I agree. “The medium is the message” comes to mind [0]. I think it has something to do with broadcast media of all kinds. When reading works from before the br

I agree. “The medium is the message” comes to mind [0]. I think it has something to do with broadcast media of all kinds. When reading works from before the broadcast era, I remember authors would somehow try to converse with the reader with via their writing style as in the writer acknowledged the existence of a reader in their writing explicitly (“Dear Reader”) or via a narrative (the narrative style of Plato) and acknowledged that the reader was somehow capable of responding and that the writer could listen. Over time, writers started acknowledging that the reader was one amongst many (“Dear readers”), but still capable and worthy of being conversed with. Moving further along, wartime recruiting posters are what comes to mind of when I think of broadcast media when there is a short message often written in the imperative: the reader exists and expected to do something, but has no avenue or agency to discuss the message. There are examples and counter-examples of the styles I mentioned, but my observation has been that the prevailing writing style has changed from expecting/demanding a two-way conversation to a sort of “speaking at each other not to each other” unless negotiated differently otherwise. [0] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_medium_is_the_message https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_medium_is_the_message