Commentary on technologies of reading, writing, research, and, generally, knowledge. As these technologies change and develop, what do we lose, what do we gain, what is (fundamentally or trivially) altered? And, not least, what’s fun?
By: Alan Jacobs
April 19, 2010
Sara Peyton compares reading on a Kindle and reading on an iPad: I’ve owned a Kindle for about 6 months and it’s my trusty companion whenever I travel. The Kindle, my headlamp, and my iPhone sit on my bedside table. I’ve always got at least five or six new novels on the Kindle. I like the Kindle’s e-ink, the...
April 16, 2010
Ars Technica summarizes a new report in Science: Humans are capable of pursuing multiple goals at once—for example, I am pursuing writing an article and eating a bowl of Froot Loops—but how those activities get divided by the brain is still somewhat of a mystery. A new study, published in Science this week, imaged human brains and...
April 15, 2010
While I was recuperating last week I read and enjoyed James Shapiro’s new book Contested Will: Who Wrote Shakespeare? It’s an excellent history of the debates over the authorship of the plays attributed to William Shakespeare — and it’s primarily that, a history. Shapiro wants to understand how and why, at some point in the 19th...
April 14, 2010
The critical judgment “This book is good or bad” implies good or bad at all times, but in relation to the readers future a book is good now if its future effect is good, and, since the future is unknown, no judgment can be made. The safest guide therefore is the naive uncritical principle of personal liking. A person at least knows...
April 13, 2010
Charlie Stross asks an interesting question: “Why are novels (the prevailing form of fictional entertainment on retail sale today) generally the length that they are?” Back in the mid to late Victorian period, when books were frequently printed and sold as weekly serials, in chapter-sized magazines that could be bound together, the...
April 12, 2010
Tim Burke is one of the most consistently thoughtful bloggers I know — and I’m choosing that word carefully: Burke doesn’t blog very often because he actually takes time to think before posting. The problem with the web, of course — and especially with the world of blogs — is that not many people follow Burke’s example....
April 9, 2010
Regular Text-Patterns-style posting will resume on Monday. But one note quickly: I find myself so overwhelmed with email that I’ve gone back to Gmail for a period. I just can’t manage the volume in a regular email client that lacks all Gmail’s organizational features. Will this mark a permanent regression? Will I be...
April 9, 2010
As Bryan says in a comment on my previous post, “you do get better care from such big institutions precisely because so many different people with such specialized expertise can be involved, but the more of those resources you have the harder it is coordinate and monitor them to ensure that they work properly.” With that point in...
April 9, 2010
So I spent some time in hospital last week — I’ll say a little more about the details later — and a slow recovery will mean that posting will continue to be limited around here for a while, and perhaps a little more link-heavy than usual. But I want to deviate from the topics of this blog, for a post or two, to comment on what I...
March 31, 2010
Quotes and links at least I can do. The whole human memory can be, and probably in a short time will be, made accessible to every individual. And what is also of very great importance in this uncertain world where destruction becomes continually more frequent and unpredictable, is this, that photography affords now every facility for...