"That’s how Netflix erases Citizen Kane and Casablanca. It can’t deny the greatness of these films. But it can act as if they never happened."
"The Internet creates the illusion that all culture is taking place right now. Actual history disappears in the eternal present of the web.
- Everything on YouTube is happening right now!
- Everything on Netflix is happening right now!
- Everything on Spotify is happening right now!
"Of course, this is an illusion. Just compare these platforms with libraries and archives and other repositories of history. The contrast is extreme.
"When you walk into a library, you understand immediately that it took centuries to create all these books. The same is true of the Louvre and other great art museums. A visit to an Ivy League campus conveys the same intense feeling, if only via the architecture.
"You feel the weight of the past. We are building on a foundation created by previous generations—and with a responsibility to future ones.
"The web has cultivated an impatience with that weight of the past. You might even say that it conveys a hatred of the past.
"And the past is hated all the more because history is outside of our control. When we scream at history, it’s not listening. We can’t get it cancelled. We can’t get it de-platformed. The best we can do is attach warning labels or (the preferred response today) pretend it doesn’t exist at all.
"That’s how Netflix erases 'Citizen Kane' and 'Casablanca.' It can’t deny the greatness of these films. It can’t remove their artistry, even by the smallest iota.
"But it can act as if they never happened."
2 comments:
The first few paragraphs in Ted's article are about the decline and fall in the sales and reputation of the novelist, John Cheever. