9/29/2015

It makes you think! (or does it?)


The Internet threatens final confirmation of Adorno and Horkheimer’s dictum that the culture industry allows the “freedom to choose what is always the same.”

http://www.newyorker.com/magazine/2014/09/15/naysayers


 I may be turning into a grumpy old man, but sometimes I think all the cool gadgets (I admit I like gadgets) are ultimately not that special.

For instance, the more recent hype about the new iPhone. I mean I know it is more modern, has more stuff...but in a fundamental way it is still like my old Blackberry. Or even an older cell phone.

In fact the whole mobile gadget universe is from a human behavior level the same, in that the whole point is to make you NOT look around at the world you are actually living in. Instead, head bowed as in prayer, look not to the left or right or within yourself. But peer through this portable looking glass.

A twist on the Socratic dictum is "Distract Thyself"

. . . . . . . . . .

Oh for the days we it was cool to be able to quote from Freudian Marxists. 

2 comments:

bloftin2 said...

There's a part of me that really wants to dump all this electronic bullshit completely. The 3 days I spent camping at a skatepark in Germany, with no phone, no internet, and no TV, was pure bliss. I was relaxed.

ZeppoManx said...

Yeah, I can't help myself from being obsessed with some goofy project that usually involves some digital aspect.

But if I am ever able to retire I kind of want to chuck it all am do crummy but heartfelt watercolors in the country all day long.