Bryan Atinsky wrote:
> Why isn't that also the case in heavy book readers? It is
> a solitary sport in which hours upon hours are spent in
> blocking out the world around you. Two people sitting next
> to each other reading may as well be in different worlds.
Instead of "two people sitting next to each other" it seems like two separate, intimate conversations. When I read a book, even crap fiction or propaganda, I'm being spoken to by a human being in a human language.
On the down side the communication is only one-way but on the other hand an author is going to great lengths to present his thoughts to me, human to human and in depth and detail unmatched in ordinary speech.
I see nothing like that in video game play, which feels like unraveling a mechanical logic problem, not like any kind of human intercourse at all. But maybe I haven't played enough video games to judge. I can relate an anecdote how both of my daughters play video games an awful lot, yet despite that they've both been very successful at academic stuff, so Gawker's "functional illiterates" is dumb trolling.
Watching teevee is kind of like reading books, also one-way though ten times shallower and with a twentieth the detail. But the difference between teevee and books is that the reader is the book author's customer, who may not be exactly "always right," but who is at least the primary focus. (I mean, the author's intent may be corrupt, he may be lying his ass off, but as he lies he's still focused directly on _you_.)
Whereas the teevee producer doesn't work for the viewer but advertisers, so his intent toward the audience is rarely to communicate with us but usually instead, just to bedazzle and distract us while his client picks our pockets.
Yours WDK - WKiernan at ij.net
Reading popular fiction is no more like an intimate coversation that playing a video game. I don't play video games but I can't see how having the imaginative fantasies of the videogame designer unfolding in front of you on a video screen at a pace you have some control over is any less intimate than an authors fantasies unfolding on a page in front of you. This just seems like elitism to me.
The same goes for video when compared to books. How could video inheriently be 10 times more shallow than a book with one twentieth the detail? This is the claim you are making isn't it? Either one can be equally engaging or stultifying. I find the idea that books contain a richer tapestry than film or TeeVee to also be rather elitist. When you watch a film the backgrounds selected for any given scene alone would take dozens of pages to describe and would be tedious to read while they can be pleasurable to view. The level of detail in 10 minutes of screen time is generally quite high. Observing the facial expressions of the actors in "real time" is every bit as interesting as reading a description of them. Complex plots and ideas can be handled in many ways both subtle and overt. A well made film or TeeVee program is no more shallow or less detailed than a well written book. A poorly made film on the other hand is generally easier to get through than a poorly written book. Certainly most TeeVee shows suck but so do most books. Try describing the detail in a single Richard Estes painting. Now imagine that as one frame in a film and multiply accordingly. If you find films lack the details and/or richness of a book then you are not paying attention to what the film maker is offering.
The idea that most books are somehow less of a commodity than most TeeVee shows is laughable.
John Thornton