I read this article before doing the other two readings, and it served as a nice introduction to what I was about to get into.
Kappelman's discussion of extenstions and amputations brought to mind something I've heard about the loss of one sense causing an enhancement in the others. For example, a blind person might have a superior sense of smell and of hearing. It also brought to mind the necessary polarity of progress, as in most aspects of life. Nothing comes for free -- there has to be some sort of sacrifice.
Kappelman notes that McLuhan is concerned with the extent to which humans ignore the amputations and focus only on the positive parts of extensions created by new technologies. He calls this "over-extension," and says it ends in a "reversal of the benefits." The example Kappelman uses -- the culture of high-speed transportation -- is a good one, and I found myself rationalizing why it's okay that we ignore the amputations of some aspects of it. It is indeed difficult to detach oneself, as McLuhan says we must, from a technological extension to truly analyze it.
The discussion of advertising was interesting to me. According the Kappelman, McLuhan saw advertising companies to be in control, but I think that time has changed this. Now, the consumer controls the advertisers, at least in part. Advertisers must bow down to our media-consumption habits and though sometimes they are sneaky (viral ads), they still have to follow our buying trends.
A conclusion I drew from this reading is that it seems we are constantly creating new technologies to make new extensions which make up for the amputations created with other technologies.
Monday, September 28, 2009
Sunday, September 27, 2009
Excerpts from Understanding Media by Marshall McLuhan
I think I read this piece three times, maybe four.
My first impression was "whoa, he's talking about the Singularity," a concept with which I was fleetingly obsessed a few years back when I was into learning about futurism and transhumanism.
To address the grand matter at hand -- "the medium is the message" -- I needed some time to truly digest that. I went for a run with the idea that I would force myself to consider all of the reading I had just done, which is a challenge in and of itself. While running I thought about my iPod, and what its message might be. I pushed this further to think of the mp3 as a medium and the message that sends -- we want what we want and we want it to be compact and portable and we want to have as much as we can! I want to be able to carry my entire music library with me as I run along Lake Michigan. Do I need to? No. Do I listen to all the music in my iPod? No way. But I can.
On the second leg of my run, I was listening to an album I had just put on my iPod before leaving the apartment. This album was all I listened to for the better part of my 8th year of living. I had all these memories of listening to this album and idolizing the musicians. Listening to it now, with 24-year-old ears, I realize that I had no idea what I was singing along to. This album was about masturbation and drugs and sex and heartbreak and growing up and I had no idea. At the same time, I got it. I understood. I felt understood by the band even though at eight years old, I didn't know what most of those subjects were. This helped shape McLuhan's concept for me. Post-punk music as the medium, my 8-year-old mind received and comprehended the message. The content had very little to do with the impact the album had on me.
There are a few ideas McLuhan presents with which I'm unsure if I disagree or just don't completely grasp. His hot media vs. cold media conversation lost me a little bit. At first, I felt I understood it, but I have to agree Mentor Cana's assertion that TV is actually a hot medium, rather than cool.
Another section that left me completely in the dark is his statement, about "the century of the psychiatrist's couch." I tried so hard to wrap my head around that one, but no cigar.
I like the idea that the "content" of a medium is typically another medium whose "content" is often yet another medium. I think it is fun exercise in throught to parse the content of a medium through all the layers until you access the true "content."
I think I agree with much of what McLuhan has to say, that is, if I'm understanding it correctly.
My first impression was "whoa, he's talking about the Singularity," a concept with which I was fleetingly obsessed a few years back when I was into learning about futurism and transhumanism.
To address the grand matter at hand -- "the medium is the message" -- I needed some time to truly digest that. I went for a run with the idea that I would force myself to consider all of the reading I had just done, which is a challenge in and of itself. While running I thought about my iPod, and what its message might be. I pushed this further to think of the mp3 as a medium and the message that sends -- we want what we want and we want it to be compact and portable and we want to have as much as we can! I want to be able to carry my entire music library with me as I run along Lake Michigan. Do I need to? No. Do I listen to all the music in my iPod? No way. But I can.
On the second leg of my run, I was listening to an album I had just put on my iPod before leaving the apartment. This album was all I listened to for the better part of my 8th year of living. I had all these memories of listening to this album and idolizing the musicians. Listening to it now, with 24-year-old ears, I realize that I had no idea what I was singing along to. This album was about masturbation and drugs and sex and heartbreak and growing up and I had no idea. At the same time, I got it. I understood. I felt understood by the band even though at eight years old, I didn't know what most of those subjects were. This helped shape McLuhan's concept for me. Post-punk music as the medium, my 8-year-old mind received and comprehended the message. The content had very little to do with the impact the album had on me.
