Stuffing our faces (with information)
January 26, 2009Aya and I were watching the trailer for We Live in Public on Sunday and there was a line that said something to the effect of “blah blah mumble being online all the time mumble mumble like an addiction, it’s like Attention Deficit Disorder blah blah” at which point Aya shot me an accusing glance, in a kind of non-verbal intervention.
Okay, I admit it (that’s the first step towards recovery, right?). I have a problem. I am online most of my waking hours (see my self-analysis). Rarely do my computers ever get switched off (I just sleep them). I can argue that it’s my livelihood. I can say I’m trying to be one of Malcolm Gladwell’s Outliers and that I have to amass 10,000 hours of, um, practice so I can be an “expert” on teh internets.
But the truth is, I like the feeling of knowing what’s up with my network, and the rest of the world. I am more aware than I used to be. I care about politics because I am more engaged. I can blame part of it on genetics. Growing up, my brother and I would rarely be without a book. I used to carry a huge backpack filled with books wherever I went — in fact, I would feel naked without the weight around my shoulders. My brother ate sci-fi pulp novels for breakfast. (He is actually a freakishly speedy reader, eating entire pages in a glance.) My dad would spend hours sitting on the toilet reading scientific journals (xeroxed from the library).
from thingsmagazine.net
The point I tried to make is that the only thing that’s changed is that we’ve shifted the same activity from “atoms to bits” (as Nicholas Negroponte likes to put it). No more 50lb backpacks; just a 4lb laptop. Instead of reams of paper, which are now gathering dust in a box taking up space in the basement, I now have Evernote, del.icio.us, and Google Reader that live in the airy Cloud.
The thing we can’t seem to get over is this: when it’s on paper, it’s okay. But when it hits the screen, somehow it becomes problematic, stigmatized, it’s an “addiction.”
One way of looking at it is that we have gotten lulled into the idea that if something made it into print, it had to be knowledge. But we now know this is not the case. We’re all in a jumble right now. The computer is the locus of too many activities: work, play, banking, browsing, rubber-necking at the train-wreck of humanity, study, creativity, etc. They are all crammed together and flattened out such that the bad taints the good (never the opposite).
Two designers in London have printed Things Our Friends Have Written On The Internet 2008, which is a publication of “stuff from the internet…printed in a newspaper format”
Another way of seeing it is from a very physical reality. For all its atomic encumbrances, the book is portable, and computers, surprisingly less so, though that all is changing. I am seeing more ordinary people whip open their laptops on the subway, more people reading on their phones, and a new wave of netbooks is hitting the streets. The screen forces us to come to it. It emanates information, and it is information of an altogether new and different quality because it is born on a screen and is meant to live on a screen, never to be frozen in print, and we are entranced by its flickering aura.
Categories information architecture, publication design, reading | Tags: publication design, reading information
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Aya | January 26, 2009 at 11:14 am
but think about it (and this has continued to be the great issue of print vs. web) which is that it probably took a LOT of work for someone to publish a book — endless revisions and editing, finding a publisher, etc. etc. Whereas any old schmoe can throw out his pithy insights of the hour up on his blog. Somehow in my mind, quality of content is related to the time spent creating it and I just don’t want my honey to be full of junkfood all the time. so there.
Irwin | January 26, 2009 at 11:21 am
Um, the sad thing is it no longer takes any work or any thought whatsoever to publish a book (same with movies).
Joe the Plumber has a book deal.
so there.
Ryan Lauer | January 26, 2009 at 12:39 pm
I think it is an issue of the user’s knowledge of information on the web and knowing how to be able to say “this is information that someone took time to develop and curate, whereas this is just some schmuck posting about his pet-peeves”. Unfortunately, the age of the internet is quite young and most people have yet to gain this discerning eye.
Aya Ogawa | January 26, 2009 at 1:13 pm
I can have 3 blogs and 3 websites but I don’t have a book deal. It may be a farce for Joe the Plumber to have one, but still, there are millions of other Joes who are NOT getting a book deal (but who could easily have a handful of blogs).
Maha | February 3, 2009 at 9:36 am
Content aside- and I think it is an interesting point… I am noticing experientially, when I read online, I always end up feeling skittish. When I read a book I always feel calm. I don’t have a kindle or other ebook reader. I do love the internet, but I do also notice some physical effects. Online reading for me= shallow breathing, a little nervous, and if I do it all day and then have to interact socially, I find people, well, IRRITATING. If I am reading a book all day, generally, I am waaaay more chill and still able to socialize without being annoyed by humanity.
Is that just me?
Irwin | February 3, 2009 at 9:49 am
It’s true what you say, Maha. A Kindle (or eInk) is slightly better but it’s still missing that je-ne-sais-quoi. I’m as nostalgic as the next guy, maybe more, and I am a sucker for a beautifully designed book. But my point is, there is more than just one kind of reading. I think there’s some space between reading a book (deep reading) and browsing. Think about the difference between reading a magazine, say, The New Yorker, and reading a book or a blog. That’s what I’m aiming for.
Sonja | February 6, 2009 at 6:44 am
Hi Irwin I just checked this site! It looks awesome. I can totally relate to this post…my sister and I were the same growing up and would always cart around bags of books everywhere. Now we both spend every waking moment it seems checking blogs constantly. Sometimes it feels like a real addiction though…the number of times I check my email in a day is frightening.
Sonja | February 6, 2009 at 6:47 am
I didn’t read the title of this until I posted my comment. That is exactly what I feel like I am doing…gorging myself with internet content and I CANT STOP
David | March 2, 2009 at 10:55 pm
You’ve got some good points here. I find my peers and I asking questions surrounding these issues alot these days. Thanks for contributing to the dialogue.
Irwin Chen | March 3, 2009 at 5:22 am
Thanks, David. I’m interested to hear what your peers (where are you btw?) have to say…
David | March 8, 2009 at 7:46 pm
Irwin – I’m in Vancouver, Canada.
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