Podcast appearances and mentions of Marshall McLuhan

Once upon a time not so very long ago, artificial intelligence (AI) was a product of speculative science fiction, especially in films from Metropolis to Blade Runner.Today, AI has so infiltrated our daily lives, the thought of not having access to Google or other AI-driven apps on our mobile phones and computers scares the crap out of a lot of people. Paul continues his investigation into AI with able assistance from author, Silicon Valley survivor and depth psychologist Elizabeth Nelson who explores the wide gulf between human and machine this week on Spirit Gym.Check out Elizabeth's essays and individual coaching groups, watch her video presentations and read her essays on her website.Timestamps7:54 Defining technology and machines.12:05 Artificial intelligence, large language models (LLMs) or large language machines?19:12 “Technology is not neutral.”23:48 Confusing data and information with real knowledge.29:50 The intrusion of machine language into our humanity.37:45 The danger of LLMs emulating humans.51:23 Exploring the gulf between human and cyborg/machine in books and films like Blade Runner.57:23 When describing what AI does, calling it making crap up or AI slop is better than hallucinating.1:08:26 Are we turning an it like AI into a being?1:14:15 The irony of some people celebrating the end times while others turn to transhumanism.1:38:18 Can you leave your tech toys at home for a week without feeling anxiety?1:49:48 Why is it so important for humanity to understand very clearly what reality is?ResourcesDepth Psychology, Myth and Artificial Intelligence: Soul and the Machine, edited by Jason Batt and Jonathan EricksonThe Art of Jungian Couples Therapy: An Introduction by Elizabeth Nelson and Anthony DelmedicoThe Art of Inquiry: A Depth Psychology Perspective by Elizabeth Nelson and Joseph CoppinPsyche's Knife: Archetypal Explorations of Love and Power by Elizabeth NelsonJournal of Jungian Scholarly StudiesUnderstanding Media: The Extension of Man by Marshall McLuhan and Lewis Lapham Elizabeth's Psyche, Soma, Cyborg course at the Pacifica Graduate InstituteThe Ship of Theseus (Theseus's Paradox)Do Androids Dream of Electric Sheep by Philip K. DickExteroceptionElysiumThe work of James Hillman and Edward EdingerPaul's podcast conversation with B. EarlDNA: Pirates of the Sacred Spiral by Leonard HorowitzFrankenstein: Or the Modern Prometheus by Mary ShelleyThe Forgotten Truth: The Common Vision of the World's Religions by Huston SmithThe Social Dilemma on NetflixElizabeth's presentation during the recent Soul and the Machine webinar on the International Society of Mythology websiteFind more resources for this episode on our website.Music Credit: Meet Your Heroes (444Hz), Composed, mixed, mastered and produced by Michael RB Schwartz of Brave Bear MusicThanks to our awesome sponsors:PaleovalleyBIOptimizers US and BIOptimizers UK PAUL15Organifi CHEK20Wild PasturesPique LifeCHEK InstituteWe may earn commissions from qualifying purchases using affiliate links.

On this episode of The Ty Brady Way, Ty sits down with Mike Saunders, a marketing strategist, keynote speaker, and the creator of the federally trademarked Authority Positioning Portfolio. The two have history, Ty was a guest on Mike's show years ago, and now the tables have turned for a conversation that is equal parts business strategy, personal philosophy, and hard-won wisdom from someone who built something real the slow and honest way. Mike's journey did not start in marketing. He spent a decade in the mortgage industry at JP Morgan Chase before the 2007 crash effectively wiped out the world he had built. Rather than wait it out, he got his MBA in marketing, launched his own firm, and promptly made every mistake a new entrepreneur can make, chasing every client, offering every service, and spreading himself so thin that nothing stuck. For four to five years he describes it plainly as a desolate and dark time, with a wife, four kids in private school, and the pressure of it all bearing down. But buried inside that stretch of struggle was the moment that changed everything, the day he handed out his first book at a conference and watched the room respond differently than they ever had to a PDF or a blog post. That one moment became the foundation of everything he does today. What Mike built from that moment is a concept he calls the Authority Positioning Portfolio, a done-for-you system that positions independent financial advisors as celebrity experts through podcast interviews, TV placements, press releases, and books, all indexed by Google and working around the clock to pre-frame trust and credibility before a prospect ever picks up the phone. He draws on a principle from 1960s philosopher Marshall McLuhan to explain why this works: the medium carrying your message gives it as much value, if not more, than the message itself. The same insight that might get ignored on a LinkedIn post becomes instantly compelling when it is delivered in a televised interview. It is not about the content changing. It is about where it is seen. One of the sharpest moments in the episode comes when Mike flips the script on the ghosting problem that plagues so many advisors. When leads no-show or disappear without explanation, most people assume it is a follow-up problem or a pricing problem. Mike argues it is a credibility problem, and the terrifying part is that no one ever tells you. They just quietly decide you are not worth their time based on what they found, or did not find, when they Googled you. The solution is not more ads. It is permanent, indexed, trust-building assets that are working even when you are not. Ty and Mike also dig into what separates people who succeed from those who stay stuck, and Mike's answer is simple but unsparing. If you are not moving forward, you are moving backward, because everyone behind you is still moving forward. He shares the story of an advisor who chose the higher-priced package not because it was comfortable but because he had learned that every time he stepped into discomfort and trusted the process, it worked out. That, Mike says, is exactly the mindset of someone ready to grow. He also introduces his daily VIP Three habit, three outreach touches per day to referral sources or strategic alliances, and his end-of-day practice of recording one good thing, a simple discipline that keeps gratitude and momentum running in the same direction. The episode closes with Mike finishing one of Ty's sentences in a way that lands hard. You either win or you lose? Wrong. You win or you learn. It is a phrase that captures the entire arc of Mike's story, from mortgage crash to marketing mastery, and it is the principle he would leave anyone with who is just getting started. Mike can be reached at MikeSaunders360.com, where his full authority hub, interviews, and contact information are all in one place.  

Is efficiency a godly value? And if the Good Shepherd leaves 99 sheep to find the one, what does that say about how we should be running our churches?The guys open with King Charles's surprisingly funny speech to the U.S. Congress, a masterclass in soft power, humour and resetting an agenda without throwing a punch, before getting into the real conversation: how do you manage a church well without accidentally turning it into a business?Stu unpacks Soul Revival's approach to project management — organised messiness, ministry slide, double-up meetings and why grace has to be baked into the structure from the start. Tim brings in Andy Crouch's cultural postures and Marshall McLuhan's medium-is-the-message warning about what happens when corporate metaphors quietly reshape how you think about ministry.Timestamps00:00 Welcome — fake arrogance, King Charles and the Churchill bath story08:30 Soft power, constitutional monarchy and why Charles reset the agenda without throwing a punch17:30 Church project management — theology, strategy and practice21:00 The African church vs the Sydney church — context shapes everything25:00 Metrics, growth and the danger of deterministic ministry thinking31:00 Andy Crouch, Marshall McLuhan and why corporate metaphors aren't value-neutral37:00 Organised messiness — Stu's philosophy of church management43:00 The Good Shepherd, the 99% and why efficiency isn't a godly value47:00 Isaac Gordon's late arrival and what it taught Soul Revival about grace54:00 Ministry slide — a practical framework for holding people and mission togetherDiscussed on this episode:King Charles III addresses US CongressAndy Crouch - Culture MakingMarshall McLuhan - The Medium is the MessageColin Marshall and Tony Payne - Trellis and VineSubscribe, leave a review, and send your thoughts to Joel at joel@shockabsorber.com.au

