
This is Marshall McLuhan: The Medium is the Massage (1967) [video] - dang
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=QL_9JKKj-xE
======
shanes
So many quotable quotes in this video. Thank you HN'r dang for submitting it.

Marshall McLuhan was the man. I really liked his blend of truth-seeking mixed
with his helping attitude. He was completely open, willing to tell anyone his
views. A very brave man because he was unafraid to sound foolish. He struck
out on his own path and spoke up, even though he suffered from stammering, but
he knew enough words and handy phrases to bypass that verbal disability with
ease.

I've read McLuhan's corpus, from beginning to end, yet every time I see him
speak, his words, so carefully selected, become a revelation once again.

Can we have another McLuhan now, please? For our time? No. There's only one
Marshall McLuhan. Just like there's only one genius of every type and age of
their time, we'll not see his kind again for a long time. Thank goodness this
man was with us, wrote so many books, was not unwilling to be recorded for
posterity. A pioneer whose message has yet to be understood.

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ploxiln
I had never actually seen this video, and when seeing references to it, even
as I clicked this link, my eyes always saw "Massage" as "Message".

Silly brain... subconsciously thinking "The Medium is the Message" somehow
made more sense as the intended title.

~~~
dang
You were right the first time. "The medium is the message" was one of the
pithy statements from _Understanding Media_ (1964) that made McLuhan's name.
The other variants of the phrase are all just plays on the first.

It's typical of McLuhan that he pretended the word "massage" was by design
when in fact it had just been a typo:
[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=QL_9JKKj-
xE#t=2m15s](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=QL_9JKKj-xE#t=2m15s).

------
solocshaw
I was introduced to McLuhan after I read Baudrillard's "America". Even though
Baudrillard's written off as an obscurantist I still think the essay gives
rich descriptions of the otherwise prosaic.

I mean, there's a part where he just talks about American deserts. He goes on
to describe a gas station's lights always being on noting the temporariness of
buildings like it.

~~~
look_lookatme
Another writer that had a bead on the way we live now was Debord. I think it's
absolutely worth thumbing through _The Society of the Spectacle_ [1] just as
an exercise in contextualizing the modern life. Different writers/theorists
for sure, but worthy of consideration.

[1]
[http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Society_of_the_Spectacle](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Society_of_the_Spectacle)

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damontal
Well I happen to have Mr. McLuhan right here...

~~~
da02
In case anyone is wondering:

Woody Allen says those words in a movie... and McLuhan shows up:
[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=sXJ8tKRlW3E](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=sXJ8tKRlW3E)

------
dredmorbius
I'd very strongly recomment McLuhan's student, Neil Postman, and his books,
_Amusing Ourselves to Death_ and _Technopoly_.

[http://www.powells.com/s?author=Neil%20Postman](http://www.powells.com/s?author=Neil%20Postman)

------
giarc
I imagine most Canadians will know who Marshall McLuhan is simply because of
the [Heritage Minute]([https://www.historicacanada.ca/content/heritage-
minutes/mars...](https://www.historicacanada.ca/content/heritage-
minutes/marshall-mcluhan?)). People often question government spending money
on things like this, but the fact that I, and many Canadians remember it 20
years later tells me it works.

------
Almaviva
On a slightly different note, the musical version is nice too:
[https://vimeo.com/8022406](https://vimeo.com/8022406)

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researcher88
Terrence McKenna's lecture on McLuhan is also excellent-

[https://youtu.be/9dROH6aOIUc](https://youtu.be/9dROH6aOIUc)

------
dang
Found via
[http://dangerousminds.net/comments/this_is_marshall_mcluhan](http://dangerousminds.net/comments/this_is_marshall_mcluhan),
which is worth reading for background.

~~~
blumkvist
Thanks for the share. Really appreciate it!

------
pnathan
It is extremely worth pondering the different media we deal in and how they
affect our use of them. The tools shape the user.

This is particularly relevant in the age of Medium, Twitter, and reddit. How
do you pick apart each medium and understand how it impresses a certain
modality of use and thought onto the creator/consumer divide? That is not a
small question.

------
Cloudy
Something that really opened my eyes to thinking about the design of everyday
things was "Objectified" (2009), a documentary on industrial/product design.

[0]
[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=S9E2D2PaIcI](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=S9E2D2PaIcI)

~~~
cyphunk
Could you expand on why this film came to your mind in this context. I also
saw objectified but felt it was, to put lightly, a fluff self-glorification by
designers.

~~~
Cloudy
We are immersed in the various mediums present in our daily life and being
aware of the medium itself and what limitations or potentialities are
available from that medium will demystify these otherwise mundane ubiquitous
things we encounter everywhere.

In the context of "The Medium is the Massage", I brought up (industrial)
design because physical products are a major part of our daily lives and I
never really gave much thought as to how a tooth brush or a Macbook was
developed and built. Yeah Objectified had a fair amount of self-glorification
of the designer egos, but before I saw the film I had no real concept of who
was behind all the stuff that I use in my daily life.

~~~
cyphunk
thanks for the clarification. design as a bi-product of human intuition and
then an agent for influence back on it. got your point.

------
anigbrowl
I absolutely recommend people read the book. It's not a light read, but it's
startling how well McLuhan anticipated the internet era.

------
hellbanner
It's a great book, too.

------
bayesianhorse
Don't underestimate "19th century factory style" school systems. I think it's
dangerous how fast rote memorization is put aside, when it's the only reliable
means of reproducibly teaching certain topics.

On the other hand, deep learning researchers now make their neural networks
memorize and reproduce their input, in order to better understand and deal
with the data. There's a lesson to be learned here!

~~~
blumkvist
You missed his point entirely. It is that a child cannot see the
purpose/usefulness of what he/she is learning at school.

Sounds familiar?

~~~
bayesianhorse
Why does purpose/usefulness matter? Dumbing down and restricting a curriculum
to what is obviously "useful" is equally bad.

~~~
blumkvist
It matters because if people are not motivated to do something, they will not
do it, or best case scenario - slack. This is especially true for kids. The
purpose of schools is for kids to learn, not for teachers to teach.

Perhaps we can put more effort into explaining to kids why they need to learn
those things.

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zak_mc_kracken
"Massage", really?

How could both the video poster and OP mess up this quote?

[http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_medium_is_the_message](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_medium_is_the_message)

~~~
sowhatquestion
Uh... did you read the article you just linked?

"McLuhan frequently punned on the word 'message', changing it to 'mass age',
'mess age", and 'massage'; a later book, The Medium Is the Massage was
originally to be titled The Medium is the Message, but McLuhan preferred the
new title, which is said to have been a printing error."

