Critical Response #6 10-18-07

Now that I have finished reading Steven Johnson's, I can honestly say that I felt that I got more out of this book than I got out of Neil Postman's "Technopoly". I felt that I could connect to Johnson more than I could Postman, so it was easier for me to read the book and actually think about it rather than just reading the words on the page. A big part of why I was able to connect so much better to Johnson was because the examples of movies, TV shows, games etc., that he used to prove and explain his points, were things that I was familiar with, so I could pull up that reference in my head and know exactly what he was talking about. With Postman, half the time I had no idea who or what he was talking about. He brought so many different people that I had a hard time keeping them straight in my head. Johnson had two or three examples and stuck with those examples throughout the whole section. Another thing that I liked better with Johnson was that he used language that anyone could understand, he literally wrote it in plain English. At points while reading Postman, I felt like I was trying to feed a book in a foreign language. All of this favoritism toward Johnson could simply be stemming from the fact that I enjoy playing video games, watching movies, and being on the Internet, so I enjoy reading about those activities a lot more than reading about technopolies.
Speaking of reading about activities that I like to do, in the last few pages, Johnson talks about how people today don't feel that they have time to sit down and read a good novel and completely immerse themselves in it and I completely agree with that. However, Johnson seems to put all the blame on other technologies, such as video game systems and the computer, for why people don't have time to read anymore. I'll admit that that is part of the problem, but I don't think it is the whole problem. People just don't have enough hours in the day to be able to sit down and read a book. Most adults are working more than 40 hours a week to try to support their families and kids today are encouraged to get involved with sports and extracurricular activities or to at least go outside and play, that they don't have time to read a book. I can sympathize with this because as a child, I loved to read and I still do, but ever since I started college, I don't have time. Between going to classes, doing all of my homework, studying for tests, and trying to have some semblance of a social life, there is no extra time to squeeze in a book. And it could easily be argued that I could be reading a book instead of playing my playstation, but a game I can quit anytime and next time just pick up where I left off. It's different with a book, once I stop there is no justing picking up where I left off, I have to reimmerse myself in the book and get back in the story and remember what is going on. If I had the time to read, I'm positive I would take advantage of it, as I'm sure all the other people who miss reading would.