McLuhan birthday gets doodle

Today's Google doodle honors Marshall McLuhan's 106th birthday. Traditionally these commemorative doodles use images and designs based on a historic event or person's life to "spell" out a version of the Google logo. This animated doodle consists of scenes depicting the successive eras of communication media as outlined by McLuhan. Beginning with oral culture in tribal society, the subsequent images progress through: written language and alphabet; the assembly line industrialism of "typographic man;" an animated McLuhan speaking on a TV screen; a human figure drumming in a village scene (perhaps evoking "second orality" or the return of acoustic space); and finally village huts arranged around a circuit board node to represent the Global Village. Clicking the doodle brings up the McLuhan estate web site and his Wikipedia page, along with several news articles and editorials calling McLuhan "the man who predicted the internet." This is extremely reductionist, of course, but what more can you expect from a Google search? Happy birthday, Herbert.