Networked: A Contemporary History of News in Transition

摘要

In this book Adrienne Russell steps along the hazardous line of writing about a period of rapid and fluid change while the change is still happening. The period she covers is the last 20 years, during which time the web has arisen and presented certain challenges to conventional or mainstream journalism. Clearly, what has happened over this period can be described and to some extent assessed but what the consequences will be and how long-lasting current changes will prove are questions that admit only speculation and guesswork. It is the inevitability of this that makes any contemporary history not only a risk-prone endeavour but also under threat of imminent supersession. Russell sees the participatory character of networked journalism as the future, having already advanced to the point where this is guaranteed, but since no one has yet been there, in time yet to come, it is somewhat premature to set down any recent shifts as the ways things will be.