Remediation

Remediation can be simply defined as"...the representation of one medium in another..." (Bolter & Grusin, p. 45). In the "double logic" of remediation, transparent immediacy and hypermediacy can sometimes contradict each other; Bolter and Grusin write that "Our culture wants both to multiply its media and to erase all traces of mediation" (p. 5). The example of football broadcasts holds true here. The football viewers desire and demand to see the first-down line along with the time, the score, and other general statistics, while also hearing the game on the field and color commentary from a booth above the game. During the course of a football broadcast, with few interruptions, all of these things will happen at the same time and due to current technology we can not only maintain this but add to it in the future (for example: picture-in-picture, interactive statistics, NFL Sunday Ticket where all games can be viewed at the same time and selected for full viewing).

Smartphones also work to increase transparent immediacy and hypermediacy by the user interfaces that they display to users. Shown on the right I have taken the video of my smartphone which uses the Windows Phone 7 operating system. On the home screen, there are a number of things shown before I even start accessing the phone. I am shown the time, the date, and my next upcoming appointment (appropriately Visual Communications). After accessing the menu page, I am shown many different buttons, or let us call them portals, that take me to different parts of the phone. There are portals for making phone calls, sending and receiving emails, looking at pictures I have taken, checking the weather and news, as well as many applications I have installed that lead to Facebook, Twitter, Foursquare, etc. As long as I have a cellular connection and/or wireless internet connection and a source of electricity, I can access all of these things at any moment in time. Not only can I do all of these things, I never see the inner workings behind them. I do not have to make sure that the cellular tower is receiving my signal or that the Facebook servers are still carrying my profile and my friends; this is all taken care of before I press the power button.

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