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But first, a caveat: there are exceptions to every generalization I am about to make.

irresolvable paradox that, without writing, we would not have Plato's staging of this discussion nor any record at all of Socrates' encounter with Phaedrus or of the Socratic method, nor indeed would there have been an Athens, as such, to remember.

Plato’s struggle with the relatively new technology of writing

This does not mean that the skill of the writer is diminished only that it has changed.

Great writers have always written with their purpose and audience in mind.

Back in 1999, when there were still a few people muttering that the Internet was “just a fad”, the science fiction writer and visionary Douglas Adams wrote an article expressing amusement at the way the mainstream media considered the Internet something odd, and slightly sinister: …you would think we would learn the way these things work, which is this: 1) Everything that’s already in the world when you’re born is just normal; 2) Anything that gets invented between then and before you turn thirty is incredibly exciting and creative and with any luck you can make a career out of it; 3) Anything that gets invented after you’re thirty is against the natural order of things and the beginning of the end of civilisation as we know it until it’s been around for about ten years when it gradually turns out to be alright really. (Adams, 1999)