“Marshalling” Networked Public Displays: Connecting
McLuhan’s Media Theory With Networked Public Displays
Nemanja Memarovic
University of Lugano
Via Giuseppe Buffi 13, Lugano, Switzerland
[email protected]
ABSTRACT
Networked public displays are envisioned to become a new
communication medium for the 21st century with
potentially the same impact on the society as the radio, TV
or the Internet. To better understand the capabilities and
limitations of such a new medium, we can turn to the field
of media theory, and in particular to the work of Marshall
McLuhan, who in the 1960s coined the slogan “the medium
is the message”. In McLuhan’s theory, the key to
understanding how a medium impacts society is to
understand the interplay between the figure, i.e., the
medium, and the ground, i.e., the context in which it
operates. McLuhan also put forward the “four laws of
media” – the tetrad – to group and describe both a
medium’s impact on society and its influence on other
media. This position paper connects McLuhan’s media
theory – both figure and ground, and the tetrad – with
research on interactions and processes in public space, in
order to better understand why networked public displays
are suited to be a communication medium that connects
communities and stimulates community interaction.
Author Keywords
Media theory; Networked public displays; community
interaction; urban informatics; urban computing
ACM Classification Keywords
H.4.3. [Communications Applications]: Bulletin boards;
H.5.3. [Group and Organization Interfaces]: Theory and
Models; H.5.1 Multimedia Information Systems;
INTRODUCTION
With ever increasing numbers of public displays in urban
spaces [18] it is not hard to imagine that networked public
displays will soon become a powerful communication
medium potentially having the same impact on the society
as the radio, TV, or Internet [6, 34, 35]. However, at the
moment these displays are receiving none or little attention
[16], mainly due their content as they bombard the passersby with advertisement. In order to understand what is it that
this medium could be doing and how it could address its
audience we turn to media theory, or more precisely to
Marshall McLuhan’s media theory [25]. His iconic work is
best known for phrases like “the medium is the message”,
“the user is the content”, or “the global village” (at the
moment of writing used to describe the impact of the TV on
the society, now commonly used rot describe the impact of
In “Interaction and Architectural Space: A CHI2014 Workshop”.
Copyright held by the authors. 2014.
the Internet). Two of the interesting tools he left us for
analyzing the impact of media on the society are the figure
and ground metaphors that explain the interplay between
the media and its context; and the tetrad of “four laws of
media” that describe how new medias interplay with the old
ones and impact the society. In this position paper we
extend our previous work [28] by connecting it with
McLuhan’s media theory [25], in order to present
theoretical ground for networked public displays as a
communication medium and thus make our contribution.
After presenting related work we present McLuhan’s media
theory, i.e., the figure and ground metaphors and the tetrad.
We then “Marshall” and describe networked public displays
through McLuhan’s figure and ground metaphors and four
laws of media. Finally we present our concluding remarks.
RELATED WORK
The work described here falls closest to the works of Ebsen
[9] and McQuire [26] who have connected McLuhan’s
media theory and how the screen can be used as an artistic
material; and investigated the impact of media architecture
on the spectator actor roles in public spaces respectively.
We attempt to complement both Ebsen’s and McQuire’s
work by going beyond the notion of a single screen and by
contextualizing McLuhan theory through the reference to
communities. Overall, the use of theory in research on
networked public displays has been scarce and has mainly
focused on its situated aspects and a single public display
[7, 22, 23, 29]. In this domain Dalton et al. [7] have
connected the space syntax theory in order to understand
people’s movement patterns in the space and how best to
place a display so it could receive more attention.
Memarovic et al. [29] have also built on the properties of
public spaces and human needs in them, i.e., the need for
passive engagement in the environment by observing what
others are doing, the need for active engagement in the
environment by talking to others, and the need of discovery
of a place and its new features [29]. Ludvigsen [22] has
focused on one of these aspects, i.e., social interaction in
public spaces according to Goffman and illustrated how we
can design public displays that stimulate it. Matthews et al.
[23] connected activity theory and peripheral displays, i.e.,
displays that are not in users’ main focus and how we can
inform their design by supporting activities that are taking
place at a certain space. More recently Memarovic et al.
[31] focused on the networked aspects of the medium and
how we can fit it in with the rest of widespread media such
as Facebook, Twitter etc., while Elhart et al. [10] drew upon
system scheduling theory to understand how to schedule
applications on this new medium. This paper complements
the current body of research by motivating the need for the
use of networked public displays for community interaction
by connecting McLuhan’s media theory [25] and research
on social and community interaction in public spaces [4].
