"Print is a dead medium".
I read that on a blog somewhere.
How am I, a humble man who knows little of anything, but has a firm, almost powerful grasp of the alphabet and its associated language; all of the little phricatives and fonemes hiding between the pages, and poetry that has us moving our tongues as if in some delightfully well-orchestrated dance, suited for anything other than writing? Ah, I know that I swapped the "ph" and "f" just now, but who cares? The butchery of language by txt-speak has long since begun, though it has not yet ended.
Men in the Heian period have written "the young these days, they do not know how to speak properly", and I suppose that must be correct throughout the generations and generations of men and women born into the world, their speech altered by culture and tainted with convenience; the english that I grew up with and decided, in all seriousness, to devote my life to penning with neat handwriting (my handwriting is anything but neat), or what life remains in these toxic bones, is now something different and alien where people say "s wut ru uptu 2dy?" and I'm supposed to understand them.
It's a different language, I suppose: the division of words into their component sounds, which are then created with various letters to sound correct? But we've already done that by assigning a series of sounds; a particular set of sounds that are interesting and clever and full of interesting information that I should probably be able to list in this entry... so, why do it again? Convenience? I can't understand it and I speak the bloody language, or thought I did...
Does any of this have something to do with the youth of today being largely illiterate? I doubt they're illiterate at all! Not one. They can likely all speak, and as texting has largely replaced telephhone conversation as a thing, well, I'd imagine they'd find some way to communicate with others.
Maybe they just see the dictionary of 'correct English' (not that there is one but let's pretend there was for you all know what I mean) as some sort of archaic and draconian collection of mundane linguistic platitudes created with rules that were meant to be bent until their shape became almost unrecognisable in many cases, or simply broken, all decided long ago (decades, if you can fathom it) by old men with beards, and so it must be avoided in order to rebel and be cool?
But, it WASN'T decided by men with beards; there were WOMEN doing some of the deciding, too! It would be an insult to my character for anyone to even suggest that I'd ever consider that, by their very nature, the possibility of a woman growing a thick, sexy beard could be impossible: I am not a sexist and thus there were many men and women whose ability to accumulate large clumps of thick and fearsome facial hair, heretofore unimaginable in nature of curliness, colour and length was legendary and still is, and there and then they decided the rules of language... possibly, I hope, whilst wearing black hooded capes and with a blood sacrifice.
I do like "proper" English, though. There's a word for the dialect and I just can't recall it at this point in time: today's one of those days where I've forgotten everything. I also like the fact that language diversifies over time when left in different environments, such as in the cases of Australia, England, America, and other countries whose populations might not regularly frequent the English-speaking world of England, and so they make up their own rules by consensus, adding some, deleting others, and it's pleasant to even see various dialects being employed, though there's always the moment where one has to alter their dialect to suit the 'class' of the person you're sharing a dialogue with, which is what I've seen many man shamelessly do, as if speaking in a normal, middle-class dialect is offensive..!
But anyway, books are dead.
We have machines that can now store millions of them, or rather, their contents, and read every word aloud into our ears, so that we need never look either at their ancient and dusty pages, stored for millenia and wondered over and enjoyed, nor the headache-inducing and sleek, shiny screens that these devices come with.
Anyway, what should I do now that my profession is in danger? Flee?
I just have to change things a little: presenting things in eBook form is potentially far better for me. No agents or publishers getting in my way, nobody telling me that they'd rather I changed something to something else, and I can write whatever I want, regardless of popular opinions or what Dan Brown's got on the shelves these days - if Tom Hanks refuses the film's script, Nicholas Cage will pick it up! - and so now I can appeal to a larger audience without having to pay a penny, I can give people a taste without them needing to pick anything up: just a click!
And who can resist a click for something free and interesting? The Nigerian Viagra salesmen with the trick to looking 30 years younger using a secret household recipe in just 6 weeks can't be wrong if they're still playing that game today; the same game from 20 years ago...
So, with the antique writing desk and various writing utensils I've acquired, surrounded (and leaning on) other books, some masterpieces and some trash, I'll try to make my mark somewhere in the middle: clever trash, or a trashy masterpiece, which will keep everyone happy, especially since I'll then be able to make printed copies available. But, unfortunately, everyone's having this brainwave and doing things the same way. Soon someone will come up with something so incredible and simple that I'll cover my face with my hand, just like Picard, and sigh and wonder why I wasn't willing to squeeze a few more moments of thought out of my mind onto the subject of sales. But, still, it's not that much of a problem...
So, the language is toast, but that's what everyone's been saying since language began.
Books are out, though they'll always be dear to many...
And writing is still a potential profession, though 100 years ago far fewer people could do it.
I should celebrate illiteracy statistics; it means less competition in the years to come!
