Blog #6 - Technology Analysis: Newspaper

    When we were deciding on which piece of communication technology to present on, I wanted to make sure that mine was something that was incredibly important to the world. Therefore, I chose to do my project on newspaper. Whether you read it or not, newspaper has been a part of human life for a long time. It has evolved and adapted to the changing world and through this, it has become an integral part of society. I personally have and do only read the newspaper through online sources. Even though people from older generations (my dad) don't think this is the correct way to gather news, I believe it is the only way news is going to be broadcasted from now on.

    

But I digress.

    The history of newspaper is quite long and a little all over the place. Joad Raymond, in his book titled The Invention of the Newspaper claims that the newspaper, as we know it, was only created in the early 1700s. Before then, news was transferred by other forms of media. News in general has been a part of human existence since the Roman Empire. Town criers lined the streets telling the tales of both local and remote things that had happened. It wasn't until the mid 1600s that people realized they should write the stories down and just pass that around. This was the time of the British newsbooks and while they were still news articles in writing, they were not classified as "newspapers" due to the rate at which they were produced...slowly.

    It wasn't until 1702 when The Daily Courant was released, that the first newsbook was created without a cover. This form of the newsbook soon became known as a newspaper. This newspaper was the first to fight for the rights found in the First Amendment (even though they were British). It was the basis for which the first American newspaper, The New-England Courant, was created by James Franklin (Ben's brother) in 1721. It wasn't until 1791 that the first amendment was created, allowing newspapers to become much more open and able to report on issues without worrying about consequences.

    From there on, newspapers began to spring up all over the country. Britannica claims that it was the hottest new trend of the early 1800s and it's no wonder why. Newspapers like the famous The New York Times began to tell stories that were both entertaining and informative. Not only that, but they could do this under the freedom created by the first amendment. Through time, the creation of muckraking and yellow journalism began to unearth the hard truth of corrupt governments. Newspaper was the main vehicle for this information, which made it incredibly important for civilians to have.

    Newspaper still has the same importance that it did throughout the last few centuries. Along with spreading knowledge, newspaper increases literacy, advertises for businesses, and has been thought to increase self-esteem by starting a daily routine. While it has changed a lot throughout its lifetime, newspaper has made quite an impact on the world. It may not be the most popular form of media today, but I believe it is still one of the most important.