MCLUHAN’S MEDIA THEORY
One of the most influential and well-known mass media
theories that looks into the long-term and societal impacts
of medias is the one of McLuhan [25] that states “the
medium is the message”. The importance of his work is
currently getting more and more attention and there are
even academic conferences that solely analyze the use of
his work in describing media [5]. A key to understanding
the impact of a medium on the processes it creates and
changes is to understand the interplay between the figure
and the ground, i.e., the media and the context in which it
operates respectively [21]. For McLuhan one cannot
understand the true impact of a medium (figure) unless the
context (ground) in which it operates is not taken into
account. For example, if car is seen as a medium (figure)
the context in which it operates (literally the ground)
resulted in expansions of highways and freeways that linked
the suburbs and the city, and new social practices such as
carpooling or street racing [36]. The importance of
understanding the interplay between the figure and ground
is best captured with this quote [32] “My writings baffle
most people simply because I begin with ground and they
begin with figure. I begin with effects and work round to
the causes, whereas the conventional pattern is to start with
a somewhat arbitrary selection of ‘causes’ and then try to
match these with some of the effects.”
In order to further understand the impact of media on the
society McLuhan’ used a tetrad of “four laws of media”,
questions that can be used to describe existing and new
media’s impact: 1) What processes does a medium amplify?
2) What does it [the medium] make obsolete? 3) What does
it retrieve from the past, something that was obsolesced?
and 4) What does the medium flip into when it is pushed to
the extreme? For example, Levinson [20] described the
radio through the tetrad “Radio, for example, enhanced oral
communication across great distances; obsolesced aspects
of written communication, such as the newspaper as the
leading edge of news delivery; retrieved some of the
prominence of oral communication from pre-literate times;
and reversed into broadcasts of sounds and images —
television.” The tetrad has also been used to describe, e.g.,
the Internet [39], augmented reality [37], the impact of
PDAs, or even processes like software testing [3].
MARSHALLING NETWORKED PUBLIC DISPLAYS
McLuhan argues that it is important to understand the
interplay between the medium (figure) and the context in
which it operates (the ground). Networked public displays
operate in the context of public spaces. Public spaces are
building blocks of local communities as they provide the
ground where local neighbors bump into each other to share
the latest news, help with a heavy grocery bag, or just ‘hang
out’. These activities, in turn, help in creating the common
identity: “When public spaces are successful […] they will
increase opportunities to participate in communal activity.
This fellowship in the open nurtures the growth of public
life, which is stunted by the social isolation of ghettos and
suburbs. In the parks, plazas, markets, waterfronts, and
natural areas of our cities, people from different cultural
groups can come together in a supportive context of mutual
enjoyment. As these experiences are repeated, public spaces
become vessels to carry positive communal meanings.” [4].
In the spirit of McLuhan’s writing that starts with
understanding of the ground and explore the context of
networked public displays, i.e., the public space in which
they operate, and make an “inventory of effects” [25] that
they can stimulate and support and at the same time explain
the reasons for that.
Networked public displays can stimulate physical activities
and engagement with the space, which in turn can lead to
social interaction between passers-by and community
members. Some of the examples of applications that were
able to do that are Communiplay [33] that allows people to
play a game where they juggle and bounce balls together
through a display network. Another example is FunSquare
that stimulates social interaction between passers-by
through an obscure/wrapped up information presented on a
display, created by matching information from display’s
vicinity (e.g., the number of people in the space) with
information from elsewhere (e.g., the population of Pitcairn
Island [29]. The reason why networked public displays are
able to do that is because they are stimulating and
supporting existing processes in public spaces. One of the
most common processes that occur in public spaces is
social triangulation, a form of active engagement in the
environment, where unusual features in the space, e.g., a
sculpture, fountain, or street performance, provide the
common ground/theme for people to socialize, which can
lead to the notion of belonging to a community [4]. In turn
this also stimulates passive engagement with the
environment where people simply observe what others are
doing, which can be translated to the “honey pot” effect
where seeing people interact with public displays raises
interest of passers-by to observe what others are doing as
well as to interact with a display.
Exchange and interaction between local community
members is another process that networked public displays
can stimulate and support. One example of such an
application is Digifieds [1] that allowed local community
members to upload classifieds to a display network. In
order to keep the accent on the local community classifieds
could be uploaded only through a mobile phone client and
when a user is next to a display or they could be created
directly on the display. Also, a classified would be seen
only on a smaller part of a display network that was
representative of a particular neighborhood. A reason why
networked displays are able to do that is because they
represent an improved version of more traditional public
notice areas that historically have been used for local
community members and neighbors to exchange
information and potentially goods [2].
