Emerging Media ─ Uses and Dynamics

Emerging Media provides an understanding of media use in the expanding digital age and fills the void of existing literature in exploring the emerging new media use as a dynamic communication process in cyberspace. It addresses emerging media dynamics during the second decade of online communication, the Web 2.0 era after Mosaic and Netscape. The current status of emerging media development calls for extended exploration of how emerging media are used in different patterns and contexts, and this volume answers that call; it is comprehensive examination of emerging media evolution and concurrent social interaction.

Emerging Media has three primary features:

• Provides a comprehensive analysis of digital media use and online communication with empirical data

• Contains studies that are both theoretical and empirical. These studies not only test the communication and other related theories in the age of digital media, but also provide new insights into the understanding of the important issues in digital media use and online communication with significant theoretical advances

• Contains studies that use a variety of research methods and approaches, including surveys, content analysis and experiments

This volume will be invaluable to researchers of communication and new media, and will serve advanced undergraduate and graduate students studying media and digital communication. With an international scope, it appeals to readers around the world in all areas that utilize new media technologies.

Xigen Li (Ph.D., Michigan State University, 1999) is an associate professor of Department of Media and Communication, City University of Hong Kong.