En este episodio Víctor cuenta, con una metáfora futbolística que no tiene desperdicio, cómo Claude Code ha cambiado radicalmente su manera de trabajar y de pensar. Diez años gestionando equipos de desarrollo para GuideDoc, peleando con muros, reuniones interminables y 150.000 euros gastados en proyectos que nunca vieron la luz. Y de repente, en cuestión de semanas, ya está tocando código en producción solo, a su ritmo, como a él le gusta. No es solo una herramienta nueva. Víctor lo encuadra filosóficamente: Andy Clark y la mente extendida, McLuhan y las amputaciones que provocan las prótesis, Sócrates en contra de la escritura. Claude no es un asistente, es ya parte de cómo piensa. Y eso, dice, lo cambia todo. ¿Quieres saber exactamente cómo ha dado el salto a tocar código en GuideDoc? En el episodio Premium de esta semana Víctor entra en todos los detalles que aquí no caben. → Apúntate al Premium Lo que vas a escuchar La metáfora del Messi empastillado: cómo Claude Code ha transformado la sensación de Víctor al desarrollar en tiempo récord. Diez años de muros con equipos de desarrollo: 150.000 euros perdidos, un año y medio sin resultados y la frustración acumulada de GuideDoc. De las pruebas al código en producción en cinco días: cómo el plan de «probar durante un año» duró menos de una semana. Andy Clark y la mente extendida: por qué Claude no es solo una herramienta sino cognición externalizada. McLuhan y las amputaciones: qué puede estar amputando Claude que aún no vemos. El contrapunto honesto: el background técnico que Víctor reconoce tener y que ayuda, aunque insiste en que no es imprescindible. El episodio Premium de esta semana En el episodio Premium de esta semana Víctor da muchos más detalles sobre cómo ha llevado todo esto a la práctica: Cómo ha empezado a tocar código real en GuideDoc con Claude Code y qué pasos concretos ha seguido. Las pruebas y plataformas previas que hizo antes de atreverse a entrar en producción. Los detalles del flujo de trabajo que ha montado y que antes le hubiera costado dos años de reuniones. → Apúntate a No es Asunto Vuestro Premium para escuchar el episodio completo. Transcripción del episodio [00:00] La pastilla de Messi: así se siente Víctor con Claude Soy el puto Leo Messi. Desde hace días, piso el campo y todo fluye, regateo a cualquiera, me los quito de encima como si no existieran, golpeo faltas que son misiles desde lejos, desde dentro del área, a la escuadra. Soy el puto Leo Messi. Marco un golazo en el Bernabéu, camino hacia la grada y me quito la camiseta mostrando el 10. Me he tomado una pastilla, chicos, y soy Leo Messi. Así es como me siento con Claude. Os lo digo de verdad. [00:39] Diez años peleándome con el desarrollo de GuideDoc Yo toda mi vida he sido guionista, periodista, he hecho programas de televisión y de radio. Llega un momento en que dejo todo ese mundo y paso a tener una empresa tecnológica: GuideDoc, una plataforma de cine documental en streaming. Pero lo que he hecho durante estos diez años ha sido básicamente gestionar películas, hacer curación y gestionar un equipo de desarrollo. Y esos diez años han sido muy difíciles. La frase más repetida en No es Asunto Vuestro es: todo es mucho más difícil de lo que parece. Tú piensas una cosa, piensas que la desarrollarás, que te juntarás con un equipo y que podrás tirarla adelante. Sí que se puede, pero siempre todo es más complicado de lo que parece. Me he encontrado con infinitos muros. Siempre que me han preguntado por esto yo he dicho: si pudiera volver atrás, al Víctor de los 18 o 19 años, a lo mejor hubiera estudiado desarrollo, o más adelante hubiera hecho algún curso, para tener las herramientas para poder desarrollar aquello que tenía en la cabeza. Si pudiera volver atrás, sería desarrollador. ¿Por qué? Por todos los muros que me he encontrado estos más de diez años. [02:22] 150.000 euros y un año y medio sin ver nada He estado en desarrollos que no han salido: un año y medio de trabajo, 150.000 euros gastados y nunca vimos ningún resultado. Lo he explicado muchas veces en el podcast. Y en los proyectos actuales, cualquier mínimo cambio cuesta. Cuesta hacerte entender, cuesta que salga exactamente como lo tienes en la cabeza, cuesta que ese mockup se entienda, cuesta desarrollar la mínima cosa. Imaginad un proyecto como GuideDoc: decenas de aplicaciones, plataformas, backends, con una infraestructura increíble y complicada. Es como un puto Netflix. Y lo he hecho yo, peleándome con la gente. Pues imaginad lo que me ha costado. [03:16] De las pruebas al código en producción en cinco días Ahora me he tomado una pastilla y soy el puto Messi. Desde hace unas semanas, gracias a Claude Code, he ido desarrollando plataformas e ideas. Todo ha sido pruebas, tests, teniendo en mente que en un futuro, yo pensaba hace una semana, haría todas estas pruebas para ver cómo funciona Claude, y en un año o año y medio, quizás haría alguna prueba con GuideDoc. Pues bien: al cabo de cinco días ya llegó ese día. Después de todas las pruebas que hice, me vi con ganas, con fuerzas y con suficiente valentía como para comenzar a tocar código en GuideDoc y empezar a hacer las cosas con la rapidez y de la manera como a mí me gusta. Si queréis saber cómo lo he hecho, en el episodio Premium de esta semana doy muchos más detalles. [04:21] Andy Clark, McLuhan y Sócrates: las herramientas nos cambian Lo que quería decir aquí es que esto se ha hablado mucho. Pensadores y filósofos han reflexionado sobre las herramientas y sobre cómo el humano cambia según la que usa. Andy Clark hablaba de la mente extendida: tu mente no termina en el cráneo. Tu libreta, tu móvil, tu Google Maps, todas las herramientas que utilizamos son cognición externalizada de nuestra propia mente. Y si aceptas esto, Claude ahora mismo se está convirtiendo, o puede llegar a convertirse, no en un asistente sino, literalmente, en parte de cómo pienso. Os lo digo de verdad: la manera en que estoy trabajando estos últimos días no tiene nada que ver con cómo trabajaba hace un mes. Ha cambiado mi manera de pensar y, evidentemente, mi manera de ver la vida. Ya no eres tú y una herramienta, sino un sistema cognitivo nuevo. Por otro lado, y esto es McLuhan: las herramientas nos amputan una parte de nosotros y actúan como una prótesis. Cada cosa que ganamos es algo que dejamos de usar. El coche nos amputó las piernas. La calculadora se lió un pollo que flipas, ya no calculamos mentalmente. Aún no sé qué amputa Claude, pero comienzo a vislumbrarlo. Y esto no es de ahora. Sócrates ya estaba en contra de la escritura, porque decía que iba a destruir la memoria: si lo escribimos, ya no hace falta pensar tanto en las cosas a la hora de recordarlas. Entiendo que haya muchos developers que se pongan las manos en la cabeza con algunas de las cosas que digo. Pero chicos: puede haber errores, evidentemente. También los hay en estos diez años de desarrollo en GuideDoc. Muchos errores, y ya los he encontrado todos ahora con la inteligencia artificial. [07:03] Dos años de reuniones en media hora Si la inteligencia artificial comete errores, me da igual, porque ya los arreglaremos. Pero la IA me hace una cosa que antes nos hubiera costado, sin exagerar, dos años de discusiones, de reuniones, de dolores de cabeza, de despertarme a medianoche pensando en eso. Dos años en media hora. Y es así de exagerado. ¿Cómo coño no voy a abrazar esto, viniendo de donde vengo? [07:28] El Messi empastillado y el proceso como producto Evidentemente, a lo mejor he puesto un ejemplo con poca gracia, porque a mí un Messi empastillado no me haría gracia. Es como lo que digo siempre: no seré capaz de ver actores generados por IA ni de escuchar un podcast donde sé que ese tío no existe. Y tampoco quiero ver un futbolista falso. Pero es que en el deporte el proceso es el producto. Estás ahí porque te gusta la esencia, y un Messi empastillado es una cosa distinta. Pero aquí, en lo que estamos hablando, el proceso es igual. ¿Qué importa si lo único que importa es lo que estoy construyendo? Si ahora viene Revolut y me pide que les haga la aplicación, con Claude, después de todo lo que he hecho estas semanas, soy capaz. ¡Soy un developer! ¿Lo veis lo que os quiero decir? [08:41] Lo que ha cambiado no es lo que sabes, sino lo que te atreves a empezar Lo que ha cambiado casi no es lo que sé hacer. Es lo que me atrevo a empezar. Eso es la clave. Sí que es verdad, para poner un contrapunto honesto: cuando se lo explico a alguien que no tiene nada que ver con el sector, un abogado por ejemplo, hay un gap porque no tiene ciertas herramientas de base. Yo tengo un poco de trampa: no soy desarrollador, entiendo muy poco de líneas de código, pero me he estado peleando con ellos durante diez años. Sé su lenguaje, sé cómo piensan, sé cómo se estructura un proyecto, sé qué es un servidor, un backend, un commit, un GitHub. Eso ayuda. Pero también es verdad que si os lanzáis con Claude y hay algo que no entendéis, se lo preguntáis y te lo explica. Estamos en ese punto. Son un montón de fronteras que se han disuelto en estas semanas. A lo mejor no es para todo el mundo, pero yo creo que sí lo es para quien tiene las ganas, la idea, cierto criterio y, sobre todo, curiosidad. Si sois de esos, lo estamos petando en la parte Premium de No es Asunto Vuestro. Os aconsejo que le deis un vistazo en noesasuntovuestro.com. Un abrazo muy fuerte, nos vemos la semana que viene. Ciao. Menciones y recursos del episodio Claude Code (Anthropic): la herramienta protagonista del episodio, que Víctor usa para desarrollar GuideDoc. GuideDoc: la plataforma de cine documental en streaming de Víctor. Andy Clark: filósofo de la mente extendida («Extended Mind»), referenciado por Víctor. Marshall McLuhan: teórico de los medios, citado por la idea de que las herramientas actúan como prótesis que nos amputan. Sócrates: mencionado como el primero en alertar sobre los efectos de una nueva herramienta, en su caso la escritura. Revolut: usado como ejemplo hiperbólico de proyecto de app complejo que Víctor siente que podría abordar. No es Asunto Vuestro Premium: donde Víctor desarrolla en detalle todo lo que cuenta en abierto en este episodio. ¿Te has quedado con ganas de saber cómo lo ha hecho en la practica? En el episodio Premium de esta semana Víctor entra en los detalles reales: las pruebas previas, el momento en que decidió tocar código en GuideDoc y el flujo de trabajo que ha montado con Claude Code. Lo que en años de desarrollo te costaría meses, en minutos. → Apúntate a No es Asunto Vuestro Premium Noesasuntovuestro.com

An Analog Brain In A Digital Age — A Newsletter by Marco Ciappelli On the Internet, Nobody Knows You're Not Human — And Nobody's Asking There was a moment — brief, unrepeatable — when the internet felt like a genuinely open place. No profiles. No algorithms deciding what you deserved to see. No one monetizing the fact that you existed. You showed up, you explored, you talked to strangers in other countries about things that mattered to you, and the whole thing felt less like a product and more like a discovery. Like finding a door to another dimension. There's a cartoon that captured that moment perfectly. 1993. The New Yorker. Peter Steiner. Two dogs, one at a computer, and the line that accidentally defined an entire era of the internet: "On the Internet, nobody knows you're a dog." https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/On_the_Internet,_nobody_knows_you%27re_a_dog It was funny. It was also prophetic. And it was optimistic in a way we've completely forgotten how to be about the web. Anonymity as freedom. Identity as something fluid, chosen, playful. You could be anyone. You could be from anywhere. You could reinvent yourself in real time, with no one to contradict you. Then surveillance capitalism arrived and broke the party. Cookies. Behavioral profiling. The algorithmic panopticon. Suddenly everyone knew everything. You weren't a dog anymore — you were a demographic, a data point, a cluster of purchase histories and scroll patterns. The internet that promised liberation became the most precise identity-tracking machine ever built. Anonymity collapsed under the weight of monetization. Nobody knows you're a dog became everyone knows you're a dog, what breed, what you ate for breakfast, and which vet you Googled at 2am. And now we're in the third act. A Buddhist monk named Yang Mun has 2.5 million Instagram followers. He posts silent morning meditations. He has made over $300,000 since October. Three Buddhist scholars reviewed his content and confirmed: his wisdom isn't grounded in any actual scripture. It just sounds like it is. Yang Mun doesn't exist. He was built with ChatGPT, HeyGen — an AI platform that generates realistic synthetic human video, a face, eyes, a voice, moving and breathing and entirely artificial — and a handful of other tools, by a creator operating inside what's being called "Big Slop": a venture-backed industry that manufactures fake influencers, automates their posting, and scales them to millions of followers while platforms, politely, look the other way. Hat tip to Jack Brewster, whose LinkedIn post on Yang Mun is what started this thread of thought. https://www.linkedin.com/posts/jackbrewster_a-buddhist-monk-named-yang-mun-has-25-million-activity-7451268378499137537-RPB1?utm_source=share&utm_medium=member_desktop&rcm=ACoAAAD_QZMB_jUr1316NWqo3MgG_iFVSPTfDgY The circle has closed. And inverted. We went from nobody knows you're a dog to everyone knows you're a dog to something far stranger: Nobody knows you're not human. The dog is gone. The human is optional. Here's what interests me — and it's not the outrage part, because the outrage is easy and everyone will do it. What interests me is the McLuhan part. Marshall McLuhan said it in 1964: the medium is the message. Not the content. The medium itself. The form of transmission shapes reality more than anything transmitted through it. Yang Mun's fake wisdom is almost beside the point. The scholars confirmed it's scripturally meaningless. But it sounds right — which is precisely the tell. The content was never engineered for truth. It was engineered for the platform. For the algorithm. For the engagement pattern that rewards the feeling of depth over the presence of it. The medium produced the monk. The monk is the message. And if you zoom out — which is what I keep trying to do from Florence, where the stones beneath my feet are five hundred years old and nobody around me is particularly impressed by disruption — you see something that looks less like a technology story and more like a civilization story. We built an internet that promised connection. We built AI to simulate humans. Somewhere along the way we forgot to ask whether any of it was real — or maybe we never quite got around to asking in the first place. Because here's the thing: this didn't happen slowly enough for us to develop a moral relationship with it. There was no adjustment period. No cultural processing. The fake monk didn't represent a fall from grace. It was a first contact situation. We haven't even named what's wrong yet, let alone decided whether it matters. The analog brain — slow, emotional, context-dependent, stubbornly human — is the one thing that still notices the difference between a conversation that carries weight and one that merely carries words. It's not superior in processing power. It's just that it comes from somewhere. From experience. From loss. From the specific, irreplaceable accident of having lived a particular life in a particular body in a particular place. The monk who wasn't there had none of that. And somewhere — maybe in 2.5 million people scrolling past silent meditations at 7am — some part of us already knows. Will we remember to ask? Are we ever gonna care? Let's keep exploring what it means to be human in this Hybrid Analog Digital Age. Stay imperfect, stay human. — Marco

