In his essay, Hall compares two models of communication. The first, the traditional model is criticized for its linearity – sender/message/receiver – and for its lack of structured conception of various moments as a complex structure of relations. The author proposes the idea that there is more to the process of communication and, thus, advances a four-stage model of communication that takes into account the production, circulation, use and reproduction of media messages. In contrast to the traditional linear approach of the sender and receiver, he perceives each of these steps as both autonomous and interdependent. Hall further explains that the meanings and messages in the discursive "production" are organized through the operation of codes within the rules of "language." "Each stage will affect the message (or "product") being conveyed as a result of its 'discursive form' (e.g. practices, instruments, relations)." Therefore, once the discourse is accomplished, it must be translated into social practices in order to be completed and effective – "If no 'meaning' is taken, there can be no 'consumption'." Each of these steps helps defines the one that follows, while remaining clearly distinct. Thus, even though each of these moments (stages) are equally important to the process as a whole, they do not completely ensure that the following moment will necessary happen. "Each can constitute its own break or interruption of the 'passage of forms' on whose continuity the flow of effective production (i.e. reproduction) depends."