THE REVENGE OF ANALOG: REAL THINGS AND WHY THEY MATTER By David Sax


David Sax loves vinyl records. He loves clocks with hands. He’s convinced that analog is superior to digital. Sadly, we live in a digital world. My Casio watch is digital. Diane’s iPhone is digital, our Canon camera is digital. David Sax makes the argument we should be leery of our digital culture. He’s convinced analog is more authentic and more real. I have to agree with David Sax on real books. I much prefer a printed book to an ebook (although I read both). What do you think? Do you prefer digital or analog? GRADE: B+
TABLE OF CONTENTS:
Part 1: The Revenge of Analog Things
Chapter 1: The Revenge of Vinyl
Chapter 2: The Revenge of Paper
Chapter 3: The Revenge of Film
Chapter 4: The Revenge of Board Games

Part 2: The Revenge of Analog Ideas
Chapter 5: The Revenge of Print
Chapter 6: The Revenge of Retail
Chapter 7: The Revenge of Work
Chapter 8: The Revenge of School
Chapter 9: The Revenge of Analog, in Digital
Epilogue: The Revenge of Summer

39 thoughts on “THE REVENGE OF ANALOG: REAL THINGS AND WHY THEY MATTER By David Sax

  1. Patti Abbott

    A mixture of both. I wonder if soon kids will not even learn how to print much less write carrying around their pads as they do. Can they tell time the old way at all? Does quarter to three have any meaning for them? Could they use a dial phone?

    Reply
    1. george Post author

      Patti, I had students who couldn’t read the analog clock in one of College classrooms. They live in the Digital World. But I prefer music CDs to vinyl records. But even CDs are antiques in the age of iTunes and digital music files.

      Reply
  2. Jeff Meyerson

    I’m with Bill on missing the old days, but I agree with George/ I prefer CDs and have no intention of downloading digital music files.

    And keep off my lawn!

    I do prefer real books but have made a big transition to the Kindle because it is so darn convenient. Let’s say I’m sitting home at 7 one morning and see a review on George’s blog that sounds good. Not only can I go to Amazon and order the book to be delivered in two days if I want it, but I can go to the library website to put a book on hold. And now that the library is buying more and more ebooks, I can often just download it directly to the Kindle and start reading! Plus, while we’re down here for eight weeks I have been able to download library books from home fairly easily.

    So even though Jackie rightly says that I am not good with change, with technology it’s another thing entirely.

    Reply
    1. george Post author

      Jeff, like you I find ebooks irresistible. My Public Library is making more ebooks available for downloads. I use my iPad as an ebook reader mostly, but like you I can order something from AMAZON from it in seconds. And, with the clock ticking on penny books on AMAZON I’ve stepped up my book buying (temporarily, I’ve assured Diane).

      Reply
  3. maggie mason

    I still have a landline, though it is a cordless phone (so much more convenient, being able to wander the house whilst talking on the phone) I am going to get a smart phone soon, as my old pay as you got cell is really outdated). I remember trying a digital watch when they first came out, and hated having to use 2 hands to tell the time!! Someone recently was complaining about telling time via cell phone and how incovenient it was. My first thought was having to turn on the phone and wait til it warms up, and I realized most people keep them turned on all the time (I don’t).

    I prefer “real” books to ebooks, though I do see a benefit for a lot of people. I’d say font size is a big one, for us boomers. I’m happy to see real books and vinyl making a comeback.

    Reply
    1. george Post author

      Maggie, I like my Casio digital watch because it has a calculator built-in. It came in handy many times. And my Casio watch cost me $12 (about 10 years ago). Like you I prefer printed books. But I love the iPad feature that turns the font of my downloaded ebooks into LARGE PRINT!

      Reply
      1. Jeff Meyerson

        Yea5, that is good.

        Jackie always says you can check the time on your phone, but then she has never liked to wear a watch while I don’t feel fully dressed without one. And my watch is analog. I like seeing the second hand go around and like having the date (if I remember to set it).

      2. george Post author

        Jeff, I needed my watch while I was working (couldn’t be late to class!) but now that I’m Retired, I sometimes go watchless.

      3. wolfi

        I had a nice analog watch while working but since I’m retird I haven’t worn a watch – just like George.

        The few times I need to have the exact time I look at my notebook. Btw I don’t like smartphones at all – the screens are too small for me, I want a lot of info. My wife on the other side is a real smartphone and kindle fan – I probably told that story already once that I had to cut one of GRRM’s novels in three, because it was too heavy for her to hold.
        With the kindle or the smartphone – no problem at all for her.

        I still have my old LPs but just look at them,never play them -the sound quality is disappointing compared to digital.

