The frontiers of the ’80s are much more inward, 
numerous and elusive than in the old hardware 
days. It might even be hypothesized that at the 
speed of light man has neither goals, objective, nor 
private identity. He is an item in the data bank—
software only, easily forgotten.

Marshall McLuhan, “Living at the Speed of Light,” 
Maclean’s , January 7, 1980.