As digital media come to saturate more and more of our societies, what benefits and challenges do they bring? Who holds power in contemporary media industries, and do they have our best interests at heart? What role do media play in our cultural identities and the relations between communities? How much control do media users have over the role of platforms, algorithms and data in their lives? Media increasingly dominate our social and cultural worlds, affecting issues of power, politics, knowledge, identity, and everyday life. But what are the implications of the mediatisation of contemporary life, and how should we make sense of it? In this fully updated and revised edition of his bestselling textbook, Paul Hodkinson explores the social and cultural significance of media in the age of digital platforms. Encompassing media technologies, industries, texts and users, and combining coverage of classic theories with extensive new material on platforms, social media, datafication and more, this book will equip you to navigate the fast-moving field of media and communication studies. Media, Culture and Society provides an essential overview for students studying introductory media modules, as well as depth for those further into their media degree.

An examination of the structures of global power in the post-Cold War period and the implications of this for human security.

All forms of online communications and interactions between people and companies on the Internet are facilitated by intermediaries – service providers whose decisions and policies have a shaping effect on the Internet, its users and the information shared on it. Today, because such intermediaries employ technologies that go well beyond the mere transmission and storage of information into new realms potentially disrupting existing business models, a rethinking of existing relevant law is called for. The legal analysis and recommendations in this book put the topic of intermediary liability in the perspective of copyright law and offer a vision on how to regulate that liability. In the context of in-depth and up-to-date analyses on EU, US, German and Dutch law, the author discusses such issues and topics as the following: the liability rules in the new Directive on Copyright in the Digital Single Market; liability for the intermediary’s own copyright infringements (primary liability); the intermediary’s responsibility to stop or prevent the infringements of others (secondary liability); the role that fundamental rights play in copyright law and intermediary liability; the rights and interests of copyright owners, intermediaries and users, and how they are protected; notice-and-takedown by service providers; website blocking by Internet access providers; the publisher’s rights and the use of online articles by platforms; legal status of hyperlinks under copyright law; and search engine use of copyrighted materials. A focus on the strengths and weaknesses of existing EU copyright law concerning Internet intermediaries in terms of how future-proof that law is, includes detailed attention to legislation, regulation and case law. With its deeply informed guidance with respect to the methods of regulation in a domain that is heavily influenced by technological developments, this book will be welcomed by policymakers, legislators, academics, judges and practitioners working in the area of copyright law as applied to the Internet. The detailed attention to the extent to which an intermediary can be held liable for copyright infringements in both the EU and the US will prove highly beneficial for in-house counsellors and advisors working for rights holder organizations and intermediary service providers.

This book analyses how digital transformation disrupts established patterns of world politics, moving International Relations (IR) increasingly towards Digital International Relations. This volume examines technological, agential and ordering processes that explain this fundamental change. The contributors trace how digital disruption changes the international world we live in, ranging from security to economics, from human rights advocacy to deep fakes, and from diplomacy to international law. The book makes two sets of contributions. First, it shows that the ongoing digital revolution profoundly changes every major dimension of international politics. Second, focusing on the interplay of technology, agency and order, it provides a framework for explaining these changes. The book also provides a map for adjusting the study of international politics to studying International Relations, making a case for upgrading, augmenting and rewiring the discipline. Theory follows practice in International Relations, but if the discipline wants to be able to meaningfully analyse the present and come up with plausible scenarios for the future, it must not lag too far behind major transformations of the world that it studies. This book facilitates that theoretical journey. This book will be of much interest to students of cyber-politics, politics and technology, and International Relations.

The emergence of 'new media' and social media is widely discussed in contemporary society. However, media and public communication are mostly analyzed within particular theoretical frameworks and within specific disciplinary fields. Such approaches have created polarized views on media and communication, and fail to create an understanding of the interdependencies between these fields. This book expertly synthesizes competing theories and disciplinary viewpoints, integrates scholarly and cutting edge research, and examines international data from fast-growing markets including China, to provide a comprehensive, holistic view of the twenty-first century (r)evolution in media and public communication. The book identifies how the changes are located in practices rather than technologies and that these practices are emergent in highly significant ways. Engaging and accessible, the book is essential reading for media scholars and communication professionals, and a valuable text for courses in media studies, journalism, advertising, public relations, and organisational and political communication.

Media studies scholars and commentators have categorised the media in distinct periods: 'old media' such as television, radio and print; 'new media' which include online media, computers, and PDAs. Now we are in a period of 'media convergence' - print newspapers sent as MP3 - but also the increasing convergence of media policy, media ownership and media practices. This book looks at how 'traditional' media companies are moving in to converged media, questions of ownership, questions of working practices and questions of the audience.

This is the second of two volumes of the proceedings from the 30th International Wittgenstein Symposium in Kirchberg, August 2007. It contains selected contributions on the Philosophy of media, Philosophy of the Internet, on Ethics and the political economy of information society. Also included are papers presented in a workshop on electronic philosophy resources and open source/open access.