The Times They Are A'digitizin'

Every day, it seems, I get an email from the New York Times telling me, as a subscriber to the newspaper, that I'm entitled to this and that on-line feature.

I rarely use any of them. I appreciate the news alerts that come via email but rarely read more than the headlines. I'm not comfortable reading lengthy news stories on line. Frankly, it hurts my eyes.

I prefer to hold a newspaper in my hand and flip through the pages looking for stories that interest me. In fact, my wife just came in from the den (it's 11:10 p.m.) and told me about several interesting stories she saw in today's paper. I'll get to them tomorrow. Sometimes I take days to finish a single edition. But I'm in no hurry and so the papers accumulate.

We keep a large brown paper bag next to our couch to collect the finished papers. Then it goes to the recyclers. Every two weeks we contribute a minimum of two full bags of old newspapers.

I understand newspapers are trying to make up for lost circulation and ad revenue by offering more and more web features. I wish them well. But by offering news and information in bits and bytes we sacrifice detail, context and perspective. That can't help a reader understand the larger picture.

As I drive through my small suburban town I see people of all ages walking along with their eyes on a hand-held device. At a local diner recently, a young couple at a nearby table, were looking not at each other but at their hand-held devices. I doubt if any of these people were scanning news reports.

If digitized information is the hare and knowledge is the tortoise, the modern world may just turn that old fable on its back. Pity if it should.