This post is part of an ongoing series dedicated to defining new media.
In the 2012 article “Media After Software,” Lev Manovich observes that the shift to digital media has created a dependence on software interfaces and that different interfaces control our experience with the underlying media.
He states that we can experience old media (e.g., woodblock prints and lithographs) directly with our senses and that the properties of old media are fixed, but the same is not true of new media. Instead, we must rely on a software interface to experience digital media, and the properties available to our senses depend on the interface that mediates between us and the media itself (pp. 11-12).
To illustrate, he uses the example of a photograph and explains that we experience an analog (printed) photograph the same way in any setting or context (e.g., museum, family photo album) because its properties are fixed, but we experience a digital photograph differently depending on the software interface we use; some software allows us only to view it, while other software–such as Photoshop–allows us to also manipulate it. The properties that we experience, therefore, arise from the software and not from the digital photograph itself (pp. 4-5).
Tying this in to my food theme, we can see this concept at work when we view recipes online. You might view a popular recipe on one website that provides text only (e.g., Recipe Source), then view it on another website that also provides photographs and reviews/feedback (e.g., Allrecipes). View it on a mobile app and the properties available to you might change yet again.
Software itself, then, mediates our experience with new media texts.
References:
Manovich, L. (2012). Media after software. Retrieved from http://manovich.net/content/04-projects/074-article-2012/73-article-2012.pdf
Newmergence Nosh 