July 14, 2008
Proof print media is far from dead.
John Hendrix did a piece in the NYT Op-Ed that is just gorgeous. I am sorry I missed it until today (my usual Sunday NYT’s routine had been disrupted this weekend). Just compare the below picture with its online (red-headed, step-) brother.*
(click to enlarge)
*Apologies to red heads and step-brothers everywhere.
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5 Responses to “Proof print media is far from dead.”
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Andrew,
Oh! I remember looking at this (in print) yesterday and really liking it, but I failed to note that John Hendrix was responsible.
Yours,
Sheila “Red” Ryan
Hey, this newspaper article is pretty cool. I like the design on this page. I should share this with my friends. Time to Digg…wait, no….Stumble? Nope. Guess I’ll scan it into my computer, write a blog post about it, and then send it off to my friends, who will hopefully send it to their friends, and so on.
While print media can still be clever, look how online can bring it to life, socially. The communicative nature of online media is what will kill traditional media.
I don’t know about kill, Kyle, but certainly maim.
The coming era of the post-consumer is the era of the small print house when thingness and quality craft become invaluable. You see, I find that physical objects become more valuable in a digital age.
So, yes, online media will continue to take over distribution of mass media, but small print houses will still live on.
“Physical objects become more valuable in a digital age.” (AS)
Five or so years ago Jon and I gave ancient coins as Christmas gifts to our nearest and dearest. Jon wrote a little essay to accompany each. In the midst of the hurly-burly and revelry, his (then) fourteen-year-old nephew, a bright Regular Kid into skate- and snowboarding and Grand Theft Auto, sat quietly reading his uncle’s essay and looking over and over at his coin. Finally he said, “Just holding something like this and thinking about someone holding it more than two thousand years ago makes me feel kind of dizzy.”
That’s a good kind of dizzy, I think.
On my trip to New York last month–my first in a big city–I was surprised to see that reading culture seems alive and well. Sure, cellphones and iPods were distracting a large number of the masses, but on the subway…rows of people, reading the Times, paperbacks, The New Yorker. I stared over shoulders and caught headlines. I grabbed magazines at corner news stands, read the paper in the park. When I was done, I folded it and stuffed it into the slats of the bench; someone would be along soon to pick up where I’d left off.
The print reading culture seemed somehow tied to the underlying community sense I got from that “big, impersonal city.” The internet is a boon in the sprawling suburbs of my home, putting the world in my hands. Bits and pixels are enough when there’s no one to say, “Hey buddy, you got the sports page?”