what is communication technology?

Hi.

I've been thinking about the old and new communication technology' ..... and I think I've got the answer for the previous post. The relevant definition of new and old must be:


Old communication technology – before digital, computer and internet
New communication technology – after digital, computer and internet


This must be it!
Because the first week of my ‘New communication technology’ lecture was about following things.

What is communication?

Communication is any process that transfers, transmits or makes information known to other people (Nicholas, J 2010).



Communication occurs when someone/something tries to give some information to others. It started as face to face communication, and then people started using cave drawing as a one of primitive communication tools. People started to write words on rocks, papyrus, and then books, and invented radio and television. It has become more complex to reach people in the modern era, such as social networking. Now it is more interactive than before.


What is technology?

Technology is the scientific study of mechanical arts and their application to the world. (Nicolas, J 2010)

Technology is a tool which requires some electrical devices. Analogue technology used to use dials a lot as well as buttons. Old TVs, old radios, watches, room fans ........ they were always controlled by buttons. This can be another definition of Old and New technology, if they have dials or not!

Now digital technology is so dominant and everything is controlled by computers. Washing machines, microwave, fridge ...... it is very hard to find any electrical appliances that are not controlled by a motherboard of some sorts these days.

Shifting to digital is mostly good as devices became capable of many more things, but it can be bad in some cases. It became a lot harder to use them as there are now too many functions. Many older people do not know what all those buttons and functions on their remote control are for. The structure also became more complicated and it's harder to fix them. The local washing machine repairer cannot fix the newer washing machines by themselves as only manufacturer can fix the motherboard, and of course, the cost of repair became much more expensive.

It also diminished the tentativeness, especially from photographs and music. The music from an analogue player has distinctive warm sound as well as noise (people often prefer noise to complete noiseless), and the colour and texture of the film photo is much more sensitive.

It is considered that in these last ten years we had ‘convergence’ of the communication technology. All other communication technology are converging into the internet, different media are converging into multimedia and became interactive, and businesses are converging using the new technology.


What is Communication Technology?

Anything that aids us in communicating is communication technology from a simple smile to posting comments on youtube. There are Old and New Communication Technology. Old Communication technology can be verbal storytelling, Cave drawings, written languages such as books and news paper, morse code, radio and TV. New communication technology is things such as mobile phones including text messages, Email, internet forums, chats, blogs, Youtube, Flickr, Twitter, and social networking such as Facebook.