17. Remediation

Internet connection. Available at http://printerinkcartridgesblog.printcountry.com/more-tech-stuff/up-to-10-of-americans-lack-good-internet-connection-14306.html. April 28, 2011.

The first cell phone. Available at http://www.techpin.com/first-cell-phone/. April 28, 2011.

Smart phone. Available at http://www.digitaltrends.com/mobile/survey-says-smartphones-outsold-pcs-for-the-first-time-ever/. April 28, 2011.

Personal Computer. Available at http://mmenterprises.org/PersonalComputer.aspx. April 28, 2011.

PDA. Available at http://www.slcentral.com/dell-axim-x50v-pda/. April 28, 2011.

A Smartphone is a handheld mobile phone integrated with computer and internet capabilities. It was a groundbreaking device considering its size and weight and is considered a notable advancement in science and technology. The first Smartphone, was the Ericcson’s R380. Popular Science, in 1999 put it on the list of, “The Best of What’s New.” The following is the original clip about the new device.1

The Smartphone refashions the idea of the mobile phone, web access, PDA and the personal computer. Media is continually reproducing or replacing each other, this process is essential. The new media is then justified by remediating the older media. Potential customers believe that new media improves upon the older media’s flaws. In this case, the Smartphone creates an improved immediacy of information. The Smartphone also demonstrates the double logic of remediation, “Our culture wants both to multiply its media and to erase all traces of mediation: ideally, it wants to erase its media in the very act of multiplying them.”2

1 William G. Phillips, “1999 The Best of What’s New: 100 of the year’s Greatest Achievements In Science and Technology,” Popular Science, http://books.google.com/books?id=8qSgh_Q-YOkC&pg=PA59&source=gbs_toc_r&cad=2#v=onepage&q&f=false (accessed April 27, 2011).

2 Jay David Bolter and Richard Grusin. Remediation: Understanding New Media (MIT Press, 2000), 5.