Impolite Society

Were you ever caught passing notes in class during the fourth grade? Do you remember the humiliation of the teacher calling you out? Maybe she even took the note and read it aloud; all the more embarrassing if you had written of your distaste for the instructor. We had to learn to pay attention in the schoolroom or face the consequences, so most of us took the lesson to heart and gave up the practice of clandestine communication.

Apparently few, if any, members of the internet generation ever had this experience, because this childhood misdemeanor is constantly practiced these days in the meeting room, or at the lecture hall, or at the conference speech. At True Archives, we have long noted the insidious effect of little electronic devices on the memory of mankind, but after recently returning from a professional conference we are now convinced that the Information Scientists are eroding our basic sense of etiquette as well. While seated within an auditorium full of bright, young professionals ostensibly gathered to listen to a bright, erudite speaker, all we could see reflected on the audience’s faces were the glow from their "smart” phones, laptops, and two-way wrist radios.

The shortened attention spans that the Biblioposers consistently deny growing among their users is plainly evident in their own behavior. Unable to be in the present moment, they literally twiddle their thumbs while someone is speaking either checking their email, or sending snippets of the speaker’s words to their colleagues located in the next row or across the world. This is not only a testimony of diminished cognitive ability, but it is also just plain rude. We wonder what it would be like were these self-appointed electronic dispatchers used their voices to concurrently comment on the speech. Would not the cacophony of mutterings drown out whatever the speaker had to say, and expose the whisperers for the rude boors that they are? Here at True Archives we challenge the internet junkies to put down the toys and listen, if they still can.