This week’s readings provide a glimpse into the “media ecology” tradition and its most well-known theorist, Marshall McLuhan. McLuhan and media ecology emerged in response to the rise of television in the 1960s – what aspects of this approach are helpful in understanding today’s digital media? Are there particular limitations to this approach that strike you, either conceptually or in relation to today’s media environments?
Reading response for 2/19
- Author By Jason Mittell
- Publication date February 16, 2008
- Categories: Reading Responses
- 15 Comments on Reading response for 2/19
I grew up in the world of academic publishing. My dad, a self-taught computer jack of most trades, handles the networks, the sometimes ill-behaved mass emails, the databases, back-ups, webspace—most everything but the sites themselves. My mom is the Executive Director of the primary client, the Society for the Study of Reproduction (SSR), and the Managing Editor for the Society’s journal, Biology of Reproduction (BOR). It’s a funny way to grow up, no question. However, given the changes in the field of academic publishing in the past twenty years, it seems logical to me to accept the basic meat in McLuhan’s statement that “the medium is the message.”
There is a fundamental difference between an article published in print, coated pages with ever-cheaper color figs bound in the 60 lb. glossy cover stock, and the same article published as a PDF in an index online (with the same color figs, as well as supplemental video clips or sound bytes couched in XML and linked to from the PDF’s access page). A printed article is sexier, the same way that film is sexier than a DVD, and the faint smell of bindery glue conjures up an archetypal image of the Pressman at work (“Under a spreading chestnut-tree” . . . ?). We still give authority to the bound printed word, as though there is something less “mass” about its derivative of mass media. Even the knowledge that one must pay to have access to the article, whether through one’s own membership dues or, less directly, through one’s institution’s membership dues, does not eliminate the sense that the electronic version of the exact same content is somehow less valuable—cheaper—than the tangible copy that comes shrink-wrapped in the mail.
The funny thing is, the electronic version is cheaper. That’s why every journal that can afford to change its processes is moving away from print as fast as it can, and hiking up the price of print subscriptions to boot. The cost of electronic publishing is much, much lower, and therefore, the cost to publishing authors is also much, much lower. The effect, of course, is to democratize the playing field of published research, since more of our Iranian friends with their Caspian horse papers will be able to afford to pay the fees to get their work out there and available. More and different work will come in. The medium directly affects the content in online publishing. This isn’t news. As the world digitizes, that fact merely becomes more and more apparent.
Even stranger, however, is how many journals are dealing with the decreased cachet of online publications of articles. Step one is obvious: pay to see the articles, whether by purchasing electronic copies individually, by purchasing an issue, or by subscribing to the journal (and all its back issues) for a year. The next move is apparently counterintuitive: make the occasional really “hot topic” papers completely free, and maybe throw one interesting-if-not-wildly-groundbreaking article per issue into the pot as well. Boost the sharing of knowledge and science, and you boost the worth of your publication as a contributor to the field. Our standards are changing. Maybe we’ll find a way to thumb through those electronic pages after all.
Meyrowitz writes, “McLuhan’s argument was that the cultural patterns he attributed to print culture would diminish in significance in the face of patterns fostered by electronic media.” (203) Is print really “obsolescent”? It’s been half a century since he made the claim and, lone and behold, no one has torched the library stacks. In taking this class, for example, we are asked to read articles and texts from an electronic source (E-Res). Yet I still find myself printing them out…the letters on a computer screen are hard to read and I can’t easily highlight sections or add comments in the margins. There must be some reason (or “bias”) why people still check out books from a library, flip through magazine pages while sitting in a plane, or deal with the hassle of locating the second half of an article in a newspaper that transcends any particular “content.” Maybe some people like the ability to interact with text on physical level (sensory bias). Maybe a person prefers books simply because he likes the way the glue smells or just because he values the lengthy history/tradition of the medium (emotional bias). Video might not require a lot of light, money, developing time, etc. but people still shoot on 35mm despite some its inherent disadvantages because of its grainy look, its color range, its ability to capture fine patterns (i.e. tweed), etc.
