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The Viral Inquisitor and other essays on postjournalism and media ecology
Many people feel as if an era is coming to an end, and they are right. The habitual ways are disrupted; political and cultural turmoil is piling up. All those disruptions are, at the core, media effects. The world is switching from print to digital. Media are the hardware of society, and culture is its software; a change in hardware makes all habitual software obsolete and disrupts the previous balance in human conditions.
The essays in this collection explore various aspects of this tectonic media shift, ranging from the competition between CNN and Fox News, the postjournalism of generative AI, and platforms enslaving users while serving them, to political polarization, the shifting epistemology of truth, and the impacts of screens on children.
The essays in this collection explore various aspects of this tectonic media shift, ranging from the competition between CNN and Fox News, the postjournalism of generative AI, and platforms enslaving users while serving them, to political polarization, the shifting epistemology of truth, and the impacts of screens on children.
189 pages, Paperback
Published August 9, 2024
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Displaying 1 - 2 of 2 reviews
December 30, 2024
Now, after the recent Hamas terrorist attack and Israel's war on terror in Gaza, news avoidance will surely rise further.
Has Mr. Media Literacy ever read a book on Palestine? Informed himself on the issue before using it as a throwaway example on a paragraph of his little book? If he did, which I doubt, does he think this is apolitical language? Because for someone who is so keen on praising the “golden age of news” as this objective beacon of journalism, he himself falling victim to Zionist genocidal propaganda makes the whole book fall on its face. I could sort of forgive the Musk praise/weird hope, but this? The genocide of our time? The most talked about, the situation that Palestinian have been explaining for more than year while being burned alive?
Is it so hard for people that proclaim themselves to be objective and apolitical and talk about “good journalism” as if it is devoid of subjectivity, to actually try to use objective language? Hamas terrorist attack and Israel’s also terroristic attack. Hamas attack on Isreaeli civilians and Israel’s attack on even more civilians, so much so that it resembles another pretty tragic event in history…but I don’t really expect these people to connect the dots, cause that would appear too partisan right? Fuck taking a stance in front of genocide and imperialism, that would mean that you're not being objective anymore, am I right fellas?
And talking about attacks on civilians on both side wouldn’t even account the historical context in which the “Hamas terrorist attack” happened because is it an attack if they are retaliating from an open air concentration camp? Is it Mr. Objective Journalism?
Like, his analysis of media in general is good. It was so interesting even if I didn’t agree with everything. I learned a lot and for that I’m glad, but that cannot be at the expense of basic moral integrity. I don’t expect everyone to use the correct terminology (which would be Hamas’s resistance against genocide and ethnic cleansing perpetrated by Israel but whatever) or to lecture about Palestine every time it's mentioned, but if you want to appear “objective” you should use actual objective language. What counts as a terrorist attack? Whether or not the perpetrators are non-white? In the effort to appear bi-partisan and objective, academics are giving credit to Zionist rhetoric. Of course, this doesn’t discount the whole book because it is really informative. And I liked it! It covers history of media and has an in-depth analysis on the way things are changing and it’s super eye opening. But I don’t understand how can people look at some things that I do and be this smart and well-read and still perpetuate genocidal propaganda. The way this particular issue is talked about makes me feel insane.
Has Mr. Media Literacy ever read a book on Palestine? Informed himself on the issue before using it as a throwaway example on a paragraph of his little book? If he did, which I doubt, does he think this is apolitical language? Because for someone who is so keen on praising the “golden age of news” as this objective beacon of journalism, he himself falling victim to Zionist genocidal propaganda makes the whole book fall on its face. I could sort of forgive the Musk praise/weird hope, but this? The genocide of our time? The most talked about, the situation that Palestinian have been explaining for more than year while being burned alive?
Is it so hard for people that proclaim themselves to be objective and apolitical and talk about “good journalism” as if it is devoid of subjectivity, to actually try to use objective language? Hamas terrorist attack and Israel’s also terroristic attack. Hamas attack on Isreaeli civilians and Israel’s attack on even more civilians, so much so that it resembles another pretty tragic event in history…but I don’t really expect these people to connect the dots, cause that would appear too partisan right? Fuck taking a stance in front of genocide and imperialism, that would mean that you're not being objective anymore, am I right fellas?
And talking about attacks on civilians on both side wouldn’t even account the historical context in which the “Hamas terrorist attack” happened because is it an attack if they are retaliating from an open air concentration camp? Is it Mr. Objective Journalism?
Like, his analysis of media in general is good. It was so interesting even if I didn’t agree with everything. I learned a lot and for that I’m glad, but that cannot be at the expense of basic moral integrity. I don’t expect everyone to use the correct terminology (which would be Hamas’s resistance against genocide and ethnic cleansing perpetrated by Israel but whatever) or to lecture about Palestine every time it's mentioned, but if you want to appear “objective” you should use actual objective language. What counts as a terrorist attack? Whether or not the perpetrators are non-white? In the effort to appear bi-partisan and objective, academics are giving credit to Zionist rhetoric. Of course, this doesn’t discount the whole book because it is really informative. And I liked it! It covers history of media and has an in-depth analysis on the way things are changing and it’s super eye opening. But I don’t understand how can people look at some things that I do and be this smart and well-read and still perpetuate genocidal propaganda. The way this particular issue is talked about makes me feel insane.
June 22, 2025
An excellent update to Marshall McLuhan's line of thinking from the mid-20th Century on how our media - all of them - affect how we live in the world.
Updated for the social media era we are living through, Mir diagnoses current cultural 'problems' that we bemoan as losses - the increasing dominance of Truthiness and the acceptance of Alternative Facts; the rampant and increasing Polarization (in our politics, but increasingly in all sorts of facets of our lives); And the increasing inability for most people to spend much time at all working to Understand a Complex argument (instead liking or blocking whatever side we're pretty sure we're on and moving on).
Andrey Mir argues that these aren't issues to overcome. Like McLuhan before him, he explains that these aren't problems that have developed because evil overlords have wrought them upon us... Rather, they are the natural implications of the various media we have invented and imbedded in our lives.
We have made the easy instant micro-gratification of Likes and Shares and Comments - little bits of Maslow's Self Actualization, earned easily, then soon needing more - the Coin of the Land... but (Mir and McLuhan assure us), "it's not our fault..." "It's not our fault..."
It's Not Our Fault
Updated for the social media era we are living through, Mir diagnoses current cultural 'problems' that we bemoan as losses - the increasing dominance of Truthiness and the acceptance of Alternative Facts; the rampant and increasing Polarization (in our politics, but increasingly in all sorts of facets of our lives); And the increasing inability for most people to spend much time at all working to Understand a Complex argument (instead liking or blocking whatever side we're pretty sure we're on and moving on).
Andrey Mir argues that these aren't issues to overcome. Like McLuhan before him, he explains that these aren't problems that have developed because evil overlords have wrought them upon us... Rather, they are the natural implications of the various media we have invented and imbedded in our lives.
We have made the easy instant micro-gratification of Likes and Shares and Comments - little bits of Maslow's Self Actualization, earned easily, then soon needing more - the Coin of the Land... but (Mir and McLuhan assure us), "it's not our fault..." "It's not our fault..."
It's Not Our Fault
Displaying 1 - 2 of 2 reviews