When does our "new media" become old?

While I was reading Chun’s, Software and Memory I was interested in the thought of change and how long new media stays “new”. In her preface Chun addresses this stating in the early 2000s “The term new media seems ‘old’” (vi). Todd’s post also made me think of changing technology. Our technology and media is constantly changing and evolving and it makes me wonder the benefits and disadvantages that might cause.

When thinking of new media, new technology, etc. I feel we are always thinking and trying to get a hold of the newest program out there. We are always ready to get rid of our old technology. Our technology we have now will seem ancient 10 years from now (think of AIM of dial up) and this is exciting to think about, but also brings up issues. Chun addresses some of these issues stating, “…most ‘archived’ software programs can no longer be executed” (3). Do we live in such a “throw away” society, that we take for granted the constant changing of media and technology without thinking of the impact it might have? “The material limits of materials no only cause the future to be volatile, but also, again, so do the ever-updating, ever-proliferating, and increasingly incompatible soft and hard technologies – the challenges to the historical preservation of software outlined in the introduction to this book” (138). We expect our software to be ever changing, but still to always be there. If I create a word document on my computer, I expect it to be there forever, or until I no longer needed. But as my computer crashed a few weeks ago, and wiped out everything, I know that is not the case.

The fact that we have to have “‘user friendly’ computer interfaces” to create “’productive individuals’” (8) shows that “software also engenders a sense of profound ignorance” (2). Chun here is referring to ignorance in terms of understanding software, but I believe in ignorance in general. New technology becomes a crutch. What would students do without spell check and Google nowadays?