Media Ecology’s executive dropout Bob Dobbs wears many, many hats. Perhaps he’d rather say he deftly straddles five bodies. He certainly defies conformity or easy introduction, but descriptions would certainly include conspiracy radio host, public convention-crasher, paranormal interview subject, and essayist. His autobiography doesn’t merely strain credulity; as he tells it, Bob’s identity is frankly impossible. And that’s just how he likes it.
Today, however, it is as a serious student of Marshall McLuhan that we find him in this announcement of his new book, What We/You Didn’t Know About Trump, exclusive to The New Explorations Weblog. As he explains in its opening pages,
I’m making a Marshall McLuhan kit of quotations nobody knows about, that he said, to get out of this cul-de-sac of ‘50s stuff that they repeat ad nauseam: “the medium is the message”, “global village”, “media ecology”, and “the tetrad”.
The book’s formatting is discontinuous, moving between quotes, prose, and transcriptions of oral commentary. Dobbs takes the long-way to reaching a discussion of his title topic, giving a novel overview of McLuhan’s changing environmental perceptions backed with ample citation. Some new post-McLuhan probes, such as the android meme and anthropomorphic physical are introduced to explain more recent developments, which are also thankfully supported through quotations and perspectives from observers like Jean Baudrillard, Frank Zingrone, Arthur Kroker, Barrington Nevitt, and Richard Cavell.
Having arrived at the closing analysis of the 45th American President, the anti-environmental nature of the long lead-in will inevitably leave the reader with a new perspective on a great many other issues besides. Just the careful selection of quotes from McLuhan alone provide a refreshing, new point of entry into understanding the great Canadian thinker, and for that reason The New Explorations Weblog is pleased to host the release of this free ebook (PDF).
Bob-Dobbs-Trump-With-Audio
Michael Edmunds
The ususal clap trap. Billed above as “Media Ecology’s executive dropout ” must refer to the loss of the executive function in his head.
Quoting Zingrone being unable to connect with students because they can’t relate to analogue tech Dobbs should look at his own examples. Today’s audience knows nothing about Zappa or Bachman Turner Overdrive. More serious is his slog on the election results attempting to reduce human behavior to twitter memes.
His admonition is I guess a joke as is the whole “book”. He says,
‘Memorize the two sentences (in red) below.
Have them ready for all conversations about McLuhan.
Say it’s what McLuhan discovered. Make it more famous than “the medium is the message”:
“In Catch-22, the figure of the black market and the ground of
war merge into a monster presided over by the syndicate. When
war and market merge, all money transactions begin to drip
blood.”—Marshall McLuhan and Barrington Nevitt, TAKE
TODAY: The Executive as Dropout, 1972, p.211’
Bob Dobbs
Mr. Edmunds’ mind, unfortunately, never actually left his hometown, Detroit – circa 1959 – despite having lived in Toronto since 1971 and attending a few classes conducted by Marshall McLuhan at the University of Toronto.
Edmunds’ been a little out of synch ever since he dropped out of Detroit.
For example:
A week before Mr. Edmunds posted this lazy review here, Frank Zappa burst out of the Tech Body with a brand new documentary celebrating his achievement as the most creative composer of the 20th Century. The excited memories haven’t let up, yet:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=U4F0rT0F6OQ
This is not just my opinion:
https://www.rollingstone.com/movies/movie-reviews/zappa-movie-review-1094636
The present day anti-environment refuses to be forgotten.
Michael Edmunds
Monthly listneners on Spotify
Drake 51,000,000
Beatles 22,500,000
Zappa 1.100,000
Not to disparage Zappa, but to remind that the criticism of Zingrone in the Dobbs’ article was off the mark.
Bob Dobbs
Edmunds is “off the mark”, not Dobbs.
I was citing Zingrone’s transparency about how he conducts his classes, not criticizing Zingrone.
Today’s audience knows nothing about McLuhan, either.
After it reads my book, it will.
The comprehensive artist knows what to retrieve.