The New Reading Environment

AW Admin · Sep 3, 2018

This article caught my attention this weekend. I've been doing the psychological equivalent of pacing, thinking about the piece, and whether or not to start this thread.

The New Reading Environment

I'm not quite sure how to frame this thread. There are a number of different ideas and topics raised by the article, so go read it.

The author has, as the title indicates, framed the piece as a meditation on the changes the 'net has brought and is bringing to the social contracts between writers and their readers.

Here are some things that caught my eye:

The first decade of the 21st century was a transitional one in terms of reader-writer relations, its habits now as foreign as those of Edward R. Murrow’s America. Gone are the happy days when we dialed up to submit a comment to Salon.com, only to be abused by Glenn Greenwald or destroyed — respectfully — by the academics at Crooked Timber. Back then, we could not have imagined feeling nostalgic for the blogosphere, a term we mocked for years until we found it charming and utopian. Blogs felt like gatherings of the like-minded, or at least the not completely random. Even those who stridently disagreed shared some basic premises and context — why else would they be spending time in the comments section of a blog that looked like 1996? Today’s internet, by contrast, is arbitrary and charmless. On social media, criticism once confined to the comments now comes as free-range abuse directed at other readers. Readers can address all parties instantaneously — writers, editors, publishers, and the world. And so writers who publish online peer into the fishbowl of readerly reception. Drop in some flakes and watch the fish swarm.

And later:

Instead the new style is simultaneously careful and strident, low-key and declarative. Articles are luridly headlined and. Extravagantly. Punctuated. Arguments sit right at the top, just like we were taught to do in high school — except now the enemy is not lack of clarity, it’s impatience. Axios, whose name is a cross between a defense contractor and an aggressive men’s deodorant, has dispensed with everything but theses and bullet points. Transparency about readership has led, in turn, to formal transparency, an internet house style that conceals nothing but delivers no pleasures. Agreeing with something has never felt less gratifying.

What do you think? What catches your eye?

I'm honestly not sure how to take the writer's tone, rhetorically.

Kjbartolotta · Sep 3, 2018

Perhaps not the overall point of the article, but a paragraph that struck me (among many others):

When questioned about their motives, the editors responsible for all this irresponsible writing rarely answer. They say only that they are acting in good faith: furthering the dialogue, expanding the conversation, exposing their readers to new ideas, inviting everyone to the table. “We give people an honest struggle, an open debate from a lot of different points of view and show that you can do that kind of work respectfully,” Bennet told Politico in April. What must it feel like, we wonder, to carefully slather such oleaginous smarminess over statements that you cannot possibly believe?

I'ma gonna get OLEAGINOUS SMARMINESS tattooed on my knuckles now. The 'good faith' argument some editors like Bennet use to defend what opinions they choose to publish almost feels absurdist and nihilistic to me, a deliberate contortion of that concept to mean exactly the opposite of what it means. Oftentimes, seems more about allegedly serious people platforming ridiculous and generally unpopular ideas with an eye to generating clicks among a certain subset of the population.

blacbird · Sep 3, 2018

This strikes me also, for no specific reason I can cite just now, as feathering into the current "post-truth" environment we live in. There's a large blur over the public's vision of "fact" and "opinion", where the two are not recognized as separate by so many people. And that is clearly being exploited by many "pundits" and bloggers. The point about about clarity and impatience is part of it, methinks.

caw

Cobalt Jade · Sep 3, 2018

Hmmm... I really don't get what point the article is trying to make, and I read it twice. The tone of it seems snide and contemptuous of the common reader of news and opinions and it rubbed me the wrong way, even though I'm familiar with it... it's very NYC cocktail-swilling urban intellectual, if that makes sense. (I grew up reading The New York Times.)

I do agree though that news on the internet is like a giant faucet turned on full blast where there's little to distinguish one drop of water from another, because the gatekeepers have all been democraticized.

On the other hand, when there were gatekeepers in the form of the big newspapers and media networks, they had as much intention to push certain agendas as bloggers and podcasters do these days. The difference is there are way more of the former these days and they are not as permanent... and in fact they are mere drops of water themselves.

Kjbartolotta · Sep 3, 2018

I suppose it's fair to say the author of the article is founding some of their assumptions on the myth of a purported golden age of journalism...which was the blogosphere in the 90s/00s, apparently. Hmm. For good or for ill, I realize I'm developing a blind spot to contrarianism.

frimble3 · Sep 3, 2018

I think the 'problem' is the ease of response, and the lack of curating.
Back in ye olden days, you had to get pen (or crayon) and paper, and find an envelope and a stamp, and ... oh, by then most people had wandered off.
And, newspapers and magazines have only so much room. Sure, some semi-literate loons were let in, but only to show how 'open' the papers were. Most people knew that you'd have to put some work into a letter, particularly if you were going for a large or popular paper.

Now, without a thought, at the press of a key, anyone, drunk, sober or certifiable, can leave any comment they want, about anything, in relative anonymity.

