Crédito para McLuhan

Siempre me entusiasmó Marshall McLuhan. Quizá por eso me da un poco de tristeza que lo ignoren tanto, justo ahora que está más actual que nunca. Es lo que le pasa a Gina Chen, de Save the Media en este post tan sugestivo: What newspapers can learn from the past. Con ese título hasta olía a San Marshall (como lo llamaba Wired en la época de Rosetto):

Something will be lost: It cannot be helped. A funny story making the rounds on Twitter lists 10 reasons you’ll miss newspapers, including their superior use as kindling. But, seriously, much more will be lost if printed newspapers cease to exist. Reading a news story online is different than reading one in print. There’s something about holding a newspaper in your hands and folding it to a usable size as you browse through a section that just isn’t the same as the serendipitous surfing on the Web. Plus, we scan online, versus read. But you cannot move ahead without leaving something behind.

Something will be gained: You can’t beat the Web’s ability to add richness to a story. It’s so much more useful to readers to link to a definition of a technical word or to background information or a related article, than it is to stick this information in a shaded box next to the story or (God, forbid) on the jump page. I remember in the 1990s when adding a graphic to your story was all the rage, and reporters complained, as if making information easier for readers to digest was somehow selling out. I think it’s tough to argue that readers can have the same interactive experience in print that they can online. They just can’t. But we can’t gain something unless we lose something, too.

McLuhan lo había dicho casi con esas palabras por lo menos antes del 31/12/1980.

Diarios y bicicletas, en Paper Papers, 17/11/08