All of the information comes from an interview on DemocracyNow! with Lawrence Lessig and opinions by me. You find the interview at http://www.democracynow.org/2008/4/17/law_professor_lawrence_lessig_on_net
-Net Neutrality
-Google
-‘Creative Commons’
-‘Change Congress’
A Public hearing on Net Neutrality in Stanford on Thursday, April 17, 2008, was held to discuss the rules that should govern the Internet. This is part of an ongoing investigation into Comcast who blocked the uploading of peer-to-peer video traffic on BitTorrent. The first hearing was in February at Harvard where Comcast paid people to fill seats and genuine participants had to wait outside. Lawrence Lessig, a leader in cyberlaw, founder and co-director of Stanford Law School’s Center for Internet and Society and Chair of Creative Commons Project, and most recent project, Change Congress, discuss the urgent issues with the Internet. In class we watched a Ted talk with him on “How creativity is being strangled by the law”.
As the monopoly of power over the Internet increases between a few major telecommunication conglomerates we are beginning to loose what made the Internet so exceptional, the power it gives to the people. The major companies like Comcast are trying ‘pick and choose’ what will run on their networks and what kind of information will be available. The issue of network neutrality is being discussed to make sure the government doesn’t allow them to have this kind of control.
Comcast is being investigated for blocking peer-to-peer sharing on BitTorrent. They continued to deny that they were blocking traffic until it was proven, and only then did they say, “Well, we’re not blocking the traffic; we’re just slowing the traffic.” They were accomplishing this by ‘inserting little messages’ to confuse the users.
Lessig tries to explain the concept of net neutrality with a helpful analogy: When you plug appliances into a wall it doesn’t distinguish who is plugging it in, what it is, or who made it. This is a neutral network. Now the telecommunications industries are trying to regulate the network. It’s not about just putting on whatever information you want or being able to access any information you want, you would have to pay to have content on the internet and the network will decide whether they want that content to be available. Making it a non-neutral network.
If the information had to be approved before it got to be published, Lessig says that sites like Google would of never been possible. Google has created a system that has figured out a way to add value to what’s out there on the web. If they had need approval before adding it to the Internet, it would’ve take years for the companies to figure out the technology and approve it. Lessig describes this predicament as:
“What the internet did, for most of its history, was say to innovators, ‘If you build the next great mousetrap, it will run on our network.’ And what’s happening now is the network owners are basically saying, ‘No, we want the right to say whether something can run on our network or not. Now, trust us. We’ll pick the best applications, and we’ll make sure that it’s the right mix of speech.’ And that’s why it’s become critical that the FCC set a very clear principle here, that they want a network, an internet network, that’s consistent with the way it’s been from the very beginning: open and neutral and free.”
Creative Commons deals with another aspect that involves ownership and the Internet. Five years ago Creative Commons was created as a response to what his group sees as “radically overburden some regulation around copyright”. Basically people want to have there work out there for other people such as artist to reuse, remix and be creative with (excluding commercial purposes), but copy right law says you must get permission to use it. Now people can mark their creative work with Creative Commons license and the “freedoms they want it to carry”. Now there are over one hundred million objects marked with Creative Commons license.
Lessig’s Change Congress project was developed with the idea that real reform happens in Congress and we have to make Congress committed to reform. Lessig sees the public as having a fundamental lack of faith in what the government does and that the system is about money. So what a Change Congress license does is it says:
“I’m not going to take money from lobbyists or PACs, I believe in public financing for public elections, I want to abolish earmarks, and I believe in increased transparency in Congress.”
At the end of the interview Amy Goodman asked Lessing, “What do you see is the role of media in reforming government?”
His basic response was that they needed to “get deeper”. He brought up the point that in the beginning of interview she said, “No sound bites”, Lessig views the media’s as focusing to represent information in as little time as possible to keep peoples attention, as a result, nothing substantial is ever explored. Sound bites are such short pieces of speech that can also easily be taken out of their context and as easily manipulated. Also when I looked up sound bite on Wikipedia I found it interesting that Marshall McLuhan helped to recognize the phenomenon.
