It certainly has been a while since I graced this humble blog. I hadn't forgotten it, just lost the motivation to write. I admit, I am something of an attention whore - I want to know people are reading this and also for those who read it to express their opinions and discuss. It wasn't happening, so I kinda gave up. Of course, I remember a lot of what I posted here gave me a certain sense of joy - I think that came from orating about something I am deeply passionate about: storytelling.
The role of media in society is two-fold. The first responsibility of media is to enrich it's audience. This can mean a number of things: to entertain, to educate, to inform, to inspire, to instill righteous anger at adversity or to calm a riot of stupidity... or even simply, just tell a good story.
Everything from the radio to the internet enriches your life in some way, be it receiving an important email to playing your favorite song, to keeping you up-to-date with traffic conditions or spending a number of hours on youtube or tvtropes. The definition of "enrich" in this case may seem all-encompassing, but in some way, media must make your life better. This is the primary responsibility of any form of media.
The second responsibility of media, which is not as important as the first but still a vital aspect, is to evolve. To advance. To grow and change and renew itself. This can mean anything from a revolution in a specific medium (IMAX cinema, digital radio, HD video, 5.1 surround sound) to inventing completely news mediums entirely (the gutenberg press, the telegraph, the radio, the telephone, the television, the VHS tape, the DVD, the internet, the smart phone). If one looks closely, you'll see that every major advance in civilization was accompanied by a revolution in mass media. Media is responsible for the fall of McCarthyism (via television), the fall of the dictatorship of the Catholic Church (via the printing press), the end of William Randolph Hurst (through cinema) and most recently contributed to the fall of the regimes in Egypt and Libya (through the internet). Never before in history has journalism been as free as it is today - thanks to the internet and the convergence of all media, information is quite literally available at your fingertips. Never before have media makers had as much power as they do right now - governments must contend with bad publicity and uprising if they were ever to threaten to censor the media.
It may sound as though I'm prattling on about a philosophy that I made up. And true, I've never heard this school of thought anywhere else, it's completely original to me. But, I live in a world where stories are told each and every day. I hope one day to be a storyteller myself. And I hold the tools I will be using to tell those stories to the highest standard and in the highest regard.
I'm inviting anyone who reads this to discuss ways in which media enriches your life, or ways in which media can evolve. It interests me, so please don't be timid - speak your mind. For the first time in history, you won't be burnt at the stake for doing so (thanks to media).
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