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David McGavock

I Was So Right About Distraction in Now You See it: Darn it all! | HASTAC - 1 views

  • I aruge that we are always multitasking and sometimes we do it more adeptly than others and it is incumbent on us to take our own internal inventory and decide what we are doing well and what we are not. And then to ask why.
  • The point is too many new technologies at once are distracting.   So is too much life.  So is too much anything that is new, cumbersome, non-routinized. 
  • But there's been so much punditry about "multitasking," as if Twitter is the only thing that makes our life's tasks multiple.   As I've said many times, heartache (emotional overload) and hearburn (physical ailments) are far more distracting than email . . . and they make it harder to learn new technologies too.
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  • Multitasking is not a symptom of technology.   The problem is that I am having to learn everything from scratch, all the time, all at once.
  • The same, by the way, is also true when your worklife depends on technology and the technology changes.
    • David McGavock
       
      This is the most frustrating for my computer clients.
  • I say that unlearning, in fact, makes us pay attention to the world in a new way.  George Lakoff says it is useful to become "reflective about our reflexes."
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    "Blaming "the Internet" or "social media" for contemporary distraction falls into a typical pattern of one genereration blaming any new technology for supposed ills, including supposed shortcomings of the younger generation (who seem to adopt new technologies and adapt to them much more easily than do their parents).  "
David McGavock

After the Protests - NYTimes.com - 1 views

  • Protests like this one, fueled by social media and erupting into spectacular mass events, look like powerful statements of opposition against a regime
  • Yet often these huge mobilizations of citizens inexplicably wither away without the impact on policy you might expect from their scale.
  • Now movements can rush past that step, often to their own detriment.
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  • Social media can provide a huge advantage in assembling the strength in numbers that movements depend on. Those “likes” on Facebook, derided as slacktivism or clicktivism, can have long-term consequences by defining which sentiments are “normal” or “obvious” — perhaps among the most important levers of change.
  • But activists, who have made such effective use of technology to rally supporters, still need to figure out how to convert that energy into greater impact. The point isn’t just to challenge power; it’s to change it.
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    Media in the hands of citizens can rattle regimes. It makes it much harder for rulers to maintain legitimacy by controlling the public sphere. But activists, who have made such effective use of technology to rally supporters, still need to figure out how to convert that energy into greater impact. The point isn't just to challenge power; it's to change it.
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