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February 12, 2007
Op-Ed. There Is Such a Thing as Too Much Information
Op-Ed. There Is Such a Thing as Too Much Information: [words by Joey] If I were to never work another day in my life, for entertainment and engagement I would not want. Between the newspaper, the NBA, Michigan sports, my backlog of nonfiction, television, movies, blogs, Wikipedia, and YouTube, there would be plenty to learn, watch, and read. The idea of "the information age" has become a hackneyed catch phrase that gets bandied about with "Web 2.0" frequency, but the truth behind the jargon remains. There is literally too much for a curious, employed person to fully digest.
This proliferation of stuff ("information" is a word I get tired of using) isn't without its unfortunate manifestations, though, and one obvious example is that our heroes can appear to be regrettably human when they take us too far behind the scenes. For instance, before internets and digital everything, your favorite music producer was a pleasant curiosity, shrouded in relative mystery and made greater thanks to it.
Through the occasional magazine feature or radio interview, you might learn about the genesis of a classic beat or the history behind a professional relationship that yielded hit after hit. If you went to a concert, you might learn more as someone like Premier spun records and yelled at you. But mostly, you just heard beats; smiled when you liked them because it felt like a friend had done you a favor; and lost yourself in the synthetic personality of this person whom you admired. I never knew much beyond the basics about Pete Rock, but I didn't really care. He was cool-on-record personified. Until recently, I didn't know what Just Blaze did all the time, and about that, too, I didn't really care. I just liked hearing the name drop before some blaring heatrock came on.
But that's no longer the case. Now, I can watch him play video games:
Have you ever fantasized about being "in the studio" with great rappers? About grabbing a Starbucks with some esteemed actor? About hanging with a star athlete? None of that stuff is a secret, anymore, and it can suck to find out the truth. The knowledge now at our disposal oftentimes destroys the fantasies that we used to construct in a simpler time. On balance, things have changed for the better, and the increased access can certainly carry with it great reward...
...but too often, we can now see our heroes for the people they really are: regular, just with unique talents. Surely, affecting an everyman persona can enhance someone's rep. But seeing a cartoon rapper dissolve into little more than a hysterically screaming fool makes it harder and harder to extend to him the benefit of the doubt that might have cast him as a shrewd operator. Instead, he just seems like an idiot:
Sometimes, I think I liked it better when I knew less.
You can find more of Joey's musings [Here]
Posted by james at February 12, 2007 03:31 PM