I believe that the idea of no sound bites is essential to the transparency in media, government, news, and everything else. What makes DemocracyNow! such a great source for news and information is how successful they are in making information available. They don’t sum up reports for you, they bring in people from the source, who know first hand what they’re talking about and they sit for a good 20 min to discuss the stories in depth. DemocracyNow! also makes their broadcasts and transcripts available for any one to use, implementing the Creative Commons project. This interview with Lawrence Lessig would have never happened on any other major news station and intern the in-depth explanation would have never been heard.
Thursday, April 24, 2008
Thursday, April 17, 2008
Wikipedia Entry
I edited an article on Wikipedia on "Sustainable Fashion". This is the second written on this subject, because a year ago I did the same for my Popular Art Writing class. The first time I wrote the article there was no existing entry and it was quickly deleted due to the 'lack' of references. This time there was an article already there, but I found it bare minimal. I've begun to edit the entry and so far, since I posted the recent changes this morning , nothing has happened. I still have a lot more I want to and will continue to write.
I find writing entries in Wikipedia to be very difficult, and truly only possible when you are an expert in a topic. Yet there again it puts you in a predicament, because you may know information about a topic in your head, but you have to find resources to support the information. Another way that I find Wikipedia difficult is writing in 'fact' form, which is different than sort the opinion format that we're guided to take at this school.
I am excited to continue working on this article, find as much information as I can and be a contributor to Wikipedia!
I find writing entries in Wikipedia to be very difficult, and truly only possible when you are an expert in a topic. Yet there again it puts you in a predicament, because you may know information about a topic in your head, but you have to find resources to support the information. Another way that I find Wikipedia difficult is writing in 'fact' form, which is different than sort the opinion format that we're guided to take at this school.
I am excited to continue working on this article, find as much information as I can and be a contributor to Wikipedia!
Wednesday, February 27, 2008
MIDTERM:my posts
MY OUTLOOK ON THE BLOGOSPHERE.......
I think that part of the big allure of participating in the blogosphere is that under normal circumstances the participants are anonymous except for a user name and maybe a profile. But face-to-face interaction is almost completely avoided. Blogging is also a great rapid response public platform to share information. The only blog that I’ve attempted to write on before this class was the ‘Huffington Post’, but I was too intimidated. There are a couple other reasons why I haven’t done blogging before, usually it is all very opinionated and it’s very difficult for me to decide concretely my thoughts in writing, it also takes a lot of time and thinking and reading in front of the computer and I’d like to think that I try to avoid my exposure time in front of the computer as much as possible. I can see blogging as being just another addicting thing to distract me from interaction in real life. I use the computer for reading the news, communicating with family and friends, and as a general information resource. I do believe that blogging is a great resource to share information, but as an Otis student I don’t have that precious free time to dabble in the blogosphere, maybe I’ll look into it after I graduate. But for now, I’ll keep blogging strictly to media studies.
Mike's Blog: responce to "What I learned about McLuhan"
A really interesting point that Mike brought up of the McLuhan interview was about his use of Tribal Man vs. Literate Man. Mike quoted McLuhan, “another basic characteristic distinguishing tribal man from his literate successor is that he lived in a world of acoustic space, which gave him a radically different concept of time-space relationship.” For me this is really interesting, the idea of living in acoustic space, which implies round space, organic space where beginning middle and end to no exist. Maybe the Internet is a modern form of acoustic space in that every page or space that we look at as an infinite amount of options to open up new windows and links. I think this concept is especially true for Wikipedia. The idea of Wikipedia also makes me think about something that Henry Jenkins said in the forum we went to, he spoke about the power of ‘we’ instead of ‘I’. I think that the Internet in contrast to books is an another example of the power of ‘we’. We are the ones using, creating and interacting with one another on the Internet. It connects us on a communal and world level. The idea of the collective ‘we’ also makes reference to the ‘tribal man’. In many tribal societies there is no concept of ‘I’, it is always about the community, us and how ‘we’ interact and live together. Jenkins also spoke of the “participatory culture” which is also a major aspect of “tribal man”. It tribal culture it the participation and working together that allows the tribe to survive. Wikipedia would not exist is it wasn’t for the community participation in it’s creation. I believe that the popularity and success of the internet is greatly due to the fact that it is a participatory medium. An example that Jenkins gave was the power of community, that the reason why we do thinks like bowling leagues or gaming, it’s not necessarily doing those things, but the conversations that happen around it. Basically, that it doesn’t matter what medium we use to connect to one another, it is the relations and conversations that occur through his process that is the driving force behind out participation. Another example would be what we’re all doing right now, blogging. I think that blogging can also be another form of this no beginning, middle or end. It is an open ended conversation.
