Tetrads

 

The ability to anticipate the impact of the emergence of technologies and the obsolescence of other technologies can be enhance if we create a tetrad based on the four laws of media. The four laws of media developed by Marshall and Eric McLuhan (1988) explain how technologies transform into different forms that better meet the needs of a society, while maintaining their historical, cultural, or technological identities (Laureate Education, 2014). The tetrad of the effects of technologies is simultaneous and they complement each other once the technology has emerged.

 

Each law is phrased as a question:

Enhance - What does it do that is new?

Obsolete – What does it obsolete?

Rekindle or Retrieves – What does it rekindle from the past?

Reverses – What does it flip into when pushed to the extreme?

 

The following tetrads for two technologies – one obsolete – overhead projectors and one emerged – Promethean boards.