Made to Break, Pages 1-81

In this week’s reading, Made to Break: Technology and Obsolescence in America, by Giles Slade, I found I was fascinated from the start. Slade states that America has become a throw-away society, where “deliberate obsolescence…is a uniquely American invention”. (pg. 3)  From the start Slade maps out a compelling and solid argument. Each of Slade’s statements are backed by examples in history. His example of the Egyptian and American is a sad image of our society. Slade writes, “…the ancient Egyptians built great monuments to endure for countless generations, just about everything we produce in North America is made to break”. (pg. 7) While reading the introduction to this book, I hoped the rest of the book would be as interesting. Much like previews at the movies, so many times the previews are better than the movie. In the case of this book, I was not disappointed.

This book examines the issue of "planned obsolescence" and its role in causing Americans to buy more products from companies who are not committed to quality. On the other hand, Slade points out about Henry Ford and his stubbornness in not making a less durable car. It is amazing to read about a man concerned about durability in his product. Slade then writes about Alfred Sloan who did not have Ford’s ethics. Sloan’s General Motors' 1923 introduction of annual car model, urged consumers to trade in perfectly good cars for more stylish updates, this is in direct conflict with Ford Durable Model-T.

In chapter three, the section on the “Obsolete Man” hit close to home in that today’s America suffers from joblessness. In 1932, “…a band of critics began to decry the growing trend toward the mechanized replacement of manpower”. (pg. 67) The “coin-operated vending machine” was the item criticized in 1932; today it is the computer and the Internet that the critics blame for most of America’s bad economy. I do not believe it is that simple, but the Utopian society of the Depression had some interesting doctrine.

Technocracy, a Utopian society that sprang up during the depression seemed to be on the right track. This society believed, “…the Depression required that society be restructured by engineers and economists around the principle of production for use and prosperity of the many, rather than the profit of the few”. (pg. 71) After reading about this society, again, I saw a parallel to our time as well. There is so much greed in this country and that was never truer than a few years ago, when so many banks were having problems and we learned about those few men whose greed knew no bounds.

That said, we are also to blame, because of our need for the newest and fastest toy. In many ways we were manipulated into this desire to buy more. Psychological obsolescence leads to obsessive purchasing. Both company’s advertising and consumer's love of the new have aided in a huge outbreak in both sales of new products and the mounting pile of garbage that is thrown away each year

Solo current event presentation – October 20, 2010

My discussion was on 3D is it a fad or the future? I found a lot of material on the subject; it seems to be a hot topic. The article I decided on is very informative and interesting to read. Alex Kartman wrote an article entitled, 3D Cinema - A Fad or the Future? which I found to cover both the past and the future of this technical phenomenon. The 3D experience has been around a long time, since the 1890’s and yet its heyday was in the 1950’s. Hollywood needed another cash cow because of the invention of the television. This pattern of using gimmicks to lure audiences into empty seats would be used every time attendance was down at the movies.

While 3D resurfaced in 2003, it was the opening of Avatar in 3D that skyrocket this gimmick to super big profits. Hollywood had found an answer to not only bring people back to the theater; they now could cut down on the pirating of movies on the Internet. Two problems stilled remained, those annoying glass you have to wear in order to see the movie, and 3D television will be released in the next year. If someone can perfect the concept of autostereoscopic 3D (glass-less viewing), and release to the public before the 3D televisions are released, the Hollywood will be able to hold on to their cash cow a little longer. When asked if 3D was a fad or the future, everyone in the class said it was a fad, and yet you cannot argue with the success of Jackass 3D. This movie’s opening weekend is the biggest opening in October ever, $50 million dollars! If 3D becomes less annoying and more accessible, I feel it will move to television and the computer and the Internet. While I do not feel personal films like The Hurt Locker or Up in the Air can benefit from 3D, the cartoon genre is made more exciting when shown in the 3D format.

Wikipedia part 2

In the second half of the book, The World of Wikipedia: How We Are
Editing Reality, by Andrew Dalby, I was quite surprised to find out that
it runs like one big giant blog.  Dalby starts off the second half o
his book by giving the reader reasons as to why we love Wikipedia, why
we do not trust it and lastly why we will trust it. This view of
Wikipedia is foreign to me as a reader and not a contributor. Dalby
sites time after time examples of vandalism and mistakes and how they
were handled. What I did find interesting were the reason we love and do
not trust Wikipedia. Dalby states plainly each reason and then goes on
to write, sometimes in too lengthy detail, examples of the specific
reason.
For example, the first reason we love Wikipedia is the virtual world it
has created. Jimmy Wales in an interview states, "We, the people of this
virtual world, can be shy and anonymous as we like, and yet our work,
good and bad, is listed and others can explore it." (pg. 120) We have
talked about this in class, about how small the world is now due to the
Internet, and here is a website that allows you to write a page, along
with scientists and professors. Which brings me to the fifth reason; we
are all equal in this virtual world. (pg. 136)
This reason goes along with another reason we love Wikipedia,
"...because it lets us write whatever we want." (pg. 130) Alas, with
this reason comes excessive editing, vandalism and poor research skills.
Which brings me to the reasons why trusting Wikipedia is sometimes very
difficult to do, how do we know without extensive research if there are
mistakes in the information we have found. Many users, including myself,
go to Wikipedia looking for information, not to write or edit an
article. The information is handled by a community of writers and
editors, the reader hopes the editors knows of which they speak or in this case post
on Wikipedia. What I like about Wikipedia is you can search footnotes
and sources at the bottom of the page, but I doubt many people have the
time or the desire to search all of them.
I think Wikipedia has become too large to be monitored effectively for
mistakes. The staff would have to be massive to support the searches
that need to be done to correct all the mistakes and vandalized pages.
What is in the future for this website that has become invaluable to
many? Will we have to pay a fee to use Wikipedia or is it so big now
that the mistakes to harm its popularity?

