The Medium is the Message

Some brief thoughts about the McLuhan reading:
What struck me as the best part of the passage was concerned with the idea that it is not the medium itself that matters, it is how it is used. As such, we cannot excuse our behaviours for using electronic communications. Often I see folks walking around with heads down sending a text message. Often this happens when making plans without a set timeline. E.g. "I'll text you when I'm close by" instead of "Let's meet at 4pm at a designated area." With the use of this form of technology, accountability in being on time is fragmented. The piece of IQ testings as being "the grestest flood of misbegotten standards" (158) is well-known. IQ is not a reliable measure of intelligence due to the biases presented that McLuhan outlines: cultural bias and the unincorporation of other forms of intelligences: tactile and aural as the other two identified. This reminds me of Elton's idea of history being a through and through written craft.

McLuhan Reading

“The Medium is the Message” p. 151-161 Essential McLuhan. ed. Eric McLuhan and Frank Zingrone. House of Anansi Press, 1995.

This book is available in print and as an ebook. You will find a link through the Library's catalogue. Please let me know if you have any trouble accessing it.

Library of Congress Archiving Twitter

There can only be value added to a researcher's wide range of evidence based material to him/her by having Twitter donate its public tweets to the Library of Congress since its inception. However, the challenge will come when answering the question what use this will have and how messages can be accessed easily and in a manageable and usable way for an end research project. Computer search engine programs have a role in this. As for insights into human life and behaviour, businesses, politicians, and various groups "patrol" Twitter to see what sort of messages are being published concerning their organization. Individuals can now be hired as social media workers with regard to this. To the extent that humanity responds via Twitter to various regional, national, and global events offers hints into the collective thoughts of a group. In response to culture, Twitter is a bank of reaction to political decisions, everyday life, and what the weather is like. The development of Twitter and the limitations of 140 characters in a message may have something to say about online literacies.

First Post of the Year

For your first posting of the year, I would like you to comment briefly some thoughts on the Library of Congress archiving twitter.

For more information about that see LoC's news release:

http://www.loc.gov/today/pr/2010/10-081.html

See also this short article in the Scientific American about analyzing twitter (login required):

http://moxy.eclibrary.ca/login?url=http://search.ebscohost.com/login.aspx?direct=true&db=aph&AN=62900486&site=ehost-live