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Digital revolution is a term describing a marked expansion in the reach and proliferation of digital devices, particularly computers and telecommunications. The digital revolution is widely acknowledged as having occurred in the last half of the 20th century with the popularisation of the PC ([1]). Often used to describe 'new technologies' (see Youth Culture and New Technologies), the digital revolution represents the transition from analogue to digital and the possibilities for global connectivity that have emerged as a result.
Revolutions bring about profound change, whether they are social, political, scientific or technological. The digital revolution is a result of our fascination with technology and affects almost all facets of everyday life. The digital revolution refers to the transition between digital and analogue systems when digital technology quickly superceded analogue systems in terms of speed, quality and performance in the second half of the 20th century.
Digital technology uses binary numbers, 1 and 0, for data processing, while analogue systems rely on a spectrum of values or non-numeric symbols. Digital material surpasses analogue technology in that it is easily transferable across distinctly different media platforms, is easily manipulated and networked and can be stored and remotely accessed or distributed. This has resulted in a convergence between traditional forms of media such as television or radio and new media technologies, such as web-streaming. According to Moore’s Law, the processing power of computer chips, memory, data storage capacity and telecommunications double every 18 to 24 months, while the cost remains stable, or decreases (Rifkin 2000, p.20). It is faster, smaller and cheaper. Computer technology was the driving force behind the digital revolution, as technological developments enabled digital microprocessors to be embedded in anything from greeting cards to hearing aids to washing machines, 'making everything around us smarter and more information intensive' (Rifkin 2002, p.20).
The digital revolution is responsible for transmission technologies encompassing the Internet, networking, ICTs and mobile and wireless networks including mobile phones and Blackberry’s and VoIP. With increased ubiquity, new media technologies, such as Wiki, enable and shape aspects of culture and society, business and economy and politics and democracy. According to Hartley (2002, p.164), 'advances in communication', that is the digital communications revolution, 'have had immense consequences for cultural, economic and political life, determining the way information is processed, transferred and creatively expressed'. New media technologies in particular, are said to have 'reshaped the material basis for society' (Castells 1996, p.1) enabling globalisation and massive economic and cultural shifts (Hartley 2002, p.164-5).
--Alison Martin 09:46, 28 Oct 2005 (EST)
