Media convergence – back to reading? December 27, 2009
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We can now watch Fareed Zakaria’s GPS show online. Oh, we did cancel our cable TV and switched to a wireless (WiMax) Internet connection about four months ago. Yet, we’re getting even more entertainment than in the past – we just use our new netbook to hook up to our new flatscreen, HDTV set and we stream Netflix and other shows through Boxee and through web sites directly (like GPS). In general, working in the communications field now for technology companies that are part of the wireless and TV convergence technologies, I’ve been acutely aware of how audiences continue to splinter and more people get their entertainment on demand, online, on mobile, on DVRs, etc. Same trend is true for news (like GPS). Does this mean that Al Gore’s hypothesis that the Internet is the best new news outlet (because of if its interactive nature) will be increasingly in vogue or even a permanent trend?
More reading! Yay! 
Indeed, the Internet is a new TV and video medium, but it is still primarily a print outlet – blogging and online news sources being predominant yet (even social networks like Facebook and Twitter are predominantly text-based). However, the Internet yields short stories – like newspapers before it, it obeys by the laws of short text to keep the attention; even though indefinite amounts of text can fit onto a web page, usually articles in NYTimes.com and such outlets are split into several screens with a “next” page so as to look more manageable (vs. newspaper columns trick). All this may also mean that magazines will probably be the last print (or electronic reading device issues – like Kindle) to disappear into the video and instant medium abyss. Just like people will always read books, there is something compelling about long-form news/in-depth articles. The problem there will be finding a valid and sustainable business model to keep paying for it all.
Non-fiction summer reading July 8, 2008
Posted by midnightzimadreams in Education, Life, Reading, Superfluous musings.add a comment
I doubt I’ll get to these myself, but I heard interviews about them on NPR at lunchtime today and picked up a couple of interesting morsels, so I’d recommend at least exploring them:
I also heard an interesting story on the housing market in Bulgaria on NPR’s Day to Day show. Listen here.
Instant news May 26, 2008
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Both in high school and college I had teachers and professors (one at each level of education) who were obsessed with current events. We had to follow the news and take pop quizzes every class period on what’s in the news at that time. It was great. I actually acquired my news skimming, CNN watching, NYTimes reading, Economist subscribing and NPR listening habits just from exercises like that. And somewhat from my journalism professors whose habits rubbed off on me (the NPR bit from a prof who listened to it in her car on our way to an FCC hearing as extra credit; The Economist from actually some Political Science junkies at the international studies program office in Germany where I was studying abroad and taking POLS classes).
It’s funny because now I actually listen to NPR’s “Wait Wait, Don’t Tell Me” show during my workouts and laugh at all the gags on the week’s news they come up with. It’s especially entertaining because there’s rarely a newsworthy nugget that I’ve missed and learn from the show itself. I love it! I’m really glad that these habits were instilled in me and I must say I am a tad surprised at how familiar I am with the news when I really do wish I read more of The Economist, and read more news in general, diversifying my sources. Must be doing a-OK. Although, I also feel like a lot of people, especially young people, get so much more news (and different stuff, not just what’s in the mainstream (even if they’re the good ones, my sources are still “mainstream”) and different interpretations of it from the Internet that I inevitably feel left out, breathing in the dust as everyone else speeds off on RSS feeds, news forums, blogs (aka the new-age pundits galore), podcasts (OK, I do listen to a couple – literally – of these), video logs, You Tube commentary, specialized news aggregation web sites, e-ncyclopedias, etc. etc. etc.
Of books and authors April 13, 2008
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Just finished “Their eyes were watching God.” A moving, deep novel. Wonderful writer. There was an afterword in academic-speak and an author’s chronological bio and several more essays on the novel itself, etc. I love it. It has been a long time since I have a read a short-to-mid-length novel that grabbed me and sucked me in for a quick read. It has been even longer since I’ve read a literature analysis or academic text based on a fiction piece. There were times when I would get hooked on a novelist and read everything he or she had written (or at least the books and short stories, not too much into the non-fiction they may have authored or any poems, though there are some wonderful poems for reading – poetry’s just not my top literary flavor of choice). I miss reading like that and I somehow doubt I’ll read any more of Zora’s books – at least not right away, not with the insatiable thirst I would read all of Hemingway or Charlotte Brontë or Alexandre Dumas. In a way this is a good change of pace, though, because it means I have a slew of interests in books (reading a non-fiction contemporary book right now and meeting one of the co-authors of it this week at a tech conference; have my eye on a few biographies and more fiction from all over the world and time). Someone was astounded last weekend/early last week that my vocabulary is in poor shape (fearing it in GRE context) when I “read so much” – yeah, well, I haven’t really been a consistent reader in my life. Reading in spurts, often in the summers. Definitely reading more when I was younger. Writing a lot more back then as well – short stories, an attempt at a novel (the sequel to “Uncle Tom’s Cabin” of all things), and even lots of poems. But it feels good to be picking up some speed again. Definitely.
Back in love with reading March 24, 2008
Posted by midnightzimadreams in Life, Reading, Superfluous musings.1 comment so far
I think I must have been in love with reading when I was younger. My early-years memory is always fuzzy, but I know I like to read, just never have the patience for it lately (read: the last 10 years+). But lately, probably thanks to Nate, I have been reading more. He got me over the type-A craziness of always only reading one book at a time and that seemed to unleash an enjoyment in books like I haven’t experienced in a long while. Now I have my lunch time book – I always feel crankier if I don’t get my early afternoon lunch & book fix. I also have my evening book and have a few more started that are waiting their turn. It feel GREAT to be picking a new book so often. It’s hard to pick, but it feels great that I’ve just finished a great one and am trying to decide what to follow it with that will be just as good without overshadowing or less thrilling but going into a different genre. Heh, I made myself sound like a bookworm. I’m no Rory Gilmore, but reading two+ books at a time and finishing one or two per month is a real breakthrough for the me of late years. It’s very pleasant to spend a Saturday and a good deal of Sunday reading at cafes and restaurants and browsing bookstores, walking around with a painfully narrowed selection, only to dismiss all books with the pretext that I’ve got a ton at home I have yet to plow through – and actually be reading those ones at home!
An added bonus is that reading more is one of my resolutions this year. I’ve been doing a-OK on most of them. – also a breakthrough, so don’t think I’m tooting my horn, just trying to be happy for myself 
Oh, yes, it’s also making me very happy that I’ve got so many friends who are engaged and it’s wonderful to be happy for them all! Though I do need to get better at this bridesmaid thing.
