By all accounts, an article in Wired magazine with a title of "The Luddite" is probably going to be a contrarian attempt at self-righteous iconoclasm, with a good dose of blind nostalgia and venting about the soulless nature of today. That's pretty much what it is.
I'm glad the copy chief of Wired has time to indulge in tired cliches and worthless retreading of columns written pre-2000, as the emergence of the cellphone, Internet, and widespread adoption of email was what spawned concerns about the dehumanizing face of modern communication technology. So that we get another dose of the same crap in 2005 is surprising, if not new, inventive, singular, or in any way relevant.
His crazy at-least-it's-better-than-sailing-ship-mail argument notwithstanding, I would argue that his delineation of face-to-face contact as the only "meaningful" human interaction is specious. It's the means of interacting with the longest history, but that doesn't automatically rule out the possibility that you are interacting with others meaningfully through other media. He only mentions IM, email, chat rooms, and other Internet-specific phenomena as meaningless communication tools; the telephone, television, and hell, the letter itself doesn't get mentioned in the course of his diatribe.
"So you rot in a cubicle trying to get the money to get the stuff, when you should be out walking in a meadow or wooing a lover or writing a song.... Look around. Our collective humanity is dying a little more every day. Technology is killing life on the street -- the public commons, if you please. Chat rooms, text messaging, IM are all, technically, forms of communication. But when they replace yakking over the back fence, or sitting huggermugger at the bar or simply walking with a friend -- as they have for an increasing number of people in "advanced" societies -- then meaningful human contact is lost. Ease of use is small compensation."
Here's how he's weaseled his way out of easy derailment--suddenly his argument becomes less "tech bad, jibberjabber good" and more "don't let it replace what you're used to." This isn't much more than an eleventh-hour attempt at bolstering his argument with something a little more akin to reason, but it doesn't validate his prior assertions. Technology is killing art? Not really. Technology is creating new opportunities for artists to express themselves, providing new inspiration, and allowing exploration of media that never even existed (interactive Flash experiences as art, anyone?).
The other major fallacy is that everything he cites as good is technology--it's just older technology. Writing a letter is not face-to-face interaction, but because it's been around longer, it gets the okay. Similarly, his assertion that you shouldn't be in the cubicle, you should be writing a song is ridiculous. The people interested in writing songs are doing just that, and I doubt they need your stupid gesticulations to help them out. Further, the increase in availability of powerful technology and the ease of transmission has allowed more people the opportunity to become artists and to find audiences. Garage Band, the MP3, bittorrent. All these things allow budding artists to find new influences, scout new media, and produce new works they wouldn't have, otherwise.
The reaction of the Luddite is to hate the new, because historically, the Luddites were a specific group of individuals who rioted against the industrialization of the factory they worked at. They were afraid not of technology as a whole, but of becoming obsolete in comparison. Did the lower class die because of machines? No, it's actually bigger than ever, but that's a different argument. Nowadays the only ones who are railing against the corporate-consumerist nature of enabling technology are the fools and bloggers who have the time to do so because they aren't busy working on something else. Maybe that's his point. Maybe he's an idiot, because he works for Wired, and if he really held to his convictions he wouldn't.
It's just surprising to me that an outlet like Wired would print an article so half-assed, unoriginal, and ridiculous in the first place.
I'm glad the copy chief of Wired has time to indulge in tired cliches and worthless retreading of columns written pre-2000, as the emergence of the cellphone, Internet, and widespread adoption of email was what spawned concerns about the dehumanizing face of modern communication technology. So that we get another dose of the same crap in 2005 is surprising, if not new, inventive, singular, or in any way relevant.
His crazy at-least-it's-better-than-sailing-ship-mail argument notwithstanding, I would argue that his delineation of face-to-face contact as the only "meaningful" human interaction is specious. It's the means of interacting with the longest history, but that doesn't automatically rule out the possibility that you are interacting with others meaningfully through other media. He only mentions IM, email, chat rooms, and other Internet-specific phenomena as meaningless communication tools; the telephone, television, and hell, the letter itself doesn't get mentioned in the course of his diatribe.
"So you rot in a cubicle trying to get the money to get the stuff, when you should be out walking in a meadow or wooing a lover or writing a song.... Look around. Our collective humanity is dying a little more every day. Technology is killing life on the street -- the public commons, if you please. Chat rooms, text messaging, IM are all, technically, forms of communication. But when they replace yakking over the back fence, or sitting huggermugger at the bar or simply walking with a friend -- as they have for an increasing number of people in "advanced" societies -- then meaningful human contact is lost. Ease of use is small compensation."
Here's how he's weaseled his way out of easy derailment--suddenly his argument becomes less "tech bad, jibberjabber good" and more "don't let it replace what you're used to." This isn't much more than an eleventh-hour attempt at bolstering his argument with something a little more akin to reason, but it doesn't validate his prior assertions. Technology is killing art? Not really. Technology is creating new opportunities for artists to express themselves, providing new inspiration, and allowing exploration of media that never even existed (interactive Flash experiences as art, anyone?).
The other major fallacy is that everything he cites as good is technology--it's just older technology. Writing a letter is not face-to-face interaction, but because it's been around longer, it gets the okay. Similarly, his assertion that you shouldn't be in the cubicle, you should be writing a song is ridiculous. The people interested in writing songs are doing just that, and I doubt they need your stupid gesticulations to help them out. Further, the increase in availability of powerful technology and the ease of transmission has allowed more people the opportunity to become artists and to find audiences. Garage Band, the MP3, bittorrent. All these things allow budding artists to find new influences, scout new media, and produce new works they wouldn't have, otherwise.
The reaction of the Luddite is to hate the new, because historically, the Luddites were a specific group of individuals who rioted against the industrialization of the factory they worked at. They were afraid not of technology as a whole, but of becoming obsolete in comparison. Did the lower class die because of machines? No, it's actually bigger than ever, but that's a different argument. Nowadays the only ones who are railing against the corporate-consumerist nature of enabling technology are the fools and bloggers who have the time to do so because they aren't busy working on something else. Maybe that's his point. Maybe he's an idiot, because he works for Wired, and if he really held to his convictions he wouldn't.
It's just surprising to me that an outlet like Wired would print an article so half-assed, unoriginal, and ridiculous in the first place.
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