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Interactive Computing

When Marshall McLuhan wrote his book on electronic communication, Understanding Media (1959), he envisioned technological changes supplanting existing media with new media that would incorporate old media an alter the social structure at the same time. He traced such changes through history and showed how they had taken place many times before, with new technologies arriving that incorporated older ones. The new technologies he called "hot," and the old ones "cool." The Internet did not exist when McLuhan wrote this book, but he seems to be predicting just the sort of change that the Internet is bringing.

Interactive computing is found on the Internet, a loose agglomeration of computing networks that enables the user to access vast amounts of information from sources all over the world. The Internet is notorious for being difficult to learn and to traverse, but those who manage to learn can access huge amounts of printed data, images, and even video on a limited basis. As access to the Internet in its various forms becomes more prevalent, including the World Wide Web, Usenet Groups, and bulletin board services through such access providers as America On-Line, Prodigy, and CompuServe, it becomes essential in every aspect of life--business, work, record keeping, communication, and so on.

McLuhan writes that it is a feature of all new media that they incorporate existing media, meaning that "the 'content' of any medium is always another medium" (8). He uses several examples, such as the fact that the book uses the written word and so incorporates the features of speech that had prevailed before. The Internet is a remarkable example of this as it incorporates virtually all existing media and provides a new way to access the written word, the photograph, sound, and video. The specific features of the Internet do the same with their area of importance. For instance, e-mail incorporates both the written word and visual ima...

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Interactive Computing. (1969, December 31). In LotsofEssays.com. Retrieved 05:43, March 28, 2024, from https://www.lotsofessays.com/viewpaper/1700644.html