I read that on a blog somewhere.
How am I, a humble man who knows little of anything, but has a firm, almost powerful grasp of the alphabet and its associated language; all of the little phricatives and fonemes hiding between the pages, and poetry that has us moving our tongues as if in some delightfully well-orchestrated dance, suited for anything other than writing? Ah, I know that I swapped the "ph" and "f" just now, but who cares? The butchery of language by txt-speak has long since begun, though it has not yet ended.
Men in the Heian period have written "the young these days, they do not know how to speak properly", and I suppose that must be correct throughout the generations and generations of men and women born into the world, their speech altered by culture and tainted with convenience; the english that I grew up with and decided, in all seriousness, to devote my life to penning with neat handwriting (my handwriting is anything but neat), or what life remains in these toxic bones, is now something different and alien where people say "s wut ru uptu 2dy?" and I'm supposed to understand them.
It's a different language, I suppose: the division of words into their component sounds, which are then created with various letters to sound correct? But we've already done that by assigning a series of sounds; a particular set of sounds that are interesting and clever and full of interesting information that I should probably be able to list in this entry... so, why do it again? Convenience? I can't understand it and I speak the bloody language, or thought I did...
Does any of this have something to do with the youth of today being largely illiterate? I doubt they're illiterate at all! Not one. They can likely all speak, and as texting has largely replaced telephhone conversation as a thing, well, I'd imagine they'd find some way to communicate with others.
Maybe they just see the dictionary of 'correct English' (not that there is one but let's pretend there was for you all know what I mean) as some sort of archaic and draconian collection of mundane linguistic platitudes created with rules that were meant to be bent until their shape became almost unrecognisable in many cases, or simply broken, all decided long ago (decades, if you can fathom it) by old men with beards, and so it must be avoided in order to rebel and be cool?
But, it WASN'T decided by men with beards; there were WOMEN doing some of the deciding, too! It would be an insult to my character for anyone to even suggest that I'd ever consider that, by their very nature, the possibility of a woman growing a thick, sexy beard could be impossible: I am not a sexist and thus there were many men and women whose ability to accumulate large clumps of thick and fearsome facial hair, heretofore unimaginable in nature of curliness, colour and length was legendary and still is, and there and then they decided the rules of language... possibly, I hope, whilst wearing black hooded capes and with a blood sacrifice.
I do like "proper" English, though. There's a word for the dialect and I just can't recall it at this point in time: today's one of those days where I've forgotten everything. I also like the fact that language diversifies over time when left in different environments, such as in the cases of Australia, England, America, and other countries whose populations might not regularly frequent the English-speaking world of England, and so they make up their own rules by consensus, adding some, deleting others, and it's pleasant to even see various dialects being employed, though there's always the moment where one has to alter their dialect to suit the 'class' of the person you're sharing a dialogue with, which is what I've seen many man shamelessly do, as if speaking in a normal, middle-class dialect is offensive..!
But anyway, books are dead.
We have machines that can now store millions of them, or rather, their contents, and read every word aloud into our ears, so that we need never look either at their ancient and dusty pages, stored for millenia and wondered over and enjoyed, nor the headache-inducing and sleek, shiny screens that these devices come with.
Anyway, what should I do now that my profession is in danger? Flee?
I just have to change things a little: presenting things in eBook form is potentially far better for me. No agents or publishers getting in my way, nobody telling me that they'd rather I changed something to something else, and I can write whatever I want, regardless of popular opinions or what Dan Brown's got on the shelves these days - if Tom Hanks refuses the film's script, Nicholas Cage will pick it up! - and so now I can appeal to a larger audience without having to pay a penny, I can give people a taste without them needing to pick anything up: just a click!
And who can resist a click for something free and interesting? The Nigerian Viagra salesmen with the trick to looking 30 years younger using a secret household recipe in just 6 weeks can't be wrong if they're still playing that game today; the same game from 20 years ago...
So, with the antique writing desk and various writing utensils I've acquired, surrounded (and leaning on) other books, some masterpieces and some trash, I'll try to make my mark somewhere in the middle: clever trash, or a trashy masterpiece, which will keep everyone happy, especially since I'll then be able to make printed copies available. But, unfortunately, everyone's having this brainwave and doing things the same way. Soon someone will come up with something so incredible and simple that I'll cover my face with my hand, just like Picard, and sigh and wonder why I wasn't willing to squeeze a few more moments of thought out of my mind onto the subject of sales. But, still, it's not that much of a problem...
So, the language is toast, but that's what everyone's been saying since language began.
Books are out, though they'll always be dear to many...
And writing is still a potential profession, though 100 years ago far fewer people could do it.
I should celebrate illiteracy statistics; it means less competition in the years to come!