A Timeline of Social/Media/History

For this project our group decided to observe four key technological inventions: language, the alphabet, the printing press and the typewriter. We chose these because without them, no other technologies could have ever been created. In this project I helped my group decide which inventions contributed to our society the most and provoked further inventions. I came up with the invention of the typewriter. Without the typewriter, the computer wouldn't have been invented and there would be no Internet. Without the Internet we would all still be getting information from books and it may be a lot harder to come by.

I learned a lot from doing this project. I realized that I wouldn't be sitting here typing right now if these four inventions had never been thought up. I would still have a pencil and paper, maybe even a feather. It's really weird to think about how everything we have now came from an earlier invention that if was never created, would leave us thousands of years in the past.

The ecology of media was defined by Marshall McLuhan in 1977 as a "means of arranging various media to help each other so they won't cancel each other out, to buttress one medium to another. You might also say, for example, that radio is a bigger help to literacy than television, but television might be a very wonderful aid to teaching languages. And so you can do things on some media that you cannot do on others. And, therefore, if you watch the whole field, you can prevent this waste that comes by one cancelling the other out."

Media ecology looks at how media of communication affects human perception, understanding, feeling and value. It also looks at how our interaction with media affects our chance of survival.

Language/Speech (50,000 yrs ago) - Language was probably one of the most useful invention of all time. Language or speech was so important because this is when human could effectively communicate the way we can still communicate today using words and sounds. Humans no longer had to draw pictures or grunt or act out what they were trying to communicate, they were able to use words. Although it may not be the same kinds of languages we use today, without this we my have never become so intelligible to actually speak.
The alphabet (over 4000 yrs ago) - from the alphabet came the invention of spelling and grammar which eventually turned into books etc. The alphabet has made it easier for humans to learn and read about new information and effectively communicate with each other through reading and writing.
The Printing Press (1430’s) - the printing press gave humans the ability to mass produce books and newspapers not only once but millions of times. The printing press has given most people the privilege of books and learning how to read. The world has become a lot more educated and informed because books, newspapers and magazines can be ass produced.
Typewriter (1886) - Books no longer had to be hand written when the typewriter was invented. The typewriter allowed work to be completed a lot faster then before. It also provoked inventors to later invent the computer etc.

"Media Ecology". Wikipedia.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Media_ecology