There are a few ideas McLuhan presents with which I'm unsure if I disagree or just don't completely grasp. His hot media vs. cold media conversation lost me a little bit. At first, I felt I understood it, but I have to agree Mentor Cana's assertion that TV is actually a hot medium, rather than cool.
Another section that left me completely in the dark is his statement, about "the century of the psychiatrist's couch." I tried so hard to wrap my head around that one, but no cigar.
I like the idea that the "content" of a medium is typically another medium whose "content" is often yet another medium. I think it is fun exercise in throught to parse the content of a medium through all the layers until you access the true "content."
I think I agree with much of what McLuhan has to say, that is, if I'm understanding it correctly.
"Critique of McLuhan’s Technological determinism viewpoint or lack of one thereof" by Mentor Cana
I did not enjoy reading this. It took me three times to finally make some sense of what Cana was trying to say.
Right from the start, I was unsure of what point Cana aimed to impress on the reader. "Critique of McLuhan's Technological determinism viewpoint or lack of one thereof?" Huh? Does he think McLuhan has a technological determinist point of view or not? I think that there is some technological determinism in McLuhan's ideas.
A major contention I have with Cana's essay is his assertion that McLuhan does "not address the process of technological innovation" and that the process of the coming-to-be of new technologies is something important that McLuhan is ignoring. The way I read McLuhan, he does address the process of technological innovation, however implicitly. In the excerpts from "Understanding Media" assigned in class, McLuhan says that in order to understand the technologies and extensions of man, we must first examine aspects of the media which begins with looking at the "never-explained numbness that each extension brings about in the individual and society." Cana also states that because Man creates these technologies, Man is actually in control. He seems to think that McLuhan suggests that once a technology exists, it is running the show. The feeling I got from reading McLuhan is that it a more entangled situation than that: Man has a need, Man creates technology to suit need, technology giveth and taketh from Man, Man creates new technology to account for downfalls of other technology, ad nauseum.
The first time I read through this piece, I was very resistant to buy into any of Cana's claims. But after re-reading it and re-reading the McLuhan piece, it all started to come together for me.
One point that I can come to grips with that Cana makes is that it is difficult to consider the content independently of the medium. Cana makes the assertion that, indeed, the content is dependents on the medium. And the message each delivers is not the same. However, McLuhan seems to have little interest in content, so I'm not sure Cana's point is very important in his critique. McLuhan makes the argument that the content of a medium is often another medium whose content is often yet another medium. It takes a while to bore through the layers of media to find the information that is being transmitted.
In the end, I think that Cana's ideas were bogged down by his language.
Right from the start, I was unsure of what point Cana aimed to impress on the reader. "Critique of McLuhan's Technological determinism viewpoint or lack of one thereof?" Huh? Does he think McLuhan has a technological determinist point of view or not? I think that there is some technological determinism in McLuhan's ideas.
A major contention I have with Cana's essay is his assertion that McLuhan does "not address the process of technological innovation" and that the process of the coming-to-be of new technologies is something important that McLuhan is ignoring. The way I read McLuhan, he does address the process of technological innovation, however implicitly. In the excerpts from "Understanding Media" assigned in class, McLuhan says that in order to understand the technologies and extensions of man, we must first examine aspects of the media which begins with looking at the "never-explained numbness that each extension brings about in the individual and society." Cana also states that because Man creates these technologies, Man is actually in control. He seems to think that McLuhan suggests that once a technology exists, it is running the show. The feeling I got from reading McLuhan is that it a more entangled situation than that: Man has a need, Man creates technology to suit need, technology giveth and taketh from Man, Man creates new technology to account for downfalls of other technology, ad nauseum.
The first time I read through this piece, I was very resistant to buy into any of Cana's claims. But after re-reading it and re-reading the McLuhan piece, it all started to come together for me.
One point that I can come to grips with that Cana makes is that it is difficult to consider the content independently of the medium. Cana makes the assertion that, indeed, the content is dependents on the medium. And the message each delivers is not the same. However, McLuhan seems to have little interest in content, so I'm not sure Cana's point is very important in his critique. McLuhan makes the argument that the content of a medium is often another medium whose content is often yet another medium. It takes a while to bore through the layers of media to find the information that is being transmitted.
In the end, I think that Cana's ideas were bogged down by his language.