Wikipedia: Tool or Joke?

For this week's assignment, I have read the first half of the book The

World of Wikipedia: How We Are Editing Reality, by Andrew Dalby. From the first time I searched the internet, Wikipedia has been a part of my computer experience, so this book held an interest for me from the start. Dalby begins his book with a short history about early encyclopedias and how this assisted in the development of Wikipedia. He then goes into how Wikipedia is used and how it works. Dalby also goes to great lengths and examples of the open editing that has caused many false statements to appear in Wikipedia. Before reading the first half of this book, I had heard about the mistakes found on Wikipedia. That said Wikipedia has become a powerhouse of success. This is due to its location on Google and with this location; Wikipedia has become a worldwide search tool.

What I found of interest was that Wikipedia, launched in 2001, began as a project for Nupedia, a free online English-language encyclopedia project by two men, Larry Sanger and Jimmy Wales, with Sanger receiving most of the credit. As of 2009, Wikipedia has collected over three million articles and is translated into over 265 languages. That is an amazing success story. When reading this book, I also looked up on Wikipedia, on its own story. Dalby did a good job with the facts, but as a side thought, you do have to wonder, are all the facts correct? Just a thought.  (p. 39 and p. 49) (Wikipedia: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikipedia)

In chapter three, Dalby writes about many different types of Wikipedia mistakes, and he also writes about Wikipedia’s biggest enemy, Nicholas Carr. Yet, when the magazine Nature published a survey on the mistakes of both Wikipedia and Britannica, most newspapers ignored the numbers. Wikipedia turned out to have 162 errors compared to 123 errors in the Britannica. What this says to me is that the damage had already been done with all the bad press Wikipedia had received previous to this survey. (p. 56)

The partnership if Google and Wikipedia have assisted in both becoming household names. Dalby writes, “Google therefore took the conscious decision to favour Wikipedia because, though its faults are many, Wikipedia is the largest available source of serious text across all subject areas”. (p. 86) It is because of the enormous available information Wikipedia offers and the placing in the top five on Google, that is due to its success. That and the fact, yes I am guilty too, most people do not look any further for information. Yet, I feel Wikipedia is a good tool, not to be used as the only source. In researching anything, people should use four sources and see which ones have a common thread, but I must close by saying Wikipedia is a great tool!

Part 2: Technopoly

Once again, while I read the second half of Technopoly: The Surrender of Culture to Technology by Neil Postman, I was very much entertained. He is a great story teller, but I cannot say he changed my mind, although he did make me pause and think further about certain subjects. I agree with some things he wrote and but others I feel Postman over reacts. Neil Postman comments on the affects of technology on our culture ranges from I.Q. scores, statistics, polling techniques, visible television, computers, and automobiles to education and the medical field.

Postman’s comments about how technology has made doctors less competent, I do not agree with that. I do not think doctors lean too heavily on technology. Do I think doctors are more competent due to technology?  Yes I do. I think of all those people who have died and suffered because our advancements had yet to be invented. As I stated in my last blog, Postman goes for the dramatic, leaning heavily on the negative extreme. Sure technology can be used too much, but most doctors use technology as a tool, so that humans live a longer better life. (p. 100-106)

Where I do agree with Postman is the over use of words and symbols to the point where they “are stripped of their power”. (p. 166) Postman states, “…Uncle Sam, God, or Jesus is employed as an agent of the profane world for an essentially trivial purpose”. (p. 167) Like obscene (bad) language, when we hear or see something over and over, we begin to not notice it anymore. Over use of words or images weakens its impact and as human beings we need to step back and remember its importance.

Postman goes on to write, “With the erosion of symbols there follows a loss of narrative, which is one of the most debilitating consequences of Technopoly’s power”. (p. 171) This loss takes away the importance of our past, our present and definitely our future. (p. 172) Also, with the loss of images, important symbols, then life has no meaning because then we have nothing to strive or go after.

I think technology is an important part of our culture. It entertains as well as makes life easier. Of course, where there is money to be made, someone will over produce the very tool that has made life easier. It will turn this tool into something ugly, if we are not careful. Going back to the basics is not the answer. It does not work anyway, because cultures move forward, not backwards.