Cultural change accompanies the transition from one form of communication to another.
(Hutton re: Ong, p. 13)
Does the web signal the "real' transition from one form of communication from another? Or was the promise of instant worldwide communication born with the telegraph the real beginning? Was radio the significant event, or television? Ong seems to be considering the broadcast forms of media as the significant events that will lead us into a second orality.
It is interesting, however, that the first incarnation of the web has led to the proliferation of words. We write on the web, we reproduce print objects on the web and we base our current searching on word forms. Text is alive and well on the web.
Or is it? For the truth, or at least the fact, is that the web is not words or images at all. It is merely bits. And it is the bits, the maleable, spinning, ever changing yet always constant bits, that will be the stuff our dreams are made on for the forseeable future.
Are bits different enough from text different enough from speech to make a profound shift in our forms of communication and our culture. That remains to be seen. Meanwhile. . .