where has the quality gone?

Many different technological innovations have changed the writing process. In 1858, the eraser was invented (Trivia-Library.com). Before the eraser, a lot of planning would have to go into writing, for there was only one try. Early on, there was much opposition towards the eraser. Many teachers disliked their students having the ability to erase. Now it is expected for writers to go through many drafts before finishing. In my opinion the eraser greatly improved the quality of writing. Other technologies also have changed writing, such as the printing press, computer, and so on. Like the eraser, many of the technological advancements have made great contributions towards writing. However technology is now significantly harming writing. The downward spiral started with the invention of the Internet. Now, it goes without saying that the Internet is not completely harmful. Email and blogs are two positive uses of the Internet that allow for more communication to take place. However, the Internet brought along inventions such as Instant Message, where users write socially at an extremely fast pace. It is this fast pace that is destroying the quality of writing. People are using writing to communicate with each other at a rapid pace, not only via Instant Message, but also by text messaging. People are sending each other short messages as quick as possible with little thought. All sense of formality is being lost and abbreviations and shortcuts are being created. It seems like an entire new language has formed of quick messages comprised of code. The most basic example of the code is “g2g” standing for “I have to go.” Now a day, many write as though they are in a race, and as technology improves, the race is only going to speed up. Voice recognition software is the next innovation that will harm the writing field. Many companies have developed software recognition programs. Nuance not only created voice recognition for processing sheets, but also for the cell phone. Now people can type and text verbally. This allows writing to take place even faster than before. The faster people write, the worse the quality seems to get.

getting started

Hey readers, I am doing this blog for an English class. I plan on talking a lot about the discussions in class and the readings. The class is going to deal a lot with the role technology plays in reading and writing. On our first day of class we discussed Plato's opinions about writing. He actually focused one of his pieces on the negatives affects of writing. Ironically, this was a written piece.