As processing power and storage capacity increased, computers changed the face of industries that use data and text, such as in scientific research, banking, accountancy, secretarial work and publishing. Now that audiovisual signals can be processed digitally, industries such as telecommunications and broadcasting are set to undergo similar dramatic changes. The audiovisual languages of media such as broadcasting, film and video are rarely recognised as significant languages. Children, who have grown up with TV commercials, music videoclips and computergames, understand these languages better than teachers. Few expect that children will ever use these language actively.
TV transmits messages one-way to a passive audience.
TV at large is passive entertainment. Fancy tricks displayed on the screen are more regarded as expressions of art than as part of a new language. Multimedia technology is set to change all this dramatically. Today, anyone with a computer, equipped with a sound card, a video-card and some editing software can apply techniques previously the domain of film directors. In communications of the future, use of text will be the exception, rather than the norm.