The first thing that struck me about the readings for today was the opening paragraph to As We May Think by the editor of The Atlantic Monthly. He says “…this paper by Dr. Bush calls for a new relationship between thinking man and the sum of our knowledge”. I found this to be a nice change of pace from the other readings we have been doing which have had a tendency to focus on the negative repercussions of technology.
When the article began describing the walnut sized head camera which would record a scientists daily observations along with a Voder type machine to record his verbalized thoughts, I couldn’t help but think of the Facebook timeline. This difference here is that each individual only has limited control over what updates appear on his or her timeline. It is not just photos that you choose to post or status updates you provide, but also those submitted by others which may appear in your chronological timeline.
The Memex, with it’s linking aspect reminded me a little of tags in blog posts. Also, I am not sure how effective the trail created by the Memex would be. I read ahead a little, to the article “Is Google Making Us Stupid” by Nicholas Carr. He describes how, while researching, people may bookmark articles that seem important, but they actually rarely return to re-read these articles. This makes me wonder how useful the pathways created by a Memex would actually be. Would the Memex just end up encouraging the same kind of skimming (as opposed to reading) habits most people have today? I’m thinking yes.