Rethinking McLuhan: Media, Format, and Device

Rethinking McLuhan: Media, Format, and Device

McLuhan’s concept of “the medium is the message” may not be as straightforward in today’s context. Media itself has transformed, and a clear distinction between media, format, and device could help refine our understanding.

If we extract format from the broader definition of media, what remains? Format refers to the structural form in which content is delivered within a medium—text, images, audio, or video. Every message, in order to be conveyed, requires a format. Each format comes with inherent physical constraints and protocols. Text and images rely on print or digital screens; audio requires speakers; video needs a screen. The protocols define how audiences engage with them—how we “read,” “listen,” or “watch.” Whether analog or digital is not the key issue here—the crucial factor is the type of format itself.

What McLuhan once categorized as “electronic media”—telegraph, telephone, radio, film, television—can be reclassified as different combinations of text, audio, and visual formats. From this perspective, television is not a medium but a device. Radio, for example, is a transmission-based medium, while the radio receiver is a device.

Some argue that the internet is a space, but I see it as a medium in the traditional sense, one that integrates all existing formats. The internet was indeed a media revolution—a drastic transformation in the way information is distributed and accessed—but it was not a format revolution. The same applies to the broader trend of digitalization.

Historically, new formats emerged alongside technological breakthroughs. The printing press enabled books, and motion pictures created cinema. Video games introduced interactive storytelling. However, a fundamental question remains: since the rise of the internet, have we seen a new format as groundbreaking as film or video games? Or are we still awaiting the next major shift?