“We shape our tools, and thereafter they shape us.” — Marshall McLuhan (attributed)Who gets to tell the AI story? A movie, a media company or Marshall McLuhan?1. The movie: the AI doc, How I Became an Apocaloptimist, which That Was The Week publisher Keith Teare dismissed because it failed to define AI.2. A media company: OpenAI bought the streaming show TBPN for hundreds of millions of dollars in a move that is akin to Lenin starting Pravda.3. Marshall McLuhan: Ezra Klein visited Silicon Valley and was reminded of McLuhan's (supposed) remark that “first we shape our tools, and thereafter they shape us.”Klein argues that AI agents are empowering tools that give humans a massive boost in productivity. But the effect, he writes, is to constantly reinforce a certain version of ourselves. These agentic tools are undermining our agency, he fears. So AI ultimately gets to tell the AI story.Agency is becoming simultaneously the political problem and the cure — the thing-in-itself. Writing in the New York Times, Sophie Haigney argues that all the worst people want to be high-agency. Out here, in Silicon Valley, we think that all the worst people want to be low-agency. Perhaps the only thing we all agree on is that nobody wants to be a bot. First we shape our AIs and thereafter they shape us. Five Takeaways•       The AI Doc Is a Massive Failure: Well made, technically fine, but it never establishes what the problem with AI actually is or what kind of solution it offers. All three leaders — Altman, Amodei, Hassabis — come across as unconvinced there will be a good future. The only opinion you can leave with is a negative one.•       OpenAI Bought a Media Company: TBPN acquired for what may be hundreds of millions. Om Malik compares it to Lenin starting Pravda. You don't buy a media outlet unless you want to influence the message. Keith thinks it's about winning the messaging war against Anthropic. Meanwhile, OpenAI's COO shifts to special projects and Fidji Simo takes medical leave.•       Ezra Klein Saw Something New in San Francisco: He noticed people using AI agents as personal assistants — empowering tools that give humans a massive boost in productivity. His observation: the effect is to constantly reinforce a certain version of yourself. We shape our tools, and thereafter they shape us.•       Agency Is the Defining Political Conversation: The New York Times argues all the worst people want to be high-agency. Keith argues the opposite: agency is the precondition for making history. The Meta verdict treated a depressed girl as a passive victim of media with no decision-making role. That depicts humans as infants. It isn't true.•       AI Is a Calculating Machine. You Have to Ask It Something: Agency hasn't been given up. The human shapes the AI completely. Each session starts from scratch. The fear is that the next generation won't be as clever as AI. But unless we have a strong sense of the self, we will be lost. If we do, we can shape these tools as we want. About the GuestKeith Teare is a serial entrepreneur, investor, and publisher of That Was The Week, a weekly newsletter on the tech economy. He is co-founder of SignalRank and a regular Saturday guest on Keen On America.References:•       That Was The Week — Keith's editorial: “Who Gets to Tell the AI Story?”•       Episode 2852: Don't Fight the Last War — last TWTW on the social media trial and the Anthropic trap.•       Episode 2850: Bring the Friction Back — Balkam on social media addiction. The agency debate continues.About Keen On AmericaNobody asks more awkward questions than the Anglo-American writer and filmmaker Andrew Keen. In Keen On America, Andrew brings his pointed Transatlantic wit to making sense of the United States — hosting daily interviews about the history and future of this now venerable Republic. With nearly 2,800 episodes since the show launched on TechCrunch in 2010, Keen On America is the most prolific intellectual interview show in the history of podcasting.WebsiteSubstackYouTubeApple PodcastsSpotify Chapters:(00:31) - Introduction: the AI doc, How I Became an Apocaloptimist (01:28) - Keith's verdict: a massive failure of a movie (03:20) - Daniel Roher's narrative: should I have a kid in an AI world? (05:30) - Who gets to tell the AI story? (07:55) - Brain surgeons vs. social policy: the trust problem (09:37) - OpenAI buys TBPN: Lenin, Pravda, and the propaganda play (11:57) - Executive churn at OpenAI: Lightcap, Simo, and the COO shuffle (15:22) - Stability is the enemy: the biggest startup the world has ever seen (17:28) - The markets: rear-view mirror meets speculation (19:48) - SpaceX with xAI: rumoured at $2 trillion (22:32) - Ezra Klein in San Francisco: I saw something new (24:19) - McLuhan: we shape our tools, and thereafter they shape us (26:42) - Why didn't the AI doc actually use AI? (31:19) - The agency debate: all the worst people want to be high-agency (38:09) - AI is a calculating machine. You have to ask it something.

In Episode 470 of Hidden Forces, Demetri Kofinas speaks with Jacob Siegel — writer and editor at Tablet Magazine, U.S. Army veteran, and author of The Information State: Politics in the Age of Total Control — about the intellectual and historical roots of his argument that the internet has given rise to a fundamentally new form of political regime, one that governs not through force or democratic consent, but by controlling the codes and protocols of the digital public arena. The first hour traces the theoretical and historical foundations of Siegel's argument, from the media theory of Marshall McLuhan, Harold Innis, Neil Postman, and Jacques Ellul, to James Beniger's 1986 work The Control Revolution, to the 17th-century philosophy of Gottfried Leibniz and its downstream influence on the cybernetic frameworks that gave rise to the internet. They discuss the rise of digital swarms, the Anonymous movement, and what Siegel observed when he returned from Afghanistan in 2012 to find American culture being reshaped by the velocity and incoherence of online mass formation. The hour closes with an examination of his central thesis: that the internet — born out of Cold War Pentagon research and reconsolidated under government auspices after September 11th — has given rise to a third form of political regime he calls the information state. The second hour examines how the information state differs in kind from the analog propaganda systems of the 20th century, and why Siegel believes it is simultaneously more powerful and more brittle than what came before. They dig into the paradox at the heart of his argument — that the same informational infrastructure built to extend elite control also created the conditions for the digital insurgencies now convulsing Western politics — and explore Siegel's critique of the counter-disinformation establishment, his views on the concentration of private platform power, and what a coherent policy response to the dysfunctions of the modern information environment might look like, including antitrust regulation, private data ownership, and the prosecution of foreign disinformation campaigns, while preserving the essential distinction between the speech rights of citizens and non-citizens alike. Subscribe to our premium content—including our premium feed, episode transcripts, and Intelligence Reports—by visiting HiddenForces.io/subscribe. If you'd like to join the conversation and become a member of the Hidden Forces Genius community—with benefits like Q&A calls with guests, exclusive research and analysis, in-person events, and dinners—you can also sign up on our subscriber page at HiddenForces.io/subscribe. If you enjoyed today's episode of Hidden Forces, please support the show by: Subscribing on Apple Podcasts, YouTube, Spotify, Stitcher, SoundCloud, CastBox, or via our RSS Feed Writing us a review on Apple Podcasts & Spotify Join our mailing list at https://hiddenforces.io/newsletter/ Producer & Host: Demetri Kofinas Editor & Engineer: Stylianos Nicolaou Subscribe and support the podcast at https://hiddenforces.io. Join the conversation on Facebook, Instagram, and Twitter at @hiddenforcespod Follow Demetri on Twitter at @Kofinas Episode Recorded on 03/16/2026

Bob Dobbs was Marshall McLuhan's archivist, and is a renegade McLuhan scholar. In this episode we discuss the work of Marshall McLuhan and Frank Zappa.Dobb's site: https://ionandbob.com/Dobb's Zappa site: https://bobonzappa.com/Dobbs's writings: https://ionandbob.com/bob/bob-writingsThings Bob wanted me to add here: Info on the photo: bobonzappa.com/about/"Hey Hey Hey, Mister Snazzy Exec!": https://www.afka.net/Articles/1971-09_Circular.htmBob's chart: https://storage.googleapis.com/ionbob/pdf/tiny_note_chart.pdfHow To Call In to OFFICE HOURS: https://bobsofficehours.com/listen/---Become part of the Hermitix community:Hermitix Twitter - / hermitixpodcast Hermitix Discord - / discord Support Hermitix:Hermitix Subscription - https://hermitix.net/subscribe/ Patreon - / hermitix Donations: - https://www.paypal.me/hermitixpodHermitix Merchandise - http://teespring.com/stores/hermitix-2Bitcoin Donation Address: 3LAGEKBXEuE2pgc4oubExGTWtrKPuXDDLKEthereum Donation Address: 0x31e2a4a31B8563B8d238eC086daE9B75a00D9E74

"Las profundidades subliminales de la radio están cargadas de los ecos retumbantes de los cuernos tribales y de los antiguos tambores", escribía, hace sesenta años, el ilustre teórico de la comunicación Marshall McLuhan. Un café del sur especial dedicado a nuestros oyentes, una invitación a pensar la escucha como acto activo y revolucionario, en contra del ruido de la comunicación contemporánea.Escuchar audio

Talking with writer, reader, wanderer Znore , anonymous author of the blog Group Name for Grape Juice and his essay collection exploring imagination across philosophy, religion, literature, conspiracy, culture, a name plucked from Finnegans Wake, a pseudonym as portal, a thumb raised to the Dao of ideas.On hitchhiking as a philosophy of life, on synchronicities, on conversations continuing between strangers, on looking for the connective narrative between Blake and Nietzsche and McLuhan, on perception as incarnation, on bodying forth a world through the senses, on Nietzsche's claim that we are all greater artists than we know, on the imagination as Christ, on supercharging passive perception into active creation, on the non-dual lurking beneath, on CS Lewis and Tolkien and the myth that is also history, on Owen Barfield and original participation, on Steiner's evolution of consciousness, on animism as the religion of the earth, on the 8 million kami of Shinto and finding spirits in toilets and trees and rocks, on idolatry as the epoch of separation, on Philip K. Dick and the band that only played once but left many recordings, on finding God in the litter of the street, on Joyce and the refusal to separate high and low culture, on Finnegans Wake, on Vipassana, on prayer as the fastest route to sacred space, on Meister Eckhart's , on the original sangha and the early Christians as communists, on Marx's alienation mapped onto Barfield's idolatry, on the potlatch and the destruction of surplus, on Robert Anton Wilson's axiom that communication only happens between equals, on politics as the great distraction from the spiritual project, on the Chöd ritual and monks inviting demons to devour them in charnel grounds, on the eye atop the conspiracy pyramid being your own ego, on Jacob Böhme's God of wrath and God of love as one God, on AI as both Pentecost and Antichrist, on masks as honest practice, on raising children, on quiet resistance, on the cosmic communism of saving all beings from suffering, on life, on practice, on love.ExcerptsOn HitchhikingEvery time you're on the road and you put your thumb out, you're tapping into the DAO and just any ride that you get, completely alters the course of your life in a certain way.On ImaginationThe primary imagination is the imagination of the I am, which is God, but it's reflected in us through our perception.And so we all have this, we all have the imagination of God in the sense that we perceive things and we create the world that we behold with our senses. It's already anti-authoritarian. But I'll call myself an anarchist anyway, just to just to emphasize that, that my main focus is freedom and liberty, right? And especially that includes above all the freedom of the imagination. The liberty of the imagination.On PoliticsCosmic communism, not related to state control and Stalinism, none of that, but it's save all beings from suffering. That's what my politics are all about…Death Sweat of the Cluster: Selected Essays from Groupname for Grapejuice.By ZnoreAn inebriated exploration of reality and other myths featuring Finnegans Wake, William Blake, Robert Anton Wilson, Philip K. Dick, Emma Goldman, Ezra Pound, Robert Duncan, Terence McKenna, Gertrude Stein, Carl Jung, Marshall McLuhan and others as guides and waylayers. A cast of hundreds. Blog becomes book becomes new medium entirely. Synchronicity, siddhis, numerology, psychedelics, anarchy, the gods, yes. The poetics of anti-authority. Beautifully illustrated. Read with tea.Group Name for Grape Juicehttps://groupnameforgrapejuice.blogspot.com/ Get full access to Leafbox at leafbox.substack.com/subscribe