February 28, 2008 11:35 AM
Kate's Blog: responce to "Power to the People"
The most important idea that Kate brought up in the future of the internet is how companies are going to make money in this seemingly free enterprise. Kate said, “The problem for the corporations is that the download culture has created an expectation of free media… Any company that wishes to compete in this new climate must restructure their business model and understand that free can also equal profit. The solution must be free media.” The beauty of the internet is the open access and freedom that we have when using the internet. The internet is completely bias, anyone, any corporation large or small can be successful. The web of an infinite amount of information is at our fingure tips. Somebody has to make money somewhere, but the media “must be free media.” Now the question is for how long? Companies are finding ways to make money and being smarter about advertising placement and there’s also the whole threat of Net Neutrality.
I think that some of the most successful ways that advertisers have made effective use of the internet is on Myspace and in the beginning of many videos viewed on line (excluding You Tube). For example, Myspace has ads everywhere, most of the time it’s relatively easy to ignore them. The most successful impossible to ignore placement is when you first go onto the home page, more often than not, there will be an ad that covers almost the whole page. This is usually done when a new movie comes out in the theaters. This works so well because most of the time the background is white, then all of a sudden one day you sign on and there’s a colorful ad covering the whole background usually accompanied by some kind of trail. I don’t think I’ve ever actually paid attention to it, but it’s impossible to completely disregard. The second way companies have been successful to make viewers pay attention to advertising it that sometimes on videos (like on TV sites or something similar) in the beginning they have figured out a way to disable the fast forward button for the commercials. Basically you’re sitting there waiting for the show to start, you can’t press fast forward, you know the ads going to be short and you don’t want to miss the beginning…so you are in a way, forced to watch the ad.
Another threat to equal “free” internet is the idea of Net Neutrality, which “prevents Internet providers from speeding up or slowing down Web content based on its source, ownership or destination…The nation's largest telephone and cable companies -- including AT&T, Verizon, Comcast and Time Warner -- want to be Internet gatekeepers, deciding which Web sites go fast or slow and which won't load at all.”(from www.savetheinternet.com) This is a complicated issue and worth looking into. Here is some more information from Wikipedia about Net Neutrality”“Some of the arguments associated with network neutrality regulations came into prominence in mid 2002, offered by the "High Tech Broadband Coalition", a group comprising developers for Amazon.com, Google, and Microsoft. However, the fuller concept of "Network neutrality" was developed mainly by regulators and legal academics, most prominently law professors Tim Wu and Lawrence Lessig and Federal Communications Commission Chairman Michael Powell most often while speaking at the Annual Digital Broadband Migration conference or writing within the pages of the Journal of Telecommunications and High Technology Law,[24] both of the University of Colorado School of Law….In April 2006 a large coalition of public interest, consumer rights and free speech advocacy groups and thousands of bloggers -- such as Free Press, Gun Owners of America, American Library Association, Christian Coalition of America, Consumers Union, Common Cause and MoveOn -- launched the SavetheInternet.com Coalition, a broad-based initiative working to "ensure that Congress passes no telecommunications legislation without meaningful and enforceable Network Neutrality protections."” (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Net_neutrality)
Aya's Blog: responce to "Millenials"
I also found the Millennials video very interesting, especially the part, like Aya said “They are also very positive and casual about their life, such as job. They believe that they can do anything.” I really do believe it’s true, I really do believe that I can do anything. I also strongly believe in making the work environment as fun and enjoyable as everyday life. This was the second time that I’d heard about the characteristics of Millennials. Though, it does feel a bit weird to hear our generation categorized and really relate and agree with a lot of the characterizations.
