4 ms·

Marshall McLuhan Speaks

29 points by ivankirigin 16y ago

oasisbob 16y ago
This is great, McLuhan has a lot to teach. I tend to find his work much more insightful and broadly applicable than Kevin Kelly, et al. His ideas reproduced in _The Medium is the Massage_ are the most popular, but my favorite is the concept of the media tetrad because it tends towards the descriptive, instead of the prescriptive: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tetrad_of_media_effects http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tetrad_of_media_effects Taking Twitter for example, instead of saying "Twitter has foo effect on society", McLuhan's tetrad provides a framework for discussion and analysis. e.g., Perhaps you think Twitter retrieves the telegraph, maybe you don't, but McLuhan provides an easy method for discussion.
- zeteo 16y ago
  "The Medium is the Massage (sic)" Freudian slip? :)
  - oasisbob 16y ago
    Heh, actually, no. Says McLuhan Biographer, W. Terrence Gordon: "by the time it appeared in 1967, McLuhan no doubt recognized that his original saying had become a cliché and welcomed the opportunity to throw it back on the compost heap of language to recycle and revitalize it. But the new title is more than McLuhan indulging his insatiable taste for puns, more than a clever fusion of self-mockery and self-rescue — the subtitle is 'An Inventory of Effects,' underscoring the lesson compressed into the original saying."
    - jberryman 16y ago
      Wow, thanks for posting that quote. This and the parent post assuming the title was a typo is really making my day. To add to the discussion, the first pages of the book are a photograph of a hand over an ear, overlaid with the words "...the massage?"
  - kylemathews 16y ago
    Nope, that's the actual title of a later book he wrote to provide a visual condensed introduction to his ideas. http://www.amazon.com/Medium-Massage-Marshall-McLuhan/dp/1584230703 http://www.amazon.com/Medium-Massage-Marshall-McLuhan/dp/158...
phr 16y ago
If, like me, you have heard bits and pieces about McLuhan, but never delved deeper, the 20 minute introduction by Tom Wolfe is well worth your time.
- commandar 16y ago
  I'll have to look into it given my knowledge of McLuhan extends as far as his Annie Hall cameo.
gruseom 16y ago
I was surprised to learn from a review of Coupland's recent biography (http://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=2115029 http://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=2115029) that McLuhan largely deplored the social changes he was writing about. "Anything I talk about is almost certain to be something I'm resolutely against, and it seems to me the best way of opposing it is to understand it, and then you know where to turn off the button." The popular image of McLuhan (and he was extremely popular - up there with rock stars) was definitely not that of a button-turner-offer. Such a mindset in many critics would make them predictable and boring, but to me it makes McLuhan more interesting. The knock against him was always that he was glib, but this suggests a depth that isn't obvious. I remember hearing that McLuhan was once at an academic conference where some professor excoriated him after his talk (McLuhan was loathed by his fellow academics). McLuhan shrugged and said, "You don't like these ideas? I got others."
- ivankirigin 16y ago
  Folks at Facebook talk about McLuhan all the time. http://livestre.am/wRA http://livestre.am/wRA I wonder if they know that. It's the first I've heard of it. I certainly disagree with it. I think the internet makes us more connected and aware of what is important in the world. For some, it is an addiction, but that isn't really the average case. Maybe Zynga developers would disagree.

29 points by ivankirigin 16y ago

This is great, McLuhan has a lot to teach. I tend to find his work much more insightful and broadly applicable than Kevin Kelly, et al. His ideas reproduced in _The Medium is the Massage_ are the most popular, but my favorite is the concept of the media tetrad because it tends towards the descriptive, instead of the prescriptive: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tetrad_of_media_effects http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tetrad_of_media_effects Taking Twitter for example, instead of saying "Twitter has foo effect on society", McLuhan's tetrad provides a framework for discussion and analysis. e.g., Perhaps you think Twitter retrieves the telegraph, maybe you don't, but McLuhan provides an easy method for discussion.

zeteo 16y ago
"The Medium is the Massage (sic)" Freudian slip? :)
- oasisbob 16y ago
  Heh, actually, no. Says McLuhan Biographer, W. Terrence Gordon: "by the time it appeared in 1967, McLuhan no doubt recognized that his original saying had become a cliché and welcomed the opportunity to throw it back on the compost heap of language to recycle and revitalize it. But the new title is more than McLuhan indulging his insatiable taste for puns, more than a clever fusion of self-mockery and self-rescue — the subtitle is 'An Inventory of Effects,' underscoring the lesson compressed into the original saying."
  - jberryman 16y ago
    Wow, thanks for posting that quote. This and the parent post assuming the title was a typo is really making my day. To add to the discussion, the first pages of the book are a photograph of a hand over an ear, overlaid with the words "...the massage?"
- kylemathews 16y ago
  Nope, that's the actual title of a later book he wrote to provide a visual condensed introduction to his ideas. http://www.amazon.com/Medium-Massage-Marshall-McLuhan/dp/1584230703 http://www.amazon.com/Medium-Massage-Marshall-McLuhan/dp/158...

phr 16y ago

If, like me, you have heard bits and pieces about McLuhan, but never delved deeper, the 20 minute introduction by Tom Wolfe is well worth your time.

commandar 16y ago
I'll have to look into it given my knowledge of McLuhan extends as far as his Annie Hall cameo.

gruseom 16y ago

I was surprised to learn from a review of Coupland's recent biography (http://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=2115029 http://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=2115029) that McLuhan largely deplored the social changes he was writing about. "Anything I talk about is almost certain to be something I'm resolutely against, and it seems to me the best way of opposing it is to understand it, and then you know where to turn off the button." The popular image of McLuhan (and he was extremely popular - up there with rock stars) was definitely not that of a button-turner-offer. Such a mindset in many critics would make them predictable and boring, but to me it makes McLuhan more interesting. The knock against him was always that he was glib, but this suggests a depth that isn't obvious. I remember hearing that McLuhan was once at an academic conference where some professor excoriated him after his talk (McLuhan was loathed by his fellow academics). McLuhan shrugged and said, "You don't like these ideas? I got others."

ivankirigin 16y ago
Folks at Facebook talk about McLuhan all the time. http://livestre.am/wRA http://livestre.am/wRA I wonder if they know that. It's the first I've heard of it. I certainly disagree with it. I think the internet makes us more connected and aware of what is important in the world. For some, it is an addiction, but that isn't really the average case. Maybe Zynga developers would disagree.