Remediation unveiled

Well, it's back to blogging. It seems like a long time, but I guess that is due to spring break. In addition, my hard drive crashed last Friday and I have been spending time reloading what I could salvage. As a result I am a bit behind in my work (sorry Dr. Mara!). At any rate, I need to define what remediation is. To start, let's look at what Bolter and Grusin have to say. The definition in the text basically says that remediation is the process by which new media technologies improve upon or remedy prior technologies. This remind me of a discussion from a class last term. We were discussion resistance to new media and the topic of "tally sticks" came up. Tally sticks were used to keep financial records in England until they were replaced by paper. Following is an excerpt from eXplore Parliament:

Tally sticks were an ancient method of accounting used by the Treasury.
Notches were cut into wooden sticks according to a code. The sticks were then
split down the middle and the Treasury kept one half and the debtor the other.
When the debt was paid the two halves were matched to see if they 'tallied'.
Tally sticks were abolished in 1783 but their use continued until 1826. The fire
at the Palace of Westminster in 1834 was caused by the burning of old tally
sticks. The fire soon got out of control as there were huge numbers of these
sticks.

Eventually, the new replaced the old. In more recent times, you can see the same thing happening with CDs and vinyl records, as well as DVDs and VHS. I don't believe that the old is always replaced though. Take paintings for example, which were not replaced by the photograph.

In addition, new media oftentimes borrow from older technologies and the old from the new. Pictures use the frame just as paintings do and DVDs use chapters just like books. On the flip side, TV news now uses many features found on Web pages. It has become hypermedia in the sense that there is audio, video, images, and scrolling text, all in multiple frames on the screen. So there it is. Those are my thoughts so far on remediation. I am interested to see where this takes us in the next few weeks.