Today we learnt about the idea of interactivity – we entertained the fact that perhaps the term “interactivity” has been manipulated and hijacked by marketing jargon and may lose its significance and that the term is a synonym for other such terms; Choice, Feedback, Discussion, Play.
Pavlik’s (1999) addresses the fact that interactivity is in fact a 2 –way influence. Traditional media and advertising predominantly was one way;
Firm => Content => Medium => Consumer
However consumers are know empowered and can interact with new media and have the ability to produce content, for example the rise of Youtube. Companies are becoming wise of this and are introducing there own “Channels” on the social networking site; HP (http://www.youtube.com/user/hp?blend=1&ob=4) have set up the campaign You on You. This truly emphasizes how the above simple model can be adapted into;
Firm/Consumer => Content => Medium => Firm/Consumer => Content => Firm/Consumer
The times have changed where audiences are passive and merely take in messages from where they’re told to (Hypodermic Needle Theory - http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hypodermic_needle_model ).