This does not make for well-reasoned and polite discourse.

If there was a rule that only one comment per POV was allowed, until the other side had also commented, I'll bet most of the 'fun' would be swiftly ended. But that would take moderators, and time, and reduce the glorious gaining of clicks.

Roxxsmom · Sep 4, 2018

Cobalt Jade said:
I do agree though that news on the internet is like a giant faucet turned on full blast where there's little to distinguish one drop of water from another, because the gatekeepers have all been democraticized..

This is an interesting point. I've certainly noticed, when researching a topic--whether it be something biological to discuss with my students, or something related to politics--that I find a bunch of very homogeneous articles with slightly different paint jobs. I have to dig more deeply to find articles that aren't just recycling something someone else already said on the topic. These aren't necessarily articles that are strongly biased or fake news, but there's a bland homogeneity.

When it comes to articles, blogs etc. about more charged issues, I have my preferred sources. But it's certainly easy to find plenty of uninformed and outright fallacious information out there. Years and years ago, I warned my students that blogs and websites aren't generally great sources, because anyone can post on the internet.

This is even more true now that it is then. And with even legitimate experts and sources taking a rather casual approach to indicating their credentials and to naming their sources, it can be really hard to tell who's talking out of their proverbial ass, unless the reader has some expertise in the subject themselves.

Chris P · Sep 4, 2018

Thanks for posting that article! Lots to think about.

The very first part of the article saying that editors (and writers) know more about readers than ever before I think sets the stage for the entire dynamic described by the article. Readers too know more about writers than they ever have, and as frimble points out the ease of access and interaction allows an idea to catch on, even if it's a misinteretation of the author's words. I wish I knew more about mob mentality and mob psychology; I'll bet it could describe a lot of what we see. I don't think today's readers are any more likely than before to mis-read an idea, but today it's possible for a misread idea to go viral and take on a life of its own. I agree too that blogs have turned everything into an op-ed. It seems like the facts matter less now than how people feel about the facts. I get really tired of reading "news" articles in which half the word count is how unknown people have responded on Twitter.

Ari Meermans · Sep 4, 2018

All of this and a change in our reading habits, I think. Just in my lifetime, I can see a difference in how people read. Before, reading was a solitary occupation. There was time to read in more depth and to ponder and make sure we understood. When we discussed we did so after all this mental activity had taken place. Today, information comes fast and in small 280-character bits and pieces and in blog posts. People learn to skim and draw conclusions from less information. Often erroneous conclusions, but conclusions all the same. We can see that conditioning here sometimes when someone's post is misread.

But we're addicted to information and the speed of response and I wonder sometimes that our heads don't explode from the sheer volume.

R.A. Lundberg · Sep 5, 2018

That article was a slog to get through. The style is a bit (perhaps more than a bit) rambling. I read a lot and the overall point of that article escapes me. I can't decide if the author is decrying the current reading style, celebrating it, or simply engaging in a rambling state-of-the-thing examination. I think...I think it's the latter. Maybe. And maybe that's the point?
It's hard to argue that there's a large amount of outright crap posted on the net, left, right, center, and a lot of it gets circulated, recycled, folded, spindled, mutilated, fluff dryed, spun, and downright plagiarized. That's always happened, it's just much, much faster. It's like drinking from a firehose.

BenPanced · Sep 5, 2018

Ari Meermans said:
All of this and a change in our reading habits, I think. Just in my lifetime, I can see a difference in how people read. Before, reading was a solitary occupation. There was time to read in more depth and to ponder and make sure we understood. When we discussed we did so after all this mental activity had taken place. Today, information comes fast and in small 280-character bits and pieces and in blog posts. People learn to skim and draw conclusions from less information. Often erroneous conclusions, but conclusions all the same. We can see that conditioning here sometimes when someone's post is misread.

But we're addicted to information and the speed of response and I wonder sometimes that our heads don't explode from the sheer volume.

This. I remember when I first got involved with fanzines and APAs, you had to wait four to eight weeks for a response, if any, since you relied on a set publication schedule to get your work to readers and get back any comments (even when the publication was local and you attended assembly/collation parties and you picked up your copy of the zine, you still had to wait for the next issue to be produced). I don't even know if they even still have a place in today's sf/f fandom due to the speed of teh intarwebz; rather than having to share the spotlight with others, you can set up shop on your own, as before, and services such as Wordpress or Blogger give you a platform that you can have as simple or tracked-out as you need or want. Now, when you post something on Monday, you can respond as soon as later that same day.

The New Reading Environment

AW Admin

Kjbartolotta

Potentially has/is dog

blacbird

Cobalt Jade

Kjbartolotta

Potentially has/is dog

frimble3

Heckuva good sport

Roxxsmom

Beastly Fido

Chris P

Likes metaphors mixed, not stirred

Ari Meermans

MacAllister's Official Minion & Greeter

R.A. Lundberg

BenPanced

THE BLUEBERRY QUEEN OF HADES (he/him)