The Medium is the Massage
I couldn’t find anything too provocative on the web for this one, so this is from Wikipedia:
While today it looks like a black and white copy of Wired magazine, and its prose reads more or less like boilerplate for any of the heady techno-utopian pronouncements of the 1990s, it should be noted that it presaged the development of the original ARPANET by two years, and preceded the widespread civilian use of the Internet by almost twenty. For this and other reasons McLuhan is often given the moniker “prophet.”
Go to town…
Comments(9)
I enjoyed reading the book, as presentation in each part is very fresh and has its own distinct flavor (I don’t really read Wired much, I have to say). I think I see the point that McLuhan is trying to make, which is that new media is trying to break down the constraints made by old media such as conventional writing and perspective principles, so that everything relates to each other and exists in one space again. I thought of this book when I was reading 70 Scenes, because it really seem to exemplify the new media that McLuhan talks about.
However, even with growing popularity of the Internet, I don’t believe the world has reached the state of true “global village.” As I was reading his commentaries on sound, I wondered what he would think of the iPod, modern technology which in my opinion fills only the air between your ears with music and separates people more than uniting them. He probably would’ve considered it new technology used in the old way.
I really enjoyed the book, It had the “the world is a smaller place each day” message about every 15 pages but it wasnt long enough to get annoying, it also had some interesting things to notice about text presentation, especially text image interaction. it seems a little similar to “good/grief” by Joshua . i agree the internet as a medium is probably the apex of it all, it defies some of the things he says, like “global village” like alice said, but it also fits in as a great equalizer, the internet can take an average joe who writes an opinion letter to his local underground newspaper to a influential blogging superstar. i really enjoyed the “art is anything you can get away with” i read this over presidents weekend so i feel like id have a better comment if i had remembered it better.
Joshua Koppel is the author i meant to type i left it blank to go look up and forgot to
Like Alice, I also put some thought into iPods and other devices that allow us to tune out the world around us, and what else this reflects about us. At first I found it to be out-dated more than it seems to be recognized to be, but I take it back. Though the comments on sound-editing and radio are not so technologically concurrent, the “massage” seems to resound well enough. The reading of it was somewhat reminiscent of a generic MCM conversation–but obviously so much better because it’s where it all began.
I loved the word “allatonceness” for multiple reasons. First, it taught me a lesson in humility. I emailed a friend who’s into etymology asking him if he could figure out what it meant. I was reading it “al-uh-tons-ness.” When I saw him he giggled politely and said, do you mean, “all-at-onceness?” Secondly, we should all invent and use more of our own words. Thirdly–what a cool idea.
Speaking of Wired and iPods, I remembered an interesting article when I read Alice’s comment. The article is discussing people who use the very ubiquity of those isolating white earbuds to share music with complete strangers.
Aside from that twist on the antisocial nature of much modern media, I was intrigued by something McLuhan says on page 125. He’s discussing how television requires the entire participation of the viewer… that conflicts with something I’ve read in another class, a piece I believe by John Ellis about television and how we interact with it.
Ellis posited that traditional cinema, the movie theater, is connected with a gaze, holding the rapt attention of the viewer. Television, by way of contrast, is much more oriented towards a glance, meaning that we leave it on in the background but DO NOT relate to it the way McLuhan supposes. Ellis definately has a point but I think I’m more with McLuhan on this one, because I feel that for myself at least if I turn on television at ALL it is to watch something specific like the olympics, and that I never personally leave the TV on… the Internet has taken over that idle, in-and-out glance-based interaction, in my own life.
If this posts twice, sorry, I’ve been having computer trouble.
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Speaking of Wired and iPods, I remembered an interesting article when I read Alice’s comment. The article is discussing people who use the very ubiquity of those isolating white earbuds to share music with complete strangers:
http://www.wired.com/news/mac/0,2125,61242,00.html
Aside from that twist on the antisocial nature of much modern media, I was intrigued by something McLuhan says on page 125. He’s discussing how television requires the entire participation of the viewer… that conflicts with something I’ve read in another class, a piece I believe by John Ellis about television and how we interact with it.
Ellis posited that traditional cinema, the movie theater, is connected with a gaze, holding the rapt attention of the viewer. Television, by way of contrast, is much more oriented towards a glance, meaning that we leave it on in the background but DO NOT relate to it the way McLuhan supposes. Ellis definately has a point but I think I’m more with McLuhan on this one, because I feel that for myself at least if I turn on television at ALL it is to watch something specific like the olympics, and that I never personally leave the TV on… the Internet has taken over that idle, in-and-out glance-based interaction, in my own life.
Did things really change that much? I think McLuhan is alright, but I can’t take him that seriously.
Is it the medium that reshapes the way we think, or is it psychology, or economics, or ideology, or something else entirely? Look, its all of these things. The problem with these theorists is that they’re so damn reductive. These theories all offer fine explanations– which may well present a cohesive, complete and sensible outlook on the world (believe me, I don’t want to suggest that these kinds of theories are somehow incomplete, because they aren’t, for the most part)– but that’s all they are, just explanations. They are not presenting alternate “worlds,” only alternate ways of considering “the world.” Not that there is neccesarily “a world,” but we all experience things, and we are all looking for answers.
McLuhan’s book insists upon the new, the idea that something important has changed in media. What makes it new, though is problematic. You could argue that language has been essentially unchanged since the written word. Or you could argue that nothing has really changed since the spoken word. Or whatever. Its just as valid. So I guess this is my real problem with McLuhan: I want some kind of reason why I should accept his explanations, and I don’t get one. Reading the book, you would think it was self-evident.
Why is it that the medium places the subject? Why not the subject places the medium? Or Nature determines the subject and the medium? Or nature places the subject, and the subject places the medium, and the medium places nature, ad infinitum? Or none of the above. Maybe this is not even a relevant topic of discussion. I have NEVER heard a good explanation for these types of questions. Yet this is the stuff it all depends upon, right?
McLuhan is alright, its an interesting book, but I wouldn’t get too carried away. He’s only a prophet if you let him be one.
If we look at McLuhan as writing a theory of how the world is affected by media, then yes, it doesn’t seem like such a good argument. Obviously, the writing is pervaded by personal
opinions and jumps to conclusions that are interesting, but still dubious.
I think that in reality he is mostly advocating a possible usage of new media, which is to connect people and ideas. Whether he was a prophet, or just someone who proposed an ideology that a lot of people agreed with, I’m not too sure.
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