McLuhan is like one of those dot com guys who predicted a massive closing of retail locations once people could do all their shopping on-line. Well, all the GAPs, Footlockers, and Banana Republics weren’t converted into California Pizza Kitchens or PF Chang’s. The suits realized that there will always be certain products like clothing or cars that people will want to try before they buy – you can’t feel how soft a sweater is by rubbing your hands up against your computer screen. A hundred pack of eagle #2 pencils or a crate of wintergreen tic-tacs, however, might be purchases I’ll make online.
My point is this – that while a new medium like the internet might offer solutions to problems inherent in an older medium like print (i.e. the ability to search for a particular section of text with greater ease), there can still be characteristics inherent in the so-called “outdated” medium (sensorial or symbolic) that meet certain needs better than the newer medium. I’ll admit this logic resembles McLuhan’s example of a misguided perception of media: “the small-pox virus is in itself neither good nor bad; it is the way it is used that determines its value.” In other words, I might be guilty of letting the “content” blind me to the character of the medium (130).
While I see the potential danger of focusing on how a medium is used rather than the medium itself, I don’t really see the danger to taking a middle ground approach here. That is to say, what’s so bad about saying “Given that said medium relies on appealing to our sense of smell, it would better suited for communicating the smell of this Papaya than say video would.” To completely dismiss the effect that “content” or usage has on evaluating a medium’s ability to communicate seems foolish to me, especially when making a claim about how people will use (or in this case not use) a particular medium. In many ways his argument that usage is irrelevant contradicts the 2nd theoretical proposition of Media Ecology dealing with media biases. I am true believer that, with only a few exceptions, no one media technology is “better” than another one and will therefore replace it – each technology is better in particular instances depending on its unique set of political, social, content, intellectual, emotional, and sensory biases. No medium will ever become obsolete unless the new medium that replaces it embodies all of its predecessor’s positive biases and solves at least some of its negative ones…and as much as I love electronic media, I wonder if it will ever be able to do all that.
Also, my dad told me about this LP created by McLuhan with John Simon (of “The Band”) he used to toke to with his college buddy at Harvard. It was taking too long to upload, so here’s a link. Check out the files marked “Side A” and “Side B.” http://www.ubu.com/sound/mcluhan.html Cool stuff, check it out. Also, someone please let me know if we are only supposed to answer the question with these comments and I can stick this post somewhere else.
Kyle raises an interesting point. Considering McLuhan’s claims, I certainly don’t see print disappearing anytime soon. Anytime I walk in into a large book store, there are still large amounts of people sitting in aisles reading, browsing etc. Even magazines, something where most of the content contained can be found online for free, I tend to prefer picking up a copy. Sure, I’ll read similar articles online, but there’s something about the feel of a tangible material that makes the difference. I print out all my readings: I think it’s easier to read them on paper, and I can bring them around with me readily.
Something that really stood out to me though in the McLuhan reading, was the metaphor of the egg thinking of the chicken as a way of making more eggs. The idea that technology isn’t just a means to an end, but rather an entity that changes the way things are simply by being. I’m not entirely sure I agree with that notion, but it’s an interesting opinion no doubt.
Internet publication is a tricky thing, because it all depends upon the content (hm hm) that the website is running. For instance, a film news site such as Aintitcool.com or twitch.com runs free news, exclusives, clips, etc, all without any sort of fee or registration. In fact, they even offer prizes to their readers and active communities around them. Ironically however, sites for famous publications like New York Times etc, have people pay online fees to see full articles and the like. So while of information is still free, certain companies still try to charge for news items that can essentially be found elsewhere anyways.
I don’t know, I just don’t see electronic media replacing print entirely.
I don’t know if this is really answering the prompt, but I was really struck by McLuhan’s assertion of our society living in what he called an “electronic age” which as returned us to a more “tribal” and “oral” kind of society. While I agree with McLuhan’s claims, I don’t think that he quite grasped the extent of modern technology.
The best example I can think of is the internet. Millions of us interact in tribe-like ways; MySpace, Facebook, and Deviantart are all self-proclaimed communities where people can interact instantaneously through message boards, wall posts, etc. just like in the oral fashion that McLuhan praised. However, I think that the internet allows us to communicate even faster and more clearly than the spoken word. Instead of describing something you’ve seen to someone else, you can just send them a video clip or an image.
