Musings on McLuhan

Today's entry made me nostalgic for UPN. As one of those deprived children who grew up without cable, I was pretty into that channel. Just like Rex I also remember Moesha

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I was also once featured in a spot for the Natick Outdoor Store (wow, their website is horrendous) when I was a kid, but the only person who ever saw it was my friend's dad.

I've spent some time trying to figure out wether or not Marshall McLuhan, author of Understanding Media, would have considered the Internet a hot or cool medium. The conclusion I have arrived at is that the Internet is a cool medium.

A cool medium demands interactivity by nature of incompleteness. One reason McLuhan defines television as a cool medium is because the pixelated image on the screen forces viewers to complete the image by themselves. So, that's one check for cool medium. Yes, computer screens are increasingly high definition, but the fact that they are not as complete, or hot, as newspapers and other printed media seems to be one of the reasons most people still prefer not to read on the computer.



Another characteristic of a cool medium to examine is interactivity. It's possible to read Rex's blog and ignore the comments section, links to other blogs, links to other webpages, embedded videos, etc. But I would still reason that his blog is interactive in the same way that a telephone is interactive, and therefore a cool medium. Not taking advantage of the opportunities for interactivity doesn't mean they're not there. For example, if I was on the phone with someone, but didn't listen, the telephone would not become any less of a cool medium. I would just be a bad friend.