Sunday, September 20, 2009
The Machine is Us/ing us
This video is a good way of demonstrating the theme in Turnley's piece that the medium is an important part of the message. Using new media to demonstrate the evolution and power of new media is effective. I particularly like when he went into the source code to briefly explain the change from HTML to XHTML to XML.
Also, toward the end when he highlights blurbs from text about how we "teach the machine" when we click on links and tag information, I was reminded of Bush's "As We May Think," and his idea of an associative trail through information rather than something indexed and linear.
Also, toward the end when he highlights blurbs from text about how we "teach the machine" when we click on links and tag information, I was reminded of Bush's "As We May Think," and his idea of an associative trail through information rather than something indexed and linear.
"Giving up my iPod for a Walkman" by Scott Campbell
This was a cute little article. The point-of-view was interesting and I especially liked when he admitted it took him three days to figure out there was music on the other side of the tape. I grew up with cassette tapes -- didn't get a CD player until I was 10 or so -- so I can't imagine not intuitively understanding how they work.
Campbell writes, "Perhaps that kind of anticipation and excitement has been somewhat lost in the flood of new products which now hit our shelves on a regular basis." When I first read this sentence I agreed. But then I remembered how my friends were behaving in the week leading up to the release of the newest iPhone and the roll-out the night before of the software upgrade ...
What I liked most was reading the readers' comments -- people nostalgic for the simplicity of an outdated technology, even though we all anxiously await Apple's latest release.
Campbell writes, "Perhaps that kind of anticipation and excitement has been somewhat lost in the flood of new products which now hit our shelves on a regular basis." When I first read this sentence I agreed. But then I remembered how my friends were behaving in the week leading up to the release of the newest iPhone and the roll-out the night before of the software upgrade ...
What I liked most was reading the readers' comments -- people nostalgic for the simplicity of an outdated technology, even though we all anxiously await Apple's latest release.
"Towards a Mediological Method" by Melinda Turnley
I'm happy to say this was less painful to read than anticipated.
A prevalent theme in Turnley's piece that I think is very important for media-makers is the idea that the medium is part of the message it is communicating. The medium is not simply a means to and end. It is also a part of the end. One has to consider the most effective medium to use to convey a message, and also consider how this medium will impact the message. A motto early on when I worked at a newspaper creating multimedia content is: "Just because you can, doesn't mean you should." This is an exciting time of emerging media and it is fun to try new things and new ways of presenting information. But the creator has to be aware and critical enough to consider which way is best.
Turnley's piece fit nicely with the Vannevar Bush article. I found myself scribbling little notes in the margins while reading "Towards a Mediological Method" alluding to Bush's article, namely in her explanations of the economic and archival dimensions.
I think I was most enlightened by the explanation of the epistemological dimension. "Once a medium's methods for structuring information are culturally normed, that medium becomes associated with certain definitions of intelligence, facility, and literacy." This idea had never really occurred to me. I supposed I understood the concept on some level, but I had never really put it into words as Turnley has.This also ties into socioeconomic factors. When a certain group of people are not literate in a medium, it is often because they don't have the resources to access it. I think of the National Broadband Plan and the stories I've heard about people being at major disadvantages because they don't have easy access to high-speed Internet. People who aren't connected to the Internet all the time are kind of living in caves, so to speak.
The overlapping of the dimensions within the explanation of each was a nice parallel to the idea of media convergence and what it means and how to analyze it. With more evolved ways of communicating messages that include multiple media with multiple implications, we are forced to consider many aspects of each.
However, this overlapping makes it difficult for me to parse the many ideas in Turnley's piece. I think I walked away from reading it with an understanding of what she is talking about, but it's the kind of understanding I can't readily put into a coherent message.
A prevalent theme in Turnley's piece that I think is very important for media-makers is the idea that the medium is part of the message it is communicating. The medium is not simply a means to and end. It is also a part of the end. One has to consider the most effective medium to use to convey a message, and also consider how this medium will impact the message. A motto early on when I worked at a newspaper creating multimedia content is: "Just because you can, doesn't mean you should." This is an exciting time of emerging media and it is fun to try new things and new ways of presenting information. But the creator has to be aware and critical enough to consider which way is best.
Turnley's piece fit nicely with the Vannevar Bush article. I found myself scribbling little notes in the margins while reading "Towards a Mediological Method" alluding to Bush's article, namely in her explanations of the economic and archival dimensions.