Where McLuhan is afraid of our “eyes becoming our ears”, things like filters and blockers can easily keep things we don’t want to see on the net out of our sight, or, for that matter, we can control what others see of our information. McLuhan is afraid of everyone being “involved in everyone else’s business”, but I think the clever net surfer knows exactly whose business to be in and who to let in to their own business.
There is also the issue of the “decline of authority” because of the electronic age. One again, on the internet there is always an authority figure, whether it be a message board admin or the people who run Facebook, someone is always telling us what we can and cannot post on these public sites. If we want to be a part of this participatory community, there are rules that must be followed.
Lastly, on the issue of print media becoming obsolete, I think that McLuhan’s own assertion of human beings always “looking back” applies here too. Internet magazines and articles had to come from somewhere. It’s important to note that in the examples McLuhan outlined–early literature coming from oral tradition, film coming from theater–the previous media have yet to disappear. We still have things like theater and rhetoric even though we have films and books. Therefore, I’m fairly convinced that printed material will live on.
I was also surprised at McLuhan’s claim that “print culture would diminish in significance in the face of patterns fostered by electronic media.” Being an English major, books have basically been my best friends my entire life, and the thought of a society without them seems completely improbable. Lum points out that “it is the structure of a medium (or media) that defines the nature of information.” So basically, it would be impossible for another form of media to replace the book because its structure would not be able to as effectively recreate the nature of the information it is trying to convey: it would not be the same, or as an efficient experience. However, after thinking on McLuhan’s claim, it seems that his prophecy is slowly coming to fruition.
I remember coming a couple days early to Middlebury as I do every fall for “The Campus” meetings. And as always, we had a guest speaker. This time it was a woman from the “Burlington Free Press” whose outlook on the print medium was about as sunny as Vermont in the winter. Her advice to us (no lie) was to either start looking into a new profession or start learning to manipulate digital medium if we wanted a career when we graduated. With the increased speed that the internet, as well as television, has allowed us, an individual can post a story on the “New York Times” website 20 minutes after it happens as opposed to a potential 24-hour delay. In an age of PDAs, blackberrys, and wireless internet cafes on every corner, individuals can access information in an instant. The concept of a print paper, in the light, seems not only superfluous, but also completely ineffective.
In a less drastic scale, one can even look at the music scene. Why wait to buy the album when you can download the leaks months before it is released? In an attempt at damage control, bands have even begun releasing records online as soon as they are finished recording as their listeners are impatient to wait the couple of months involved in distribution time. As I mentioned last class, Radiohead pioneered the “download-only” version of music: completely eliminating the middle-man. And Oasis and Nine Inch Nails are following in their footsteps.
And while popular music does not hold the same scholastic esteem as books, and journalism is occasionally described as “literary prostitution,” I believe that books can only hide behind their venerability for so long. Over this past summer, I worked at the Middlebury College library, and part of my job description was to organize the microfiche (a somewhat dated medium as well) and throw away all the print copies of journals.
I agree with Jessie: I think American culture’s impatience is greater than its loyalty, and we may end up reading to our kids from an Amazon kindle before they go to sleep.
http://www.amazon.com/gp/mpd/permalink/m2S5YCKCJJ64W8:m1KUZNR4TVZSMM
i first read meyrowitz on mcluhan, then mcluhan’s actual article.and something interesting happened: while reading meyrowitz, i understood everything mcluhan had said, agreed with him in almost every single point and thought he was a genius. when i read mcluhan i got confused, i couldn’t followed his arguments, and filled the pages with question marks.
i thought this was a clear manifestation of mcluhan’s claim “the medium is the message”. even though both are in written form, meyrowitz writes in the formal, traditional scholar way (“text-based thinking”), while mcluhan’s style is “elliptical rather than linear” and “raed more like transcripts of extemporaneous speaking.”
my conclusion was that i am more used to reading books than to dealing with media, thus i could understand the former article more clearly. and i suddenly felt illiterate for the first time in my life: i haven’t learn yet how to read the same way other people can. and i am not the only one. so a new problem arises in this “media centered society.”: most people know how to read or write. but how many forms of media can they “understand”? how much of the message can they get?
