Tim Challies on the message of the medium of digital technology:
According to Mark Federman, the message of a new technology, the ideology carried within it, is “the change in inter-personal dynamics that the innovation brings with it.” So the “message” of a particular television show is not the show itself, with all its dramatic scenes and storytelling, but the change in attitude or the change in thinking that the audience experiences after watching it. The “message” of a show like American Idol may have been not the music but the nastiness of one of its judges—a nastiness that quickly shaped and defined society. The message within the medium of the Internet may not be the e-commerce sites and videos and blogs we use every day but he way humans are increasingly seeing themselves and their relationships with others in terms of data and networks. The true message of these digital technologies is buried deep inside them and will eventually be revealed in time. We will see their effect in the ways we think differently act differently, and understand ourselves differently.
—Tim Challies, The Next Story: Life and Faith after the Digital Explosion (Zondervan,2011), 38–39.
This has been my primary concern as I use the internet — not the content related hazards, but the packaging. All the really great, useful content that I enjoy and from which I benefit so much is packaged in a way that caters to our get-it-fast-and-easy culture. Jigabytes of information have enabled me to accomplish things I otherwise never would have. It has also, to some extent, made me a lazy thinker. I don’t think it’s worth the trade.
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