fading as a cultural figure, as somebody people 
quoted or felt that they should know about. 
Partly, I think, it happened because McLuhan 
became a very hot item in the ’60s when there was 
a feeling of tremendous change in the works, 
almost apocalyptic in scope. By the ’70s it was 
clear that all this change had its limits: the 
institutions were still there, students were more or 
less going back to classrooms, and Congress and 
the House of Commons, the political and economic 
cornerstones were more or less still in place. So all 
the media, the magazine, the television people who 
had done pieces on McLuhan felt they had done 
McLuhan, that there was nothing new say. So