Also as Aya said, “The video made me think about difference between me and my parents”, but unlike Aya, for me this is were the lines blurred a bit more. Both of parents have nicer phones than I do, but I use text messaging more. My mom has more knowledge about computer programs than I do, but I spend more time on the internet and use websites like You Tube and Myspace unlike her. I didn’t have a digital camera till a couple months ago, but my dad has always had top quality digital cameras. So maybe the difference between the generations isn’t so much the amount of technology we use, but how we use it.
The way in which Millennials interact with one another really has transformed the technological world. The people who started the social networks of both Myspace and Facebook are Millennials. As part of this generation we are experiencing and acting in this environment first hand and through the power of the internet we have a new power of the self, maybe that’s why we think we can do anything. Like Aya describes in her last sentence, “It was very interesting experience that I saw how Millennials and the digital world have changed whole world, and I am also part of it.”
February 27th, 2008 at 6:34 pm
I think that part of the big allure of participating in the blogosphere is that under normal circumstances the participants are anonymous except for a user name and maybe a profile. But face-to-face interaction is almost completely avoided. Blogging is also a great rapid response public platform to share information. The only blog that I’ve attempted to write on before this class was the ‘Huffington Post’, but I was too intimidated. There are a couple other reasons why I haven’t done blogging before, usually it is all very opinionated and it’s very difficult for me to decide concretely my thoughts in writing, it also takes a lot of time and thinking and reading in front of the computer and I’d like to think that I try to avoid my exposure time in front of the computer as much as possible. I can see blogging as being just another addicting thing to distract me from interaction in real life. I use the computer for reading the news, communicating with family and friends, and as a general information resource. I do believe that blogging is a great resource to share information, but as an Otis student I don’t have that precious free time to dabble in the blogosphere, maybe I’ll look into it after I graduate. But for now, I’ll keep blogging strictly to media studies.
Mike's Blog: responce to "What I learned about McLuhan"
A really interesting point that Mike brought up of the McLuhan interview was about his use of Tribal Man vs. Literate Man. Mike quoted McLuhan, “another basic characteristic distinguishing tribal man from his literate successor is that he lived in a world of acoustic space, which gave him a radically different concept of time-space relationship.” For me this is really interesting, the idea of living in acoustic space, which implies round space, organic space where beginning middle and end to no exist. Maybe the Internet is a modern form of acoustic space in that every page or space that we look at as an infinite amount of options to open up new windows and links. I think this concept is especially true for Wikipedia. The idea of Wikipedia also makes me think about something that Henry Jenkins said in the forum we went to, he spoke about the power of ‘we’ instead of ‘I’. I think that the Internet in contrast to books is an another example of the power of ‘we’. We are the ones using, creating and interacting with one another on the Internet. It connects us on a communal and world level. The idea of the collective ‘we’ also makes reference to the ‘tribal man’. In many tribal societies there is no concept of ‘I’, it is always about the community, us and how ‘we’ interact and live together. Jenkins also spoke of the “participatory culture” which is also a major aspect of “tribal man”. It tribal culture it the participation and working together that allows the tribe to survive. Wikipedia would not exist is it wasn’t for the community participation in it’s creation. I believe that the popularity and success of the internet is greatly due to the fact that it is a participatory medium. An example that Jenkins gave was the power of community, that the reason why we do thinks like bowling leagues or gaming, it’s not necessarily doing those things, but the conversations that happen around it. Basically, that it doesn’t matter what medium we use to connect to one another, it is the relations and conversations that occur through his process that is the driving force behind out participation. Another example would be what we’re all doing right now, blogging. I think that blogging can also be another form of this no beginning, middle or end. It is an open ended conversation.
