Welcome to Litsy!

A little bit dated, having been written before the rise of the internet and social media, but still relevant in the discussion of how our culture has evolved (devolved?) from a print society to a visual one, where everything (religion, politics, sports, news, history) is packaged for entertainment value. 3 📺📺📺 1/2
6th book #ShutdownReadathon #Round2 @Squidget

"Truth, like time itself, is a product of a conversation man has with himself about and through the techniques of communication he has invented."

This book feels so relevant today despite having been written in 1985. A prescient look at how tv (and of course now social media) lead to disinformation, and a focus on entertainment. Central thesis is that we are living more in Brave New World than in 1984. Trump seems the culmination of these predictions. We do seem at least to be coming aware of the problems of these technologies and that is one part of the proposed solution.

Happy day after Thanksgiving. Hoping you all had a nice holiday. We enjoyed making our own thanksgiving dinner for the first time and chilling at home. Today eating breakfast pie and reading this book which still feels highly relevant even tho published in 1985.

Bailed at 22%. May just not be in the mood.

#downphoto
"When a population becomes distracted by trivia, when cultural life is redefined as a perpetual round of entertainments, when serious public conversation becomes a form of baby-talk, when, in short, a people become an audience, and their public business a vaudeville act, then a nation finds itself at risk; culture-death is a clear possibility."

A compelling take on our addiction to entertain.

How I wish I could stay away from my phone and all those mind-changing stuff. But no matter how the world shapes you, just stay true.

"We do not measure a culture by its output of undisguised trivialities but by what it claims as significant."

Yes!

Currently listening to. A good follow up after Bunk.

#nonfiction

This book is interesting to say the least! Currently half way through :)

I completely forgot to post yesterday the both my #LMPBC #GroupW and the next round for #TheCanadianTour were sent out. They should be to the recipients within 3-6 business days.

This book was another university course assignment, but I greatly enjoyed it ... as much as you can enjoy reading a book about society's impending doom, anyway. Throughout the trading experience, I felt a creeping sense of unease about the uncanny ability of Neil Postman to predict a lot of the things that happened in the 2016 American election ... back in 1985.

Making a resolution now to read Orwell, Huxley and Postman in 2017. #2017readingresolutions

http://www.salon.com/2016/12/24/what-truth-george-orwell-aldous-huxley-and-the-t...

#fictionnonfictionpairings #seasonsreadings2016 Huxley believed "we are in a race between education & disaster, and he wrote continuously about the necessity of our understanding the politics & epistemology of media. For in the end, he was trying to tell us that what afflicted the people in Brave New World was not that they were laughing instead of thinking, but that they did not know what they were laughing about & why they had stopped thinking"

Fascinating opinion piece which includes quotes from Postman's 1985 book: https://www.technologyreview.com/s/602981/social-media-is-killing-discourse-beca...

Everything in our background has prepared us to know and resist a prison when the gates begin to close around us . . . But what if there are no cries of anguish to be heard? Who is prepared to take arms against a sea of amusements? To whom do we complain, and when, and in what tone of voice, when serious discourse dissolves into giggles? What is the antidote to a culture's being drained by laughter?

Americans no longer talk to each other, they entertain each other. They do not exchange ideas, they exchange images. They do not argue with propositions; they argue with good looks, celebrities and comercials.

Hard to believe that this was written in the 1980s, before the Internet and it still strikes a powerful chord in 2016. Also the cover reminds me of Prince Robot from Saga.

"We now know OF many things, when we once knew about them." - Largely contextualizing Huxley's theories in the Age of Television, this book has some sober points about the current state of public discourse.

First time listening to an audio book. This one is intensely academic, making every mile of my commute an education. 📚🤓