

From Thinkers to Clickers - tjr
http://www.acm.org/ubiquity/views/m_thirunarayanan_8.html

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ajscherer
I don't think the author did a very good job of making the case that people
are thinking less due to the web. "Sometimes you need to get a second book on
a subject and that gives you time to think" is not a satisfactory substitute
for actually measuring how much thinking people using books versus the web to
acquire knowledge do.

I also think the focus on clicking is a little bit misplaced. A similar
argument would be that listening to a lecture is better than reading a book
because a reader spends all her time turning pages.

I feel like this is a really interesting topic that isn't addressed very well
by this article.

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joel_liu
The web provides more "thinking food" although it is distraction sometimes.

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TrevorJ
"The simple printed book is much more conducive to promoting thinking than the
sophisticated Web. If a book does not provide all the information that one
needs, some of the information has to be deduced and some of it has to be
imagined."

Not everyone will agree with this, but that point really resonated with me.

Worth the read. I found myself feeling a bit convicted. I may stop by the
library later tonight and pick up a book.

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roc
I'd rather spend my deduction and imagination time on problem solving than
information gathering.

Or to be more specific: I'd rather spend my deduction and imagination time
_engaged with my peers_ on solving problems, than sitting in quiet
contemplation of information that I do not have convenient access to.

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gambling8nt
Why is your "deduction and imagination" time a fixed quantity? The thrust of
the argument in favor of learning through books rather than the internet is
that you will spend an equal amount of external problem solving time, but more
internal problem solving time as part of the information gathering process.

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roc
Because all my time is a fixed quantity? I'd like to live forever; I just
don't think it's going to work out. ;)

And I don't see any reason to prefer internal problem solving to external
problem solving. If anything, I would lean toward external problem solving, as
I believe very strongly that interacting with my peers has made me far better
at it.

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anigbrowl
_Clicking: The Repetitive Task of the Cyber Age_

There is a good point in this paragraph: in an attention/information economy,
the act of selection has both a primary and secondary economic value. The
primary economic value is satisfying the consumer's desire for information,
the secondary is satisfying the information-providers desire for information
about the consumer. Although the secondary economic value of a single click is
almost infinitesimal, the number of collectors is relatively small.

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bowman
I think the internet has created a problem due the the sheer amount of
information we can reach. I disagree with the author though and think we are
just experiencing "teething" problems while humans get used to the internet.
Any new technology requires time to adjust.

I'm excited at what will happen when computer technology seizes to be 'new'
and becomes a stable medium. If you disagree with this ever happening consider
the lack of major change in desktop OS's in the last 5 years.

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socratees
I wish to disagree on some of the views put forth by the author. I've
certainly learnt a lot just using the internet ( ex. learning a new
programming language.) I even bought a couple of books which were helpful to
me, but not as useful as the web. There needs to be focus no matter whether
you read a read or you browse. Clicking != stupidity as long as you know what
you want.

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dgallagher
You make a good point. If you wisely use your time on any medium (Internet,
Books, Newspapers, TV, Radio, Lectures, whatever), you can learn a lot of
meaningful information. Kudos to you for doing it! :)

If you don't use your time efficiently, however, you can end up in an endless
purgatory zone of just, say, "clicking around the internet".

I think it comes down to the individual, if you're able to "focus" effectively
on the task at hand or not. I read a blog posting a while back that argued
that focus is a competitive advantage in today's world as so few seem to do it
well (must check my email every 5 minutes, gah!!! ;). Switching focus rapidly
throws your mind out of the zone and arguably makes you less productive (there
have been some pop-science study's of late that have backed this up).

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mgenzel
I think the Internet has and will continue to have profound effect on how we
interact with the information, and most likely, on our cognitive processes as
well. It is unclear, however, whether the overall change is progress-positive,
progress-negative, or progress-neutral. Also it is unclear what can be done to
prevent the change: the genie is out of the bottle at this point.

