Whereas a few years audiences had to take what they were given and be grateful for this, now new media technologies' focus is on the convenience of the consumer. The MP3 player and other software that goes with it enables the audience to create playlists, listen to the portable device whenever they wish, add videos to the music that they are listening etc. This means that the audience is getting much more of a personalised experience.
With programmes like "iTunes", audiences can now download only the exact songs they want to listen to, instead of having to go out and buy entire albums. This means that record companies are now focusing more on the sales of singles rather than albums, as this is where they are likely to make most money. Now, the entirety of a person's musical experience can be formulated over the internet: they see singles advertised through MSN and other sites, listen to them and watch the videos over sites like Youtube, and download whatever they wish over iTunes. They can even discuss all of this in music forums. Everything that they do is designed tobe therefore for their convenience and be only what they want it to be.
Part of this started with the 'MP3 revolution' when the first iPods came onto the market. These then became an essential to the media ecosystem, replacing the portable CD player as smaller, with no jumping of music, and no having to carry around CDs.
Now more and more new media technologies are being converged, and this includes musical ones. Instead of buying a phone and an MP3 player, why not buy a phone with an MP3 player on it that you can plug into the internet and download whatever you like onto it? And it even comes with earphones! Oh, an don't forget the digital camera.
Not only has this become possible in the passed few years, but the amount of choice available to audiences is incredible, as every company wants a slice of the technological pie, e.g. Apple has the iPod, but Samsung have the equivalent. Each of these focus on the idea that audiences are unique individuals with their own needs, so the ability to create playlists, download what they like, and even choose what colour their MP3 player is is very important.
