Convergence culture

I have read Jenkins' book before, and I am re-reading it now, under a new light, after what was discussed and learnt this semester in our course. But there are some topics in the book, which called my attention above others, that I would like to discuss here, hoping to get back some comments and critics about it.

The first point that called my attention was the change (and/or inversion) in the roles of the media usage. Before the advent of the digital media as we know nowadays, the media (publicities, ads, publications, etc.) was used by the companies as a mean to impose and/or influence the customers (basically, all of us). It was clearly a top-to-bottom relationship, as pointed by Jenkins. And, although we always had the power to influence back through the consumption of a given product/idea, the media control was, without any doubt, in the hand of the companies. Who controlled the media had the true power. Being from a country as Brazil, this power is even clearer than I believe it was possible to notice in Europe.

With the advent of the digital media, this control changed. There is still the top-down control used by the companies to influence the customers, but we are not helpless targets anymore. Having in hands the possibility to research, comment and exchange ideas about pretty much everything, we have the power now to influence the companies and media on how we want things to be. And the companies are adapting themselves to this new reality and using it as much as possible to have the customers as allies and partners, instead of confronting them.

The second topic brought up by Jenkins and that called my attention was the idea of cultural convergence, mainly due to the fact that the technology allows us to mingle between different cultures, systems, political realities. There aren't limits to the interaction allowed by the digital media. I can personally see a good side and a bad side of it (I believe you can come up to several other pros and cons in this matter): The good side is the possibility of exchange ideas and information with people and cultures coming from different realities and such a situation was impossible before the usage of digital media was spread. This certainly enriches the cultural experience, improves the technology and creation of new concepts and ideas, among other benefits. But I can also see a bad side: With time, there is a possibility that there won't be anymore any unique culture, traditions defined by geographical situation, everyday life, etc. Everybody will be so inserted in the digital world and so aware of what is going on in other places that they might forget their identity as an unique person in an unique place in the planet. I hope I am wrong though.

But there is a third topic that called my attention and somehow answers the questions that I brought up in the previous idea. The information and data available in the digital media is so vast and rich, no one is able to absorb everything and everything is absorbed in a different manner by each individual. Therefore, no matter how open and available the information is, how easy it is to know more about any topic, the way this topic will be learnt will be different, so there will still be peculiarities in each culture and way of living, which will be kept. The question I see here is that these differences won't be influenced anymore by geography, by way of living or weather, as it was in the past. The main factor will be the way people understand the world and interact with it and how one understands the changes in the society and culture.

I'm very sure new topics will intrigue me, now that I am reading the book again. Nevertheless, there is no doubt this is a great book and a wonderful source of information for us.