THE EVOLUTION OF MEDIA THROUGH THE THEORETICAL OPTICS BY M. MCLUHAN

Technology has come a long way to its contemporary state, from primitive tools to complex technical systems. Today, the Internet is a powerful media technology channel that, in terms of audience coverage and impact, can be compared with traditional media, newspaper, radio and television. The aim of the article is to identify the features of the development of media and media technologies from the standpoint of an evolutionary approach, including through the prism of M. McLuhan's media theory. M. McLuhan is one of the first theorists who reflected on the nature of electronic media. In the discourse of M. McLuhan of particular importance is the position according to which the media are defined as a medium, i.e. means or channel of communication. In the historical evolution of a person, media technologies move from auditory to visual culture and vice versa. Media technologies, according to M. McLuhan, become something that unites people, breaks the boundaries in the classical concepts of space and time. Media technologies have a complex impact on a person as a subject of social practices; through a person, media technologies reshape the social fabric, making changes in temporal practices, practices of communication, memory and power.