A definition of new media is proposed as a point of departure and framework for the book. Conventionally, overviews of new media research have tended to emphasize technological development before turning to questions of cultural contexts and social change. In this volume, however, this technologically deterministic convention is reversed. We begin by analyzing the changing social landscape within which new media are making their entrance. There has been much writing, and even more speculation, about the role of the new media in relation to key social trends.
Technological changes are part of even broader changes at many levels from the local to the global.
Drawing on a variety of perspectives, a range of issues are considered as they shape and are shaped by the new media. In recent years communication researchers have been joined by scholars from computer science, systems engineering, anthropoligy, human geography, social studies of technology, information science, and organizational studies, among other fields, to investigate the social shaping of new media design and use. Interoperability, ergonomics, human-computer interaction, interface design, navigation, and system implementation are being reconsidered as inextricably interwoven parts of a rich social and cultural fabric. This section surveys key issues in the design of new media from a social perspective. This section considers the ways that media industries and markets have been reconfigured in response to growing new media systems and services.