Saturday, November 12, 2011

Another Book Review (of a different sort)

Unlike Vita, I have no qualms about blogging about books I've had to read for school. Because of the all-consuming nature of the public school system, as of right now I haven't been reading for pleasure much. Less than I want to, at least. Remember I talked about reviewing this book I hated, about THE YOUTH and THE INTERNET?* The time is now, grab your popcorn.

That book is Born Digital, by John Palfrey and Urs Gasser. I picked it because I thought the cover was clever, which is something I deeply regret now. Basically, it's 375 pages of trying to define, analyze, and condemn internet culture and all us young whippersnappers who are so infatuated with it. It's a book for the lonely, confused, elderly masses. Those who have had zero exposure to technology in the past 25 years, and/or who have no contact with anyone born after 1985, who could have explained the entire premise of BD in five minutes and a few example Google searches.

Maybe it's just my problem with nonfiction in general--I literally had to force myself to read it, it was so goddamn dry and dull*--or maybe I'm just biased because I'm a Digital Native.***

The best comparison I can up with for this is March of the Penguins. I'm assuming you've seen it. It's cute and well-intentioned, but it boils down to many, many minutes of "The penguins are walking. It is cold." This gets tedious and repetitive very quickly. There are occasional tidbits--where the penguins all merrily slide on the ice or get chased by a badass seal--that make the audience sit up and pay attention, or chuckle slightly. But then it's back to the penguins standing around in the snow.

I lied, I can think of another comparison: it's like reading a book on skydiving. You can read about it all you want, you might think you've perfected your skydiving technique based solely on the knowledge you've obtained from this large, academic book, but after all that it would probably serve you better to just go skydiving for yourself. There are some things, some experiences, that books cannot hope to capture.

I mean, it does its job, giving a nice primer on all things internetty and what we're doing with it--good and bad, pedophilic and political--but it's just not interesting. But it tries so hard. I just kind of want to pat these two fifty year old men on the head. Again, feel free to cite my position as a snobby, young digitally literate person for whom next-to-none of the information provided was new or helpful or relevant as the reason I find this so unappealing, but that's what I thought about it.

* I'm actually writing this blog-review as a means of procrastination from the assigned review I'm going to have to turn in for a grade. THE INTERNET HAS CORRUPTED ME BEYOND REPAIR IT'S GIVEN ME A SHORTENED ATTENTION SPAN OH BLOODY NO. (*end sarcastic rant*) In all seriousness, at a point I had to stop caring so much about why I disliked this book, and treat it as An Exercise In Plodding Through Walls of Boring Text, training me for whatever godforsaken tests I'll be subjected to in the near future/The Actual Future Where I Will Have A Job That Involves Reading Things.

** Not all nonfiction has to be like this, that's not what I'm saying. But well-written, captivating nonfiction, I gather, is hard to write and more based on the particular reader's subject of interest than anything.

*** If you're one for drinking games, (though I hope you aren't, really) take a shot every time you read the words "those born digital", "Digital Natives" or "young Americans". You will be in the hospital halfway through the second chapter. Learn some synonyms, guys.

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