Countering Information Overload
Posted on April 2, 2009
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There was Kathleen Parker on the op-ed page of The Washington Post writing about a “TMI-addled nation.” Her reflections coincided with the 30th anniversary of the accident at my former workplace, and I thought for a moment she was exaggerating the anniversary’s impact a bit. But no, she was reflecting on “Too Much Information.” Now there’s a concern for these times.
Ironically, information overload is occurring at a time when newspapers, the core of the traditional media, are disintegrating. In my own Pennsylvania neighborhood, the two Lancaster papers just merged and my hometown paper, The Lebanon Daily News, will shortly be printed by a sister paper in York, 53 miles away. (It will be interesting to see how the delivery time holds up there.)
But Kathleen has a point in that the media array is atomizing, our information setting is becoming highly variegated and challenging to comprehend. I wouldn’t say too much so, because it’s not clear how all this will settle out. As Clay Shirky says, we’re in 1,500, with electronic Gutenbergs clamoring for our attention from the Internet and cable TV.
The danger, as Ms. Parker notes, is that as people become overwhelmed with information they become less attentive, less hopeful of, and thereby less interested in, finding meaning in the buzz. Prolonged, such an overload state can make for a truly dysfunctional, inattentive society.
Maybe the best we can all do is to stake out our own information limits, and stay with them. Choose the blogs we want to follow, the books we want to read, the electronic media we want to indulge (like Bill Moyers, not Fox) and stay with them, piecing together meaning for ourselves but not expecting to get it universally – or, as they used to say, objectively – correct.
Instead of going with the flow, use a dipstick and hope it provides accurate enough samplings.
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