentially augmented reality, is occurring by way of ad-revenue allocation. 

We find ourselves at a moment in time where analog formats like television and radio are no longer the single conduit to reach market specific demographics. While television and radio remain the main recipients of brand advertising dollars, there is a shift of ad related dollars to the digital world. Even traditional periodicals like the New York Times are beginning to see a furtherance of pay-to-play subscribers, around 640,000 + according to David Carr. A prime example of this loyal readership reshaping the proverbial landscape is Wired Magazine’s uptick in ad-revenue from the digital sector. According to Ad Age, a publication about the advertising business, Wired saw 45 percent of it's annual ad-sales revenue from it's digital publication, a significant percentage for a periodical who remains vigilantly print oriented. 

In an era of constant repurposing, aggregating, development and immediacy, American’s are hard pressed to wait for the news to hit their Twitter or Facebook news feeds, real-time blogs, video snapshots and so forth, let alone discern if it is actually news. As Steven Levingston and W. Lance Bennett point out, “We (the American public) are interested in event-driven news, defined as coverage of activities that are, at least at their initial occurrence, spontaneous and unmanaged by officials within institutional settings.” Therefore, we tend to take what we get, rather than sifting through the malaise and milieu of mayhem that is real-time communication.

We are more inclined to add to the rumor mill, with the purpose of being the first to exclaim or herald, in lieu of participating after educating ourselves. Whose fault is this? Is it the fault of those delivering these innovative social media platforms? Is it the fault of editors, journalists, and the conglomerates that own their news media platforms? Or is this simply our culture as it stands today?  These are issues of immediacy and real-time communication in the digital age, that are not only positive, but also a necessary reality. The next question delves into the cultural change in the dissemination of news to our current and future devices. How will augmented reality, a quintessentially mobile technology, affect how we are taught to discern news? Will it turn our focus to local news? Will it make us shy away from reading all together? Or will it further this digital renaissance?

Digital media is here to remain, not just as a confluence of information for entertainment and education, but also as an increasing augmentation of our real world identities and how we interact within them. Yes, there are hiccups, road bumps, and issues to be pondered. For example, a bar in Seattle has banned Google Glass from being used inside its friendly confines, bringing up issues of privacy and legal prohibitions against digital devices. Nevertheless, this is the present scope of how technology companies, like Google, see our future interaction within this hyper-digital world. While some of us refuse to change, clinging to the familiar interwoven authenticity of newsprint and its easy-on-the-eyes/ready-to-annotate format, the world continues to evolve with or without us. Print media may be nostalgic, however that doesn’t mean it’s going away, it simply means it is reshaping its purpose and provenance. And we shouldn’t treat it like an old fogy, rather we should embrace it by utilizing its greatest characteristics to better our future augmented realities. Much like analog before it print will refuse to go away, nevertheless digital media is the new daily. In fact, it’s the new hourly and it’s here to stay.

References:

Barringer, Felicity and Kuczynski, Alex. “The Media: Net Draining Talent From Print Media.” The New York Times. 28 Feb. 2000. Web 13 May. 2013.

Bilton, Nick. “Google Begins Testing Its Augmented Reality Glasses.” The New York Times. 04 Apr. 2012. Web. 22 Apr. 2013.

Carr, David. Interview with Charlie Rose. Charlie Rose Show. New York, New York. 09 Apr. 2013. Television.

Darlin, Damon. “Feel Free to Read This Later, on Your Phone.” The New York Times. 11 Dec. 2010. Web 13 May. 2013.

Eaton, Kit. “App Smart Extra: A Gentle Introduction to Augmented Reality.” Gadgetwise.

The New York Times. 22 June. 2012. Web. 13 May. 2013. 

Farlo, Lois. “Guardian launches ‘augmented reality’ specs to offer immersive liberal insight.” The Guardian. 31 March. 2013. Web. 22 Apr. 2013.  

Gershman, Jacob. “Seattle Bar Declares ‘No Google Glass Zone.’ Wall Street Journal. 11 March. 2013. Web. 22 Apr. 2013.

Ives, Nat. “Digital Cracks 50% of Ad Revenue at Wired Magazine.” Ad Age. Web. 03 Jan. 2013.

Levy, Steve. “Google Gets Transparent With Glass, Its Augmented Reality Project.” Wired Magazine. 04 Apr. 2012. Web. 22nd Apr. 2013. Web.

Livingston, Steven & Bennett, W. Lance “Gatekeeping, Indexing, and Live-Event News: Is Technology Altering the Construction of News?” Political Communication Vol 20, Issue 4, 2003. 363 - 380. Web & PDF. 

Ostendorf, Bill. “Don’t Redesign, Rethink.” Editor & Publisher Vol 144, Issue 1, 2011. 34-41. Web & PDF.

Stelter, Brian. “Local TV News Is Following Print’s Path, Study Says.” The New York Times. 18 March. 2013. Web 13 May. 2013.