Are new media democratic?

This paper – which was presented as a lecture to students at City University in 2010 – aims to give an overview and critique of the claims being made for new media in relation to their democratic properties and potentials. It (perhaps crudely) presents two distinct narratives, both of which are ‘true’ according to current debates, statistics and developments, asking readers to question their own use and understanding of digital media in terms of democracy, and to think again about the language that may have been naturalised around their use