Though a limited series, it was one from which he had acquired more sound information by diligent perusal than many a man of opportunities has done from a furlong of laden shelves.

— On Gabriel Oak’s tiny library in Far from the Madding Crowd

Now you are continuing on to read its first sentence. Before you go any further, stop and ask yourself what are the chances that you will read every sentence of this blog article, right through to the end, without checking your email, looking at Facebook, texting a friend, following a hyperlink, or interrupting in any other similar way. If you are like me and are honest with yourself, the chances are small! How many online articles do we merely skim, glance at, or half-heartedly scroll through, desultorily highlighting random snippets of text?

I have been thinking recently about how I read online, particularly after finishing Nicolas Carr’s thought-provoking book The Shallows: What the Internet is Doing to Our Brains. Carr’s basic point is that the internet encourages shallow engagement with its content. Clicking through hyperlinks provides access to lots of information, but despite providing a quick stimulus, the benefits are usually not deep. Unlike reading a codex (i.e., a bound, paper book) in which we more easily immerse ourselves and engage the imagination, reading online is generally a much less focused activity.

Carr cites many examples of research which, unsurprisingly, support such claims: claims which I warrant we are all familiar with from our own experiences. He also draws on advances in neuroscience to explain how our interaction with technology (both books and the internet) not only provide data to our brains but also shape the way our brains work. As Marshall McLuhan told us sixty years ago, the medium by which content is delivered is not neutral. It is an extension of our senses.

This being said, we are not entirely at the caprices of the internet when it comes to reading online content. Our native senses—sight, hearing and so on—influence our thoughts, and yet we can exercise control over them. The same ought to be true of their extensions, including the internet. We can be attentive to how we use online media. Are we doing the easy but ultimately unrewarding thing, flitting from page to page without purpose? Or do we deliberately choose to read certain pages and to give them our full attention? This does not necessarily mean that we can attend to webages as one attends to other media—the web browser will never be the codex—but perhaps we can train ourselves to be fruitful in the way we use online videos, news services, blogs and social networking.

Part of this discernment will likely lead to a less-is-more approach. It might be better, for example, to actually read two important news articles all the way through in the morning rather than to skim ten. I’ll even tell you a secret: I find I am actually more efficient online when I do read rather than skim. I spend less time and I get more out of it.

Finally, it is helpful to recognise that there are “submedia” within the internet. Email is not video; social networking is not blogging. Each of these submedia have interfaces that deliver content in different ways. The sub medium of the blog with which you are engaging now has great utility. It is like a newspaper column or a magazine article, but more readily available. It is not as formal as a journal but can still be intelligent. It generally encourages reflexion on topical subjects, but the best blogs are considered and articulate. It is worth thinking about whether the way we read blogs coheres with these properties.

This is the end of this post, and congratulations if you actually took up my challenge to read it without interruption. Now you may feel free to go back and follow some of the hyperlinks. And more importantly, you can click the “like” button with the satisfaction of knowing that it will be based on a well-informed opinion.

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Reprinted with permission from Ibo et Non Redibo (May 7, 2014)

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