The Impact of the Development of American New Media on Citizens’ Political Power and Life

With the change of the times, the media has become a two-way contact movement in which all people participate. On the one hand, the low threshold of social media provides the public with more opportunities for political participation, reduces the distance between the public and decision-makers, and makes it possible to turn the democratic ideal into reality. The ability of social media to quickly amplify information through different media platforms enhances its ability to influence politics. It can be said that it has become a news media with a large audience. In particular, limited news is a stable source of political content. It also contributed to the success of social movements and political protests by promoting information and logistics facilities. On the other hand, our behavior of consuming media has created a new form of it - the social data layer, which reveals our behavior and makes us lose a certain degree of privacy. Everything can be measured, quantified, and stored. Website programmers can view the online consumption statistics of all their posts in real-time, analyze how to make more attractive content to readers, and even make an in-depth analysis of the audience's behavior, interest and emotion. In this way, we will be attracted by the temptation of the network and more social relations. In maximizing "social relations", we are always "connected" to an Internet supporting device. These can be smartphones, cars, sports bracelets, sensors, signals, and servers, which record a large amount of data of our daily life. The media follows us, and we are digitized. More and more data about our lives are almost permanently stored on the server, and can even be searched by others. We need to understand that we have entered the post PC World in the 21st century. All devices and things are connected.
Everything responds quickly in the "Internet of things era". This is a world that is always online and highly connected. It can be said that the Internet gives us unparalleled ability to create and express ourselves, but it also means that the responsibility borne on us will become great. We need to understand that we are the media. Although the saturated and overflowing information in the new media era will inundate us, and even we will have the emotion of "doubt and fatigue", we still need to keep a clear mind to distinguish complex situations. Not only that, but we also find that there are some problems in the differentiation of the media market. Although the development of technology gives us more choices in information, the "audience segmentation" will create discrete communities of special interests, resulting in our ability to hear many voices. In this seemingly open "new media" environment, there is still a fortress for more privileged members. Newer forms of communication will attract groups from higher socio-economic and educational levels, and "discussion" will be limited to their scope. In most cases, political and media elites still control the agenda of media forums. Although it improves the accuracy of information to a certain extent, this trend will stimulate the general public to go further and further in the process of public discussion and feedback.
This is a question that we should deeply reflect on.
Therefore, on the whole, on one hand, the Internet has widened the gap between "yes" and "no" political information and participation in the community, because newer forms of communication will attract audiences from higher socio-economic and educational groups to actively participate in political activities, but at the same time, most citizens without resources and skills cannot participate. [8]

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