Of Relevance

Now that we have all this “extra” information sources, do we know more than before?
The short answer? No.

According to “What Americans Know 1989-2007” :

a new nationwide survey finds that the coaxial and digital revolutions and attendant changes in news audience behaviors have had little impact on how much Americans know about national and international affairs.

On average, today’s citizens are about as able to name their leaders, and are about as aware of major news events, as was the public nearly 20 years ago.

Other interesting statistics? (remember, this is a US study done for and of Americans):

- 5% LESS Americans can name their vice-president today than could in 1989 (but, to be fair, Quale was far more entertaining – a position now stolen by Bush)
- 11% LESS American can name the Russian leader now than could in 1989
- More than 93% of those surveyed could identify Arnold Schwarzenegger as the California governor
- Men, on average, knew more than women, all other factors being equal

Luckily, for those of us who are information addicts, the study also shows that those who do read or follow the news, are indeed likely to know more. So in (very) short, the bulging sources of information simply feed those who followed the news, international affairs etc already, but do little to encourage those who couldn’t be bothered to read a paper.

If you want to test how much you know, take the quiz here.
Thanks to ePluribus media for drawing my attention to the study.

I came across this interesting sidebit in an old issue of The New Yorker (Oct16, 2006), written by Nick Paumgarten.

He talks about Yossi Vardi, an Israelite living in the US, who helped found ICQ. During a talk he presented at a Gadgetoff (an annual gathering devoted to “bringing the smart and the useless together”), he promised to show how you can transfer data faster with snails than with broadband.

“He compared various data-transfer systems: ISDN, ADSL, Wi-Fly (that is, pigeons). Then he showed a slide of a snail hitched to a tiny chariot with DVDs for wheels. If each disk contains 4.7 gigabytes of data, and if the snail (chasing a scrap of lettuce) travels at 0.000023 metres per second, the snail-system performance rate is over thirty-seven megabits per second. That blows ADSL out of the water.”

Of course, he acknowledges that the technology is not perfect. Specifically in France,

“culinary habits may pose a denial-of-service problem”

Came across this on the Slashdot blog:

Recently, our school board made the decision to block Wikipedia from our school district’s ….The reason given was that Wikipedia (being user created and edited) did not represent a credible or reliable source of information for schools. Should we block sites such as Wikipedia because students may be exposed to misinformation, or should we encourage sites such as Wikipedia as an outlet for students to investigate and determine the validity of the information?”

When considering this from the perspective of only the two questions asked by the blogger, does it not seem obvious that accessing Wikipedia should almost be a requirement? Becasue it is essential, in this information age, to quickly be able to differentiate fact from fiction. And yes, that means not taking what is read/quoted/posted as fact, but rather as an opinion that needs to be independently substantiated. Otherwise, as a commentator on the above blog points out, we have the disastrous possibilty that people might start to take The Onion seriously.

Mental arithmetic versus the calculator is an apt analogy. We were taught at school that prior to entering any numbers on the calculator, we should at least have some idea of what the final answer will be, so that we can discriminate whether the answer the calculator gives us is likely correct, or an error (as a result of wrong key input). Spreadsheet / Excell formulas are also a good example!

The point is, that while we should welcome and embrace the depth of information and technology available, we should never lose our power of reasoned, logical critique. And as the “new generation” is being schooled, this should be strongly inforced. I often hear parents lamenting that their kids cannot spell because Word does it for them. Let us at least not forget to teach them how to think for themselves.

And anyway, has it not been proven that overall, Wikipedia is about as incorrect as the Britannica?

Is the blogging phenomenon a well disguised pyramid scheme? It seems that everyone who reads blogs, also feels compelled to write some.

It certainly happened to me.

I have been thoroughly exploring the South African blog scene for about two weeks now (ever since this month’s inspiring First Tuesday meeting, actually) and have now decided to dive in myself. So hello, world.

Suddenly I realized that there is a lot I want to say. So in a moment of insanity, I set up three blogs (although only this one actually has any posts for now!).

But whilst reading the blogs I was struck by their general high quality, frequency and depth of information presented. There has been much talk lately about the ridicoulous low fees that freelance writers are paid for their work in South Africa, and here it seems that writers are scrambling over themselves to offer this service for free.

I can only explain that by using Mike Stopforth’s quote from the First Tuesday meeting: that all bloggers have egos. And apparently, knowing that people are reading and responding to your thoughts is a great ego boost. And it might well be. But it is also a boost for the audience. As readers, we now have the opportunity to choose exactly what (whom) we read, at what frequency and we can even comment, if moved to do so. And then, of course, the loop closes, when the audience also begins to blog.

Is it a pyramid scheme, where the number of blogs will outgrow the available audience? Not if I am a common example. Although I aspire to write (only) three blogs, I already subscribe to over fifty.

So keep on writing!

Hmmm. A blank page. Daunting.

Need an ice breaker.

Hey! Anyone watching Idols? Oh.

Speaking of music, here is a nice tounge-in-cheek post about the high quality of lyrics, as suggested by Seth’s Blog. Makes me think of that old quote about nobody going bankrupt by underestimating the intelligence of the masses, or something to that effect.