MEDIA & ITS FIRST REPUTED COMMENTATOR - MARSHALL McLUAN

Rambaud quotes
Marshall McLuhan.
For a rather short version

in French choose this LINK

Rambaud qualifies (the famous) Marshall McLuhan, the first observer of the medias, professor of literature at the Univ. of Toronto, Canada in the middle of last century (ie in his and my lifetime, so not so long ago; as an “rude malin” a tough, shrewd individual and quotes him as saying “The Television will dissolve the fibre of all social life in a very short lapse of time. If you manage to understand it’s dynamics you will realise that you have no other choice but to eliminate it as quickly as possible. Television will totally disrupt the psychic and sensorial life. ” How visionary he was in this according to Rambaud with whom I agree to a large extent, perhaps not blaming so much the technology itself and the bulldozer mechanics but of our own ineptitude.

McLuhan, the first to predict the idea of “The Global Village” that through technological spread, rapid transport and communications (phone & internet) the great wide world would appear to be a village where every body knows every body. Rambaud highlight the down side of this where loss of privacy over balances friendliness. The debate remains open, and is likely to be for some time to come. Let me refer you to my post on the OCDE 2006 Forum on such concerns.



NB. from Wikipedia :
Note again McLuhan stresses the importance of awareness of a medium's cognitive effects. He argues that, if we are not vigilant to the effects of media's influence, the global village has the potential to become a place where totalitarianism and terror rule.

Key to McLuhan's argument is the idea that technology has no per se moral bent -- it is a tool that profoundly shapes an individual's and, by extension, a society's self-conception and realization:
More sayings from Marshall McLuhan [LINK-html] from the Marshall McLuhan Foundation[LINK-html]