What happens when we stop treating the Bible as a sacred object and start paying attention to how we actually use it? In this conversation, theologian David Dault reflects on interpretation, responsibility, and the ethics of reading scripture in a fractured world. In this episode with Evan Rosa, Dault reflects on interpretation, responsibility, and how readers shape the meaning and moral impact of the Bible. Together they discuss the materiality of scripture, translation and betrayal, moral seriousness, scriptural reasoning across traditions, catastrophic love, and the ethical responsibility readers bear for how sacred texts are used. Episode Highlights “To assume that we know what a text is telling us is a matter of hubris.” “The Bible doesn't tell you to do anything. You as a reader decide what to do.” “Violence is always an act of interpretation.” “We never get to a place where everything is clean and everyone benefits.” “We have to take responsibility for the violence we involve ourselves in.” About David Dault David Dault is a theologian, journalist, and media producer whose work explores religion, culture, ethics, and interpretation. He is Executive Producer and host of Things Not Seen: Conversations About Culture and Faith, a nationally distributed public radio program. He teaches in the Institute of Pastoral Studies at Loyola University Chicago. Dault's scholarship focuses on hermeneutics, religion and media, and the ethical implications of how sacred texts are interpreted and used in public life. His book The Accessorized Bible examines the material forms, cultural framing, and interpretive communities that shape how people encounter scripture. He holds degrees in theology and religious studies and frequently writes and lectures on religion, politics, and culture. Helpful Links And Resources The Accessorized Bible, by David Dault https://yalebooks.yale.edu/book/9780300153125/the-accessorized-bible/ Things Not Seen: Conversations About Culture and Faith https://thingsnotseenradio.com David Dault's personal website https://www.daviddault.com/ Show Notes The Accessorized Bible—material culture of scripture, design, marketing niches, and the ways the physical form of the Bible shapes how readers interpret and use it Bible as object, medium, and cultural artifact; Marshall McLuhan and media theory—the form of a book shaping how ideas move between minds Books as technologies of imagination and identity formation; reading as a kind of “magical” transfer of ideas from one mind into another “To assume that we know what a text is telling us is a matter of hubris.” Interpretation requires caution, humility, and the recognition that texts exceed our control Making the familiar strange again; recovering the power of scripture by refusing to domesticate it or assume we fully understand it Franz Rosenzweig on preserving the alienness of sacred texts; debate with Martin Buber on translation and clarity Translation as interpretation—translators inevitably carry values, ideologies, and cultural assumptions into the text Harold Bloom's Anxiety of Influence; interpreters “misread” texts in order to wrestle with their influence and generate new meaning Reading scripture in community; trust, vulnerability, and shared responsibility among interpreters Scriptural reasoning—Jews, Christians, and Muslims reading shared stories (Noah, Abraham, Moses) together without claiming mastery over the text Tikkun olam—Jewish ethical tradition of “repairing the world”; the world is wounded and humans participate in its healing Repentance and Repair—Rabbi Danya Ruttenberg on moral accountability, restitution, and the work of restoring relationships Violence embedded in interpretation; moral action always involves choices about attention, resources, and responsibility The “flashlight” metaphor—moral attention illuminating one suffering person while another need temporarily falls into shadow Jairus's daughter and the woman with the hemorrhage—competing moral urgencies in the Gospels “We never get to a place where everything is clean and everyone benefits.” Moral action always involves tragic limitation and competing responsibilities Levinas and infinite responsibility; the ethical demand arising from the face of the person before us Moral seriousness versus performative irony; resisting discourse driven by trolling, spectacle, and dopamine-driven outrage A Bible Is A Book—dismantling the assumption that sacred texts themselves command moral action Steve Martin's The Jerk and the phone book illustration; a sniper randomly selecting a name and deciding someone should die “The Bible doesn't tell you what to do.” Readers decide what moral actions follow from a text Reader responsibility; refusing the excuse “the Bible told me to,” recognizing moral agency belongs to interpreters Scripture as “accessory to a crime”—sacred texts used as cover for violence, exclusion, or cruelty The Bible as platform—modular text shaped by study notes, editorial commentary, illustrations, and devotional framing Study Bibles, children's Bibles, niche-market editions; publishing strategies shaping the interpretive experience Platform logic—similar to Facebook or Twitter; users curate meaning from a shared medium Proof-texting and selective quotation; constructing entire moral worlds from isolated passages Hannah Arendt on responsibility; loving the world enough to accept responsibility for it James Baldwin leaving Paris after the Little Rock crisis; refusing comfort while others bear injustice “Someone should have been there with her.” Baldwin's recognition that solidarity requires leaving safety and standing beside the vulnerable Catastrophic love—risking institutions, traditions, and comfort for the sake of vulnerable bodies Matthew 25 ethics; encountering Christ among the hungry, imprisoned, and marginalized Moral seriousness as daily practice; imperfect responsibility, persistent solidarity, doing what one can today and beginning again tomorrow #Bible #ChristianBible #BiblicalInterpretation #TheologyPodcast #ChristianEthics #Hermeneutics #Scripture #FaithAndCulture #DavidDault Production Notes This podcast featured David Dault Edited and Produced by Evan Rosa Hosted by Evan Rosa Production Assistance by Noah Senthil A Production of the Yale Center for Faith & Culture at Yale Divinity School https://faith.yale.edu/about Support For the Life of the World podcast by giving to the Yale Center for Faith & Culture: https://faith.yale.edu/give

Artificial Intelligence, or AI, is all the buzz right now. It's come on the scene quickly, and so many are enamored with what it can do. For those of us who have engaged with AI through the growing number of apps that are out there, we are generating songs, videos, images, and even text in literally a split second, and what we see is so amazing that it can draw us in just as quickly as it responds to our prompts. Dartmouth University professor Scott Anthony has been watching his students to discern what they're feeling about a future saturated with AI. In an article in Fortune Magazine, titled “They'll lose their humanity: the professor says he's surprised just how scared his Gen Z students are of AI”, Anthony says he's noticing that his students fear losing their critical thinking skills to the AI Machine. The late media philosopher Marshall McLuhan saw this coming. He said this, “We shape our tools and then our tools shape us.” Parents, exercise caution in how you embrace AI in your life and home. 

Are we navigating reality, or just a highly optimized map of the past? In this episode, we dive into the architecture of our modern ghost story. We explore how the digital systems built to reflect our world have instead consumed it, replacing human experience with statistical prediction, algorithmic herding, and mechanical objectivity. Drawing on a wide synthesis of philosophy, media theory, and history, we deconstruct how the "map ate the territory." From Jean Baudrillard's simulacra to the predictive text of modern Large Language Models, we examine the uncanny reality of living inside a model that only knows what the dead have written. If the internet is a séance and your digital profile is a voodoo doll, what happens to the biological original? In this episode, we unpack: The Precession of Simulacra: How credit scores and algorithmic risk models generate the reality they claim to measure. The Bureaucracy of the Dead: Why modern AI is less an artificial intelligence and more an industrialization of our ancestors, echoing the warnings of James Hillman. Digiphrenia & The Voodoo Doll: Douglas Rushkoff's narrative collapse and Jaron Lanier's terrifying metaphor for the modern attention economy. The Numbers Shield: Theodore Porter's revelation that "mechanical objectivity" and rigid quantification are actually defense mechanisms used by fragile institutions. Spheres & Foam: Peter Sloterdijk's theory on why we retreat into fragile, toxic digital bubbles when our shared reality fractures. We didn't just build tools; we built environments. And when the machine becomes the environment, its logic becomes our logic. Join us as we look for the gap in the code—the unquantifiable silence where true human agency still survives. Concepts & Thinkers Discussed: Adam Curtis, Jean Baudrillard, Marshall McLuhan, Naomi Klein, Shoshana Zuboff, James Hillman, and Peter Sloterdijk.

Lost in today's media landscape? Or are you just curious as to how the industry got here?You need to go back to Marshall McLuhan, the grandfather of media literacy, and the grandfather of this week's special guest.On this week's Media Roundtable: Special Edition, Dan Granger (CEO & Founder, Oxford Road) and Giles Martin ( EVP, Strategy, Oxford Road) welcome the legacy media guru Andrew McLuhan (Director & Founder, The McLuhan Institute).Andrew's work continues the legacy of his grandfather (Marshall McLuhan) and father (Eric McLuhan). The McLuhan family's work is enormously relevant to marketers: it's all about the effect media and technology have on people. When marketers decide which channels to use and how to craft & place their messages, they would do well to draw on McLuhan's insights.Dan, Giles, and Andrew are talking: Early Media Literacy, The Media is The Message, and Hot vs. Cool. Let's dig in.“ Nobody loves being sold stuff, so you're already at a disadvantage. But people do love creativity. If that's not a license to have some fun, I don't know what is.”- Andrew McLuhan (Director & Founder, The McLuhan Institute)See Privacy Policy at https://art19.com/privacy and California Privacy Notice at https://art19.com/privacy#do-not-sell-my-info.

Andrew McLuhan joins the pod to discuss the current state of mass media and whether his grandfather [Marshall] would have an X account.Check out Andrew's Substack: https://mcluhan.substack.com/ And read João Ruy Faustino's piece in pomo on McLuhan https://cracksinpomo.substack.com/p/marshall-mcluhan-was-not-a-globalist

Andrew McLuhan joins the pod to discuss the current state of mass media and whether his grandfather [Marshall] would have an X account.Check out Andrew's Substack: https://mcluhan.substack.com/ And read João Ruy Faustino's piece in pomo on McLuhan https://cracksinpomo.substack.com/p/marshall-mcluhan-was-not-a-globalist

Andrew McLuhan is the son of Eric McLuhan, a grandson of Marshall McLuhan, founder and director of The McLuhan Institute (founded 2017). TMI was founded to conserve and continue media studies in the McLuhan tradition, which arguably began with "Understanding Media: The Extensions of Man" published in 1964.Conrad's Deli - The best jerky you'll ever have: https://conradsdeli.com/ use promo code "FIRST THINGS" for 10% off.-------------------------------------------------------------------------------✒ Substack: https://johnheersftf.substack.com/ⓧ https://x.com/johnfromftf

This week we're joined by actor, drag queen, and Debbie Harry fanatic, Love Connie, for a look at David Cronenberg's sexy and sadistic meditation on horror, television, and society: Videodrome. The early 1980s saw a revolution in consumer video. Small UHF stations broadcast trashy movies at night to compete with the larger VHF networks. VCRs and cable introduced theatrical films to the home market uncut for broadcast. Canadian media theorist, Marshall McLuhan, had some real deep thoughts on what that would mean for our society and how it would change our consciousness. Cronenberg saw a movie in there and he cast James Woods and Debbie Harry as pawns in a game played by shadowy figures using television signals to physically transform the viewers. Max Renn is an executive for CIVIC-TV, a small UHF station in Toronto, a station that broadcast violent and pornographic content. He's on the lookout for the next sensation that'll broaden his audience and he stumbles on to what appears to be a snuff show called Videodrome. It's nothing but brutality, no plot, no characters, just violence. The deeper he looks into it, the worse his hallucinations become. What's real? What's fantasy? Does it even matter? What is Videodrome doing to him? Join the Bring Me The Axe Discord: ⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠https://discord.gg/snkxuxzJ⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠ Support Bring Me The Axe! on Patreon:⁠⁠https://patreon.com/bringmetheaxepod⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠ Buy Bring Me The Axe merch here:⁠⁠⁠https://www.bonfire.com/store/bring-me-the-axe-podcast/⁠⁠

Link to the full podcast:https://youtu.be/hDxHkneqASs?si=MXWSdLog-1XDbxIn Description:Dr. Tom Trimble emphasizes the urgent need to regain control over technology, clarifying that he is not against it but believes it must be managed intentionally. Drawing from Marshall McLuhan's idea that “the medium is the message” and Neil Postman's view that technological change is ecological, he explains that smartphones have transformed every aspect of life—family, worship, and even prayer. Reflecting on his late son Anthony's words, Trimble shares a powerful lesson: after all the time spent on our devices, “nobody even wants my phone.” Mortality, he notes, brings clarity about what truly matters—God, relationships, and purpose.Purchase The Christian Leader Blueprint book today: https://www.ryanfranklin.org/blueprintbookDownload The Christian Leader Blueprint – Short Guide (Free): https://www.ryanfranklin.org/blueprint Take the Christian Leader® Self-Assessment (Free):https://www.ryanfranklin.org/clselfassessment Learn more about Christian Leader® Community Coaching:https://www.ryanfranklin.org/communitycoaching YouTube and Audio Podcast: https://www.ryanfranklin.org/leaderpodcast Connect with Ryan: Email: info@ryanfranklin.org Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/rnfranklin/ Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/rnfranklin/ Linkedin: https://www.linkedin.com/in/rnfranklin/ Audio mastering by Apostolic Audio: https://www.apostolic-audio.com#leadership, #thoughtleadership, #ministry, #pastor, #pastors, #churches, #leadershiptraining, #churchleader, #churchleaders, #influence, #leadershipdevelopment, #coaching, #executivecoach, #leadershipcoaching, #productivitycoach, #productivity, #growthmindset, #theproductiveleader, #ChristianLeader, #ChristianLeadership, #LeadershipPodcast, #FaithAndBusiness, #PodcastInterview, #ChristianEntrepreneurship, #KingdomImpact, #PodcastInspiration, #LeadershipJourney, #PurposeDriven, #ChristianPodcast, #LeadershipEssentials, #LeadershipFundamentalsSend us a text

We say goodbye to 2025 and offer a skeptical welcome to 2026 with a very special call-in episode. Topics range from Marshall McLuhan to Michael Jackson and beyond. Join us on Patreon for an extra episode every week - https://www.patreon.com/michaelandus

The Future Commerce team reflects on their favorite podcast moments from a year of extraordinary conversations. From haunted dolls and architectural rhizomes to debates about capitalism and idealism, these episodes challenged conventional wisdom about how brands influence culture and why efficiency alone won't save us. (Feat. Rory Sutherland, Dami Lee, Andrew McLuhan, Nick Susi, Kunle Campbell, Ana Andjelic.)Our Year In Cultural CommerceKey takeaways:VISIONS 2025 brought together Dami Lee, Andrew Huang, and more creative pioneers to explore the future of culture through the lens of commerce and its effects on humansSpooky Commerce pushed our limits: Jolene the doll elevated spooky season to performance artIdealism struggles to scale under capitalism's efficiency demandsHeritage isn't always precious—sometimes it needs critical interrogationTechnology transforms humanity whether we contemplate it or notMarketing success occurs beyond the attribution window we measureRory Sutherland's conversation was our most-downloaded episode of 2025, for good reason. "It's really hard to be idealistic in a capitalist society or period." — Brian Lange [00:13:12]"We're not measuring other forms of what makes things successful. Are we just letting technologists, efficiency ops and finance run the world? I don't think it leads to the greatest outcome where we're all happiest." — Phillip Jackson on Rory Sutherland's marketing critique [00:36:13]In-Show Mentions:Listen to Dami Lee's VISIONS presentation on architecture, the structure of our lives, rhizomes, and more.Listen to Kunle Campbell's conversation with Phillip at K:LDN on capitalism vs. idealism and meaning.Listen to Ana Andjelic's episode on the throughline that connects brand culture to operations, merchandise, on-the-ground events, and more.Listen to Andrew McLuhan's 2-hour feature unpacking his grandfather Marshall McLuhan's predictions and insights on media, technology, and what technological development will do to our future. Listen to Nick Susi's Halloween special on the true story behind the War of the Worlds mania (and the media war that drove it).Listen to Rory Sutherland's episode on the fat tail of marketing and what cultural shifts marketers of tomorrow should be preparing for.Associated Links:Check out Future Commerce on YouTubeCheck out Future Commerce Plus for exclusive content and save on merch and printSubscribe to Insiders and The Senses to read more about what we are witnessing in the commerce worldListen to our other episodes of Future CommerceHave any questions or comments about the show? Let us know on futurecommerce.com, or reach out to us on Twitter, Facebook, Instagram, or LinkedIn. We love hearing from our listeners! Hosted by Simplecast, an AdsWizz company. See pcm.adswizz.com for information about our collection and use of personal data for advertising.

