Bill Keller
Author Review
Bill Keller is an American Journalist, born in 1949. Before starting to work with the new york times, he used to be a reporter for The Dallas Times Herald. He officially joined The New York Times in 1984. Keller has had different jobs in the media company before becoming its chief editor in 2003. Worked as a reporter, writer, and columnist. During the years he was in the New York Times, he built a name for himself and the media house too and won many accolades.
Purpose of the Author
In the New York Times article, ‘The Twitter Trap’ by Bill Keller, the writer is worried and bothered about the technological advancement that has brought about the rise of social media. He is trying to make us understand the drawbacks and dangers of these new modes of interaction and communication, which is the price that comes with this advancement: Facebook, Twitter, and other major social media platforms. The author intends to tell us how social media’s real purpose has been replaced even though it was an excellent technological venture. He shows the relation of human abilities with social media and describes the impact of these tools on personal skills and characteristics. Ideologically he is not against the goodies technology, and social media has come along with, but instead worried about the impacts of the former on day-to-day human social lives, interactions, communications, and abilities.
Strategies Used to Support the Purpose
Bill Keller believes Social media has done us more harm than good. This is already clear in the first two paragraphs, where he thinks it was a lousy idea suggesting to her daughter, she joins Facebook. She gained many friends so fast. He quotes, ‘I felt a little as if I had passed my child a pipe of crystal meth.’ It seems like it was quite a scare. Further, more dangers of social media are highlighted in the article.
First, he talks about memory and remembrance. Back then, people had functional memory capacities and could remember a lot of information. He talks about Foer’s book, ‘Moonwalking with Einstein, ‘ which discusses what we lose as things continue changing. Nowadays, it is all different. Anything can be looked up on the internet. All information can be accessed easily. We no longer have to pay attention to remembering details or essential information because it is, or can be saved digitally. Technology has even made individuals lose the mastery of streets, roads, or buildings, and landmarks. GPS can assist you in finding directions instead.
Social media takes away our attention. When we see notifications on our PCs or phones and other places, our brains become centered on what they say. Quickly, we open the information to know what they say and leave whatever else we were concentrating on. When your attention is taken away, you become distracted. Social media makes all your attention. It needs a response, primarily when you have been addressed, or a post touches on something that affects you.
Bill Keller laments on how human abilities and characteristics are gradually being eroded. Technology and social media are competing with the realness of life. Smart people are even becoming less intelligent. Now the human brain relies more on programs, software, and the internet. Real friendships and conversations are rare nowadays. This is associated with having large numbers of virtual friends on the platforms whom you have never met. These days, people do not socialize the same way they used to do before. You do not have to see a person one on one first before you become friends with them. Social media has lost its real purpose that was intended
. Keller believes that twitter makes people stupid. He even went ahead and made a tweet saying “#TwitterMakesYouStupid. Discuss.” After the tweet, there were many negative opinions, and only a few people could agree or relate to what he said. Nowadays, people on Twitter and Facebook are more interested in criticism, dragging people, and mockery. This has made the platforms completely lose their original objective. From such tendencies, a certain percentage of people who frequented social media no longer do so. They rarely use twitter or Facebook anymore.
Conclusion
In support of Bill Keller, social media’s rise is gradually replacing the true meaning of life. The way humans relate and interact nowadays is different from how it used to be back then way before Twitter and Facebook became popular. The modern picture is showing there is a bruised social life. This is attributed to how fast human abilities and characteristics in conversing, interacting and making friendships disappear. If social media usage is not regulated or reduced, we will become slaves to it, and we might end up paying a huge price for this technological advancement.
References
Bill Keller, May 18, 2011, ‘The Twitter Trap,’ Pg 11, The New York Times Magazine.