The End of Patience: Cautionary Notes on the Information Revolution - Hardcover

Shenk, David

Hardcover

ISBN 10: 0253336341 ISBN 13: 9780253336347

Publisher: Indiana University Press, 1999

Synopsis

David Shenk looks at the new face of our world with a curiosity and connection-making responsiveness that make him exhilarating to read. These are bits, takes, provisional sweeps at issues still coming into focus, but taken together they give us a startling glimpse of where we are. Shenk is so close to the present that most readers will mistake it for the future." ―SVEN BIRKERTS, author, THE GUTENBERG ELEGIES

If the world of constant, instantaenous communication makes you a little nervous from time to time, David Shenk can explain why. This book is a very useful antidote to the endless praise lavished on the new electronic mediums. Read it slowly!" ―BILL McKIBBEN, author, THE AGE OF MISSING INFORMATION

In this provocative collection of essays, David Shenk expands his enlightened skepticism to include thoughts on the dangers of online journalism, the ethical implications of digital photography, and the misguided hopes for computers in the classroom. Shock-jocks, computerized toys, Microsoft-bashing, and genetic testing are all subject to his incisive and discerning criticism.

Is Shenk just another neo-Luddite determined to bash all things digital? Hardly. This self-described technology enthusiast―and avid fan of the Internet―is simply interested in clear-eyed analysis of how machines we use actually affect our lives. As one of the founders of the Technorealism movement, he insists that new technologies must be appraised for their ability to achieve traditional human ends, rather than embraced merely for novelty's sake. The End of Patience includes vignettes from Shenk's conversations with some of the most provocative technology thinkers of our time, including Mitch Kapor, Steven Johnson, Esther Dyson, Douglas Rushkoff and Steve Silberman.

About this title

Review

"Information overload" is a simple phrase for a complex phenomenon: the overwhelming sense that modern media technologies churn out more words and images than our culture can usefully absorb. David Shenk, a technology critic with a knack for unraveling the complex, has an even simpler name for it--"data smog." That was the title of his first book, a smart, useful critique of the march of info-tech "progress" that has brought us such marvels as spam, junk mail, and 57 channels with nothing much on.

His second book, The End of Patience: Cautionary Notes on the Information Revolution, continues and expands Shenk's analysis, collecting articles and commentary he wrote for National Public Radio, The New Republic, FEED, Wired, and other high-minded venues over the last three years. Shenk's targets here vary widely: the corporatization of scientific research, the dizzying ethical choices surrounding biotechnology, and the scourge of Web sites with too many bells and whistles all get due consideration. But his central message remains the same throughout. Our technologies, he warns, are shaping us into a nation of info-hungry, data-dizzy "button smackers," risking the quality of our life and culture for the doubtful thrill of instant knowledge.

Shenk's warning is a gentle one, however, tempered by an affectionate familiarity with the media he critiques. And though this book could have used a little more winnowing (in particular, the transcribed conversations with assorted media-critic pals of Shenk's come off as little more than chummy, self-indulgent filler), in general his writing has a sure, light touch that glides past the bombast of classic technopunditry. Happily, Shenk follows his own prescriptions, cutting through the information haze rather than adding to it. --Julian Dibbell

About the Author

David Shenk is author of Data Smog: Surviving the Information Glut, which The New York Times called "an indispensable guide to the big picture of technology's cultural impact," and the Chicago Tribune called "A concise, insightful, and welcome critique of the communications world we have created."

He is also co-author of Skeleton Key, and has contributed to Wired, Harper's, The New Republic, The New York Times, Feed, Salon, and NPR's All Things Considered. He is a co-founder of Technorealism, which seeks to articulate a more balanced approach to technology.

Shenk was a 1995–96 fellow at the Freedom Forum Media Studies Center, in New York, and in 1998 traveled to Japan as a U.S.–Japan Foundation fellow.

Edition details

• Publisher: Indiana University Press
• Publication date: 1999
• ISBN 10: 0253336341
• ISBN 13: 9780253336347
• Binding: Hardcover
• Language: English
• Edition number: 1
• Number of pages: 176