Superbloom: How Technologies of Connection Tear Us Apart By: Nicholas Carr Published: 2025 272 Pages Briefly, what is this book about? On its surface, this is a fairly typical anti-social media book, though Carr does have some interesting things to say about weaknesses inherent to the medium: content collapse, algorithmic engineering, and hostility generation. All things I'll get to in a bit. What's the author's angle? Carr comes from the Marshall McLuhan and Neil Postman school of media criticism. Media have inherent properties that lead to different sorts of communication, and different strengths and weaknesses. Carr, like many, thinks that social media has some particularly salient weaknesses.  Who should read this book? When considering whether to read a non-fiction book, one has to consider where it fits with one's various interests. If you're really interested in the negative effects of social media, then I would definitely read this book. If it's one of many interests, but not in your top 5-10, then you can probably skip it.  What does the book have to say about the future?

Oscar-Nominated Filmmaker Pen Densham on Writing, Cinematography, Photography, Creativity and the Freedom of Breaking the Rules There's a particular kind of magic that happens when a storyteller stops trying to please the market and starts listening to their soul. Pen Densham knows this better than most—he's lived it across three different mediums, each time learning to let go a little more. Densham's creative journey spans decades and disciplines: from screenwriting to cinematography to, now, impressionist photography. When I sat down with him for Audio Signals Podcast, we didn't dwell on credits or awards. We talked about the vulnerability of creativity, the courage it takes to break the rules, and the freedom that comes when you stop asking for permission. "Those scripts that I wrote out of passion, even though they didn't seem necessary to fit the market, got made more frequently than the ones I wrote when I was architecting to hit goals for a studio," Densham told me. It's a paradox he's discovered over and over: the work born from genuine emotional need resonates in ways that calculated formulas never can. His thinking has been shaped by extraordinary influences. He studied with Marshall McLuhan, who opened his eyes to the biology of storytelling—how audiences enter a trance state, mirroring the characters on screen, processing strategies through their neurons. He found resonance in Joseph Campbell's work on myth. "We're the shamans of our age," Densham reflects. "We're trying to interpret society in ways that people can learn and change." But what struck me most was how Densham, after mastering the craft of writing and the machinery of cinematography, has circled back to the simplest tool: a camera. Not to capture perfect images, but to create what he calls "visual music." He moves his camera deliberately during long exposures. He shoots koi through blinding sunlight. He photographs waves at dusk until they fragment into impressionistic dances of light and motion. "The biggest effort was letting go of self-criticism," he admitted. "Thinking 'this is stupid, these aren't real photographs.' But I'm making images that blow my mind." This is the thread that runs through Densham's entire creative life: the willingness to unlearn. In writing, he learned to trust his instincts over studio formulas. In cinematography, he learned that visual storytelling could carry emotional weight beyond dialogue. And now, in photography, he's learned that breaking every rule he ever absorbed—holding the camera still, getting the exposure right, capturing a "correct" image—has unlocked something entirely new. There's a lesson here for anyone who creates. We absorb rules unconsciously—what a proper screenplay looks like, how a film should be shot, what makes a "real" photograph. And sometimes those rules serve us. But sometimes they become cages. Densham's journey is proof that the most profound creative freedom comes not from mastering the rules, but from having the courage to abandon them. "I'm not smarter than anybody else," he said. "But like Einstein said, I stay at things longer." We left the door open for more—AI, the creator economy, the future of storytelling. But for now, there's something powerful in Densham's path across writing, cinematography, and photography: a reminder that creativity is not a destination but a continuous act of letting go.Stay tuned. Subscribe. And remember—we are all made of stories. Learn more about Pen Densham: https://pendenshamphotography.comLearn more about my work and podcasts at marcociappelli.com and audiosignalspodcast.com Hosted by Simplecast, an AdsWizz company. See pcm.adswizz.com for information about our collection and use of personal data for advertising.

Oscar-Nominated Filmmaker Pen Densham on Writing, Cinematography, Photography, Creativity and the Freedom of Breaking the Rules There's a particular kind of magic that happens when a storyteller stops trying to please the market and starts listening to their soul. Pen Densham knows this better than most—he's lived it across three different mediums, each time learning to let go a little more. Densham's creative journey spans decades and disciplines: from screenwriting to cinematography to, now, impressionist photography. When I sat down with him for Audio Signals Podcast, we didn't dwell on credits or awards. We talked about the vulnerability of creativity, the courage it takes to break the rules, and the freedom that comes when you stop asking for permission. "Those scripts that I wrote out of passion, even though they didn't seem necessary to fit the market, got made more frequently than the ones I wrote when I was architecting to hit goals for a studio," Densham told me. It's a paradox he's discovered over and over: the work born from genuine emotional need resonates in ways that calculated formulas never can. His thinking has been shaped by extraordinary influences. He studied with Marshall McLuhan, who opened his eyes to the biology of storytelling—how audiences enter a trance state, mirroring the characters on screen, processing strategies through their neurons. He found resonance in Joseph Campbell's work on myth. "We're the shamans of our age," Densham reflects. "We're trying to interpret society in ways that people can learn and change." But what struck me most was how Densham, after mastering the craft of writing and the machinery of cinematography, has circled back to the simplest tool: a camera. Not to capture perfect images, but to create what he calls "visual music." He moves his camera deliberately during long exposures. He shoots koi through blinding sunlight. He photographs waves at dusk until they fragment into impressionistic dances of light and motion. "The biggest effort was letting go of self-criticism," he admitted. "Thinking 'this is stupid, these aren't real photographs.' But I'm making images that blow my mind." This is the thread that runs through Densham's entire creative life: the willingness to unlearn. In writing, he learned to trust his instincts over studio formulas. In cinematography, he learned that visual storytelling could carry emotional weight beyond dialogue. And now, in photography, he's learned that breaking every rule he ever absorbed—holding the camera still, getting the exposure right, capturing a "correct" image—has unlocked something entirely new. There's a lesson here for anyone who creates. We absorb rules unconsciously—what a proper screenplay looks like, how a film should be shot, what makes a "real" photograph. And sometimes those rules serve us. But sometimes they become cages. Densham's journey is proof that the most profound creative freedom comes not from mastering the rules, but from having the courage to abandon them. "I'm not smarter than anybody else," he said. "But like Einstein said, I stay at things longer." We left the door open for more—AI, the creator economy, the future of storytelling. But for now, there's something powerful in Densham's path across writing, cinematography, and photography: a reminder that creativity is not a destination but a continuous act of letting go.Stay tuned. Subscribe. And remember—we are all made of stories. Learn more about Pen Densham: https://pendenshamphotography.comLearn more about my work and podcasts at marcociappelli.com and audiosignalspodcast.com Hosted by Simplecast, an AdsWizz company. See pcm.adswizz.com for information about our collection and use of personal data for advertising.

Back in episode 112, Phil and JF devised a gimmick for a show: randomly select one of the many aphorisms in The Book of Probes, a compendium of Marshall McLuhan's prophetic quips designed by David Carson, and see what happens. It proved lively enough that they're trying it again nearly a hundred episodes later. The resulting conversation touches the weird across a range of themes: tourism, the two kinds of truth, advertising, Kubrick's marketing savvy, technology, orality versus literacy, and much more. A fitting feast for the mind as the year draws to a close. From all of us at Weird Studies, happy holidays. • Sign up for JF Martel and Erik Davis's upcoming course on Moby-Dick. • Join Phil, JF, and composer Pierre-Yves Martel for Weirdosphere's Solstice Story Hour on December 21. • For dates, venues, and the full slate of Weird Academia events in Bloomington this January, visit the Centre for Possible Minds website. • To participate in the Weird Academia Colloquium, email organizers Emma Stamm and Michael Garfield at elfthoughts@gmail.com Header Image: NASA. REFERENCES Marshall McLuhan, Distant Early Warning Deck Thomas Mann, The Magic Mountain Plato, The Seventh Letter Marshall McLuhan, The Book of Probes Toronto School of Communication Theory Walter Ong, Orality and Literacy Paul Kingsnorth, Against the Machine Charles Taylor, A Secular Age Plato, The Republic  Marshall McLuhan, Understanding Media Jonathan Crary, 24/7 H. P. Lovecraft, The Color out of Space Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Canadian philosopher Marshall McLuhan is most recognized for the expression "the medium is the message" which means the technology or medium we use to transmit information changes our behavior — and society — more than the information it carries. Tim Love spent more than four decades in the world of global advertising. He was Vice-Chairman of the global advertising and marketing services company, Omnicom Group. Since retiring, Love has turned his attention toward the way our online world operates today — and how behavior data collected on us users is being used to not only drive our behavior but is negatively impacting mental health and has led to polarization. We discuss his new book "The Medium is the Mirror: The Reformation of Truth."

Welcome to another episode of the **Bowie Book Club**, where wild speculation and grasping for straws about Bowie's favorite books has reigned supreme since 2016. This time we read Medium is the Massage by Marchall McLuhan, a stew of images, aphorisms and (maybe unfounded?) optimism that will loosen up those tired media muscles.

Neil Young turns 80 — a chart reading. The 11/11 Trump reckoning comes true. Marshall McLuhan and Tom Wolfe. Tantra Studio: What is a "wiresexual"?Notes, astrology chart, discussion, photo — are hereThank you for visiting. You are listening to Planet Waves. You can hear my full length show every Friday night at https://planetwaves.fm My Substack is: https://planetwaves.substack.com/ Visit the Astrology Boutique for all of your astrology needs. Lots of free samples and the monthly horoscope too. https://www.astrology.boutique/

In this episode of Thinking Out Loud, Nathan and Cameron dive deep into a rich theological discussion on globalization, nationalism, and the Christian's calling in a hyper-connected yet fractured world. Through the lens of American farm policy, overproduction, and the global soybean market, they explore how shifting trade dynamics, political realignments, and cultural homogenization reveal both the power and fragility of modern systems. Drawing on biblical wisdom and thinkers like Wendell Berry and Marshall McLuhan, Nathan and Cameron challenge Christians to discern where their true responsibilities lie—between interest, concern, and focus—and to reclaim a distinctly Christian vision of diversity, culture, and stewardship amid global uncertainty. This conversation is perfect for believers seeking thoughtful, gospel-centered insight into current events and how faith shapes our engagement with economics, culture, and identity.DONATE LINK: https://toltogether.com/donate BOOK A SPEAKER: https://toltogether.com/book-a-speakerJOIN TOL CONNECT: https://toltogether.com/tol-connect TOL Connect is an online forum where TOL listeners can continue the conversation begun on the podcast.

Technology has given an untrained humanity unprecedented power over itself. Peter Berkman, following Marshall McLuhan and Romano Guardini, argues that he "digital world" has rapidly replaced other modes of human interaction, and AI presents a rapid acceleration of that movement. In this podcast, Marc Barnes and Peter Berkman discuss this development and the Christian response.

