Being here and there at the same time
Four generations old (or maybe five), but already the medium of choice-this statement does not define television, but probably captures its social significance. It can be said from the outset that while cinematography is at the borderline between the civilization of literacy and that of illiteracy, television definitely embodies the conflict between the two. In fact, television irreversibly tipped the balance in favor of the visual. The invention of television took place in the context of the change in scale of humankind. Primarily, television occasions the transition from the universe of mechanics and chemistry, implicit in film making and viewing, to that of electricity, in particular electronics, and, more recently, digital technology.
Television, as a product of this change in the structure and nature of human theoretic and practical experience, results from the perceived pragmatic need to capture and transmit dynamic images. Electricity was already the medium for capturing and transmitting sound at the speed of electrons along telephone networks. And since images and actions are influenced by the light we view them in, it followed that light is what we actually wanted to record and transmit. This is television. Cumbersome and still owing a lot to mechanics, television started as a news medium, allowing for almost instantaneous connection between the source of information and the audience. It was initially mostly illustrative. Today, it is constitutive, in the sense that it not only records news, it makes news. It constitutes a generalized mass-medium supporting entertainment and ritual (political, religious, military).
Literacy corresponds to the experiences of human self-definition in the world of classical physics and chemistry. It is based on the same underlying structure, and projects characteristics of this experience. Electricity and electronics correspond to very fast processes (practically instantaneous), high leverage of human action, diversity, more varied mediating elements, and feedback. The film camera has the main characteristics of literacy. It can be compared to the printing press. But the comparison is only partially adequate since it writes movements to film, and lets us read them together on the shared white page called the screen. Between recording the movement and viewing it, time is used for processing and duplication.
Television is structurally different, capturing movement and everything else belonging to what we call reality, in order to make it immediately available to the viewer. Electronic mediation is much more elaborate, has many more layers than cinematography, and as a result is much more efficient. Film mapped from the selected world of movement, in a studio, on the street, or in a laboratory, to a limited viewership: public in a movie theater. It requested that people share the screen on which its images were projected. Television maps from many cameras to the entire world, and all can simultaneously partake in its images. Television is distributed and introduces simultaneity in that several events from several locations can be broadcast on the TV screen. By comparison, cinematography is centralized. Filming is limited to the location where it is being carried on. Cinematography is intrinsically sequential in that it follows the narrative structure and constitutes a closed entity. Once edited for showing, the film cannot be interrupted to insert anything new.
There are still many who see the two as closely related, and others who see the use of television only as a carrier (of film, for instance). They ignore the defining fact that film and television, despite some commonalties, belong to practical experiences impossible to reconcile. In fact, while film passed the climax of its attraction, television became the most pervasive medium. Due to the use of television in education, corporate communication, sports, artistic and other performances, such as space exploration and war, television impacts upon social interaction without being an interactive medium. A televised event can address audiences close to the world's entire population. When recording images for television became possible, television supported continued human experiences of decentralization, which previous communication technologies could not provide. The video camera and the video cassette recorder, especially in its digital version, make each of us own not only the receivers of the language of images and sounds, but also emitters, the sources, the private Hollywood studios. That is, they make us live the language of TV, and substitute it for literacy. Interactive TV will undoubtedly contribute even more in this direction.
It is already the case that instead of writing a letter, some people make a video and send it to family and authorities, and to TV stations interested in viewer feedback and news stories. The massive deployment of troops in the Desert Storm operation made clear how the shift from literate to illiterate communication integrates video communication. Together with the telephone, television and video dominated communication patterns of the people involved. Subsequent troop deployments confirmed the pattern of illiterate communication.
Among the many networks through which the foundation of our existence is continuously altered, cable TV plays a distinct role. Many consider it more important than libraries, probably for the wrong reasons. Whether living in thickly populated urban clusters or in remote locations, people are physically connected through multi- channeled communication networks, and even through interactive media. Cable TV is often seen only as another entry to our home for downloading classical programs as well as pornography and superstition. The full utilization of the electronic avenue as a multi-lane, bi-directional highway through which we can be receivers of what we want to accept, and senders of visual messages to whomever is interested and willing to interact with these messages, is still more a goal than a reality. With computer- supported visual communication integrating digital television, we will dispose of the entire infrastructure for a visually dominated civilization. In the age of Internet, wired or wireless networks become part of the artificial nervous system of advanced societies. Whether in its modem-based variant, or through other advanced schemes for transporting digital information and supporting interaction, the cable system already contributes to the transformation of the nature of many human practical experiences. These can be experiences of entertainment, but also of learning, teaching, even work.
There is a negative side to all this development, and a need to face consequences that over time can accumulate beyond what we already know and understand. Children growing up with TV miss the experience of movement. Jaron Lanier discussed the "famous childhood zombiehood," an expression of staring into nothing, a limited ability to see beyond a television image, the desire for instant gratification, and a lack of basic common sense appreciation for doing work in order to achieve satisfaction. Games developed around video technology train children to behave like laboratory rats that learn a maze by rote. They grow up accepting the politics of telegenic competition, a poor substitute for competence and commitment. Their vote is focused on brands, regardless of whether they regard political choices or cereals. Addressed en masse, such viewers gel in the mass image of polls that rapidly succeed one another. That technology makes possible alternatives to literacy embodied in the visual is unquestionable. To what extent these alternatives carry with them previous determinations and constraints, or they correspond to a new stage in human civilization, is the crux of the matter. The degree of necessity and thus the efficiency of any new form of visual expression, communication, or interaction can be ascertained only in how individuals constitute themselves through practical activities coherently integrating the visual. There is no higher form of empowerment than in the fulfillment of our individual possibilities. Telegenic or not, a president or a TV star has little, if any, impact on our fulfillment in the interconnected world of our time.
Television implies a great deal of language, but such language frees the audience from the requirement of literacy. You do not need to know how to write or read to watch TV; you need to be in command of a limited part of spoken language in order to understand a TV show, even to actively participate in it-from going on a game show to using cable networks, videotex, or interactive programs, exploring the Internet, or setting up a presence on the network.