        PS:
        We still have a few analog clocks: in the kitchen, the attic, the garages so if i just want to know if it’s time for lunch or for a walk, a glance is enough.

        A bit OT:

        Around 2004 I bought my first smartphone – a windows mobile, because it had a version of MS Word and I wanted to have my book list there when traveling, instead of that 100 pages self printed “book”.

        Then I got a nasty surprise: The downloaded file (just text, I already had downgraded from the database …) would not open – without Word Mobile giving any reason …
        I tried everything – the test version I had built worked wothout a glitch but not the real thing (less than 1 MB btw). Somewhere in the depths of MS online help then I found the answer:

        Word Mobile (at leat that version) had a limit of 8000 lines for a text and my list had around 12000 books plus 4000 lines for authors and other info …

        It worked after I cut the the file in three – like authors from A to H, I to R, S zo Z or something like that but of course that was very inconvenient so I continued to carry my list on those shopping trips. That list also was something to impress people with of course …

      4. george Post author

        Wolf, many of my friends with smartphone have had their accounts hacked. And, they seem to pick up a lot of viruses, too.

  4. Deb

    Anyone who thinks vinyl is preferable to CDs never had to tape a penny to the needle-arm of a record player to stop the record from skipping. #babyboomermemories#

    I have friends whose kids do not know how to tell analog time. I think it’s less important that kids know “when the big hand is on the 9, it’s 45 minutes past the hour” than they learn all the concepts that telling analog time teaches: numbers representing more than one thing simultaneously (try explaining 3:15 or 9:45 to a kid and you’ll see what I mean); the clock face representation of moving through time in seconds, minutes, and hours; the sense of how time moves. These fundamental concepts are lost when moving away from analog time.

    I think it was Douglas Adams who said (paraphrase), the technology that exists when you’re born and up until your teens, you accept and never question; the technology that is introduced in your teens and twenties all looks fantastic and you want it immediately; the technology that is introduced in your middle-age gives you pause, you worry about negative effects and implications; and then there comes a time where you just decide all this new technology is simply not for you and you either don’t adopt it or are dragged kicking and screaming to adopt it because it’s now simply a requirement of living. I think I’m solidly in that last category now!

    Reply
    1. george Post author

      Deb, you are so right! I’m resisting new technology all the time. When I was teaching online courses at the College, the College spent hundreds of thousands of dollars for STARFISH software which would track students (when the logged on, what they did on the web site, etc.). At a STARFISH meeting, a Dean got angry with me when I declared STARFISH was a waste of money. “How can you say that!” she demanded. “I don’t need to know when students log on,” I told her. “When they fail my exams, I know all I need to know. The STARFISH money could be better spent on tutors for the struggling students.”

      Reply
      1. Deb

        I had a co-worker who referred to senior management’s “magic box” idea of how technology works. A lot of managers think if a process can be automated or tracked, it’s somehow going to better. They focus on the process not the outcome. Of course, this is not a trait limited to senior managers, but it can have a lot of negative consequences when a manager thinks everything will be roses and sunshine if a process has an online component.

      2. george Post author

        Deb, you’re right about Management everywhere wanting to “buy” a solution. I’m sure the STARFISH people gave the Deans a great promo and promised “huge” learning gains. All for a price. Meanwhile, you and I who work with Real Students know learning is much more complicated.

      3. maggie mason

        I remember when the county was going to put all the child support accounts on line. A senior clerk (not a techie) was put in charge of the program. about 1/4 of the entire child support staff was put in a large unused room at the courthouse. I was one of the first to go. It wasn’t going quickly enough so within 6 months 1/2 the staff was delegated to the project. I was there about 9months IIRC. When I went back to my dept., the amount of unanswered mail was astounding. 6 cubicles filled with postal bins of mail. And the ultimate result: the program was not ever going to work.

        The worst managers never seem to ask the people who actually do the work what will help.

        I have a bunch of cd’s, many classical, I inherited and will happily send to anyone in the US (sorry) for postage reimbursement. If you want a list, let me know.

      1. Deb

        Rick–I hate to break it to you, but there’s a lot of things kids today don’t know how to do, starting with reciting their multiplication tables!

      2. george Post author

        Rick, you would truly be SHOCKED by what today’s student don’t know. They’s smart and eager to learn (at least most of the ones in my classes), but they lack basic knowledge. My students were very weak on History. Some thought the Civil War was fought 500 years ago!

    2. Jeff Meyerson

      Wolfi, you are so right. I’ve picked up huge books – collections of all the Oz books, for instance, or the Complete Sherlock Holmes – that would be a chore to carry around but just another book on the Kindle. I believe I downloaded the complete WAR AND PEACE too, as I’ve always ment to go back and reread the full version this time. In high school, the version we read was definitely abridged.