This is a preview — for the full episode (released: Sept 24, 2025), subscribe: https://newmodels.io https://patreon.com/newmodels https://newmodels.substack.com Writer Gideon Jacobs joins to discuss ontological literacy among other things in the wake of the assassination of American Christian Nationalist Charlie Kirk, which in our assessment was not actually a political assassination.  Names Cited: Alexander Dugan, Amanda Askell, Alain Badiou, Jean Baudrillard, Becoming Press, Byung-Chul Han, CERN, Charlie Kirk, Donald Trump, Kevin Munger, Elon Musk, Eric Davis, Grok, Felix Guattari, Jay Springet, Jesus Christ, Jezebel, Keith Johnstone, Kamala Harris, Larry Ellison, Luigi Mangione, Marshall McLuhan, Mara McKevitt, Mark Zuckerberg, Peter Carroll, Vladamir Putin, RFK Jr., René Girard, Theo Anthony, Tyler Robinson, UnitedHealthcare, Walter Ong See also: https://www.instagram.com/gideon___jacobs NM Talkcore: Gideon Jacobs on Trump as Image (Nov 2024) NM Talkcore: Gideon Jacobs on Musk, Trump, and Fiction (2025)
 Gideon Jacobs, “Player One and Main Character,” (Apr. 2025) https://lareviewofbooks.org/article/player-one-and-main-character/ Gideon Jacobs, “Trump l'Oeil,” (LARB, Nov 2024) https://lareviewofbooks.org/article/trump-loeil/ Jay Springett: https://thejaymo.net/permanentlymoved/ https://newmodels.io

What you hold in your mind shapes you. In this episode, Raghunath and Kaustubha explore Marshall McLuhan's famous line—“We become what we behold”—and connect it with Krishna's teachings in the Bhagavad-gītā and Śrīmad-Bhāgavatam. Do we let random media and impulses shape us, or do we consciously adopt tools that align with who we want to become? From the media-is-the-message to Bhāgavatam 10.12, we enter Aghāsura's cavernous “cave,” watch Krishna rescue His friends, liberate the demon, and trigger a celestial celebration. Along the way: fearlessness vs. recklessness, why a morning program beats doom-scrolling, and how bringing Krishna into the heart quietly lowers the temperature on everyday panic. Key Highlights * McLuhan meets the Gītā: how tools and habits carve our destiny * The cowherd boys' fearless joy vs. reckless “No Fear” bravado * Aghāsura decoded: envy, anxiety, and Krishna's liberating touch * Why a crafted morning program beats algorithmic autopilot * Celestial fireworks—demigods, Gandharvas, and Brahmā's astonishment A practical, provocative look at how the tools we choose today determine the lives we live tomorrow.

In this episode of Acta Non Verba, host Marcus Aurelius Anderson interviews Mark McGrath, a Marine, strategic advisor, and author. Together, they explore the philosophy of "actions, not words," discuss the impact of technology and AI on orientation and decision-making, and dive deep into the teachings of John Boyd and Marshall McLuhan. The conversation covers adaptation, information warfare, and the importance of continuous learning and reorientation in a rapidly changing world. Episode Highlights: [15:53] — The role of AI and technology in enhancing human orientation and decision-making. [11:04] — The "Five T Protocol" for analyzing information warfare: terrain, target, tone, trope, and tactics. [27:39] — Lessons on adaptation, energy, and continuous movement from military and business perspectives. Mark McGrath is a Marine, strategic advisor, and author of "The World of Reorientation." He is the co-host of the "No Way Out" podcast and serves as Chief Learning Officer at AGLX. Mark is known for bringing John Boyd’s strategic philosophy to life, helping leaders navigate uncertainty with sharper observations, stronger orientations, and decisive, adaptive actions. He is also the creator of the "Contra Frame" Substack, where he explores experimental ideas on strategy and orientation. Contact Info & Links: Substack: The World of Reorientation Substack: Contra Frame Podcast: No Way Out AGLX: com Twitter/X: @markmcgrathcio LinkedIn: Mark McGrath Learn more about the gift of Adversity and my mission to help my fellow humans create a better world by heading to www.marcusaureliusanderson.com. There you can take action by joining my ANV inner circle to get exclusive content and information.See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

What you hold in your mind shapes you. In this episode, Raghunath and Kaustubha explore Marshall McLuhan's famous line—“We become what we behold”—and connect it with Krishna's teachings in the Bhagavad-gītā and Śrīmad-Bhāgavatam. Do we let random media and impulses shape us, or do we consciously adopt tools that align with who we want to become? From the media-is-the-message to Bhāgavatam 10.12, we enter Aghāsura's cavernous “cave,” watch Krishna rescue His friends, liberate the demon, and trigger a celestial celebration. Along the way: fearlessness vs. recklessness, why a morning program beats doom-scrolling, and how bringing Krishna into the heart quietly lowers the temperature on everyday panic. Key Highlights * McLuhan meets the Gītā: how tools and habits carve our destiny * The cowherd boys' fearless joy vs. reckless “No Fear” bravado * Aghāsura decoded: envy, anxiety, and Krishna's liberating touch * Why a crafted morning program beats algorithmic autopilot * Celestial fireworks—demigods, Gandharvas, and Brahmā's astonishment A practical, provocative look at how the tools we choose today determine the lives we live tomorrow.

If you listen to The Colin McEnroe Show regularly, you likely know that Colin has been influenced by two media theorists: Marshall McLuhan and Neil Postman. Postman wrote Amusing Ourselves to Death, among other books, and McLuhan is probably most famous for the phrase "The medium is the message," in addition to other influential ideas. This hour, we look at the ideas of McLuhan and Postman, and discuss why they still resonate so much today. GUESTS: Bill Yousman: Professor of Media Studies at Sacred Heart University Megan Garber: Staff Writer at The Atlantic who writes about the intersection of politics and culture. She is the author of On Misdirection: Magic, Mayhem, American Politics. She previously worked for Neiman Journalism Lab and the Columbia Journalism Review Andrew McLuhan: Founder and director of The McLuhan Institute, which was founded to conserve and continue media studies in the McLuhan tradition. He is the son of Eric McLuhan and the grandson of Marshall McLuhan MUSIC FEATURED (in order): Passacaglia by Johan Halvorsen (performed by Grégoire Blanc) Please Mr. Postman by The Marvelettes The Revolution Will Not Be Televised by Gil Scott-Heron Medium is the Massage by Akira the Don, Marshall McLuhan Fish n’ Chip Paper by Elvis Costello Amusing Ourselves to Death by Winston Apple Support the show: http://www.wnpr.org/donateSee omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

⸻ Podcast: Redefining Society and Technologyhttps://redefiningsocietyandtechnologypodcast.com _____________________________This Episode's SponsorsBlackCloak provides concierge cybersecurity protection to corporate executives and high-net-worth individuals to protect against hacking, reputational loss, financial loss, and the impacts of a corporate data breach.BlackCloak:  https://itspm.ag/itspbcweb_____________________________A Musing On Society & Technology Newsletter Written By Marco Ciappelli | Read by TAPE3August 18, 2025The Narrative Attack Paradox: When Cybersecurity Lost the Ability to Detect Its Own Deception and the Humanity We Risk When Truth Becomes OptionalReflections from Black Hat USA 2025 on Deception, Disinformation, and the Marketing That Chose Fiction Over FactsBy Marco CiappelliSean Martin, CISSP just published his analysis of Black Hat USA 2025, documenting what he calls the cybersecurity vendor "echo chamber." Reviewing over 60 vendor announcements, Sean found identical phrases echoing repeatedly: "AI-powered," "integrated," "reduce analyst burden." The sameness forces buyers to sift through near-identical claims to find genuine differentiation.This reveals more than a marketing problem—it suggests that different technologies are being fed into the same promotional blender, possibly a generative AI one, producing standardized output regardless of what went in. When an entire industry converges on identical language to describe supposedly different technologies, meaningful technical discourse breaks down.But Sean's most troubling observation wasn't about marketing copy—it was about competence. When CISOs probe vendor claims about AI capabilities, they encounter vendors who cannot adequately explain their own technologies. When conversations moved beyond marketing promises to technical specifics, answers became vague, filled with buzzwords about proprietary algorithms.Reading Sean's analysis while reflecting on my own Black Hat experience, I realized we had witnessed something unprecedented: an entire industry losing the ability to distinguish between authentic capability and generated narrative—precisely as that same industry was studying external "narrative attacks" as an emerging threat vector.The irony was impossible to ignore. Black Hat 2025 sessions warned about AI-generated deepfakes targeting executives, social engineering attacks using scraped LinkedIn profiles, and synthetic audio calls designed to trick financial institutions. Security researchers documented how adversaries craft sophisticated deceptions using publicly available content. Meanwhile, our own exhibition halls featured countless unverifiable claims about AI capabilities that even the vendors themselves couldn't adequately explain.But to understand what we witnessed, we need to examine the very concept that cybersecurity professionals were discussing as an external threat: narrative attacks. These represent a fundamental shift in how adversaries target human decision-making. Unlike traditional cyberattacks that exploit technical vulnerabilities, narrative attacks exploit psychological vulnerabilities in human cognition. Think of them as social engineering and propaganda supercharged by AI—personalized deception at scale that adapts faster than human defenders can respond. They flood information environments with false content designed to manipulate perception and erode trust, rendering rational decision-making impossible.What makes these attacks particularly dangerous in the AI era is scale and personalization. AI enables automated generation of targeted content tailored to individual psychological profiles. A single adversary can launch thousands of simultaneous campaigns, each crafted to exploit specific cognitive biases of particular groups or individuals.But here's what we may have missed during Black Hat 2025: the same technological forces enabling external narrative attacks have already compromised our internal capacity for truth evaluation. When vendors use AI-optimized language to describe AI capabilities, when marketing departments deploy algorithmic content generation to sell algorithmic solutions, when companies building detection systems can't detect the artificial nature of their own communications, we've entered a recursive information crisis.From a sociological perspective, we're witnessing the breakdown of social infrastructure required for collective knowledge production. Industries like cybersecurity have historically served as early warning systems for technological threats—canaries in the coal mine with enough technical sophistication to spot emerging dangers before they affect broader society.But when the canary becomes unable to distinguish between fresh air and poison gas, the entire mine is at risk.This brings us to something the literary world understood long before we built our first algorithm. Jorge Luis Borges, the Argentine writer, anticipated this crisis in his 1940s stories like "On Exactitude in Science" and "The Library of Babel"—tales about maps that become more real than the territories they represent and libraries containing infinite books, including false ones. In his fiction, simulations and descriptions eventually replace the reality they were meant to describe.We're living in a Borgesian nightmare where marketing descriptions of AI capabilities have become more influential than actual AI capabilities. When a vendor's promotional language about their AI becomes more convincing than a technical demonstration, when buyers make decisions based on algorithmic marketing copy rather than empirical evidence, we've entered that literary territory where the map has consumed the landscape. And we've lost the ability to distinguish between them.The historical precedent is the 1938 War of the Worlds broadcast, which created mass hysteria from fiction. But here's the crucial difference: Welles was human, the script was human-written, the performance required conscious participation, and the deception was traceable to human intent. Listeners had to actively choose to believe what they heard.Today's AI-generated narratives operate below the threshold of conscious recognition. They require no active participation—they work by seamlessly integrating into information environments in ways that make detection impossible even for experts. When algorithms generate technical claims that sound authentic to human evaluators, when the same systems create both legitimate documentation and marketing fiction, we face deception at a level Welles never imagined: the algorithmic manipulation of truth itself.The recursive nature of this problem reveals itself when you try to solve it. This creates a nearly impossible situation. How do you fact-check AI-generated claims about AI using AI-powered tools? How do you verify technical documentation when the same systems create both authentic docs and marketing copy? When the tools generating problems and solving problems converge into identical technological artifacts, conventional verification approaches break down completely.My first Black Hat article explored how we risk losing human agency by delegating decision-making to artificial agents. But this goes deeper: we risk losing human agency in the construction of reality itself. When machines generate narratives about what machines can do, truth becomes algorithmically determined rather than empirically discovered.Marshall McLuhan famously said "We shape our tools, and thereafter they shape us." But he couldn't have imagined tools that reshape our perception of reality itself. We haven't just built machines that give us answers—we've built machines that decide what questions we should ask and how we should evaluate the answers.But the implications extend far beyond cybersecurity itself. This matters far beyond. If the sector responsible for detecting digital deception becomes the first victim of algorithmic narrative pollution, what hope do other industries have? Healthcare systems relying on AI diagnostics they can't explain. Financial institutions using algorithmic trading based on analyses they can't verify. Educational systems teaching AI-generated content whose origins remain opaque.When the industry that guards against deception loses the ability to distinguish authentic capability from algorithmic fiction, society loses its early warning system for the moment when machines take over truth construction itself.So where does this leave us? That moment may have already arrived. We just don't know it yet—and increasingly, we lack the cognitive infrastructure to find out.But here's what we can still do: We can start by acknowledging we've reached this threshold. We can demand transparency not just in AI algorithms, but in the human processes that evaluate and implement them. We can rebuild evaluation criteria that distinguish between technical capability and marketing narrative.And here's a direct challenge to the marketing and branding professionals reading this: it's time to stop relying on AI algorithms and data optimization to craft your messages. The cybersecurity industry's crisis should serve as a warning—when marketing becomes indistinguishable from algorithmic fiction, everyone loses. Social media has taught us that the most respected brands are those that choose honesty over hype, transparency over clever messaging. Brands that walk the walk and talk the talk, not those that let machines do the talking.The companies that will survive this epistemological crisis are those whose marketing teams become champions of truth rather than architects of confusion. When your audience can no longer distinguish between human insight and machine-generated claims, authentic communication becomes your competitive advantage.Most importantly, we can remember that the goal was never to build machines that think for us, but machines that help us think better.The canary may be struggling to breathe, but it's still singing. The question is whether we're still listening—and whether we remember what fresh air feels like.Let's keep exploring what it means to be human in this Hybrid Analog Digital Society. Especially now, when the stakes have never been higher, and the consequences of forgetting have never been more real. End of transmission.___________________________________________________________Marco Ciappelli is Co-Founder and CMO of ITSPmagazine, a journalist, creative director, and host of podcasts exploring the intersection of technology, cybersecurity, and society. His work blends journalism, storytelling, and sociology to examine how technological narratives influence human behavior, culture, and social structures.___________________________________________________________Enjoyed this transmission? Follow the newsletter here:https://www.linkedin.com/newsletters/7079849705156870144/Share this newsletter and invite anyone you think would enjoy it!New stories always incoming.___________________________________________________________As always, let's keep thinking!Marco Ciappellihttps://www.marcociappelli.com___________________________________________________________This story represents the results of an interactive collaboration between Human Cognition and Artificial Intelligence.Marco Ciappelli | Co-Founder, Creative Director & CMO ITSPmagazine  | Dr. in Political Science / Sociology of Communication l Branding | Content Marketing | Writer | Storyteller | My Podcasts: Redefining Society & Technology / Audio Signals / + | MarcoCiappelli.comTAPE3 is the Artificial Intelligence behind ITSPmagazine—created to be a personal assistant, writing and design collaborator, research companion, brainstorming partner… and, apparently, something new every single day.Enjoy, think, share with others, and subscribe to the "Musing On Society & Technology" newsletter on LinkedIn.

