RSS and objects

public This guy makes a brilliant point about magazine articles: "I had begun to notice that people refer to a magazine article by mentioning the magazine, not the author, but with a book they typically don't remember the publisher, but only the author[...]." In this context (but another post) the guy explains why RSS saves us: it lets us pick authors that we like and design a nameless, virtual newspaper/magazine which is entirely by the people we are most interested in. Our virtual magazine can even have lots of comics (see the links page) and Dave Barry. It gives me that 90's optimism that yes, the Web really can revolutionize publishing and information dissemination.

Remember the `zine revolution, where a collection of a few people printed stuff up and made their pals read it and also left it at the bookstore hoping that a few strangers would also read a few pages? There's blogging with RSS for ya.

private So I myself have now been using an RSS reader for a little over a week. The results? My apartment is much cleaner, and I have no dishes lingering in the sink. I think I'm like a lot of people in that I guide my life based on the item on my `to do' list that is the least onerous at the moment. This had meant hitting <F5> on Paul's blog and seeing if he's said anything in the last five minutes, but now that's entirely obsolete, since the RSS reader does that automatically. As much as I love chycks in eyeliner, even that site from a few days ago has become onerous.

In fact, generally, looking for new content is among the most onerous things I can think of. As much as I may give the impression otherwise, I hate clicking on things and hoping they'll turn up something good; I really do think 90% of the content online is crap; and buying stuff online is so painful at this point that I'd rather go without than suffer the requisite half an hour of aimless clicking that goes into buying anything with plastic or silicon parts.

And so, having barred the joy of <F5>-ing the sites I really do like, I'm down to sweeping my floor and doing dishes. I guess it's sort of a geek thing to do, to automate and make efficient your downtime (here's a great example).

Oh, and I also read the NYT and the Economist more, since they now push themselves to me rather than requiring that I click on a link. I am thus notified within half an hour any time a U.S. serviceman dies in Iraq.

virtual I bought a big pile of records the other day. I'm increasingly feeling what the luddites of old said about CDs: they're just not fun compared to records. There's no tactile joy, nothing to do with your hands or your eyes. The little CD booklet really doesn't compare to the big square sleeve that hipsters have lately taken to framing and hanging on the wall. There's no ritual to putting a CD in the little motorized tray. As previously noted, if you have to get up every twenty minutes to flip the darn record, you're more likely to listen compared to just putting on a playlist in the background.

To go even further, walking through Chinatown in Manhattan a month or two ago, I happened upon a pile of 78 RPM records, from circa 1915-1925. They do indeed put the records of the 80s to shame: these things don't wobble or bend, and they weigh something substantial. They feel good to hold. These 78s are vaguely Jewish in nature, like Cohen calls his tailor on the 'Phone (comedy monologue, it says) and the Yiddisher klezmer orchestra. I wish I coud hear them.

I was raised more on CDs, though, so the step from CDs to MP3s on a hard drive was a trivial one, since pushing little plastic buttons and clicking on the picture of a button are about the same experience. Now I've got an efficient, streamlined system for playing music that involves absolutely no tactile involvement at all. Perhaps this is why I'm so into good computer keyboards---but compare the keys on your keyboard with the keys on a piano (not to be confused with a MIDI keyboard). In the end, convenience and cheapness will always win out over tactile fun. That's why CDs made records basically disappear, and why MP3s threaten to make the entire concept of music purchased with a tangible physical medium obsolote.

For me, this brings up two questions: first, how far will the virtualization of things go? Will all our media be on screens and speakers; our cars, tools, and other assorted things with buttons replaced with little touch-screens and voice commands; the soft parts replaced by pictures of soft parts; and once-heavy things like glass jars, wood furniture, and telephones replaced with cheap, light, and fully functional plastic counterparts? What'll be left? Which brings us to the central question:

The visitors from the future are always drawn as having gigantic heads and tiny hands. I wonder if the future really is in not touching things. I guess it can go one of two ways. We may not care at all, since our heads are getting bigger, or we may start to care much more about the things that are basically impossible to replace with non-tactile substitutes: clothing, food, people.

Which is how my RSS feed has made my life better: by streamlining the way I waste time online, I'm forced to read physical books, put my hands under running water, play records, and live more in the tactile world.