## 2 Information as a Variable in Media Ecology Analysis  
Information on the medium level is most typically associated with _transmission_. In the well known Shannon-Weaver Model of communication, an _information source_ encodes a _message_ which is then sent out as a signal by a _transmitter_, over a _channel_ to a _receiver_ that decodes the message and sends it on to its _destination_[2]. It is important to note that this model is based on electronic media such as the telegraph or telephone, and not on, say, face-to-face conversation, or public speaking. In the case of the telegraph, the information source is the telegraph key, which is used to tap out a message in Morse Code, the message being sent as electrical impulses through wires, which are the channel (or in the cases of wireless telegraphy, the electromagnetic spectrum and the airwaves constitute the channel), to be received at the other end where the electrical impulses are turned into a series of long and short beeps (which the telegraph operator translates from Morse Code to written alphabet). In the case of the telephone, the microphone is the information source, encoding sound as electrical impulses that the transmitter sends through telephone lines, the channel, where the receiver turns the signal back into sound played on a speaker. The Shannon-Weaver Model reflects the close connection between information theory and the introduction of electronic communication technology, and serves as an adequate representation of the technical aspects of information transmission via electronic media. When it has been overgeneralized and used to represent communication in general, however, the model becomes easy to criticize as simplistic and inaccurate. Problems with the model include the fact that it does not allow for the complexities of human communication, which involve the use of numerous channels simultaneously; that it represents communication as one-way, not allowing for the fact that much of human communication entails interactions and transactions, and that these too occur over multiple channels simultaneously; and that it only represents dyadic communication, leaving out triadic situations, group contexts both small and large, and public and mass communication. Broadly, the model can be faulted for describing human activity by way of a mechanistic, technological metaphor, leaving out such vital concerns as meaning, purpose, and motivation. In the field of media ecology, the transmission or transportation view of communication that underlies the Shannon-Weaver model has been criticized and rejected in favor of metaphors emphasizing ritual and communication over time rather than space [18,19], transformation and the effects or message of the medium itself [20], and resonance and communication as the sharing of meaning [12,21]. Reducing the role of the medium to the narrow notion of _channel_ suggests that messages can exist independently of a medium, that the sender somehow creates a message and only then decides which channel to use in sending it. In other words, the model does not recognize the prior existence of the channel or physical medium, which has much to do not only with the creation of the message, but in the decision to send a message in the first place [4]. Moreover, while the activities of encoding and decoding are sometimes included in the model, the prior existence of the code itself goes unmentioned, as if the message could be created without a code, rather than created by choosing units from the code itself (e.g., words, numbers) [4]. Messages are created by working with materials as well as by following formal, grammatical, structural patterns [22], so that the division between channel and code is somewhat artificial, a form of elementalism [14], and this is also true of the divisions between source, message, channel, and receiver, not to mention the fact that noise can be present at any point in transmission, not just in the channel.