A piece on Nieman, a year ago more or less, but still as relevant. Three video lectures / talks, the first of which prompted the saving of the URL for a later day:
James Gleick ... bestseller, translated into 20 languages, is The Information: A History, a Theory, a FloodClocking in at 73 minutes, I have to admit that some of it has "flooded past" in the year gone by, but I still recommend it.
I group Gleick in with moderately large group of thinkers exploring the impacts of digital tech and content. Books like The Shallows, Hamlets Blackberry, Not a gadget and so on. And there is no doubt that digitization changes "everything". Would I have even heard about those books ten years ago before starting to blog? Maybe, but clearly not twenty years ago before seeing web and newsgroup content for the first time.
It is part magic, part wonderland
- imagine that just about any speech or lecture can be preserved and shared globally. For no incremental cost on either end.Rather than traveling to California I could sit on my couch, holding 10 inches of glass and watch the I/O keynote (first hour anyway...) along with A MILLION (!!!) other people. Working with thees kinds of things, it is useful to stop and reflect on just how far we've come every now and then. With hangouts on air and recording, you just need a webcam (built into any laptop and most mobiles) to invite the world in. Google handles the rest. Distribution, encoding, storage.
Just like that.
Want to do a debate series, inviting two people from different countries each week? Just do it.
Want to do a class for school kids in your favorite subject? Press record.
Sure, there is something like a 100 hours of new content by the time you've finished reading this post. But that just means that the content that does resonate has the chance to spread that much faster, further and longer than before.
- ...and the sun is taking a short time out, so I can just about make out the text on the screen in my reflection .. brightness to the max, blogging from the balcony