February 28, 2008 11:35 AM
Kate's Blog: responce to "Power to the People"
The most important idea that Kate brought up in the future of the internet is how companies are going to make money in this seemingly free enterprise. Kate said, “The problem for the corporations is that the download culture has created an expectation of free media… Any company that wishes to compete in this new climate must restructure their business model and understand that free can also equal profit. The solution must be free media.” The beauty of the internet is the open access and freedom that we have when using the internet. The internet is completely bias, anyone, any corporation large or small can be successful. The web of an infinite amount of information is at our fingure tips. Somebody has to make money somewhere, but the media “must be free media.” Now the question is for how long? Companies are finding ways to make money and being smarter about advertising placement and there’s also the whole threat of Net Neutrality.
I think that some of the most successful ways that advertisers have made effective use of the internet is on Myspace and in the beginning of many videos viewed on line (excluding You Tube). For example, Myspace has ads everywhere, most of the time it’s relatively easy to ignore them. The most successful impossible to ignore placement is when you first go onto the home page, more often than not, there will be an ad that covers almost the whole page. This is usually done when a new movie comes out in the theaters. This works so well because most of the time the background is white, then all of a sudden one day you sign on and there’s a colorful ad covering the whole background usually accompanied by some kind of trail. I don’t think I’ve ever actually paid attention to it, but it’s impossible to completely disregard. The second way companies have been successful to make viewers pay attention to advertising it that sometimes on videos (like on TV sites or something similar) in the beginning they have figured out a way to disable the fast forward button for the commercials. Basically you’re sitting there waiting for the show to start, you can’t press fast forward, you know the ads going to be short and you don’t want to miss the beginning…so you are in a way, forced to watch the ad.
Another threat to equal “free” internet is the idea of Net Neutrality, which “prevents Internet providers from speeding up or slowing down Web content based on its source, ownership or destination…The nation's largest telephone and cable companies -- including AT&T, Verizon, Comcast and Time Warner -- want to be Internet gatekeepers, deciding which Web sites go fast or slow and which won't load at all.”(from www.savetheinternet.com) This is a complicated issue and worth looking into. Here is some more information from Wikipedia about Net Neutrality”“Some of the arguments associated with network neutrality regulations came into prominence in mid 2002, offered by the "High Tech Broadband Coalition", a group comprising developers for Amazon.com, Google, and Microsoft. However, the fuller concept of "Network neutrality" was developed mainly by regulators and legal academics, most prominently law professors Tim Wu and Lawrence Lessig and Federal Communications Commission Chairman Michael Powell most often while speaking at the Annual Digital Broadband Migration conference or writing within the pages of the Journal of Telecommunications and High Technology Law,[24] both of the University of Colorado School of Law….In April 2006 a large coalition of public interest, consumer rights and free speech advocacy groups and thousands of bloggers -- such as Free Press, Gun Owners of America, American Library Association, Christian Coalition of America, Consumers Union, Common Cause and MoveOn -- launched the SavetheInternet.com Coalition, a broad-based initiative working to "ensure that Congress passes no telecommunications legislation without meaningful and enforceable Network Neutrality protections."” (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Net_neutrality)
Aya's Blog: responce to "Millenials"
I also found the Millennials video very interesting, especially the part, like Aya said “They are also very positive and casual about their life, such as job. They believe that they can do anything.” I really do believe it’s true, I really do believe that I can do anything. I also strongly believe in making the work environment as fun and enjoyable as everyday life. This was the second time that I’d heard about the characteristics of Millennials. Though, it does feel a bit weird to hear our generation categorized and really relate and agree with a lot of the characterizations.
