National Media and Globalization
National media has a large and captivating effect on a nation’s portrayal. The media can present a country in an extremely subjective way, and show events in either a very positive or a relatively negative light. Media within the country itself is also a very interesting topic to analyze. My multimedia project took a deeper look into India’s own national media and popular culture and its influence on the country itself as well as social justice issues.
I explored two different sides of national media in India; one on the relatively positive note of technological advances through social media, as well as the social media revolution within India. The other portion I researched and presented my project on was a more negative aspect of the social media culture, and how the social media scene has been criticized with instances of cyber attacks, as well as the neglect to address any of the recent rape crises through the media.
The country of India currently possesses 850 million units of digital devices that allow access to the media, including more cellphones than the entire population (Mobile and Social Statistics India). In 2013, India became the 3rd largest smartphone market in the entire world, with 20% more usage on mobile devices such as stationary ones such as desktops (Mobile and Social Statistics India). This is a large amount of statistics to discuss, however they offer a lot of insight into how India as a nation functions with the use of mobile devices. This also relates directly to social media usage in the country where 2 out of every 3 Indians are on Facebook, Twitter, Google+, Pinterest, and other social media sites every day. In a more applicable sense, this social media revolution contributes immensely to political aspects in India. Almost all Indian politicians are followed in Twitter, and the use of social media was used heavily to influence voters in the 2014 elections (Mobile and Social Statistics India).
Although there have been huge technological advances regarding technology and social media, there have also been severe negative effects as a consequence. India is currently ranked second in cyber attacks due to social media (Symantec). Because the social media expansion has been so huge throughout India, predators have utilized this to target new victims. In addition to this, in 2014 India has the second highest number of social media scams globally and the highest in the Asia Pacific region (Symantec). Through these statistics, it is clear that although social media expansion throughout India can offer great advantages in this age’s technology centered culture; it also poses many threats to India’s citizens.
Global India 