MchLuhan believes that the medium shapes the message and that it controls the meaning as well. People give the meaning in accordance with the particular medium and there is also the important point that even content is the medium. Each medium has a specific time related to its reproduction. McLuhan also talks about light bulbs comparing them to the medium which doesn not have a content, but still has impact on the darkness.
With the evolution of the media, there have been many changes in the lives of people. “The medium, or process, of our time – electric technology – is reshaping and restructuring patterns of social interdependence and every aspect of our personal life” (McLuhan 8). People depend on one another more with the development of media and technology because the job market asks for very specific positions and many new skills are being required in modern times. “All media are extensions of some human faculty – psychic or physical” (McLuhan 26). The medium is so important because it conveys the message from a specific person. This can be used to shape public opinion, which is the case with television as a medium. Movies also have impact on the society and on forming particular trends within a culture. These trends become global and then marketers use this information to sell the products of the companies that hire them. Another key term is that the world has become a global village and this is true because the geographical and physical distance is no longer relevant. “Ours is a brand-new world of allatonceness. “Time” has ceased, “space” has vanished. We now live in a global villagea simultaneous happening” (McLuhan 63). Allatononceness is a term which means that everything is available at once and this is the case because there is the content and there is the medium which is also the message. Also, the new technologies and new forms of media change the society in a way that is in favor of people who invent them. The message is less important than the medium and that is because of the fact that the medium changes perspective of people and shapes public opinion. Television makes it possible for the people to observe many events in real time which makes a shift on reality. The public always feels as if they were in the front rows and that is why pubic figures gain so much popularity. The message is related to the masses which is why the title of this book refers to messages as massages. Massage contains the word mass inside and the medium becomes the message only when it reaches a wide audience. Only then is it capable of changing societal norms and other values. “Societies have always been shaped more by the nature of the media by which men communicate than by the content of the communication” (McLuhan 8). Communication has always been important, but with the technological advancement, the world has become better connected and artificially smaller.
Sven Birkerts would agree with McLuhan because he also thinks that technological progress has impact on the society and on its culture. He believes that the print has been replaced by modern technology: “The electronic media are invisible in process, but omnipresent in product. They have slipped deeply and irrevocably into our societal midst, creating sluices and circulating through them” (Birkerts). Therefore, these two authors have a similar attitude towards the effects of media and medium is clearly the message because of its form. The form has become a content as well because it changes human perception by modifying it in a way that promotes mass consumption. Every medium is used for the purpose of creating artificial needs and for promoting products which are supposed to make people more connected, but alienate them instead.
Works Cited
McLuhan, Marshall. The Medium is the Massage. Corte Madera: Ginkgo Press, 2006. Print.
Birkerts, Sven. "Into the Electronic Millennium ." Boston Review. N.p., n.d. Web. 7 Apr. 2016. <http://new.bostonreview.net/BR16.5/birkerts.html>.