I must agree with everyone else and say that I was also surprised at McLuhan’s claim that print media was becoming obsolete with the development of electronic media. I find this statement very hard to believe. Like Kyle said, while electronic media has made it so that the readings for class are available to read online, I still find myself print out the eRes because they are easier to read and it is possible to highlight and make comments. But how much of our use of print media stems from the fact that we grew up with it? As a child we learned how to read from a print book. So, is this why we still find it easier to print out the eRes to read? Does this mean that in the future, that if our children learn to read solely from electronic sources that print media will actually become obsolete?
In his article, McLuhan says that “the medium is the message because it is the medium that shapes and controls the scale and form of human association and action” (130) I am not sure I necessarily agree with this. If this is true, what would McLunhan have to say about how cultural circulation socially shapes technology when things are not used the way they are intended to be used. I think it is just as important to study the content as it is to study the medium and that it is the combination of the two that forms the entire message.
I was struck by Meyrowitz’s mention of James Morrison’s observation that McLuhan’s writing was essentially hypertext, or as Morrison puts it, “multilinear webs of association that stress connections among multifaceted phenomena” (207). Along those same lines, I think the greatest power of the media ecology approach is that in its rawest form (i.e. McLuhan), it encourages us not only to write about media as environments, but also to write and think about these environments in a way that parallels or approximates a perceptual understanding of them. If under normal circumstances we are “fish” in the water of media, then media ecology helps us to think (and perhaps even write) like “human beings”—to think of that water as an environment that is neither “natural” nor “intrinsic.” As many of his critics pointed out, McLuhan’s very writing of “The Medium is the Message” in the medium of print was almost farcical, yet the relative “inaccessibility” of McLuhan’s message within that medium served in many ways to prove his point. In the 60s, however, with the “typography epoch” in many ways at its height and linear thinking the order of the day, few could really see that. Now that the drastic changes brought on by electronic media have become more visible in our daily lives (perhaps because of the sheer speed at which those technologies themselves have been changing), we are more likely to at least understand what McLuhan was trying to say, if not necessarily agree completely with it.
That having been said, I think there is one major limitation with the media ecology approach—it does not take into account the hyper-interactivity that is an integral part of many new electronic media. The technologies that framed McLuhan’s world—print, radio, film, and television—were interactive in their own way, but not nearly to the extent that technologies like video games and the varied manifestations of the internet are. Common people had little control over “content” in McLuhan’s day, whereas Web 2.0 is all about user-created content. The medium may still be the message, but more and more individuals are defining that medium.
Shakespeare said that a rose is still a rose by any other name, but can that really be true in an environment so based on keywords and search engines? If I were to search “Delta Gamma Cream Colored Rose,” how much random flotsam and botanical and sorority history would I have to wade through to find out that this particular breed of rose is essentially unavailable to the masses, and the sorority has recommended several other breeds of different nomenclature as a substitute gift for my sister? A lot. Period.
I say this becaus I did, in recent memory, spend an embarassing number of minutes clicking back and forth between our online syllabus and the eRes page, matching the course numbers, titles, and dates trying to figure out what our reading actually was, because the two have distinctly different content. Still slightly confused on the matter, I decided to read all of the ones I didn’t read last week.
McLuhan quotes Sarnoff as saying “We are too prone to make technological instruments the scapegoats for the sins of those who wield them. The products of modern science are not themselves either good or bad; it is the way they are used that determines their value.” McLuhan argues that this ignores the very nature of the medium as a message in and of itself. In a media environment with so many links and layers and sources, is it ever really possible to know what you’re looking at or what its message is? Reading McLuhan from a book seems like a comforting and less confusing notion through no fault of his or eRes’s. As much as the medium defines the message and the message affects the reader, the reader: this “technological idiot” McLuhan references, affects the medium by using and interpreting it improperly. Whence then comes the message when the entire process is cyclical? I see we will be reading some of Stephenson, and from this laptop it looks more and more as though interactivity may overwhelm what we might consider content.
