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180 COMMUNICA TION THEORY
networks; indeed, they are typically mutually constitutive. Where technical
embeddedness becomes more and more normative, other forms of con-
nection like the face-to-face often become revalued. And with this form of
connection, direct interaction with another person can become substituted
by interaction with media objects.

Sociality with objects

Dependence on techno-social networks may exhibit different kinds of
intensity depending on what other kinds of connections and circulations
co-exist with them. The more embedded are technologies in such net-
works, the more it is possible to engage with these technologies as ends in
themselves. To the extent that such embeddedness creates a techno-social
way of life, ‘transport’ models of understanding communicative events
become redundant, as is the social type said to be at the centre of this
model‚ the media technology ‘user’. User perspectives (see, e.g.,
Silverstone, 1991; Silverstone et al., 1991, 1992) are typically interested in
which technologies are taken up by particular individuals and the pur-
poses for which they are used, but do not examine the interaction between
individuals and objects, nor how such interaction can actually alter the
identity of the person interacting. What the user perspective also ignores
is that objects of interaction are means of maintaining the connection to
mediums/networks. 7
The television, the Walkman, the mobile phone, the motor car, the
keyboard – people become very attached to these commodities, and begin
to relate to objects rather than to other people. The greatest fetishism of
commodities is of these means of connection. Relations to other persons
become refracted through these objects, or they may become confused
with our own narcissistic relationship to the technology itself.
In a longitudinal study (1991–6) of over 400 TV audience diarists in
the UK, Gauntlett and Hill (1999) document the companionship which the
TV set provided for viewers of all age demographics. ‘When respondents
wrote about what television meant to them, they often listed the informa-
tion and entertainment aspects of television, but mentioned as well the
company and even “friendship” that it offers’ (115). Two kinds of attach-
ment were reported: the TV set itself as ‘friend’ or a member of the
family; and TV as bringing ‘friends’ from outside the home (115–19).
Many of the diarists who reported strong emotional affections toward
their set lived alone. But equally, many reported some degree of guilt
about issues such as daytime TV viewing being a waste of time, or being
selfish in watching a programme which the viewer knew that few family
members, friends or visitors would be interested in.
Arguably, the more personalized a communication technology,
the greater the human–technical interface. McLuhan, in a chapter in
Understanding Media (1994) entitled ‘The Gadget Lover’, argues that in