Also as Aya said, “The video made me think about difference between me and my parents”, but unlike Aya, for me this is were the lines blurred a bit more. Both of parents have nicer phones than I do, but I use text messaging more. My mom has more knowledge about computer programs than I do, but I spend more time on the internet and use websites like You Tube and Myspace unlike her. I didn’t have a digital camera till a couple months ago, but my dad has always had top quality digital cameras. So maybe the difference between the generations isn’t so much the amount of technology we use, but how we use it.
The way in which Millennials interact with one another really has transformed the technological world. The people who started the social networks of both Myspace and Facebook are Millennials. As part of this generation we are experiencing and acting in this environment first hand and through the power of the internet we have a new power of the self, maybe that’s why we think we can do anything. Like Aya describes in her last sentence, “It was very interesting experience that I saw how Millennials and the digital world have changed whole world, and I am also part of it.”
February 27th, 2008 at 6:34 pm
Thursday, February 21, 2008
Deconstructing Medias
Diesel AdWho created this media message? Why?
Diesel created this media message to sell their clothing and maybe possible to raise awareness or be a parody of global warming.
Who is the target audience? What text, images or sounds suggest this?
The target audience age ranges from 21-35, who are wealthy to be able to buy the clothing, live in a city, probably aware of global warming, but not concerned enough to do something about it. Could be male or female.
What is the text (literal meaning) of the message?
A man and women obviously enjoying themselves and looking good while the rest of the world is underwater.
What is the subtext (unstated or hidden message)?
If you wear Diesel you’ll be prepared for anything, have nice clothes, be oblivious to the problem and look sexy in the process.
What tools of persuasion are being used?“Diversion”: The major image in the ad is of a city under water and the text “global warming ready” indicating that Diesel is prepared and or aware of the problem, and by wearing diesel, you will be too. The issue is diverged with the sexual foreground image of the man and the women, turning the issue from something serious to something erotic.
“The Big Lie”: By buying Diesel you’ll be global warming reading. In reality, nothing you do when purchasing their cloths will either making you ready for global warming or more importantly do anything to prevent it.
What healthy messages are communicated? What unhealthy messaged are communicated?
Maybe the healthy message could be that they have created just one more place where the platform is put out on the table to discuss global warming. Possibly part of the message is the sarcasm in the idea that if you look and dress like that you’re ready for anything. On the unhealthy side they are still selling the idea as something fantastical, possibly improbable and gives no solutions to the problem.
What part of the story is not being told?
That by continuing to buy their clothing, you’re continuing to propel the circle of consumption and continuing the progress of global warming.
Hitachi Flat Screen Ad
Who is the target audience? What text, images or sounds suggest this?Adults who have money to spend on new technology, who most likely have a family.
What is the text (literal meaning) of the message?The first thing you see is a boy and a girl playing around in a living room, then a voice says “Superior flat screen technology from Hitachi”. So you then realize the kids are watching television, and then the voice says, “A great picture, which ever way you look at it”. The camera zooms in on the little girl emphasizing her innocence.
What is the subtext (unstated or hidden message)?
Saying that your kids will enjoy TV, their innocence will be saved and they’ll interactive while watching. It’s the next superior generation of TVs for you or your children. That your kids will be active and healthy and they’ll benefit from watching TV.
What tools of persuasion are being used?Hyperbole: “A great picture, which ever way you look at it” It’s impressive sounding language that is both vague and meaningless. It’s used to impress the target and make them more susceptible to the sales pitch.
Warm & Fuzzy: Using children as sentimental images to sell the product.
What healthy messages are communicated? What unhealthy messaged are communicated?I don’t believe that there’s a healthy message here at all. The unhealthy message is that the ad is saying that a television for your living room to distract your kids and entertain them is good idea.
What part of the story is not being told?
When children actually watch television they usually never moving around or being interactive…their eyes are glued and their absorbing everything that’s being sold to them, from toys to food, in all the ways that media uses children to continue the cycle of consumption.
see ad at: http://youtube.com/watch?v=T8lfHQVHpNk
Lars and the Real GirlWho created this media message? Why?
