The communication faculty at High Point University believe that we're on the vanguard of a new era in communication-user-directed communication-that may be even more significant to society than the introduction of television. Take video games. You can go anywhere in the world and see Internet cafes filled with people transfixed in front of a screen playing games. While to some this may seem to be a silly waste of time, we believe that there's a lot more going on. Games are actually an example of a revolutionary communication medium because they alter the fundamental ways that humans respond to messages-people are no longer simply passive recipients but are actually co-message makers. In fact, a strong case can be made that we're at a parallel point in time to when Aristotle proposed rules of rhetoric that have shaped Western communication for centuries.

Even the way that games and other interactive entertainment are produced changes our conceptions of the communicator. The Twentieth Century honored what the critics call the auteur, the lone communicator--a Hitchcock or Spielberg--getting his or her individual message out to a large audience in a particular country. The Twenty-first Century will honor the creative team and the visionary leader communicating their symbiotic messages to a scattered audience of individuals anywhere in the world. This teamwork and leadership is what's driving our new economy. And educating this next generation of these types of communicators is what the Nido Qubein School of Communication will be about.