Blog Post 2: The Diffusion of Innovation Today

According to the 1963 study conducted by Katz, Levin and Hamilton, The "Traditions of Research on the Diffusion of Innovation", there are seven components to the process of diffusion. The components are: 1) Acceptance, 2) Time, 3) A Specific Item, 4) Units of Adoption, 5) Channels, 6) Social Structure and 7) Value Systems. In 2015, I believe that this seven-step process is still relevant to digital communication and its diffusion in our society today.

Generally, I would say that society, for the most part, accepts digital communication as the chosen means of today's age to remain in contact with one another. For instance, almost everybody today now has a cell phone and uses it as their primary point of contact -- and some even no longer have a landline telephone at all. As for time, digital communication spread throughout our society rather quickly. However, cell phones specifically gone through many phases since making their first debut a few decades ago. But, since then, have evolved tremendously.

In regards to a specific item, once again, cell phones have had a tremendous amount of attention paid to them over the diffusion of digital communication process. For units of adoption, I think digital communication has paid a close amount of attention to this aspect. For instance, with the various forms of social media platforms, each one seems to have a very specific target audience in mind -- (i.e. Facebook started out as a way for college students to keep in contact.)

As for channels, this has played a very key part in the diffusion of innovation today. There's word of mouth -- people tell their friends how great their new iPhone is, which causes said friend to go out and buy one themselves. Then, there's also television advertising, online advertising, etc. In regards to social structure, I believe this is another big factor for the diffusion of innovation today. There is definitely a structure for how our society accepts and embraces the latest forms of technology. You have the early adopters, who will be first in line for the latest product, and you have the laggards who will wait until their old and loyal form of technology dies on them until they embrace something new.

And, finally, value systems are also important in regards to the diffusion of innovation today. There's the group of people who absolutely have to own the latest form of technology because they view it as a status symbol, and there's also those on the opposite spectrum who refuse to allow materialistic possessions control their lives -- and will purposely avoid the adoption of new innovation.

Overall, I feel that people are willing to accept and integrate digital communication into their life quite easily. Since our society today is so heavily digitally communicated based, I believe that if you refuse to accept the diffusion of innovation it will almost restrict you in everyday life -- as it is guaranteed that almost everyone around you has already adopted these forms of innovation. Cell phones have replaced home phones, email has replaced regular mail, and so on. Digital communication has integrated into all of our lives in some way or form, whether we like it or not.

Blog Response 1

Blog entry writing prompt: Postman describes how the horse stir-up changed the nature of battle and thus disrupted society in the 8th century. Similarly, bows and arrows were replaced by guns, which resulted in eradication of a society.

Thinking of digital media as tools, how have they affected our culture? Postman says the tools “become the culture.” Do you agree? Why or why not? Think of a comparable invention today that changed society and explore its potential impact.

Digital media has had a drastic impact on our culture over just the past decade alone. Digital media are definitely tools that we use at our disposal. We use Facebook as a tool to keep in touch with loved ones and post about our lives, we use email in place of post mail and refer to it constantly to communicate with people at work and school -- and that's just to name a couple key digital media aspects. I absolutely believe that Postman is right when he says that the tools "become the culture." Today, in 2015, it is almost impossible not to use digital media. Our whole culture has adapted to replacing previous tools of communication with all things social media. Our world today revolves around constantly improving on our digital media "tools." I would say the most comparable invention today that has changed society would have to be the smart phone. The smart phone has been a very powerful and dynamic invention -- which is constantly being improved and updated on. The reason that the smart phone has had such an impact on our society, is because of the digital media "tools" that it is capable of. That iPhone in your pocket has the whole digital world at your fingertips; you can catch up with your friends on Facebook, surf the internet on the Safari browser, email your boss from your iCloud account, watch a cute cat video on YouTube, call your mom from the phone function -- and that's just to name a few. It is quite common today for a person to not even have a landline telephone in their home, or send bill payments through post mail. I really do not see the smart phone going anywhere any time soon. I think that the potential impact can be even more incredible than what we already have witnessed. I mean, think about the FaceTime function -- with just the help from our phone/tablet/computer and wifi, we are able to video chat with people from all over the world. I can only begin to imagine what's next for the world of smart phones. Maybe while video chatting with a loved one overseas you can instantaneously purchase a plane ticket through your smart phone to visit them, or have a digital concierge in your smart phone to help you with everyday real life tasks? The possibilities are really quite endless.