Reading

Before I get into what I wanted to write about I want to remind everyone that we are meeting this Thursday at six pm at the Morrison Library's conference. Everyone better show up because I am on vacation this week and I am coming in Thursday just for the meeting.

As far as that internet messing up our reading skills I do have to say that I do find that I often will print out an article if I want to give it a good reading. Especially at work. I think it's nice that the library doesn't limit our surfing. I find that surfing community blogs like Metafilter and Lifehacker and news sites like New York Times and the Charlotte Observer help me at work. You never know what is going to come at you at the reference desk and you have to be informed and know how to move around the internet.

I did find an excellent post about research habits on the internet here by Scott Karp. He is quoted in that article about the possibility of Google making us stupid. Like Nicholas Carr said in his article about research and reading on the internet we do tend to skim when we read on the internet but, as Karp points out, that is not a bad thing. I think the two styles of reading can live side by side. I skim over internet articles and I'll read some of them closely. I still sit back with a book and let it carry me away.

In some ways the internet can be like television with sites like Youtube out there that allow you to mindlessly watch videos of hillbillies jumping motorcycles over flaming barrels but there are also some pretty amazing and creative videos on Youtube. To me the internet is like any kind of media. It offers the worst and best of what humans have created. It's up to you use it wisely. There is nothing wrong with watching a guy jump a mountain bike into the side of a building but it's not what you want to do with all your time.

I don't want to leave you that. Check out this this video of Donald Hall and Alicia Ostriker. It's about what it means to write and read.