Media Taxonomy

[1] By "Continuity," I mean a medium’s ability to maintain its original form, to occur in the same way at different times. Thus, speech disappears after it is uttered (unless preserved in a storage medium), but a book will retain its form and can be reread over many years.

[2] In thinking of "Cinema," I am thinking specifically of the act of going to a theater in which images are projected from behind the viewer onto a screen in front of the viewer, hence the three-dimensionality of the medium.

Aaron Rester
Winter 2003