Granted, confusing the reading isn’t exactly the infocalypse. And I also don’t see print disappearing any time soon, simply because it is tangible and tangibility is a very permanent, comforting quality of a medium. I feel really good about our Stephenson reading because I have the actual book physically present in my room. A medium that works need not necessarily disappear as McLuhan suggests. My computer could crash, get a virus, need its hard drive wiped. A server could crash, a website could be removed, an eBook in the library could have too many people viewing it, the text could possibly be changed, and maybe I just plain don’t like eRes. But nothing and no one can mess with my book without my knowing, or unless it takes an unfortunate dive into my fish tank. I think that “read only,” hard-copy quality of print will see it long into the future, despite the fact that it works and more advanced technology can in most ways take its place.
McLuhan’s argument about the medium being the message, subconsciously helps us understand current media and I believe it is still applicable to us in the “modern world.” I would like to talk about watching The Daily Show (TDS), and compare the differences in experience and message between viewing the same episodes (or clips) live on TV and viewing them on the internet at thedailyshow.com.
When watching TDS on TV, when something is funny, we sometimes laugh so hard that we trample over the next joke. For those without a Tivo, we cannot go back and see/hear what we missed. Additionally, we are continually processing the information as new because we haven’t seen it yet, so we are not sure what to expect and we do not know when something funny is coming. Here, the message is the live comedy (while it is not really live, it is same day recorded and the viewers at home typically do not know what to expect), the suspense and anticipation add to the experience just as much as the actual joke.
If we contrast this with watching clips online, I think that the message has changed substantially. We (or at least, I) go online to thedailyshow.com to rewatch clips that I am already familiar with, typically to show my friends who may have not seen the clip. Here the comedy is not about the actual surprise of the joke because that is no longer novel—instead the please comes from a shared experience and the familiarity with the performance. I also like rewinding the clip and watching it again to “explain” any of the information that my friends may not have got on first viewing. It’s probably annoying to my friends, but it makes me feel important. The message here has changed, just like the comedy. Comedy is no longer something that has to be watched when it happens because it can easily be found and viewed again. We can share clips by emailing them and with the ability to leave comments, we can even critique them as well.
I chose TDS not only because it is popular, but it is one of the few shows to have it’s own website that allows easy, commercial free access (I’m 95% sure about this, I’ve not seen a commercial, just ads in the margins, but please comment if I’m mistaken). NBC, ABC and other networks allow you to watch shows online, but there are commercial breaks. TDS is providing is users high quality, searchable, and most importantly legal (important for no other reason than I know the clips wont be removed in a week when I want to show someone else) clips that transforms the show from a scheduled sequence of monologue, correspondent, interview, to just a collection of clips. We shift the order and change it when we watch it online. The medium shapes the content.
The so-called “failures” of McLuhan’s writings that Meyrowitz presents in his essay are more so a failure of the reader’s eye than it is against McLuhan. Do not the criticisms of the technicalities of McLuhan’s writing style and argument exemplify McLuhun’s point of the social use of the medium determining its value? McLuhan, above all, calls attention to the separation of content and medium. His words/ texts are the extension of his thoughts on media. The criticism that McLuhan’s writings “…fail to meet the traditional standards of scholarly texts…” (194), exemplify how the content of the medium blocks the message. Given the extent of McLuhan’s misinterpretation and criticism for his unconventional, absolutist style, was there a better medium for McLuhan to communicate his ideas?
McLuhan’s messages and ideas are revolutionary and prophetic of today’s techno/computer/ information age as “his ideas have also permeated the thinking of those who criticize him” (209). He allows us to “navigate with a [clearer] vision” (130) by showing the greater scope of possibilities when thinking about the medium vs. content. By understanding the separation between medium and content, we can detach the values and assumptions that limit it. To me, one of the most interesting points McLuhlan states is “For any medium has the power of imposing its own assumption on the unwary. Prediction and control consist in avoiding this subliminal state of Narcissus trance. But the greatest aid to this end is simply knowing that the spell can occur immediately upon contact, as in the first bars of a melody” (134). His point suggests that we perceive new media through old frameworks but by separating these norms, the possibilities are extensive.