Useful Resources: 1. Ben Shneiderman, Professor Emeritus, University Of Maryland. 2. Richard Hamming and Hamming Codes. 3. Human Centered AI - Ben Shneiderman. 4. Allen Newell and Herbert A. Simon. 5. Raj Reddy and the Turing Award. 6. Doug Engelbart. 7. Alan Kay. 8. Conference on Human Factors in Computing Systems. 9. Software psychology: Human factors in computer and information systems - Ben Shneiderman. 10. Designing the User Interface: Strategies for Effective Human-Computer Interaction - Ben Shneiderman. 11. Direct Manipulation: A Step Beyond Programming Languages - Ben Shneiderman. 12. Steps Toward Artificial Intelligence - Marvin Minsky. 13. Herbert Gelernter. 14. Computers And Thought - Edward A Feigenbaum and Julian Feldman. 15. Lewis Mumford. 15. Technics and Civilization - Lewis Mumford. 16. Buckminster Fuller. 17. Marshall McLuhan. 18. Roger Shank. 19. The Anxious Generation: How the Great Rewiring of Childhood Is Causing an Epidemic of Mental Illness - Jonathan Haidt. 20. John C. Thomas, IBM. 21. Yousuf Karsh, photographer. 22. Gary Marcus, professor emeritus of psychology and neural science at NYU. 23. Geoffrey Hinton. 24. Nassim Nicholas Taleb. 25. There Is No A.I. - Jaron Lanier. 26. Anil Seth On The Science of Consciousness - Episode 94 of Brave New World. 27. A ‘White-Collar Blood Bath' Doesn't Have to Be Our Fate - Tim Wu 28. Information Management: A Proposal - Tim Berners-Lee 29. Is AI-assisted coding overhyped? : METR study 30. RLHF, Reinforcement learning from human feedback31. Joseph Weizenbaum 32. What Is Computer Science? - Allen Newel, Alan J. Perlis, Herbert A. Simon -- Check out Vasant Dhar's newsletter on Substack. The subscription is free!  

Lisa Overall, Managing Director of Creatalytics, a company that is closing the impact gap between media and message and maximising return on creative investment, discusses the intricate relationship between brand performance and creative optimization. She explains the role of creative analytics in enhancing media effectiveness, and the constraints that can drive creativity.  In 1964, when Marshall McLuhan wrote “The medium is the message” there has been an on-going advertising conundrum – is it the content or the channel? Is it the creative and the media? Is it the message or the medium? Karen Nelson Field has demonstrated that the choice of media channel impacts the attention, but the creative messaging is responsible for triggering the action. So, assuming both are essential, how do we ensure the media and the message are working together, particularly in a world where there is so many different media choices? Lisa shares her views on the future of measuring creative performance, the impact of time on consumer response, and the opportunities presented by social media for testing and learning. Listen on Apple: https://podcasts.apple.com/au/podcast/managing-marketing/id1018735190  Listen on Spotify: https://open.spotify.com/show/75mJ4Gt6MWzFWvmd3A64XW?si=a3b63c66ab6e4934  Listen on Stitcher: https://www.stitcher.com/show/managing-marketing  Listen on Podbean: https://managingmarketing.podbean.com/  For more episodes of TrinityP3's Managing Marketing podcast, visit https://www.trinityp3.com/managing-marketing-podcasts/  Recorded on RiversideFM and edited, mixed and managed by JML Audio with thanks to Jared Lattouf.

The hunt for certainty is killing creativity.Rory Sutherland, chairman of Ogilvy and the poet of persuasion, joins us live from Klaviyo London to challenge marketing's obsession with thin-tailed attribution. Brands are facing an existential crisis in an increasingly brandless, chat-interface powered world, but Sutherland believes that current measurement models are not designed to allow marketers to test, fail, learn, and grow, systematically destroying breakthrough potential.Key takeaways:Technology evolves from option to obligation: Parking apps that liberated us from coin machines now trap those without smartphones, while McDonald's screen-only outlets eliminate human flexibilityMarketing is fat-tailed, business is not thin-tailed: "10% of what you do delivers 130% of the value, but you don't know what the 10% is in advance." But marketing's current measurement system is designed for us to fail. Attribution models punish necessary failures and do not credit long-term breakthroughsInterface changes redistribute power overnight: When fundamental interaction modes shift from typing to voice and stores to apps, established advantages can disappear instantly, creating opportunities for complete market disruptionBrand value is multifarious, not monolithic: Fame, trust signals, and decision-making heuristics remain valuable even as chat interfaces challenge traditional brand expression. "People will come and find you rather than you having to find them." – Rory Sutherland[00:06:13] "Interface change is always disruptive, because if you change the interface within which people choose and act, you fundamentally change behavior." - Rory Sutherland[00:20:25] "There's a concern I always have about technology, which is the extent to which a lot of technology arrives as an option and ends up as an obligation." - Rory Sutherland[00:42:47] "There's a danger that what [AI is] doing is enshrining groupthink. It's taking groupthink and effectively engraving it." - Rory SutherlandLinks & In-Show Mentions:Learn more about OgilvyCheck out Future Commerce on YouTubeCheck out Future Commerce+ for exclusive content and save on merch and printSubscribe to Insiders and The Senses to read more about what we are witnessing in the commerce worldListen to our other episodes of Future CommerceHave any questions or comments about the show? Let us know on futurecommerce.com, or reach out to us on Twitter, Facebook, Instagram, or LinkedIn. We love hearing from our listeners!

In this episode, we dive deep into the intellectual lives of two of Canada's most influential media theorists: Harold Innis and Marshall McLuhan. Author and professor Tom Cooper joins us to explore his new book, The Lives and Thought of Harold Innis and Marshall McLuhan, offering unique insights into their work, relationship, and relevance in our hyperconnected world. We unpack everything from Innis's time-biased and space-biased media framework to McLuhan's famously cryptic “the medium is the message”—and how both thinkers anticipated the digital age in uncanny ways.

Garrett and Mike discuss Marshall McLuhan and his concept of "The Medium is the Message." They explore how the mediums and technologies that make up our environment change our perceptions and modes of being even more than the actual content of those mediums and technologies.

This is a preview — for the full episode, subscribe: https://newmodels.io https://patreon.com/newmodels https://newmodels.substack.com Our guest is American media theorist Douglas Rushkoff. He is the author of such seminal books on digital culture and networked communication as Cyberia (1994), Media Virus (1995), and Coercion (1999); and numerous further titles including, Program or Be Programmed (2010/2025) and Survival of the Richest: Escape Fantasies of the Tech Billionaires (2022). He is also the host of Team Human and a professor of Media Theory and Digital Economics as CUNY/Queens. On this episode, Doug speaks with us about the evolution (and devolution) of digital culture across web 1, 2, 3, and beyond via a synthesis of media theory, psychedelic thinking, and practical wisdom for navigating our contemporary networks. Names cited: Adam Curtis, Alex Garland, Allan Kaprow, Amazon, Art Bell, AT&T, Bernie Madoff, CNN, Cyberia, CVS, Dan Rather, Daniel Dennett, David Bowie, David Hershkovitz, David Lynch, Donna Haraway, Douglas Rushkoff, Elon Musk, Emmanuel Levinas, Francis Bacon, Genesis P-Orridge, Jake Tapper, Jeff Bezos, Jeffrey Epstein, Jesse Armstrong, Joe Rogan, John Brockman, John Perry Barlow, Joseph Chaikin, Kamala Harris, Lauren Sanchez, Louis Rossetto, Ludwig Wittgenstein, Madonna, Marjorie Taylor Greene, Marshall McLuhan, Martin Buber, Martin Heidegger, Media Virus, Michael Jackson, Milton Friedman, Naomi Klein, Naomi Wolf, Neil Simon, New Models, New York Times, Norbert Wiener, Orit Halpern, Paper Magazine, Peter Thiel, Pierre Teilhard de Chardin, Present Shock, Ray Kurzweil, Richard Dawkins, Robert Anton Wilson, Ross Douthat, Skinny Puppy, Spinoza, Star Trek, Team Human, Temple of Psychic Youth, The Long Boom, The Process Church, The Simpsons, Vanessa Machado de Oliveira, Walter Benjamin, William S. Burroughs, Wired Magazine

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In this thought-provoking episode, Bob Hutchins explores a radical possibility: that we may be witnessing the beginning of the end of humanity's 500-year relationship with the written word. Drawing from media theorists Walter Ong and Harold Innis, Bob examines how generative AI might fundamentally transform not just how we communicate, but how we think and connect as human beings. Since Gutenberg's printing press, we've been compressing the entirety of human experience into alphabetic symbols—a constraint that has both liberated and limited us. While we've become virtuosos of written expression, creating symphonies of meaning from simple letters and punctuation, we've also lost touch with the immediacy and embodied richness of oral culture. Bob argues that AI could serve as more than just a writing assistant—it might become the bridge technology that frees us from the cognitive overhead of translating experience into symbols, allowing us to rediscover richer, more authentic forms of human communication. Key Topics Explored The Gutenberg Legacy How the printing press fundamentally altered human consciousness The trade-offs between abstract thinking and embodied presence Walter Ong's insights on orality versus literacy Media Ecology and Communication Bias Harold Innis's theory of communication bias How different media favor durability versus immediacy The space-biased nature of written civilization The Translation Problem The cognitive burden of converting lived experience into symbols Why meaningful moments often "die in translation" The gap between what we experience and what we can express AI as Liberation Technology How AI might reduce the overhead of symbolic communication The possibility of universal translation between experience and expression Moving beyond AI as writing assistant to AI as cognitive scaffolding Post-Literate Communication Immersive storytelling and embodied performance Collaborative creation and real-time narrative improvisation Visual, spatial, and archetypal forms of expression The return to mythic and symbolic meaning-making The Promise and the Peril Democratizing eloquence for those who struggle to articulate rich inner lives The risk of losing essential cognitive muscles developed through writing Questions of authenticity in AI-mediated communication What happens when written language becomes optional? Two Possible Futures AI as bridge to richer human communication AI as communicative prosthetic leading to human atrophy The importance of conscious navigation during this transition Key Insights "Even at their most transcendent, words remain what they've always been—ghosts of experience, shadows cast by the real thing." "The deepest insights seem to emerge in conversation rather than through explanation, in the spaces where we're figuring something out together rather than delivering prepared thoughts." "How we communicate shapes who we become. If we want AI to help us recover more embodied, authentic forms of expression, we need to be clear about what values we're optimizing for." Questions for Reflection Are we trying to become more efficient communicators or more fully human ones? What would it mean to communicate primarily through embodied presence again? How do we maintain authentic connection when our communications increasingly flow through AI mediators? What practices keep us grounded in embodied experience as AI handles more symbolic communication? About The Human Voice The Human Voice explores the intersection of technology, human flourishing, and authentic communication. Host Bob Hutchins brings together insights from media ecology, contemplative spirituality, and organizational psychology to examine how we can navigate technological change while preserving what makes us most human. Connect with Bob Website: http://www.humanvoicemedia.com LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/bobhutchins/ Resources Mentioned Orality and Literacy by Walter Ong The Bias of Communication by Harold Innis Understanding Media by Marshall McLuhan The Gutenberg Galaxy by Marshall McLuhan

