Related to that, one of my "followers" on Twitter posted this little blurb about automating authorship.
There is no doubt, though, the book — or at least the physical artifact we know as “book” — is in something of a crisis. Not too long ago, I heard Ken Wark, a Professor of Culture and Media at The New School’s Eugene Lang College, remark that the professor is now really a “DJ,” as books are no longer assigned to students; rather, collections of essays are gathered up in readers, or, increasingly, just pointed to on the web. What was “the book” is now a mashup. It’s significant that the academy no longer views the book as the center of learning.Are our syllabuses degenerating into patch-writing? So, all you teachers are to blame!
What would happen if your students wrote a program to write their papers?
I don't even want to bring up copyright.
3 comments:
People have been saying things like "the book is in a state of crisis" or "books are dead" since the advent of the internet. As someone who works in the world of books, I can tell you that they ain't going anywhere.
I hope I didn't give the impression that I think, or I'm advocating, that "books are dead."
Hardly. The experience of reading a book, the tactility of it (dog-earing the pages, flipping through, the smell of a book...) is way too enjoyable.
Irreplaceable, even.
But I do think both Ken Wark's statement, as well as the potential for computers to do "writing" for us, at least raises questions. It's problematic enough that saying "books ain't going anywhere" is really missing some very real things that are happening today.
No, I wasn't suggesting that the suggestion was yours, merely responding to the quote. I agree that it's problematic, but I'm much more interested in the relationship between traditional print and electronic media.
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