I think if the information\electronic age has taught us anything, it has taught us that text–the printed word–is a remarkably versatile medium for communication, and one that will die hard.
Although Meyrowitz is correct, McLuhan did sort of foretell the internet, it seems to me that he gasped only at the medium, and not the content. I believe that the internet revitalized the written word. This blog is a prime example of that. Were it not for this wonderful tech, would we be able to have this sort of group discussion? I suspect not. Email replaced snail mail, big deal…but by now it has replaced a fairly good percentage of phone calls I bet.
It seems to be that the progression of technology has reversed itself a bit. The telephone is an improvement on snail mail, because it allowed people to communicate instantly, but also in a closer facsimile to speech. But now, a lot of people text each other more than they actually call them! And texting on most phones (iPhones aside) is pretty cumbersome.
But I digress. I think McLuhan’s approach is interesting and valid, but I’m not sure if I buy it. Saying that lightbulbs are information, for example. I guess I would agree, but what’s the information? Its not particularly releveant or needed information. Every medium is going to carry a little background information, but generally its unimportant. How the medium is used to convey other information is what is most intriguing to me.
McLuhan’s position that “The Media is the Message” is an extremely relevant statement in that it provides us with a point from which to study our current cultural essence. Technology certainly “adds itself to what we are.” Yet, from the standpoint of technological determinism, it also defines what we are becoming. These two statements make me think of Daft Punk’s song “Technologic.” It perfectly sums up the manner with which we interact with the content of technology while also positing that we are governed by the new mediums brought forth by its necessary evolution.
While being able to communicate in ever expanding forms of media to a huge cross-section of people, we are not able to do the same without these new mediums of communication to such a wide-spread audience. Take this comment for example. As I (possibly) shape the way that you might be thinking about our reading assignment my ability to do so is partially handicapped by my current inability to make this point through a face-to-face interaction with everyone who might eventually read this comment.
This last point speaks to my original thought. Our cultural essence is currently defined not only by our statements or interactions with technology but by the way that new mediums for communication fragment physical social relations by allowing individuals to truly have lives outside of them. The result is the fragmentation of the self. Take second life. Humans are now able to interact with each other via a virtual world. Some married people actually have second life spouses. The cultural matrix existing within his medium for interaction will drastically change the fabric of American society. Its existence already challenges the Judeo-Christian ethic which America was founded on.
The medium IS the message… for me. With photography, I’ve always loved the originality and uniqueness behind the medium of B&W photography. From the release of the shutter, to the anticipation of the film development, to the actual outcome of the negatives, to the experimentation in the darkroom with the prints, to the final print– I love an original picture that I can take and create. But, as we now live in a digital age, the medium has totally changed. As McLuhan states, “For the ‘message’ of any medium or technology is the change of scale or pace or pattern that it introduces into human affairs,” and digital photography is one example of this.
I agree with McLuhan when he says that “media study considers not only the ‘content’ but the medium and the cultural matrix within which the particular medium operates,” because as Ernesto stated, “it provides us with a point from which to study our current cultural essence.” Our culture and our society is shaped by the mediums being used presently, and also by past mediums, from which we study to improve our lives now.
Also, like Brian was saying about using different mediums to watch a TV show, I actually enjoy and prefer to watch LOST on my computer in my room than in a TV lounge. A TV lounge involves watching with other random people who may be talking, so I’d rather watch it with a few of my buddies and listen using my dependable 2.1 sound system.
The common phrase, “TV will rot your brain, why don’t you pick up a book,” usually heard by children from their parents is interestingly enough a reference to the use of medium. Today, this phrase isn’t usually heard because of the newer mediums available, such as computers and the internet. So much can be learned from the internet nowadays, that normal print in books isn’t considered the ‘right’ thing to address or use anymore. People of different generations throughout our culture and society are learning that our lives are changing through the uses of certain mediums, and in the end, medium shapes the content.