Leaving a mark in the setting and/or decorating a particular
space, thus creating history and historical connections with
it is another process that networked public displays can
support. Within this area CLIO project [38] is a prominent
example as it allowed people to upload stories of
historical/local relevance for a place in the city of Oulu or
Corfu (two separate deployments) in the form of text,
pictures, and videos that were shared across a display
network. Another and more simple example is the Moment
Machine [27] that allows passers-by to take photos and
leave them in the urban setting and also share them across
the network, thus collecting and creating memories within
and across public spaces. Instant Places’ “Pins” [17] that
allowed football fans to express their belonging to a
community by displaying football club’s emblem is another
example of an application that allows leaving a mark on a
networked public display. Historically, people have been
leaving their marks since the beginning of the time, e.g.,
cave paintings or pictograms or modern city graffiti.
Marking of a space in turn creates history and historical
connections with it. For example, “The freedom to leave a
personal mark on a site, one that can rest within marks of
history is one kind of valued modification. The
photographs, notes, and flowers left at the Vietnam
Memorial in Washington offer a moving image of this kind
of transformation” [4]. This notion of leaving a mark in the
setting is also stimulating the provision of difference and
diversity. Again here, instant Place’s “Pins” are a good
example as they allow people to leave different marks, thus
stimulating and supporting diversity. This is also possible
as public spaces represent the ground where different can
and should be seen [14].
Networked public displays can also unite community
members to express their opinion about locally relevant
topics thus stimulating civic engagement. For example, the
Discussions in Space application [40] and UBInion [15]
allowed local community members to post comments on
new architectural changes in the environment and general
problems with a city respectively. Similarly to leaving a
mark in the setting, also the ability to express one’s opinion
in public space has been with us since the beginning of
time. A prominent example of one such public space is
ancient Greek’s Agora – a central point in any city where
community members would gather to discuss and debate
locally relevant topics. Creating links across space and time
is another process that networked public displays support.
In this area researchers have mainly investigated the use of
real-time video connection to create connection between
distant places, e.g., Hole in Space connected New York and
Los Angeles through a video link. Similar and more recent
projects are Connected Urban Spaces [11], Hole in the
Earth [12], and Telectroscope [42]. A more recent and
engaging example is Communiplay that engaged people
across spaces in a game where participants from different
public spaces were juggling balls together. Some of these
experiences of bridging distant places are similar to the
experience walking in a public spaces where we see
glimpses of connections of our locality with other distant
places, e.g., seeing Chinese restaurant can spark and
intrigue imagination/day dreaming about a far away
location (unless you are in China). Public spaces can
stimulate discovery and imagination by creating
connections to other distant worlds. As an example
Stonehenge portrays our connection with the universe [4].
We can look at the above-mentioned processes also through
the McLuhan’s tetrad or four laws of media. What
Processes Does a Media Amplify? Networked public
displays amplify casual/chance encounters and social
interaction between passers-by and local community
members, exchange and community interaction, marking
the territory and creating historical connections with the
locality and local community, visibility of different social,
interest, age and other groups, public debate, links to distant
places. What Does the Media Make Obsolete? Static
“special features” of public spaces such as fountains and
sculptures, analog notice boards, physical public
decision/discussion meetings, interactions in the virtual
world. What Does It Retrieve From the Past, Something
That Was Obsolesced? The strongest notion that networked
public displays bring back from the past is local community
interaction and exchange within community members. As
pointed by Thompson [43] “We are thus looking to an
urban society where, perhaps, more people are living in
relative proximity than ever before, but where the regular
daily social contact that comes from sharing homes or
living in culturally homogenous districts no longer pertains.
It is an intriguing prospect – a close-knit society of
strangers.” As shown in the above section networked
displays bring back the accent on local community
interaction. They are also bringing back the notion of a
notice board as a tool for local (and in this case also distant)
exchange. Graffiti, visual appropriation of the urban space.
What Does the Media Reverse Into When Pushed to the
Extreme? TV/ real-time audio-visual connection enhanced
with other stimuli that describe a public space such as smell
and noise, platform used for self-promotion (similar to
Facebook), or even “PlaceBook” social networking service
that creates place profiles and connects places.
CONCLUSION
Networked public displays are still finding their way and
the message they will carry. However, if we look at the
above-mentioned processes and the tetrad we can clearly
see that in the core of the processes networked public
displays stimulate and support are local communities and
community interaction: whether it is stimulating social
interaction or exchange between local members or public
debate about a locally relevant topic, local communities are
at the heart of the process. This is due to the ground/context
in which networked public displays operate, i.e., the public
space, and the way they amplify and stimulate processes
that have been occurring in the ground. Future research can
build upon this research and further fill in the tetrad and/or
connect other effects of networked public displays to its
causes coming from the ground (the public space).
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