> “Where advertising is heading is quite simply into a world where the ad will become a substitute for the product and all the satisfactions will be derived informationally from the ad and the product will be merely a number in some file somewhere,” McLuhan continued.

The computer mouse I bought recently gives me great satisfaction, and I've never once derived satisfaction from any ads for it.

Also, the piece goes on, doing something I dislike but which I've never seen dissected quite so obviously:

> There are a lot of different ways to interpret McLuhan here, especially when it comes to the “product” being “merely a number in a file somewhere.” Is this a way to talk about digital goods? Or, as another way to look at it, is the ad the product to begin with?

Or was he saying what he meant, in the manner of a normal adult speaking the language with which they're most comfortable, and "interpreting" him like is stuffing words in his mouth. Never mind that the words he spoke were fatuous and transparently wrong, I am foursquare opposed to "interpreting" people into saying things they blatantly never said. It's Minitrue without the memory hole: We don't have to erase the words if we're free to "interpret" them to mean absolutely anything we want.

Yes, every act of communication is interpreted. I'm opposed to dishonest "interpretation" which disregards the plain meaning.