Neil Postman argues that medium is the metaphor, meaning the way in which individuals receive information influences how they use and understand it. With the advancement of technology, having an inherent bias to inflict social change, the world enters a new digital age in which all modern civilizations are subject to new mediums. One such digital medium is Vine, a video sharing service owned by the micro-blogging entity known as Twitter. This application allows users to share short videos up to a limit of 6 seconds, and replays them indefinitely. The popularity of Vine didn’t go unnoticed, as it gained over 40 million users in just over 7 months. This exemplifies Postman’s argument that modern epistemology is largely dependent on entertainment
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People give credibility to platforms such as Vine because it follows the axiom of seeing is believing. Under such pretenses disinformation is not clearly identifiable, as often no context is provided for the short video being watched. Vine is part of a larger meta-medium provided by advancing technology slated toward an emphasis of instant gratification, absence of prerequisites, and a need for whatever being presented to be entertaining. Images and videos by essence are easier for people to engage, as it requires no strenuous cognitive presence. These visual stimuli often rely on the user to superimpose their perspective and imagination unto whatever the piece of content happens to be, and the user is briefly entertained, departing with information that serves virtually no purpose to them. Vine excels at these brief moments of entertainment, as each video is limited to a mere 6 seconds. This hardly allows room for any logical thought, argument or context. The medium which Vine provides has a clear bias toward entertainment, as the time constraint makes it near impossible to impart anything but entertainment value to a …show more content…
The viewer’s attention is generally drawn two to three different ways within the 6 seconds. It is no secret why people who partake in social media outlets such as Vine have problems paying attention and seem to be disconnected from reality. Hypothetically if the average Vine user watches 100 videos a day, which takes a mere ten minutes, their attention is broken and refocused 200-300 times! This totally destroys any continuity of thought, discourages any objective thinking and any logical cognitive process. However, the sad truth is people spend much more than ten minutes a day on social media platforms such as Vine. In fact, current estimates show that it’s over 3 hours a day on average. “Americans aged 18-64 who use social networks say they spend an average of 3.2 hours per day doing so, according to new research released by Ipsos Open Thinking Exchange (OTX)” (Staff). If someone spent 3 hours on vine, to put this into perspective, they would have their attention broken and refocused an astounding 3,600-5,400 times. Keep in mind that in a ten minute timeframe, the user is visually stimulated 100 different times, which breeds ample opportunity for the brain to release the addicting dopamine hormone to keep the individual watching and feeling entertained. It is now easy to understand why Vine is so addicting and has such profound epistemological changes on modern
People give credibility to platforms such as Vine because it follows the axiom of seeing is believing. Under such pretenses disinformation is not clearly identifiable, as often no context is provided for the short video being watched. Vine is part of a larger meta-medium provided by advancing technology slated toward an emphasis of instant gratification, absence of prerequisites, and a need for whatever being presented to be entertaining. Images and videos by essence are easier for people to engage, as it requires no strenuous cognitive presence. These visual stimuli often rely on the user to superimpose their perspective and imagination unto whatever the piece of content happens to be, and the user is briefly entertained, departing with information that serves virtually no purpose to them. Vine excels at these brief moments of entertainment, as each video is limited to a mere 6 seconds. This hardly allows room for any logical thought, argument or context. The medium which Vine provides has a clear bias toward entertainment, as the time constraint makes it near impossible to impart anything but entertainment value to a …show more content…
The viewer’s attention is generally drawn two to three different ways within the 6 seconds. It is no secret why people who partake in social media outlets such as Vine have problems paying attention and seem to be disconnected from reality. Hypothetically if the average Vine user watches 100 videos a day, which takes a mere ten minutes, their attention is broken and refocused 200-300 times! This totally destroys any continuity of thought, discourages any objective thinking and any logical cognitive process. However, the sad truth is people spend much more than ten minutes a day on social media platforms such as Vine. In fact, current estimates show that it’s over 3 hours a day on average. “Americans aged 18-64 who use social networks say they spend an average of 3.2 hours per day doing so, according to new research released by Ipsos Open Thinking Exchange (OTX)” (Staff). If someone spent 3 hours on vine, to put this into perspective, they would have their attention broken and refocused an astounding 3,600-5,400 times. Keep in mind that in a ten minute timeframe, the user is visually stimulated 100 different times, which breeds ample opportunity for the brain to release the addicting dopamine hormone to keep the individual watching and feeling entertained. It is now easy to understand why Vine is so addicting and has such profound epistemological changes on modern