Below are Atlantic notes, from James Fallows and others, on the expected and unexpected effects of the computer revolution on our habits of thought, work, and life. The thread’s title is in honor of the seminal article largely prefiguring the modern Internet, “As We May Think” by Vannevar Bush, which the Atlantic published in 1945.
In some of the installments you’ll find lower down in this thread, I mentioned both the internal and the external unintended-consequences of the shift from paper to electronic reading.
Internal: at least for me, information simply registers differently, and more deeply, from a traditional book or magazine page.
External: reading from a printed source emits social cues about what you’re doing, and the presence of print around a house affects the environment in which children grow up.
Now readers on related aspects of this shift. First, from a person who has worked for many years as a teacher, in the United States and overseas:
The idea of "concept of book" is taught in most good Ed. School classes about reading. If you don't know to read from right to left, top to bottom, and whether to start front or back, you can't work the damn thing. You and I got the training from parental exposure. There are many children who do not have "reading parents" to stack their environment with cues.
A child seeing Mom work a Kindle does not get the same cues as when Mom is reading a book or magazine.
Similarly:
Growing up, my parents had National Geographic, Smithsonian, Newsweek, among others and I would pick them up when I got bored. Other than a couple of home improvement magazines, I do not subscribe to any today. I feel like I am cheating my children of any experience.
And from this same reader, not about the effect on children but on the other social cues:
You quote a reader who would “ . . . leave [The Atlantic] around the house so when people come by they will think I am smarter than I really am."
I subscribed to The Atlantic and The New Republic in law school and would carry them with me to class and read during breaks for this exact reason.
And about reading newspapers in hard copy: You cannot beat reading the newspaper first thing in the morning, lay out each page, drink your coffee and read. I go Sports, Front Page, Local, Business and Life/Entertainment.
I am a fast reader and read close to 90% of the paper in 15 minutes. I cannot imagine reading this way online.
From a reader in Japan, on this final point on the visual/intellectual ergonomics of reading a physical newspaper:
I enjoy reading what an editor has selected as news worthy, another way of saying that what I read in a paper are often things that I would never click on at a news site, the physical click becomes a self selecting echo chamber of sorts.
I agree: on the one hand, any excursion into online media leads to clicks you hand’t expected. On the other hand, I find that looking at a physical paper — which I have begun making myself do again, because I’m convinced that the results are better — leads me to more unanticipated items of “actual news.”
***
Let’s get back to kids-and-reading. A mother of youngish children writes:
I still subscribe to newspapers, The Atlantic, and other magazines for me, but also for my own children. More than anything else, I want to turn my kids into readers.
When I was younger, the new issues of Time and US News & World Report would be on our coffee table every Monday night. My parents also subscribed to the local newspaper and the WSJ, so there was always something to read just lying around. It was just easier to read an article, than to pick up a book.
By having books, newspapers and magazine around my house, even though I also have them on my iPad and Kindle, and by having my kids see me read them, I’m hoping that by osmosis and by example, my children will pick them up as well.
They may see me on the iPad or even on the computer doing the same thing, but it’s easy to assume that I’m just catching up on Candy Crush or random websites. I hope that by reading the real thing, and having my kids see me read the real thing, they will learn to enjoy it as well. I think it’s working, but until I know for sure, I still enjoy reading news in its original format.
And back again to social cueing:
Your piece just now reminded me of a common reader's dilemma from the past. If I was reading something highbrow, academic or otherwise socially impressive, part of the joy was to read it in public - on the train, in a coffee shop etc - letting people know what an intellectual force of nature I was.
On the other hand, when I was reading something lowbrow, dumb, hyper-violent or trashy, I would often leave the book at home even though I wanted to keep reading it, because people would decide that it said something about me I didn't want them to believe/know...
Relevant to the reader’s first paragraph: when I’ve been traveling in foreign countries where I can read, or sort of read, the language, I have been similarly vain about carrying newspapers in the local language, as a “I’m not a complete tourist!” signal. Relevant to the second paragraph: as noted before, I love books from the superb Hard Case crime series. The Hard Case trademark is issuing its books in retro-1950s lurid covers, as you see at right. While I love the panache of the covers sometimes I feel that I need to cover them up. What other people subway or airplane should think is, of course, “who is that cool guy reading a retro-50s series with its campy covers?” What I’m afraid they’ll think is, “Who is that creep?”
***
Finally for now, back to the visual-memory difference between reading in a physical book, where you always know how far along you are from beginning to end, and where a given passage appears on the page. After I mentioned that these cues were important to me, a reader responds:
Hallelujah! How is it the design fanaticism of Apple still hasn't solved this problem on the iBooks app?
