tecnology has brought a revolution in media ? explain if
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Media can be classified by their impacts on audiences, McLuhan said in his 1965 book Understanding Media. Some types of media tend to be “hot” – that is, they immerse audience members and allow less participation. Others tend to be “cool,” allowing audience members to be detached from the message or requiring more participation in making sense of the message. The idea wasn’t entirely new; for example, Enlightenment philosopher David Hume said in 1742 that a free press should not be feared because the medium could not incite rebellion. “A man reads a book or pamphlet alone, coolly. There is no one present from whom he can catch the passion by contagion.” (Hume, 1742)
Just where each medium might fall on a hot-cool spectrum depends on its cultural and historical context. In the 1960s, McLuhan could say that cinema was “hot” because audiences were fully immersed in the medium, while television was “cool” because, at the time, it was a low-definition medium that required some effort to enjoy. Yet over time, as television technology improved, the medium became more and more immersive; today, McLuhan might see television as much hotter than it once was.
The categories are not really fixed, and McLuhan often said provocative things he called “probes” just to stir up conversation. For instance, he thought of radio as a “hot” medium since it immersed audiences, and yet many others have seen radio as requiring a sense of imagination to fill in the details of the story, which would make it a “cool” medium. Perhaps his most provocative idea was that “hot” new media technology could be so overwhelming that many people would go into a subtle state of shock, a “psychic rigor mortis,” as they tried to “cool off” its effects. Modern concerns about addition to social media and online video gaming systems might be seen as examples of this idea.
In any event, it’s useful to question whether a linear view of hot-cool media categories really helps us understand psychological reactions to media. Recent studies of brain activity using functional magnetic resonance imaging (fMRI), which was not available in McLuhan’s time, show that reading books, watching movies or searching the internet all use very different portions of the brain in unique ways. (Wolf, 2008)
Update: Reading books and watching cinema affect specific portions of the brain and deepen our ability to understand the complexities of social life. And yet, for reasons not yet explained, television has less of this effect. (Paul, 2012; Goldman, 2012).
Just where each medium might fall on a hot-cool spectrum depends on its cultural and historical context. In the 1960s, McLuhan could say that cinema was “hot” because audiences were fully immersed in the medium, while television was “cool” because, at the time, it was a low-definition medium that required some effort to enjoy. Yet over time, as television technology improved, the medium became more and more immersive; today, McLuhan might see television as much hotter than it once was.
The categories are not really fixed, and McLuhan often said provocative things he called “probes” just to stir up conversation. For instance, he thought of radio as a “hot” medium since it immersed audiences, and yet many others have seen radio as requiring a sense of imagination to fill in the details of the story, which would make it a “cool” medium. Perhaps his most provocative idea was that “hot” new media technology could be so overwhelming that many people would go into a subtle state of shock, a “psychic rigor mortis,” as they tried to “cool off” its effects. Modern concerns about addition to social media and online video gaming systems might be seen as examples of this idea.
In any event, it’s useful to question whether a linear view of hot-cool media categories really helps us understand psychological reactions to media. Recent studies of brain activity using functional magnetic resonance imaging (fMRI), which was not available in McLuhan’s time, show that reading books, watching movies or searching the internet all use very different portions of the brain in unique ways. (Wolf, 2008)
Update: Reading books and watching cinema affect specific portions of the brain and deepen our ability to understand the complexities of social life. And yet, for reasons not yet explained, television has less of this effect. (Paul, 2012; Goldman, 2012).
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