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MMoon
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16 years ago @ Spark | CBC Radio - Episode 59 - December ... · 0 replies · +1 points
I have to grant EMJ a point there. Cognitive surplus is not a 20th century phenomenon. Maybe fewer people had the time to do it, but even those who did did not had time. How did the Protestant Reformation happen? Peasants definitely had thoughts about that.
However, I just want to comment on Shirky's analogy that the printing press may have ended the careers of scribes but opened the careers of novelists and journal publishers. I forget who said it but I remember a comment once somewhere that said one of the negative results of the age of hi-tech is that the technology is changing so fast it has no time to actually establish a culture and a place for everyone within it.
The printing press was around long enough to create quite a vibrant print culture. Technology changes so quickly that people have to keep updating their technologies, going through learning curves, purchasing new technology, catching up with what is happening currently on the latest technology that there is no time to establish a culture. Today we have the blog, will it be around next year or will something new emerge? And 10 years from now?
It is almost impossible now to cultivate a culture. We are in a fast lane where the speed is increasing rapidly and its all we can do to keep up. Some people are already ahead of a game that will only become dominant in the next couple of years and don't yet know it, some people are setting off in a direction that may be totally right now but will be obsolete in a couple of years. How does one plan for a career in this business? Do you think if blogs go belly up to something totally new anyone will want to go back and read the old blogs the way they read old books published in 1850?
It is planned obsolescence at an ever increasing rate and the only ones with a sure bet of making money on it will be the producers of the new technology. We do not live in an age that is about the products of technology, it is about technology. Drop your motorola and get a blackberry, drop your blackberry and get an ipod. Forget the mouse and start poking the screen with your fingers. I am sure, very soon, we will not even be writing here anymore, we will be speaking directly onto, or performing onto.
However, I just want to comment on Shirky's analogy that the printing press may have ended the careers of scribes but opened the careers of novelists and journal publishers. I forget who said it but I remember a comment once somewhere that said one of the negative results of the age of hi-tech is that the technology is changing so fast it has no time to actually establish a culture and a place for everyone within it.
The printing press was around long enough to create quite a vibrant print culture. Technology changes so quickly that people have to keep updating their technologies, going through learning curves, purchasing new technology, catching up with what is happening currently on the latest technology that there is no time to establish a culture. Today we have the blog, will it be around next year or will something new emerge? And 10 years from now?
It is almost impossible now to cultivate a culture. We are in a fast lane where the speed is increasing rapidly and its all we can do to keep up. Some people are already ahead of a game that will only become dominant in the next couple of years and don't yet know it, some people are setting off in a direction that may be totally right now but will be obsolete in a couple of years. How does one plan for a career in this business? Do you think if blogs go belly up to something totally new anyone will want to go back and read the old blogs the way they read old books published in 1850?
It is planned obsolescence at an ever increasing rate and the only ones with a sure bet of making money on it will be the producers of the new technology. We do not live in an age that is about the products of technology, it is about technology. Drop your motorola and get a blackberry, drop your blackberry and get an ipod. Forget the mouse and start poking the screen with your fingers. I am sure, very soon, we will not even be writing here anymore, we will be speaking directly onto, or performing onto.
Medley