      Reply
      1. Jeff Meyerson

        That was an answer to Deb’s comment about her friend’s kids.

        Jackie said there was a constant argument in the schools over “process vs. product.” Needless to say, probably, she was on the latter side.

        Of course George is resistant. He doesn’t have a cellphone!

      2. george Post author

        Jeff, as the banks move to do away with credit cards I’ll be forced to get a smartphone (which will be the new credit card) just to have access to credit. In the words of Rick Robinson: “BAH!”

      3. Deb

        John and I made sure our kids could tell analog time and knew their basic math facts (addition/subtraction, 1-20, and their multiplication facts), among other previously-standard educational necessities, but today’s emphasis is teaching the concept rather than teaching the nuts and bolts and allowing the concept to grow organically (or not–I’m no Pollyanna, I know making a child memorize multiplication tables is not always going to result in an ultimate understanding of underlying concepts). Teachers are under so much pressure to move through massive amounts of material very quickly, there’s just no time to focus on the things that we spent days, weeks, months even!, learning at school. It’s a shame, but I suspect most young people under the age of 30 learned to tell analog time from their parents, not their schools.

      4. george Post author

        Jeff, they don’t teach kids cursive writing any more, either. And many schools have dropped memorizing the multiplication table.

  5. Rick Robinson

    It’s an interesting question, how we mix the available platforms. I have an analog (old fashioned) watch, with a sweep second hand (and a little window with the date, though it hard to read). I wore digital watches for many years, but am glad I’ve gone back. I’m shocked that on of your students couldn’t tell time, George.

    I have a smart phone that pretty much sits on the charger, rarely used, but handy in emergencies and certain situations. Most of the time I use the land line. While I prefer physical books, of late print size has become more of an issue, and that is the greatest positive of ebooks for me. Plus I do like being able to tap on a word to see the definition if I’m not sure. Also, ebooks, on my iPad, are lighter and easier to handle than large, heavy hardcover ones. Yes, I have gotten ebooks from the library, though there is the time limit.

    I have a LOT of CDs, though they are dying out. I have many songs and albums that I’ve downloaded, they are MP3 files. I have borrowed albums from the library and copied them to my computer to listen to later, no problem. Streaming video, however, is problematic for me. I don’t want to watch a film/program on a little screen, and I’m not set up to bring movies to my TV via internet. So I’m still a member of physical DVD Netflix, which I understand they are going to discontinue sometime soon. I’ll be sorry when that happened.

    I’d never go back to an analog camera. Digital camera are so superior. The same with a computer word processing program over typewriter and things we don’t often even think about, such as the computer boxes in our cars that keeps us from having to adjust the timing and carburetor all the time.

    As for paper, it’s still everywhere. The time of going to the doctor’s office and them having your files in the computer? I have to fill out paperwork every time, even though they have the information already! They want a physical, signed update on stuff. Probably a lawyer thing.

    There will come a time when an entire generation with have given over to computerized methods of communication, but they will have lost something, just as I think we have already lost the important skill of personal voice communication, given way to text, tweet and those dratted emoticons.

    Now I’ll go fix breakfast: analog oatmeal, in an analog pan, eaten with an analog spoon.

    Reply
    1. Jeff Meyerson

      We got rid of our landline some years back. We just weren’t using it much, and almost all the calls we got were either political or surveys or people selling stuff, inevitably at dinnertime. Most of our relatives were far from us so any calls were on the cellphone anyway.

      But then Verizon offered us a much better deal. If we bundled the phone with the cable and the television (this was after we switched to Fios) it was worth it. But we don’t use a landline, we said. So? Don’t use it.

      So we bought a cheap phone, plugged it in, and turned the ringer off. Jackie uses it when she wants to call Amazon or Verizon or whatever, as she prefers the bigger, heavier handset. She will turn on the ringer so Amazon can call her back. I don’t think I’ve used it since we got it, and I would have to look on the cellphone to even find the number. (It’s a 347 area code rather than 718.)

      Reply
    2. Jeff Meyerson

      1. The doctor. All our doctors use tablets and computers now. We sign in (and I hate using my finger to try and do it) on a tablet, and the nurse and doctor keeps all the records digitally.

      2. Streaming video. We agreed up until recently, but since we got the new smart TVs we just downloaded the Netflix and Amazon Play apps to the television. I could (almost literally) not be easier. It saves our favorites too.

      Reply
      1. maggie mason

        I would really like to do streaming but I have limited outlets. I heard you can plug something into the tv, but am afraid that’s not all I’ll have to do. sigh

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