The position on the page still holds (mostly, though I believe I've seen times when page layout changes without changing font or size), but the inability to know where you are in a book is really annoying. Sure, you can look down at the page number, but that's nothing like the intuitive feel of a book where you just see that you're about 2/3 of the way through. Same holds for every other ebook reader I've seen.
Yesterday I mentioned the astonishing (to me) news that, by cramming a wad of Post-it notes underneath the cover of my ailing Android Nexus 5 phone, I could save myself the significant cost and hassle of buying a new one.
Three followups. First from Jason Virga, creator of the Post-in note video that saved me so much time and dough:
When my Nexus 5 microphone first started malfunctioning, my first thought was "oh well, time to get a new phone”!
Thankfully my curiosity drew me towards tinkering around a little bit before making that new purchase. Within an hour, I figured out the problem and posted the video.
The phone is actually great, and nothing else was wrong with it. So I thought a few minutes checking under the hood couldn't hurt. Thankfully, it turned out this way, and has saved many people as you said "hundreds of dollars".
And for me helping people brings me utter joy.
And to me too!
***
Second, from a reader who operates a charter-boat company. First he talks about a similar self-help story; then, reflections on What This All Means:
Last Spring, making flank speed to get a boat ready for the upcoming season my random orbit sanders seized. One, then the other 30 minutes later. From a remote port, the nearest replacements (on a sunday) were a 3 hour round trip away.
But the Internet to the rescue. Don't remember what I googled, but in short order I was watching a bearing repacking for my sanders on Youtube. (Fine particles from sanding enter the sealed bearings, mix with the bearing grease and turn it to non-lubricating goo) I took a chance and sprayed PB Blaster (WD-40 on steroids) into the bearings,and Voila! I was back in business and the boat launched on time.
I think the internet has been disastrous for professional communications, both the profession and the communication. I really do think books, magazines, tv, movies are worse for the internet.
But it is a true golden era for amateur communication, most especially peer to peer communications like your and my day-savers.
We’re fighting off the professional-world effect here at the Atlantic, but overall the reader has a point. His emphasis on the professional/amateur difference is a useful clarification.
***
Another bit of testimony:
The internet has also saved "early adopters" like me (more than once) from our impulses to upgrade things at the earliest opportunity.
My latest impulse (and fiasco) was to upgrade my Macs (both desktop and laptop) to Yosemite right when it came out (instead of rationally waiting until bugs had been fixed and, more importantly, vendors caught up developing drivers for it). [JF note: burned long ago, I never load an operating-system update until the first “maintenance release.”]
Later that day, when I went to print something out from my laptop, nothing happened (expect a notification on the icon bar telling me an error had occurred). So I looked at the error message and, of course, it was essentially gibberish to me: Stopped - ntdcmsmac open fail:dlopen(/usr/lib/dlthm1zcl.dylib…
Of course, I immediately knew it had something to do with the upgrade, and I got the sinking feeling I would need to wait for Dell (the maker of my printer) to get around to upgrading the drivers (I went to their web site, and they hadn't yet).
Instead, I decided to poke around the internet, googling the above error and the word Yosemite, to see what I could find out. Sure enough, someone had posted a "workaround" to deal with the issue.
(Essentially, Apple beefed up the security features of the OS; in doing so, they prevented programs, etc, from copying files into certain directories. One of those directories was the one the printer driver, dlthm1zcl.dylib, was located in. On top of that, I guess it also erased the driver. And, since the drivers could no longer access the directory, you couldn't simply reinstall the drivers.
The solution was to reboot the machine into recovery mode, disable the security feature, reboot into regular mode, install the current version of the printer driver, which could now access the directory, reboot back into recovery mode, re-enable the security feature, and then reboot back into regular mode).
Worked like a charm.
And, as you said, thanks to all those willing to share their expertise with those of us who often need it!
Disaster (or challenge) for professionals, golden age for amateurs: such are our times.
Norman Rockwell illustration for electric light ad, 1920s (Wikimedia)
As a business matter, the Atlantic has placed tremendous emphasis through the past two decades on integrating all the different ways we try to get our message out. This means via the classic in-print magazine, the ever-expanding and -refining range of our web sites, live events, videos and podcasts, and so on. I say “through the past two decades” because we were one of the very first publications to have a serious online site, starting with Atlantic Unbound back in 1994.
As an intellectual and cultural matter, the whole undertaking is more connected than you might think, with most people working in the same physical space in Washington and talking about the interactions among the various things we do. Here is a reader note about the way it comes across on the other end. I offer it as a little document on the state of modern cultural / intellectual/ technological life.
