One more update from Vegas: a late entry book review video from Sarah T. of Nicholas Carr. The Shallows: What the Internet Is Doing to Our Brains.
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The audio level on the commentary was a bit low considering the “buzzing” noise in the background.
If Carr is arguing technologies disappear behind the message/content, how would he explain the ways (benefits/constraints/impact/changes) technologies can affect the message/content? Such as not using Oxford commas in newspapers to save print space, or having to learn morse code to decipher messages over a telegraph which were written as concisely as possible, how the way keyboards were laid out so the keys wouldn’t jam on a typewriter and wasn’t changed even after the introduction of PCs, etc.
Carr said the medium is the message? The medium is the technology isn’t it? How can the medium be the message?
How in the heck could people read without spaces between words? That would have been crazy.
I like how you found relative videos to integrate into your review; they nicely break up the whole piece. Good job.
Again, another fascinating topic!
I too, found the background noise distracting, but we’re not being evaluated by our video editing capabilities, I hope!
I also really appreciate the more conversational approach to your delivery. It relays a more natural, relaxed, and comfortable atmosphere to your audience so, well done on that front!
Did we read something of Carr in this class? I could be getting my classes confused, but I do recall reading about a change in Nietzsche’s writing after he acquired a typewriter and how it changed the style of his writing from prose to telegraphic.
Also, if the 50′s were correct, we should have smell-o-vision by now, right? I appreciated your humor when you were introducing Carr’s observation of using various senses in the interaction with computers and being online. I wonder if the mind/body is just not capable of retaining information because our resources are being allocated toward the visual and listening component when interacting online? Kind of like when plants put more energy into the dying leaf/limb of it’s body to save it, thus less energy is left for the rest of the plant, impeding it’s growth. We are an organism like anything else and similarly function for survival.
In any case, as I noted in Melissa’s review, I think these issues are just in their infancy and so much more needs to be observed, studied, and researched. As much as technology makes our lives easier, it seems that it is not without its consequences and we are starting to realize just how much.
^Germaine, I think you’re thinking of Carr’s “Is the Internet Making Us Stupid?”
Sarah, I’ll echo what others have said about enjoying the videos that you incorporated into your video. They were relevant and interesting.
I found myself making connections between your review of this book and the book I read (Howard Rheingold’s “How to Thrive Online”), especially towards the end when you point out that, although Carr’s arguments are valid and well-supported, there are ways to focus one’s attention online through simply having awareness of your own mind and attention. This was precisely what an entire section of the book I read was about; Rheingold refers to it as “mindfulness,” but I think it’s the same concept you bring up at the end of your review. And I definitely agree with you there.
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Sarah, I was really fascinated to hear what Carr had to say about the evolution of the brain, and the evolution of reading. I also didn’t know some of what you explained about the evolution of the written word and the idea of sustained reading of script. I personally enjoyed hearing about the anthrobiological elements of brain evolution, and how reading on the Internet, while maybe perceived as a step down, is actually more in step with how our brains are wired to perceive things.
What fascinated me, then, we how Carr also then argued that this isn’t necessarily to our benefit in terms of intelligence and memory, how this is perhaps having a negative impact on our long-term memory and our ability to make connections due to sensory overload.
I think you (and Carr) then make a good point, and I’m glad you ended on this point: That, no matter what the Internet does to our brains, we can be self-aware enough to recognize it and train our brains to behave differently. I don’t know near enough about neuroplasticity to make this as coherent as I’d like it to be, but metacognitive ideas are so intriguing… that thinking about thinking can actually affect and change thinking…
I think you did justice to what sounds like a really complex topics, and hats off to your integration of other video. I loved the fountain pen ads and the typewriter ads, leading in to the pictures of computers (in their many forms) and the audio discussing (we)blogs and their changes in formatting… Really nice video review!
Nice job, Sarah! I liked how you were very conversational (something I didn’t really attempt to do because I was following a script instead of notes for the most part, being my first “talk” with the web audience). I liked that you incorporated videos, though I found them a bit jarring. I think more transition would have helped me with this.
The book sounds very interesting and I liked that you were able to critique it. I tried to do that with mine but I ended up agreeing with mostly everything she said – it was more a book that agreed with things I had noticed than a book that challenged any notions I had. I think this was a great review and the book sound very interesting.
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Hey, I wasn’t late! I just put it in the dropbox on emu-online instead of emailing it…(don’t do this, people!)
Also, you all are so kind! I had the flu and thought the video was fairly terrible. I wanted to show some of the anatomy of a neuron and maybe make less weird gestures. Haha!
So, the sound quality was better before YouTube processed it (it usually goes the other way around…), but I apologize for that. There wasn’t any buzzing in my original recordings…again, sorry about that!
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