Class 3.17

McLuhan's Four Laws of Media applied to: modern cell phone

1. The cell phone enhances the human ear and voice by making the voice audible to someone far away and in return, someone else's voice can be heard from a far distance. It also enhances face to face conversations by making it possible to call or text someone who is in a different location. It also enhances the instantaneous informational era in which we live by making contact with another person instantaneous and possible at any time.
2. The modern cell phone makes pay phones obsolescent. There is no longer a need to pay money to use a pay phone because everyone has their own personal cell phone on their body at all times. Pay phones are no longer on the side of every road and less and less frequently seen. The cell phone also short-cuts or bypasses the need to have face to face conversations with people. Instead, they can just send a text or make a quick phone call.
3. The modern cell phone retrieves old fashioned letter writing and postcard sending. It makes it possible, in a more time efficient manner, to reach people who are far away and contact them at any time.
4. The cell phone reverses into personal isolation due to lack of face to face conversation with other people. Because of this, people can become technologically dependent on their cell phones and may develop societal crutches because they have become so used to a technological buffer in their communication with people.

The creator or inventor of the cell phone probably assumed that it was the first step to an instantaneous informational society. Perhaps they did not, however, anticipate the use of text messaging for cheating on tests or image messaging for exploitation. Both of these events would probably still have taken place in some way, but cell phones make it much easier.

These laws apply to the way and reasoning behind the creation of anything. The most important parts of these laws are laws one and two. Whenever something is created or designed, it is made to enhance some part of people's traits or functions. Also, it always renders something obsolete and it is important to take this into consideration when exposing some new feature or designed object to the world.