The writer was Nancy Oliver, director Craig Gillespie and produced by Sidney Kimmel Entertainment. The main actors were Ryan Gosling, Emily Mortimer, Paul Schneider, Kelli Garner, and Patricia Clarkson. The movie was made to a positive moral story about real life issues, human relationships, mental illness, community and acceptance.
Who is the target audience? What text, images or sounds suggest this?
Above 16, older audience who could understand the issues. Probably lower to upper class, to anyone who is open to idea we’re not perfect. I believe that as a society we tend to lock up and neglect people with mental illness. This movie showed a community who came together and excepted Lars because he was a part of the community because we’re all delusional in out own ways.
What is the text (literal meaning) of the message?
The story is about different individuals dealing with different issue. Lars is dealing with forming relations with people in the real world. His mother died at his birth, his brother left as soon as he got the chance and his father was never a good father and died when he young as well. Lars’s brother has a house and wife and soon to be father, now he’s dealing with his brother delusion that the sex doll that he bought from the internet is a real girlfriend. For him he’s tackling the issue of the guilt he feels for abandoning his brother and learning to reconnect with him and accept him for who he is. Even the doctor psychiatrist has her issues that she is working out as she is helping out. But what is special about the story is that no matter what, the whole community is there for Lars to help him get through his delusion.
What is the subtext (unstated or hidden message)?
That we all have issues, that they may be in different shapes and forms, but we all have them. I think that the underlying moral is to be excepting of each other’s differences and as a community, if we work together we can achieve anything.
What tools of persuasion are being used?
“Humor”: Humor is defiantly used to sell the story, to easy the tension and problems that the characters have.
“Scientific Evidence”: The doctor in the movies, wearing a lab coat is the one who tells Lars brother and wife that to fix the problem they need to go along with it.
What healthy messages are communicated? What unhealthy messaged are communicated?
The overwhelming healthy message is acceptance and the power of community. I believe that I really see an unhealthy message in the movie.
What part of the story is not being told?
What it takes to create a movie, the time and money and effort.
Tuesday, February 19, 2008
What I learned about the complex Marshal McLuhan from the Playboy Interveiw of 1969
Marshal McLuhan saw himself as an investigator of the ‘technological environment’. What made his discoveries and thinking possible was his openness to discuss and question what we may seem to think as fact or givens, such as the phonetic alphabet merely being a tool for communication. I have some disagreements with some of his ideas, but I believe that much of that has to do with some of the ways he describes issues in the interview. The fact that he considered himself a “generalist, not a specialist" was both advantageous and disadvantageous in that he was able to cover large topics, but in that process his messages weren’t as cohesive. What I do admire is his non-commitment and openness to any theory or fixed point of view, which opened the door for him to have such revolutionary ideas.
McLuhan believed that technology was an extension of humans, just like clothing is an extension of our skin. If we don’t realize the influence and power of the ‘technological environment’ over us, then we are in for big trouble as a society. He described in the interview his main reason for his investigations is:
“…to convey the message, that by understanding media as they extend man, we gain a measure of control over them.”
He believes that things first went astray with the development of the phonetic alphabet. McLuhan sees all media as extensions of humans that have immense effects on our nervous system that numbs us. He warns that we develop a syndrome called “Narcissus Narcosis” where by “man remains unaware of the psychic and social effects of his new technology as a fish of water it swims in.”
I believe that to understand the effects of media is extremely important to us as designers and artists because we are the ones who are creating and using medium. McLuhan believes it is:
“…the artist who perceives the alterations in man caused by a new medium”, and that “most people are blissfully ignorant of what the media does to them.”
This is especially true to artist because we are more hyper-aware of the environment around us because we know how objects and things are constructed and we thrive off and work in the global world…we make media for people. This is why it is so important to understand his message.
McLuhan talks about the demise of the ‘literate man’ and the power of ‘tribal man’.
“Literate man is alienated impoverished man; retribalized man can lead a far richer and more fulfilling life—not the life of a mindless drone but of the participant in a seamless web of interdependence and harmony.”
