
The Medium Is the Message, 50 Years Later - Thevet
http://www.psmag.com/navigation/nature-and-technology/medium-message-50-years-later-91552/
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parasubvert
Harold Innis and his work such as "Empire of Communication" was the foundation
for McLuhan's more punk-rock interpretation of communication theory. Pink
Floyd vs The Clash.

Innis I found insightful for his view of how technology changes cultures
because the dominant means of communication changes what it means to be human.

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tjradcliffe
McLuhan: "As a result, precisely at the point where a new media-induced
environment becomes all pervasive and transmogrifies our sensory balance, it
also becomes invisible."

So, we're still a century or so away from this with regard to smart phones
etc. TV barely reached this point before it went into decline
([http://www.nytimes.com/2011/05/03/business/media/03televisio...](http://www.nytimes.com/2011/05/03/business/media/03television.html?_r=0)).
Newspapers did, quite likely, as did radio.

So long as people complain about how devices are changing us, they are not
invisible, so anyone engaged in critical commentary (at least in the popular
press) is proof that we are nowhere near this boundary.

Wearables may change the timeline for ubiquitous computing, but again: so long
as there is hand-wringing about how the technology is changing us, this
transformation is not complete.

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espeed
In 1999 I named my consulting company "Electric Speed"
([http://electricspeed.com](http://electricspeed.com)) after reading McLuhan's
book...

    
    
      At no period in human culture have men understood the  
      psychic mechanisms involved in invention and technology. 
      Today it is the instant speed of electric information 
      that, for the first time, permits easy recognition of the 
      patterns and the formal contours of change and 
      development. The entire world, past and present, now 
      reveals itself to us like a growing plant in an enormously 
      accelerated movie. Electric speed is synonymous with light 
      and with the understanding of causes.
    
      — Marshal McLuhan, Understanding Media: The Extensions of Man (1964)

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Jedd
Disturbingly that article doesn't mention the word 'massage' anywhere. Which
is kind of important.

~~~
ky3
According to

[http://www.marshallmcluhan.com/common-
questions/](http://www.marshallmcluhan.com/common-questions/)

Now there are four possible readings for the last word of the title, all of
them accurate: “Message” and “Mess Age,” “Massage” and “Mass Age.”

~~~
Jedd
Yup. Matches the wikipedia telling of the story. Nonetheless, the history is
kind of important given the popularity of this quote. Bit like the
(mis-)paraphrasing of 'Life wasn't meant to be easy' popularised in my part of
the world (Australia).

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smacktoward
There are very few books I've read that I can honestly say changed the entire
direction of my life.

McLuhan's _Understanding Media: The Extensions of Man_ is one of them.

