Showing posts with label internet. Show all posts
Showing posts with label internet. Show all posts

Tuesday, May 10, 2016

In praise of distracted, Internet-addled writing

In his review of Freewrite's "Smart Typewriter," Ian Bogost offers praise for the pre-Internet era of writing, when one could set one's fingers to the keyboard and simply write, without all the distractions and bells and whistles that a wifi connection bring to the process.

There's more than a hint of protesting too much.

No one would reasonably dispute that writing tools affect the shape and content of both writing and the thought that goes into writing, but it's mistaken to suggest — as Bogost seems to — the the older, slower way was necessarily deeper. Here's an odd passage:
For Nietzsche, the typewriter offered a way to write despite his deteriorating vision (and sanity). He knew that tools changed their users; “Our writing tools are also working on our thoughts,” Nietzsche aphorized. These are facts I happen to know just because they were memorable, not because I remember facts like these regularly anymore. I’ve long since outsourced such easily-rediscovered knowledge to the Internet.
Here's the thing: The human brain is at once both wondrous and limited. In writing this essay 30 or 40 years ago, Bogost might've dropped the exact same knowledge from memory — or, if he (as is often the case with this kind of learning) remembered-ish Nietzsche's comment, he would've gone into the stacks of books (his own, or perhaps a library's) to find the comment, quote it precisely, and cite it. Now, if he's unsure, he can Google it up. Good writing rarely stops and starts with the writer's brain and the writing tools; it's often augmented by reporting and research, knowledge of not just how to marshal facts in service of a story or argument, but how to marshal those facts. Forty years ago, Bogost might've written: "I've outsourced such easily-rediscovered knowledge to the encyclopedia," and it would've sounded silly as a lament. We writers use such tools to enlarge our understanding, and our craft.

Wednesday, August 18, 2010

Managing My Digital Life (Or: How I Learned To Love The Internet Without Surrendering To It)

I've spent the last few months trying to figure out how to live a thoughtful, contemplative life in a digital age. There's been a lot of talk lately about Nicholas Carr's book, "The Shallows," and about how The Google Life is one of endless multitasking and short-circuited thoughts that, not so slowly, is robbing us of the ability to think or read deeply, or at length.

For awhile, I tried a little bit of cold turkey -- deactivating my Facebook and Twitter accounts -- and pondered the idea of giving up the digital life entirely. I discarded that idea ultimately: Giving up the Internet is, frankly, impractical. Twitter, it turns out, is a useful networking tool. And Facebook, well ... Facebook connects me with my friends, old and new. I would miss them.

Plus: I like blogging.

Instead, I've had to set limits for myself. The problem for me isn't so much the Internet -- there's tons to love about the Internet -- but my own capacity for endless, shallow farting around. So:

* I'VE LIMITED MYSELF TO 100 FEEDS TO FOLLOW ON TWITTER. AND I KEEP IT ENTIRELY TO THE BROWSER. Once I reactivated my account, I remembered why I'd abandoned Twitter in the first place -- too many feeds, updated too frequently. I'd previously used the Twitterrific desktop client, and Twitter updates would thus push themselves into my consciousness constantly whenever I was using the computer. Now Twitter is waiting there for me when I choose to go get it. And there's not as much for me to get: I'm at 100 feeds I'm following now -- when I add one, I drop one. It's that simple.

* I'VE DEEPLY LIMITED MY RSS FEEDS: I'm down to Philly's newspapers, a couple of local blogs and one major liberal blog, one major conservative blog and one major libertarian blog. I also subscribe to Memeorandum, which allows me to track the flow of blogospheric conversation without having a million blogs pushing their updates into Google Reader. Yes, there are good bloggers whose work I still want to follow -- but I can either drop in on them from time-to-time or I can catch their highlights from their Twitter feed. It's less oppressive than having 1,000 unread posts in my reader.

* I'VE CHANGED HOW I USE INSTAPAPER: If you haven't used Instapaper, you should, because it offers one potential solution to Carr's vexations, letting you save long-form written pieces for later reading -- when you're in less of a scanning RSS mode and readier for meatier reading. But it comes, for many people, with a new problem: The piling up of unread articles in the Instapaper queue. My solution? I won't let myself have more than five items in the queue at any one time. (Six, in a pinch.) If a story lingers for a couple of days, I recognize that I'm probably not going to get to it -- and delete it. Generally speaking, though, my approach here is the same as Twitter: If one new story comes on, another must go off. Preferably, I've read it first. But not always.

What's more, I read Instapaper articles only on my iPhone. The temptations to multitasking are simply too great on my computer. I can engage the text a little better if it's the only thing in front of me -- and iPhone is good at keeping just one thing in front of you. If Instapaper had highlighting and note-taking options available -- like the Kindle and Nook for iPhone do -- I'd be completely set.

The next couple of things I'm less good at, but trying to incorporate into my life:

* NO NET AT DINNERTIME: My wife and I realized that popping on a movie at dinnertime was having the effect of distracting our toddler son from actually eating -- with consequences for the entire family at bedtime. So, no more videos at mealtime. There's a temptation to futz on my iPhone at the point, but I'm trying to turn it off completely and enjoy the company of actual humans over food. A little music in the background is OK.

* THE COMPUTER COMES OFF COMPLETELY AT 9 PM. This one I'm worst at. But the nights I turn it off and retire to bed with a good novel are the nights I sleep best and wake up most refreshed.

The wonderful thing about the Internet is that it offers virtually limitless access to information, video and dialogue. But my time is limited, as is my attention. So I'm setting limits on my engagement with the Internet, so that I can live a life that is enhanced by what the web has to offer -- not dominated by it.

Monday, August 2, 2010

Dear Steve Levitan: Don't take 'Modern Family' offline!

James Hibberd reports:

If it was up to Steve Levitan, his ABC hit "Modern Family" wouldn't be available online.

During an ABC-sponsored coffee break at TCA, Levitan said he's unsuccessfully lobbied Disney-ABC TV Group president Anne Sweeney to remove online versions of his hit show.

Noting there's roughly 2 million people watching "Modern Family" episodes online whose viewership is not fully monetized Levitan said that, in theory, those viewers could be watching the comedy on regular ad-supported TV.

I'm one of those 2 million viewers. And I need to let Mr. Levitan know something: I'm not going to watch "Modern Family" on TV if you take it offline. I don't have a TV. (I don't say that snobbishly; I'm obviously watching TV shows anyway.)

If you take "Modern Family" off Hulu, then, one of three things will happen.

* I will stop watching "Modern Family" entirely. There's no money in that for you!

* I might hypothetically watch, ahem, less than fully legal feeds of "Modern Family" that will be easy to find online anyway. There's no money in that for you!

* I will wait a year or two for "Modern Family" to show up on Netflix Streaming, or some after-the-fact placement on Hulu, and watch it then. In which case, you probably get some money -- but only about as much as you're getting now!

As Levitan surely knows -- or, at least he should -- 2 million viewers online isn't really 2 million viewers he's not getting on television. Some people might go back to the TV, surely, but a lot won't. Instead of seeing the 2 million viewers of "Modern Family" online as "not fully monetized," he should instead think of them as "additional monetization we might not be getting otherwise." Hulu is ad-supported, after all.

The web video genie is out of the bottle. It's not going back in.