Gino's Ghazal Blog

How the Internet Affects Friendship, Writing, Etc.

Sept. 19, 2009 | By now the arguments are familiar: Facebook is ruining our social relationships; Google is making us dumber; texting is destroying the English language as we know it. We're facing a crisis, one that could very well corrode the way humans have communicated since we first evolved from apes. What we need, so say these proud Luddites, is to turn our backs on technology and embrace not the keyboard, but the pencil.

via www.salon.com

To follow up an earlier discussion on how the Internet affects writing, friendship, accuracy of information, and so on, here's an article on Salon, an interview with the author of a new book defending the new media against their critics. The author is a professor at the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign. I hope you find his comments helpful. If you've read the book, "A Better Pencil," I'd like to hear your response. I may read it at some point, but I'm buried in books right now.

Sometimes, other times, then & now . . .

Stuff keeps changing. I've been retired for two weeks now; it's an eerie feeling. The old habits of planning classes and other things haven't gone away, nor have the habits of going to the office or contacting co-workers. Not that I'm planning classes or going to the office, but the impulses are still there.

My being retired is a main reason that the June and July issues of The Ghazal Page haven't appeared yet. I was exhausted when I retired and haven't recovered yet. The pattern of my days in retirement is beginning to take some shape now.

The June and July issues are not the only late items; the issue presenting ghazals from the tercet challenge is also overdue. June and July, together with the August issue, will make up a three-part summer issue, each part about the same size as the usual monthly issues. The tercet challenge attracted some excellent ghazals; that issue should appear in early August at the latest.

As my retirement progesses, I will either make more use of this blog or cancel it. By "more use" I have in mind more frequent posts on a wider range of topics. A new name for the blog seems appropriate, but I haven't thought of one yet. With a wider range, I may post more somewhat personal entries, without being autobiographical. Especially, I want to comment on some of the reading I expect to be doing. Perhaps we can discuss some poems, books, even music and movies.