MobileRead Forums - View Single Post - The Shallows: What the Internet is doing to our brains

BeccaPrice · 05-10-2013, 09:33 AM

I finally finished The Shallows - for such a slim book, it took almost 2 weeks to read it. And then, to disprove his point for him, I read -devoured, really - The Man With No Language and had no problem concentrating on it or following it.

My main reaction to The Shallows is that, if he finds the internet so distracting, he's doing it wrong. As Humpty Dumpty said about words, it's all in who is to be the master. If your emailer interrupts you every time you get get a new message, you should be able to turn that feature off (and isn't AOL the only one that does that? Mine is pull technology; I have to actively go to the web page and request updates.).

So I had a lot of "get off my lawn" sense about the book, and a certain amount of pity for the author. His research is sound, but I'm not sure his conclusions are justified.

05-10-2013, 09:33 AM	#15
BeccaPrice Wizard Posts: 2,145 Karma: 11174187 Join Date: Jan 2011 Device: Sony 350, K3-3G, K4SO, KPW	I finally finished The Shallows - for such a slim book, it took almost 2 weeks to read it. And then, to disprove his point for him, I read -devoured, really - The Man With No Language and had no problem concentrating on it or following it. My main reaction to The Shallows is that, if he finds the internet so distracting, he's doing it wrong. As Humpty Dumpty said about words, it's all in who is to be the master. If your emailer interrupts you every time you get get a new message, you should be able to turn that feature off (and isn't AOL the only one that does that? Mine is pull technology; I have to actively go to the web page and request updates.). So I had a lot of "get off my lawn" sense about the book, and a certain amount of pity for the author. His research is sound, but I'm not sure his conclusions are justified.