Examine Blogosphere with tetrad

The tetrad allowed McLuhan to apply four laws, framed as questions, to a wide spectrum of mankind's endeavors, and thereby give us a new tool for looking at our culture. That is to say, the tetrad is a means of examining the effects on society of any technology (i.e., blogosphere) by dividing its effects into four categories and displaying them simultaneously.

• What does it enhance?
  What does blogosphere extend?
  
  In the case of bloggers, it has spread out people’s thought and their opinions toward their life. On the other hand, it also helps people easily get to know each other by visiting other’s blogs where contain lots of information about their personal interests, diaries and their living pictures. Unlike in the past, people had to do it through face-to-face meet up or phone call. Meanwhile, it also creates a 24/7-communication platform, which allows communication getting more promptly without time or region difference.
  
  
  

• What does it make obsolete?
  What does blogosphere obsolete?
  
  Taking down your life in a blog makes a traditional diary unnecessary. Most people are no longer write down their life in a personal diary. By contrast, they are more care about how to running a personal blog and make it more interesting or more popular. Although blogosphere has excites people’s interaction more frequently, it also obsolete people’s solitary time. Life becomes so busy and distracting. Third, blogosphere has gradually taken over some traditional media such as columns in newspaper and magazines. Due to some bloogers would share their knowledge or reviews toward politic, fashion and entertainment. All these tremendous archives have become a free and valuable information source.
  

• What does it retrieve that had been obsolesced earlier?
  What does blogosphere bring back?
  
  It is no doubt that blogosphere returns with the sense of community. People are being more open up, more expressive and are much more willing to explore each other. One might consider the rise of the Facebook that accompanied the influential social network.
  

• What does it flip into when pushed to extremes?
  What does the technology reverse into if it is over-extended?
  
  In the sense of cultural value, blogosphere is indeed a convenient and interesting database of information. However, there are nearly ninety percent of the blogs are constructed by armatures. Not to mention that most of the information among these blogs is copied from others anonymous source. The validity and reliability is a question we need to think further. Also, due to the convenience of attaining knowledge from Internet is so easy that eliminates people’s reading habit and the ability of observing and studying the truth.
  
  
  
  

How does media change people's expectation in their life.

Marshall McLuhan 1911~1980

McLuhan's work is viewed as one of the cornerstones of the study of media theory. McLuhan is known for coining the expressions "the medium is the message" and the "global village."

The medium is the message by Marshall McLuhan

The main concept of McLuhan's argument (later elaborated upon in The Medium is the Massage) is that new technologies (like alphabets, printing presses, and even speech itself) exert a gravitational effect on cognition, which in turn affects social organization: print technology changes our perceptual habits ("visual homogenizing of experience"), which in turn affects social interactions ("fosters a mentality that gradually resists all but a... specialist outlook"). According to McLuhan, the advent of print technology contributed to and made possible most of the salient trends in the Modern period in the Western world: individualism, democracy, Protestantism, capitalism and nationalism. For McLuhan, these trends all reverberate with print technology's principle of "segmentation of actions and functions and principle of visual quantification.

The global village by Marshall McLuhan

In the early 1960s, McLuhan wrote that the visual, individualistic print culture would soon be brought to an end by what he called "electronic interdependence": when electronic media replace visual culture with aural/oral culture. In this new age, humankind will move from individualism and fragmentation to a collective identity, with a "tribal base." McLuhan's coinage for this new social organization is the global village, a term which has predominantly negative connotations in The Gutenberg Galaxy.

Tetrad of media effects by Marshall McLuhan

The tetrad is a means of examining the effects on society of any technology (i.e., any medium) by dividing its effects into four categories and displaying them simultaneously. McLuhan designed the tetrad as a pedagogical tool, phrasing his laws as questions with which to consider any medium:

* What does the medium enhance?
* What does the medium make obsolete?
* What does the medium retrieve that had been obsolesced earlier?
* What does the medium flip into when pushed to extremes?