I think I was most enlightened by the explanation of the epistemological dimension. "Once a medium's methods for structuring information are culturally normed, that medium becomes associated with certain definitions of intelligence, facility, and literacy." This idea had never really occurred to me. I supposed I understood the concept on some level, but I had never really put it into words as Turnley has.This also ties into socioeconomic factors. When a certain group of people are not literate in a medium, it is often because they don't have the resources to access it. I think of the National Broadband Plan and the stories I've heard about people being at major disadvantages because they don't have easy access to high-speed Internet. People who aren't connected to the Internet all the time are kind of living in caves, so to speak.
The overlapping of the dimensions within the explanation of each was a nice parallel to the idea of media convergence and what it means and how to analyze it. With more evolved ways of communicating messages that include multiple media with multiple implications, we are forced to consider many aspects of each.
However, this overlapping makes it difficult for me to parse the many ideas in Turnley's piece. I think I walked away from reading it with an understanding of what she is talking about, but it's the kind of understanding I can't readily put into a coherent message.
"As We May Think" by Vannevar Bush
Knowing before I began reading it that Bush's As We May Think was a bit prophetic, I considered how I thought Ender's Game to be prophetic, what with the boards Valentine and Peter post on. Bush's piece is far more forward-thinking and right-on than Card's novel, though.
Writing in 1945, he argues we have a great deal of recorded human knowledge and experience without an efficient method of selection and retrieval. In a sense, we have too much knowledge and experience on record because we can't even use it if we aren't able to quickly sift through it to get what we need to suit our purposes. He envisions a method of record-keeping that allows the user/researcher to sort through records in an associative, natural manner, rather than the archaic method of his time -- pre-determined, indexed paths to obtaining information. He envisions a way to create "trails" of discovery from one piece of information to the next, akin to a stream of consciousness -- one datum leading to a related piece of datum leading to yet another, however digressive it may be.
This idea is very much like the WWW as we know it today. A rudimentary search about Mercury in retrograde can land a user at the homepage for the local Quaker Circle of Friends an hour later. How did he get from astrology to Quakers? Keep clicking the "back" button on his browser or check out his web history.
I think, though, that we are still experiencing a similar overwhelmedness (is that a word?) to the one Bush seems to express. There is so much information and so many ways to veer off the narrow path one intended to stay on that it is easy to lose focus when performing research on the Internet. I find myself seeing links on a page and thinking "Oh, I'll come back and check that out after i click this link" and then I never do end up returning. It is as though we have gotten too good at linking the different "trails" of information associations and I find myself getting overwhelmed and distracted, sometimes frustrated and put-off altogether.
Another concept Bush brings up that I liked is the idea of mechanizing repetitive thoughts/actions to free up the brain for more creative purposes. Likewise, he argues that if we have a better archiving system that allows for ease of access and navigation, Man can stop trying to remember everything. The archival technology will remember it for him, freeing up brain space for other endeavors.
Writing in 1945, he argues we have a great deal of recorded human knowledge and experience without an efficient method of selection and retrieval. In a sense, we have too much knowledge and experience on record because we can't even use it if we aren't able to quickly sift through it to get what we need to suit our purposes. He envisions a method of record-keeping that allows the user/researcher to sort through records in an associative, natural manner, rather than the archaic method of his time -- pre-determined, indexed paths to obtaining information. He envisions a way to create "trails" of discovery from one piece of information to the next, akin to a stream of consciousness -- one datum leading to a related piece of datum leading to yet another, however digressive it may be.
This idea is very much like the WWW as we know it today. A rudimentary search about Mercury in retrograde can land a user at the homepage for the local Quaker Circle of Friends an hour later. How did he get from astrology to Quakers? Keep clicking the "back" button on his browser or check out his web history.
I think, though, that we are still experiencing a similar overwhelmedness (is that a word?) to the one Bush seems to express. There is so much information and so many ways to veer off the narrow path one intended to stay on that it is easy to lose focus when performing research on the Internet. I find myself seeing links on a page and thinking "Oh, I'll come back and check that out after i click this link" and then I never do end up returning. It is as though we have gotten too good at linking the different "trails" of information associations and I find myself getting overwhelmed and distracted, sometimes frustrated and put-off altogether.
Another concept Bush brings up that I liked is the idea of mechanizing repetitive thoughts/actions to free up the brain for more creative purposes. Likewise, he argues that if we have a better archiving system that allows for ease of access and navigation, Man can stop trying to remember everything. The archival technology will remember it for him, freeing up brain space for other endeavors.
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