2002? that's ancient history

After reading the first page of any given assigned reading, I inevitably need to look up the year the author was writing... it really drives home just how quickly things are changing on the internet. Today it's hard to imagine the internet without video sharing sites but McPherson in Reload, only six years ago, is basing her entire argument on an internet where video was still relatively fringe despite what hype she says TV executives were running about it. McPherson argues that TV and the web are fundamentally separate media because of mobility scan and search and transformation; and that somehow they had to apply to video on the web. However in practice the most popular video on the web is in fact material from TV. Interestingly, the navigable space of the internet is merely what happens between these segments of non-participatory entertainment. It would seem that participatory entertainment/narrative currently falls more into the video game area of online material, and that mildly participatory, mildly online TV 'experiences' are simply less popular? That is to say, participatory beyond just the commenting system on video sharing sites. The idea of the worker being incorporated into capital rather than subjected to capital definitely has come in to play though. I guess my point is that it's difficult to interpret a theorist in the context the theory was written without some parts seeming ridiculous because of one's own context, and it's especially interested when dealing with a media that changes contexts so quickly.