技术变革既不是加性也不是减法的。它是生态的。我的意思是“生态”与环境科学家使用的单词相同。一个重大的变化会产生总变化。如果您从给定的栖息地中删除毛毛虫，那么您就不会遇到相同的环境减去毛毛虫：您有一个新的环境，并且已经重组了生存条件；如果将毛毛虫添加到没有的环境中，也是如此。这就是媒体的生态也是如此。一项新技术不会增加或减去一些东西。它改变了一切。
(Technological change is neither additive nor subtractive. It is ecological. I mean "ecological" in the same sense as the word is used by environmental scientists. One significant change generates total change. If you remove the caterpillars from a given habitat, you are not left with the same environment minus caterpillars: you have a new environment, and you have reconstituted the conditions of survival; the same is true if you add caterpillars to an environment that has had none. This is how the ecology of media works as well. A new technology does not add or subtract something. It changes everything.)