Elon University

Archives: Expert Predictions

The Internet? Bah! Why Cyberspace isn’t and Never Will Be Nirvana

Computers and networks isolate us from one another. A network chat line is a limp substitute for meeting friends over coffee. No interactive multimedia display comes close to the excitement of a live concert. And who’d prefer cybersex to the real thing? While the Internet beckons brightly, seductively flashing an icon of knowledge-as-power, this nonplace lures us to surrender our time on earth. A poor substitute it is, this virtual reality where frustration is legion and where – in the holy names of Education and Progress – important aspects of human interactions are relentlessly devalued.

An Inquiry into Mail, an Experiment with the Post Office, and a Comment on Cryptography

You wake up one morning to discover that your handwriting’s gone. You can’t sign your name. Your business has lost its letterhead, envelopes, checks, logos, and even the ink in your pens has disappeared. You open your mouth, and no sounds come out. You can no longer shake hands, frown, snicker, or laugh out loud. Oh, you can still communicate, using the same uniform style imposed on everyone: ASCII text. The only difference between your messages and another’s is their contents. You spend your life developing your public appearance: it shows in your handwriting, signature, voice, clothing and handshake. You leave all this behind when you send e-mail.

An Inquiry into Mail, an Experiment with the Post Office, and a Comment on Cryptography

Why not send a fax? It’s far more universal than e-mail – we not only find fax machines everywhere, but they can all speak to one another. Moreover, they can handle diagrams, pictures and any language … I find it easier to just scribble a note on a plain piece of paper and send it over fax … Network mail, even decade-old e-mail, lacks warmth. The paper doesn’t age, the signatures don’t fade. Perhaps a future generation will save their romances on floppy disks and Internet Uniform Record Locators. Give me a shoebox of old letters.

On Classrooms, With and Without Computers; Some Basic Astrophysics for the Intrepid

Unlike broadcasting, there’s no regulation of online content. I’ve already seen a virtual-reality ad for Absolut Vodka. How long before kids download animations of dancing cigarettes? For that matter, who’ll be responsible when some 12-year-old tries out the explosives recipe in rec.pyrotechnics and blows off his arm? … Once we provide students with network access, we have little choice but to trust that they’ll use the nets wisely. The best way is to help them along, let them explore and learn on their own. There’ll be lots of wasted time, plenty of sidetracks and an occasional eureka.

On Classrooms, With and Without Computers; Some Basic Astrophysics for the Intrepid

Anyone who’s directed away from social interactions has a head start on turning out weird … Computers teach us to withdraw, to retreat into the warm comfort of their false reality. Why are both drug addicts and computer aficionados both called users? Thanks to television, huge numbers of Americans have become nocturnal zombies who spend their evenings inert before cathode-ray tubes. Computing is equally nonholistic: a motionless consumption of the mind … A generation of network surfers is becoming adept at navigating the electronic backwaters, while losing touch with the world around them.