TOPIC 6

TETRAD OF MEDIA

Using McLuhan's "Tetrad of Media" (see diagram below), choose a medium or media application or tool (e.g. newspaper, books, radio, tv, film, internet, computer games, handphone, instant messaging, blogging, online advertising, youtube, facebook etc.) and explain its media effects.



This is the diagram of McLuhan's "Tetrad of Media"

CRITICAL REFLECTIONS

1) I decided to choose the internet application. In my opinion, internet application is a useful and a great media application in this world. Internet application enhances our lives with many powerful usages. It is not only for fun or communicating people but you can also find many types of information that people need. For example, you need to search for something difficult, you can just go surf the internet and search by your own and you will get all the information that you need. Internet is very good, it obsolesces the other types of media application or tool. Internet has many functions that it obsolesces other normal tools. Internet is a fast medium in many aspects ; to communicate with people, to browse for informations. By using internet, communicating is just a click away. Whereas before the existance of internet, we depend on postmen to deliver our mails. Other than that, by using internet, we can gain informations faster. As an example, we can get the latest news on the internet instead of reading the newspaper.

2) I think the usage of this application which is internet retrieves one of the main powerful of the internet is to find any of information that we need. With this media also, people can easily make or create a lot of business that they can make money from it. But if we're not smart enough to use it or in the other word people are too obsessed with the internet, it will harm yourself and your desktop too. For example, if an individual keeps on playing and downloading all the applications from the internet, he/she may download virus into his/her desktop. In conjunction with that, if someone is too obsessed with the internet, they may just give out their informations to the website, this may lead to wrong usage of credit cards, scams and hackers.

PERSONAL REFLECTION

In this week of Media Culture's class, the lecturer gave us some explaination about the topic of "The Extansion of Man" . My lecturer gave an information about the McLuhan's theory. Well honestly I've never heard of it before. Besides that, I've also learnt the hot and the cold media combine together with the Tetrad of Media. I think this week is kind of very interesting topic to learn eventhough it's a little bit complicated.