the death of reflection

The most recent edition of the Left Business Observer is out.

There is a review of Jodi Deans new book Blog Theory: Fedback and Culture in the Age of the  Drive  and this part got me to thinking about ways to blog in an impactful way...

With the not-so-news that blogs are declining in favor of social networking, the blog is now becoming the format for long-form journalism on the web. What does that 

mean? Dean argues that it’s wrong to evaluate blogs just by studying their content, whether journalistic or diaristic, or style, be it narcissistic or derivative (or sometimes 

arresting and thoughtful). 

That’s not enough: the materiality of the medium has to be investigated as well, meaning its routine of endless updates and links, with the 

newest posts at the top with older ones stacked below in reverse chronological order. Feelings often take precedence over thought, and immediacy over distance. 

There’s something compulsive about it. One posts, often into the void—and then Tweets the post, comments elsewhere, and posts again. “The value added…stems 

purely from the being added,” Dean writes.

It’s not only that there’s no closure—there’s hardly a moment’s rest. It all attempts to make connections, but actual contact is elusive; instead, there’s an endless repetition of the post–link–click 

routine. The means the death of “reflection,” which had been central to Western philosophy for several centuries.

I've always found my blog/twitter/facebook as a way to help filter the crap and highlight useful items of interest.  As well as an opportunity to think through items, brainstorm, or just save items to look at in the future.  With the recent social movements from Egypt to Wisconsin from individuals to retake their political systems and create space for the ability of people to have a say in their own lives its made me want to reevaluate my time/efforts....

One sliver of that would be to spend more time reflecting rather than consuming links and new items.  The biggest chunk should be in more real world organizing.