Tetrad: Blogs (Take One)

McLuhan Laws of Media Tetrad Blog
Personal voice enhances	Whining columnist reverses
retrieves Diary, conversation, personal letters	obsolesces Personal web page

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Retrieval is to obsolescence as enhancement is to reversal
Diary, conversation, personal letters is to Personal web page as Personal voice is to Whining columnist

Retrieval is to enhancement as obsolescence is to reversal
Diary, conversation, personal letters is to Personal voice as Personal web page is to Whining columnist

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Some may say that blogs are not different than personal web pages, but most will agree that they are different. There is certainly a difference in the publishing method (e.g., you can publish from your phone without an HTML editor) which allows different stories to be told.

Ruby on Rails and McLuhan's Media is the Message

Ruby on Rails, the web programming language, has always claimed to be "opinionated software." I was reading Scott Raymond's "Ajax for Rails" where he states it this way:

Every piece of software is opinionated - it encourages (and discourages) certain ways of thinking, of solving problems, of structuring ideas. Software embodies a vision of the world.

This is exactly what Marshall McLuhan wrote about in "Understanding Media: The Extensions of Man" and "The Medium is the Massage." It is great to see that this concept is now an accepted part of our culture and understanding of new technologies.