All the text info are copied from Wikipedia. See Wiki for further information.


more about McLuhan:
Marshall McLuhan's official website
Marshall McLuhan on YouTube
McLuhan - The Media is the Message
Marshall McLuhan on the TODAY Show

outline draft of Thesis topics (1)

A great new age -
to praise the revolution of Internet

The Core Problem

Since the invention of Internet has developed, human culture has shifted to a new epoch.
Thanks to technique, to communicate information and knowledge is as easy as snapping a finger. Myriads of various information is handing around our everyday life, from actively log into Utube looking for fun to passively receiving forward emails. It is no doubt that it only take a decade and insensibly Internet has already overturn the pattern of human being. But I just can’t help but wonder, is digital revolution like this indeed brought us multitudinous benefits or it carries not only advantages but also some inevitable impacts to our economic and culture?

While I recall the condition of Internet ten years ago, “netscape” stands for the spirit of that period. We downloaded and shared sources, which were provided by mainstream medias. Now a day we have upgraded to the period of “web2.0”, which is the era of google. The idea of web2.0 is upload and share. It is a completely free platform where every user on the Internet can share and feed their owns opinions. Due to the convenience of “cut n paste information” is so easy for web users; people are no longer willing to study and think further. There are tons of blogs out there, and most of them are uncultivated crudities. The idea of sharing supposed to be based on the basis of moral standard. My only question is: are we mature enough to deserve the freedom of Internet?

If you would stop your pace and spend some time thinking, it is no doubt that the progress of Internet has indeed brings us lots of “benefits”; the increase of bandwidth allows us freely download unauthorized sources even more easily; the quality of digital camera has achieved professional resolution but most of the time we only use it for taking pictures which we’ll never review again; Tons of hippest music in our hard disk but we can’t hardly remember our favorite song’s lyrics. These “benefits” are just some trivia facts in our life. But on the other side, the change from Internet has already brings unavoidable impacts toward our politics, business, art and culture.

It is undeniable that Google turns the authority back to people that we can choose and screen whatever we need through the search of specific keyword. These clicks of Adwords and Adsense has contribute Google became the almighty king of Internet. And most of these advertisement profits are from the small and medium-sized enterprises. It seems like a perfect win-win situation that not only satisfies web user’s needs but also brings the most accurate clients to proprietors. But due to the budge issue, if we arrange 20% budget to the Internet companies, it means 20% budget of print and TV media would be cut off. Then the mainstream media would be forced to lay off employees and debase quality, which will ultimately become a vicious circle. Meanwhile, many Internet companies such as Google; they never produce but guiding people to some other sources. If one day that all the mainstream media are no longer exists, no one would be responsible for producing fine and reliable informations, what else can you google?



Same theory could also apply to entertainment business, due to the technology of uploading and sharing files cause the rampancy of pirate copy. From 2000 to 2006, the sales volume of records had reduce 20% off. Illegal music and movies has persecuted traditional media to large-scale reducing the staff and decrease productions. Take Disney as an instance, it declared that they dismissed 650 people during 2006 in order to cut down expenses, meanwhile the animations and movies of each year would subtract almost a half. Traditional media has facing a serious crisis that could cause extinction.

I have to clarify myself that I’m not against the technology of Internet. I’m just point out that people abuse technology could be harmful to our economic, values and creativity. The invention of Internet is unquestionably a great revolution. It is an inevitable and irreversible direction.
Take the industrial revolution of the 19th century for an example, the change from “handcraft to machinery is the milestone of the world culture evolution. When it’s time to face the inevitable change, we all have to face it with courage, and move forward with our wisdom. Right now, we are facing another change, accompanying uncertainty of how the world would become, I feel that we all need a clear standard to follow, an “internet morality”, and by following it, we’ll all adapt to the change, and by doing so, we’ll all become better as a whole.




Methodology

I’m going to use research documents and survey to understand people’s habits when it comes to internet, and get an in-depth understanding of how each social class uses internet, and further develop a “internet ten commitments”, and use it as a parameter for morality, and value of the virtual world. On the technical level, I’ll use my specialty in webpage development, and develop an interactive-multimedia, one combining the style of monopoly and personality test, and further let people understand the “internet morality”, and supply with solutions. Although this may not change the whole environment, but I believe through games, it can help the society further understand this upcoming change.