A reader in Texas writes:
My hardcopy version of The Atlantic arrived today. It made me think about how my interaction with the world is influenced by the magazine and all of your various websites.
I use Feedly to collect all of the various Atlantic feeds and (yes!) blogs. I check these daily, indeed several times a day.
When the magazine is about to be released, I notice that all at once there are many long form article on my feed. I secretly rejoice, as I know that the hardcopy is on its way. I don’t read them on my computer or my phone, but do mark some that I know I will want to send to friends later.
Then, a day or so after that, I am able to access the issue on my Kindle. Yes, I pay for the Kindle subscription even though I can get all that content for free online, and I will be getting it a day or so later in the mail.
I use the Kindle version (Years ago, when you had reviewed the Kindle favorably, I sent you a note asking about the “reading experience.” You replied that just because you have a Kindle that doesn’t mean you need to give up books) to read most of the short articles. I will be waiting for a meeting, or just killing a little bit of time and say, “I can read a short article” and I will look for stories with a short word count. (I love the word count for this reason). I don’t like it for the articles with images (especially infographics) or the long form.
Then I wait and wait until I get the magazine. This is where I read the long form articles, review the pieces I have already read, and leave it around the house so when people come by they will think I am smarter than I really am.
I especially love the last sentence.
***
Two placeholder notes for later discussion, picking up on points I’ve mentioned before:
First, even though I find it much more convenient to read almost anything in a Kindle / nook / iPad version, I have begun consciously willing myself to spend more of my reading time (when possible) on the physical, paper versions of books, magazines, and newspapers.
The advantages of reading-on-paper vary among these media: the subconscious but surprisingly important flash-memory visual impression of where things are on a page with a book (and where the page is within the book), which does affect my recall of them; the attractive page layout of a nice magazine; the ability to scan things quickly and see their relative importance on a physical newspaper page. But beyond those differences is the common factor: my reluctant admission that reading from a physical page undeniably makes me retain and remember them better. I am sorry that this is so, because it’s less convenient. (And I still spend a ton of time reading electronic versions.) And maybe the difference is mainly the distraction factor: you can’t click a link on a page, which sounds like a minus but is a plus. One way or another, for me the difference in retention is real.
Second, let’s get back to that stellar last sentence. I’m wondering about the unintended long-term effects of electronic media reducing the amount of printed material that is just part of the visual landscape in homes and offices.
As early as I can remember, and long before I could actually read, I was conscious of my childhood homes being full of printed material, on practically every surface. Charts, maps, book covers, book cases, posters, stacks of kids’ books, stacks of adults’ books, magazine collections, things with words that were clues to interests my parents had had in the past or were reading / doing / planning on now. Or things they wanted their children to be aware of and comfortable with. The shift to e-reading leaves many fewer of these cues just lying around in constant passive view. There’s also a social effect. My wife Deb could always tell what book or magazine article I was reading, just by seeing it in my hands. Now she has no idea what is on the iPad, and I don’t know what she’s in the middle of reading.
We’ll see where this all leads. For now, thanks to the reader for describing his practices.
Or: how 50 cents’ worth of Post-it notes, and a brief bout of searching, saved me hundreds of dollars just now.
Glamor shot of the Nexus 5, red model
I am a fan of my Nexus 5 Android phone, made by LG and branded by Google. Its neon-orangey-red color makes it harder to lose than some dignified black phone. Also it conforms to my platform philosophy: Apple for laptop and tablet, Android for phone.
This Nexus 5 has always worked great, until yesterday when it just stopped working as a phone. If people called, I could hear them, but they couldn’t hear anything back from my end. Trying to use the voice-command function made it clear: the Nexus’s built-in microphone had completely conked out.
After 30 seconds of searching (in Evernote) to see how long ago I bought the phone, I find that it’s beyond its one-year warranty. In the next minute of searching online, I see that LG’s “repair” policy involves weeks of turnaround time and high enough costs that you might as well just get a new phone. Which in the world of unrepairable modern tech may of course be the intended point.
But then, thank you Internet! The next 60 seconds of searching, and less than five total minutes of work, allowed me to get the phone back to working order. The answer is all here:
Executive summary: you open the phone, you cram in a wad of little Post-it notes, then you close the phone back up. The pressure from the notes tightens up a connection that has come loose. The phone now has a small midriff bulge but works fine again.
Apparently this is a prevalent enough design/structural problem for the Nexus 5 that the this video is part of a large selection dealing with the loose-microphone-connector issue. But it’s the one I’m highlighting, because it required no tools, had total material costs of about 50 cents, and was so quick from start to end.
No larger point, beyond offering a small positive note about the often-maddening online world. Specific thanks to “JBug1979,” creator of this phone-saving YouTube video.