From tariffs on foreign goods to scaling back on US military and humanitarian aid abroad, it's clear that Trump is intent on moving the country in a more protectionist direction. But what does that look like for pop culture? Think: Kendrick's “Not Like Us” as an anthem for our time, versus Drake collaborating with lesser-known grime and Afro-house producers during the Obama years.Critic Jaime Brooks — who you may also know for her work in musical projects like Elite Gymnastics and Default Genders — recently wrote an epic essay exploring the geopolitics of music and entertainment in 2025. The piece is called “Notes on the Canzukian Schism,” and it's an eye-opening look at the ways the European social welfare system, US military policy, and libertarian free market evangelism have shaped our experiences as both consumers and producers of pop culture over the past century.Jaime joins us to discuss how her Canadian upbringing — much like Marshall McLuhan's and Drake's — gave her a distinct perspective on media and culture in the Anglosphere. She takes us through the history of radio in the UK and US, and how it set the stage for both the genesis of Western pop music and the perennial question of whether art should be funded by markets or the state. We also talk about how the “poptimism vs. rockism” debate overlooks the material realities of the music industry, how being online and being literate have become two entirely separate things, and why community radio may be the last viable path forward for culture.Want to continue the conversation? For access to our member-only Discord (and the full edition of this episode), sign up for a paid subscription.Subscribe to Jaime's Substack, The Seat of LossRead more by Jaime“American Sajaegi” (The New Inquiry)“The Summer of Love and the Holy Fair” (The New Inquiry) This is a public episode. If you'd like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit theculturejournalist.substack.com/subscribe

I, Stewart Alsop, am thrilled to welcome Leon Coe back to the Crazy Wisdom Podcast for a second deep dive. This time, we journeyed from the Renaissance and McLuhan's media theories straight into the heart of theology, church history, and the very essence of faith, exploring how ancient wisdom and modern challenges intertwine. It was a fascinating exploration, touching on everything from apostolic succession to the nature of sin and the search for meaning in a secular age.Check out this GPT we trained on the conversationTimestamps00:43 I kick things off by asking Leon about the Renaissance, Martin Luther, and the profound impact of the printing press on religion.01:02 Leon Coe illuminates Marshall McLuhan's insights on how technologies, like print, shape our consciousness and societal structures.03:25 Leon takes us back to early Church history, discussing the Church's life and sacraments, including the Didache, well before the Bible's formal canonization.06:00 Leon explains the scriptural basis for Peter as the "rock" of the Church, the foundation for the office of the papacy.07:06 We delve into the concept of apostolic succession, where Leon describes the unbroken line of ordination from the apostles.11:57 Leon clarifies Jesus's relationship to the Law, referencing Matthew 5:17 where Jesus states he came to fulfill, not abolish, the Law.12:20 I reflect on the intricate dance of religion, culture, and technology, and the sometimes bewildering, "cosmic joke" nature of our current reality.16:46 I share my thoughts on secularism potentially acting as a new, unacknowledged religion, and how it often leaves a void in our search for purpose.19:28 Leon introduces what he calls the "most terrifying verse in the Bible," Matthew 7:21, emphasizing the importance of doing the Father's will.24:21 Leon discusses the Eucharist as the new Passover, drawing connections to Jewish tradition and Jesus's institution of this central sacrament.Key InsightsTechnology's Shaping Power: McLuhan's Enduring Relevance. Leon highlighted how Marshall McLuhan's theories are crucial for understanding history. The shift from an oral, communal society to an individualistic one via the printing press, for instance, directly fueled the Protestant Reformation by enabling personal interpretation of scripture, moving away from a unified Church authority.The Early Church's Foundation: Life Before the Canon. Leon emphasized that for roughly 300 years before the Bible was officially canonized, the Church was actively functioning. It had established practices, sacraments (like baptism and the Eucharist), and teachings, as evidenced by texts like the Didache, demonstrating a lived faith independent of a finalized scriptural canon.Peter and Apostolic Succession: The Unbroken Chain. A core point from Leon was Jesus designating Peter as the "rock" upon which He would build His Church. This, combined with the principle of apostolic succession—the laying on of hands in an unbroken line from the apostles—forms the Catholic and Orthodox claim to authoritative teaching and sacramental ministry.Fulfillment, Not Abolition: Jesus and the Law. Leon clarified that Jesus, as stated in Matthew 5:17, came not to abolish the Old Testament Law but to fulfill it. This means the Mosaic Law finds its ultimate meaning and completion in Christ, who institutes a New Covenant.Secularism's Spiritual Vacuum: A Modern Religion? I, Stewart, posited that modern secularism, while valuing empiricism, often acts like a new religion that explicitly rejects the spiritual and miraculous. Leon agreed this can lead to a sense of emptiness, as humans inherently long for purpose and connection to a creator, a void secularism struggles to fill.The Criticality of God's Will: Beyond Lip Service. Leon pointed to Matthew 7:21 ("Not everyone who says to me, ‘Lord, Lord,' will enter the kingdom of heaven...") as a stark reminder. True faith requires more than verbal profession; it demands actively doing the will of the Father, implying that actions and heartfelt commitment are essential for salvation.The Eucharist as Central: The New Passover and Real Presence. Leon passionately explained the Eucharist as the new Passover, instituted by Christ. Referencing John 6, he stressed the Catholic belief in the Real Presence—that the bread and wine become the literal body and blood of Christ—which is essential for spiritual life and communion with God.Reconciliation and Purity: Restoring Communion. Leon explained the Sacrament of Reconciliation (Confession) as a vital means, given through the Church's apostolic ministry, to restore communion with God after sin. He also touched upon Purgatory as a state of purification for overcoming attachments to sin, ensuring one is perfectly ordered to God before entering Heaven.Contact Information*   Leon Coe: @LeonJCoe on Twitter (X)

Andrew McLuhan—author, speaker, and steward of The McLuhan Institute—shares rich, mind-bending perspectives on the current state of culture, media, connection, and commerce. Drawing from a generations-deep intellectual legacy forged by media theorist and philosopher Marshall McLuhan, Andrew explores what it means to live in a world electrified by complete digital immersion.A New Medium Is A New CultureKey takeaways:“I quickly discovered that it's easy to overwhelm people with too much information. It's almost the worst thing you can do, because you lose them, and it can be hard to get them back.” – Andrew McLuhan“It's much easier to teach people one thing at a time than it is to teach them ten things at once.” – Andrew McLuhan“‘A poem can't mean something that it doesn't mean to you.' Which is kind of deep, but it's not the cop out that you think it is.” – Andrew McLuhan, quoting T.S. Eliot“Marshall McLuhan saw that through human history we've been influenced and steered by the structure and nature of our innovations more than by what we've done with them. A new medium is a new culture.” – Andrew McLuhan“We don't like finding out how we're being used.” – Andrew McLuhan“Commerce is a form of media. It is manipulating people in some way and people are being shaped by it.” – PhillipIn-Show Mentions:How People Are Really Using Gen AI in 2025 – Harvard Business ReviewOther Harvard Business Review pieces:Personalization Done RightThe Consumer Psychology of Adopting AIEric McLuhan's Taking Up McLuhan's Cause – re-releasedThe McLuhan InstituteAssociated Links:Check out Future Commerce on YouTubeCheck out Future Commerce+ for exclusive content and to save on merch and printSubscribe to Insiders and The Senses to read more about what we are witnessing in the commerce worldListen to our other episodes of Future CommerceHave any questions or comments about the show? Let us know on futurecommerce.com, or reach out to us on Twitter, Facebook, Instagram, or LinkedIn. We love hearing from our listeners!

Bob Dobbs was Marshall McLuhan's archivist, and is a renegade McLuhan scholar. In this episode we discuss the work of James Joyce, Marshall McLuhan, and Joyce's Finnegans Wake.Dobb's site: https://ionandbob.com/---Become part of the Hermitix community:Hermitix Twitter - / hermitixpodcast Hermitix Discord - / discord Support Hermitix:Hermitix Subscription - https://hermitix.net/subscribe/ Patreon - / hermitix Donations: - https://www.paypal.me/hermitixpodHermitix Merchandise - http://teespring.com/stores/hermitix-2Bitcoin Donation Address: 3LAGEKBXEuE2pgc4oubExGTWtrKPuXDDLKEthereum Donation Address: 0x31e2a4a31B8563B8d238eC086daE9B75a00D9E74

This election felt like the peak of the TV-ification of politics. There's Trump, of course, who rose to national prominence as a reality-TV character and is a master of visual stagecraft. And while Trump's cabinet picks in his first term were described as out of central casting, this time he wants to staff some positions directly from the worlds of TV and entertainment: Pete Hegseth, his choice to run the Pentagon, was a host on “Fox and Friends Weekend”; his proposed education secretary, Linda McMahon, was the former C.E.O. of W.W.E.; Mehmet Oz, star of the long-running “The Dr. Oz Show,” is his pick to run Medicare and Medicaid; and he's tapped Elon Musk, one of the most powerful figures in American culture, to lead a government efficiency effort. Two years ago, we released an episode that helps explain why politics and entertainment are converging like this. It's with my old Vox colleague Sean Illing, host of “The Gray Area,” looking at the work of two media theorists, Marshall McLuhan and Neil Postman, who uncannily predicted what we're seeing now decades ago.And so I wanted to share this episode again now, because it's really worth stepping back and looking at this moment through the lens of the media that's shaping it. In his book “The Paradox of Democracy,” Illing and his co-author, Zac Gershberg, put it this way: “It's better to think of democracy less as a government type and more as an open communicative culture.” So what does our communicative culture — our fragmented mix of cable news, X, TikTok, YouTube, WhatsApp and podcasts — mean for our democracy? This episode contains strong language.Mentioned:“‘Flood the zone with shit': How misinformation overwhelmed our democracy” by Sean Illing“Quantifying partisan news diets in Web and TV audiences” by Daniel Muise, Homa Hosseinmardi, Baird Howland, Markus Mobius, David Rothschild and Duncan J. WattsBook Recommendations:Amusing Ourselves to Death by Neil PostmanPublic Opinion by Walter LippmannMediated by Thomas de ZengotitaThoughts? Guest suggestions? Email us at ezrakleinshow@nytimes.com.You can find transcripts (posted midday) and more episodes of “The Ezra Klein Show” at nytimes.com/ezra-klein-podcast. Book recommendations from all our guests are listed at https://www.nytimes.com/article/ezra-klein-show-book-recs.This episode of “The Ezra Klein Show” was produced by Rogé Karma. Fact-checking by Michelle Harris, Rollin Hu, Mary Marge Locker and Kate Sinclair. Mixing by Sonia Herrero, Carole Sabouraud and Isaac Jones. Our production team also includes Elias Isquith, Kristin Lin, Jack McCordick and Aman Sahota. Audience strategy by Kristina Samulewski and Shannon Busta. The executive producer of New York Times Opinion Audio is Annie-Rose Strasser. Unlock full access to New York Times podcasts and explore everything from politics to pop culture. Subscribe today at nytimes.com/podcasts or on Apple Podcasts and Spotify.