Congeries of cross connected concepts
What with Instapundit going all poddy and the rise of video based weblogs like Hot Air, I can see that I will soon be left behind with the Ted Kaczynski crowd, bemoaning the cruel technology that has left me an outcast in my own country. I have tried, really I have, but it’s both low and high bandwidth at the same time in the wrong ways. High bandwidth because I have to focus on it continuously in a way I don’t with text and low bandwidth because the amount of useful information per second is much lower (for me) than well written text. It’s almost infuriating, but more and more content seems to be going that way. I feel a little sorry about not liking video, since (having tried my hand at video editing) I realize that it’s not less work than writing, but podcasting — that’s just lazy, dudes.
It also makes me wonder about the claim of how much more “multi-tasking” the new generation is. No media multi-tasks like lots of windows of text on a large video display. Perhaps it’s not really multi-tasking but filtering by people who have grown up in a noisy environment. Just like hunter gathers would be uneasy in a silent night, the next generation feels uneasy in an environment without lots of background stimulus.
Hopefully, if there’s anything of significance on this inaccessible to me new media, some kind soul will translate it back to a form I can use.
UPDATE:
Rand Simberg stays behind with me.
| Ali Choudhury Friday, 10 November 2006 at 10:54 |  |
Yep, text is a lot faster and efficient.
Video’s best used for things you have to see. Podcasts are best for conversations between multiple participants and things like the Battlestar Galactica commentaries.
| Andrea Harris Friday, 10 November 2006 at 19:16 | |
I won’t be podcasting or any of that nonsense either. I did put up a couple of experimental things I did with my Kodak on Youtube, but if you were able to see that and you could hear my voice you’d be grateful that I am sticking to text for the most part.
Watching videos, tv, and such irritates me anyway. I sometimes feel overwhelmed by the stimulus, I think. I went through a phase where I always had to have music on (crappy rock music too), but I am older now and that has passed. Sometimes I can’t stand any noise at all.
