Media Injustice Technology and Digital Media

Technology and Digital Media: Media Injustice

Media Injustice: Technology and Digital Media

Media Injustice

In his book, Couldry (2012) discusses four different types of media injustices. This text focuses on the first media injustice which occurs when a person is harmed by the media, but lacks effective means of seeking redress for, or publicizing the harm committed against them (Couldry, 2012). This media injustice is selected for a number of reasons. First, it is the most common form of media injustice in the society today. Secondly, thistype of injustice is more important to analyze than the other three as it is often promulgated against the less fortunate in society; the weak, who are often in no position to defend themselves.

There are numerous case studies demonstrating the extent of this particular media injustice in the current society. A perfect example is the Rolling Stone Magazine's 2012 reporting of the rape incident at the University of Virginia involving a student identified as 'Jackie'. In their news article, Rolling Stone reported that a number of Jackie's friends, who had been with her on the night in question, had given their statements confirming the incident (Talbot, 2012). The accused were victimized, and suffered greatly as a result of Rolling Stone's reporting. One of Jackie's friends, identified in the article as 'Andy', who reportedly witnessed the incident and advised the victim not to report it as a way of protecting her reputation, said later that he had never even met Jackie. Moreover, it was discovered that Rolling Stone had not interviewed any of Jackie's supposed friends, neither had it interviewed the seven men accused of the crime before publishing their document (Talbot, 2012). Rolling Stone committed the first type of media injustice by publicly accusing the seven men of a crime, and hurting their reputation in the process, yet denying them an effective opportunity to defend themselves and give their perspective. The magazine intentionally denied the accused a proper platformfor defending themselves.

Part Two: What are the three pressing areas that need to be monitored by organizations in their use of technology and digital media? How would you change emerging technologies to better support an organization?

There are three pressing areas that organizations need to address in their use of technology and digital media. The first of these is interaction and connectivity with internal and external stakeholders. Organizations should align their technology and digital media policies with the social theory (Couldry, 2012). They should ensure that the digital media and technologies used in external and internal communication allow for effective interaction and connectivity with both external and internal stakeholders. A second component to consider in the use of technology is knowledge-sharing (Gaal et al., 2015). Gaal and his colleagues (2015)express that organizations need to ensure that the technologies they use contribute to knowledge-sharing among stakeholders, for the betterment of the organization. Knowledge-sharing usually occurs through procedures such as blogs, social networking sites, and virtual meetings, which allow for storytelling and online discussions. The third area for consideration is the business benefit of these technologies. Organizations should evaluate the business benefits of these technologies against their negative effects. The use of social networking sites for organizational communication could, for instance, have harmful effects such as reducing employees' focus; organizations should identify such potential harms and develop policies for mitigating their effect so that the maximum business benefits of digital media are realized.