Monday, November 17, 2008

Types of Internet Media

Every time I need to think of how communication is different on Internet media I keep needing to make a mental run-through of all the various distinct Internet media. So to save time next time, here is a list of Internet media. Please let me know if I missed something or included something that should be rolled up.

I'm defining media as a unique form of communication between humans, (so FTP is more of a file exchange than a communication medium). Some mediums blur the distinctions by merging or hosting other mediums.

Typology of Internet media:
  1. Website (includes publicly available websites, and private such as intranets & extranets )
  2. Mobile website (a website optimized for viewing on a handheld, mobile device)
  3. Internet telephony (i.e. Voice-over-Internet Protocol, such as Skype)
  4. Internet television (both television channels delivered by the Internet, such as the Bell Fibe service, or individual tv shows offered via the websites of channels)
  5. Email
  6. Instant messaging and chat (I might include Twitter here)
  7. Forums/message board (allows threaded text-based conversations)
  8. Streaming audio (includes podcasts & Internet radio)
  9. Streaming video (includes webcasts, podcasts, YouTube videos)
  10. Games (includes console-based and online-only)
  11. eBooks
Within mediums there are genres, so website would have some of the following genres:
  • social networking site
  • blog
  • e-commerce site
  • online gambling site
  • news
  • informational
  • wiki
I'm not sure I got this right and I found anyone else that has tried to categorize all Net things like this, so I'm curious what others have to say.

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