William Powers and Paper in the Digital Age

In 2007, William Powers wrote an essay, "Hamlet's Blackberry." The paper was a part of the Discussion Paper Series, out of Harvard University. The subtitle and underlying theme to the essay is that "... Paper Is Eternal." Powers writes:

We live in an age obsessed with new technologies. The sophisticated modern consumer knows the fine points of all the latest media devices. There are countless popular magazines dedicated to helping us stay abreast of our media devices, and they cover every imaginable kind of technology except the one on which the magazines themselves are printed. Paper is the most successful communications innovation of the last 2000 years, the one that has lasted the longest and had the profoundest effect on civilization. One can easily make the case that without the technology that is paper, there would be no civilization. Yet most of the time, we don’t even think of paper as a technology. And so we don’t ask the questions we routinely ask about other technologies: How does it work? What are its strengths and weaknesses? Is it easy and enjoyable to use? Paper doesn’t seem to require much consideration because it’s so simple: a thin, flexible material that reflects light, crisply displaying any marks you make on it. What more is there to say?

Find that essay here, on Harvard's servers. In July NPR's Morning Edition covered the book and author. The story's webpage prefaces the subject with a series of questions: "Do you find yourself checking Facebook as soon as you wake up in the morning? Do you answer e-mails on your Blackberry while surfing the Web? Even as you read this article, is your right index finger twitching on the mouse, just itching to click on something new?" The webpage continues: "Powers' book is not a Luddite manifesto. The writer may question the way we use our gadgets, but he certainly doesn't condemn it. ("With a few keystrokes, I can bring up an old manuscript from the British Museum. That is miraculous," he says.) He does, however, recognize the downside of constantly being flooded with new information — or what he calls the "conundrum of connectedness."" Read from that feature story's webpage here, from/on NPR.org. And download that Morning Edition podcast here. Powers was also a guest on This Week in Mobile; YouTube video below.

Jeffrey Pfeffer and Power

Jeffrey Pfeffer is the Thomas D. Dee II Professor of Organizational Behavior at Stanford University's Graduate School of Business. This business school's magazine summed Pfeffer's thesis in an introduction of an article about the book and its topics: "Through three decades of teaching and writing about power, Jeffrey Pfeffer has emphasized a pithy but potent concept: Politics often trumps performance." See that article here. NPR's Forum (a KQED affiliate program) plugged the book. You can find the podcast of that show, here. The Harvard Business Review keeps a blog called "The Conversation," where Pfeffer posted an entry called, "Women and the Uneasy Embrace of Power." In the article, he writes that:

The evidence shows that women are less power-oriented than men. Women have more negative attitudes toward holding power, they are less likely to pursue power-based influence strategies, they are more bothered by and disfavor hierarchical relationships, they are less motivated to dominate others, and they are less likely to take actions to attain power. Moreover, in situations such as salary negotiations, studies show that women often believe that they deserve less than similarly qualified men and are, as a consequence, likely to demand less and to press their salary demands with less vigor.

See that HBR blog post here.

Celebrating 40 Years of the National Lampoon from The Takeaway: Early Edition by feedback@thetakeaway.org (Public Radio International and WNYC Radio)

In 1970, three young alumni from the Harvard Lampoon started a national version of their campus humor magazine. It was called National Lampoon, and in the forty years since its launch, the Lampooon's humor and former members have permeated television, film, and just about every other cultural outlet in America. Rick Meyerowitz is an artist who regularly contributed to the Lampoon for fifteen years. His new book, celebrating the magazine and the people behind it, is called Drunk Stoned Brilliant Dead: The Writers and Artists Who Made the National Lampoon Insanely Great.

Download the podcast here. See also: Drunk Stoned Brilliant Dead: The Writers and Artists Who Made the National Lampoon Insanely Great, Return of the Nose Masks, Letters from the Editors of National Lampoon, National Lampoon, Elvis the Bulldozer

The Colbert Report - September 28, 2010 - Ross Douthat

September 28, 2010 - Ross Douthat Views: 143,127 Aired: 09/28/10 Episode 06123 Democratic voters suffer from apathy, and Stephen doubts if Ross Douthat is that conservative.

See: See also: Grand New Party: How Republicans Can Win the Working Class and Save the American Dream, Charlie Rose - Andrew Exum / Ross Douthat (July 27, 2009), Grand New Party: How Republicans Can Win the Working Class and Save the American Dream, Charlie Rose - Andrew Exum / Ross Douthat (July 27, 2009)