McLuhan’s interpretation of media and technology being an extension of humankind extends to humanity in general by the similarities between media and man. McLuhan breaks down into sections different aspects of a human and how that interconnects into electric technology. Individualism is one, another is family, your job, and the government that surrounds you. He bridges a connection between your eyes and books, how a booklet extended through sight as an originator. How an automobile is an extension of your foot in terms of movement. He even references clothing being an extension of the skin as it covers and shields your body. How media can be an extension of our nervous system by projecting and influencing our thoughts and actions.
Hazards that technological progress can possibly bring for individuals and society are the process of control and lack of origination. How tech brings in structural systems and pushes us to think in terms of being one-track-minded and having fixed ideas. How the media can provide society with one big misconception of the life we create around us. If “the medium is the message,” artists and designers can play the role of innovators and the plug that connects a message to a medium. They can take control of the media and create new ways for the masses to relate and make sense of the world that surrounds them by defining their own needs and not the needs and wants of the media that’s trying to control them.
The work of a designer can become subordinate to the media they use to distribute information by designing work the way they were told to instead of in a way that can challenge the old world order and bring in new means of communication and information. If designers decided to use a medium that does not directly provide instructions on how to process that message that is being told to the public then there is the opening that is needed to help designers become in control of their own medium source.
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