This is an example of where McLuhan’s generalization works against him because I don’t believe the issue is so black and white. First of all, isn’t McLuhan the ‘literate man’? Without his knowledge in literature he wouldn’t be who he is. I agree in his idea that the retribalization of society would lead to a “far-richer and more fulfilling life”, but that can only be accomplished through the sharing of knowledge and use of media. Through the blending of what the phonetic alphabet has given us and with the blending of tribal values a beautiful global community is possible. This can only be accomplished with caution and with the aid of the McLuhan’s warnings of the power of media and the effect of the expansion of the technological environment on humans.
McLuhan believed that technology was an extension of humans, just like clothing is an extension of our skin. If we don’t realize the influence and power of the ‘technological environment’ over us, then we are in for big trouble as a society. He described in the interview his main reason for his investigations is:
“…to convey the message, that by understanding media as they extend man, we gain a measure of control over them.”
He believes that things first went astray with the development of the phonetic alphabet. McLuhan sees all media as extensions of humans that have immense effects on our nervous system that numbs us. He warns that we develop a syndrome called “Narcissus Narcosis” where by “man remains unaware of the psychic and social effects of his new technology as a fish of water it swims in.”
I believe that to understand the effects of media is extremely important to us as designers and artists because we are the ones who are creating and using medium. McLuhan believes it is:
“…the artist who perceives the alterations in man caused by a new medium”, and that “most people are blissfully ignorant of what the media does to them.”
This is especially true to artist because we are more hyper-aware of the environment around us because we know how objects and things are constructed and we thrive off and work in the global world…we make media for people. This is why it is so important to understand his message.
McLuhan talks about the demise of the ‘literate man’ and the power of ‘tribal man’.
“Literate man is alienated impoverished man; retribalized man can lead a far richer and more fulfilling life—not the life of a mindless drone but of the participant in a seamless web of interdependence and harmony.”
This is an example of where McLuhan’s generalization works against him because I don’t believe the issue is so black and white. First of all, isn’t McLuhan the ‘literate man’? Without his knowledge in literature he wouldn’t be who he is. I agree in his idea that the retribalization of society would lead to a “far-richer and more fulfilling life”, but that can only be accomplished through the sharing of knowledge and use of media. Through the blending of what the phonetic alphabet has given us and with the blending of tribal values a beautiful global community is possible. This can only be accomplished with caution and with the aid of the McLuhan’s warnings of the power of media and the effect of the expansion of the technological environment on humans.
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)
The quote that you pulled out from the interview that really stood out to me was about the power of the book.
“McLuhan suggests that the invention of the book creates nationalism and the spread of popular ideas, "...narrative chronology in literature and a psychological mode of introspection...that greatly intensified the tendencies toward individualism and specialization engendered 2000 years before by phonetic literacy."”
The book is a tool. As you said, you use books as your tool to express your art. Schools use books to teach subjects, novelist use books to tell stories, and chefs’ use books publish recipes. A book is a way to share information, which can lead to individualism, but can also be a tool for community.
I think that the medium of how information is shared, whether it’s verbally, phonetically, or through images is not the problem. As technology expands, information becomes more widespread, opening more doors of intellect every step of way. The problem is when the medium is used as a tool of deception, when we don’t question the content of the medium and who’s saying it. As McLuhan suggested, the spread of nationalism. Take for example the history classes that I grew in through the LAUSD system. If I could burn all those history books I would. It was the most blatant US nationalist campaign. It wasn’t until high school, when I had a teacher that didn’t use the books that I began to question and look past the sugar coated stories of what the government was teaching it’s youth.
Of course you are using the book as medium to your advantage, the same way the a painter uses paint and canvas to their advantage, and as a fashion designer I use the human body and cloth to my advantage.
My point being, I disagree with McLuhan that it’s not the medium, but rather how the medium is used. There needs to be healthy skepticsm in all that’s fed to us no matter what shape or form it takes.