The Next New Thing

My idea for a new media is an app/technology that completely digitizes all transactions involving money. Whereas Google Wallet can only send money through checking accounts, this app would unify all forms of payment (including credit cards) allowing us to have convenient control of our finances. At the same time, this technology would eliminate the use of cash/coins as well as the risk of losing bank cards. This idea could work with our smartphones, provided there is some way to make the payment directly between the phone and a retailer. Maybe one day our wallets will be obsolete.

P2P File Sharing

File sharing is the transference of digital files between users over computer networks. Peer-to-peer file sharing is a special type of file sharing that allows all users in a system to send and/or receive files over a P2P network. P2P sharing requires its own software to be conducted. Today, there are thousands of piracy/streaming websites that perpetuate this kind of file sharing. As mentioned in the 2009 article, "Digital Pirates Winning Battle With Studios", the NBC show "Heroes" was downloaded about five million times, equivalent to half of the show's American viewership.

1. Digital Pirates Winning Battle With Studios by Brain Stelter and Brad Stone. The New York Times, Feb 5, 2009. http://www.nytimes.com/2009/02/05/business/media/05piracy.html?_r=0

Privacy & Confidentiality

Issues of privacy have arisen because we are trying to define what types of information should be shared in certain contexts. Confidentiality is similar, but is more specific to a professional setting in which one cannot reveal their clients' sensitive information. The relationship of these concepts and new media lies within the information that we give away. New media inherently requires us to publicize ourselves in the online world. As more of our lives become digital, we gradually lose the privacy of our personal information.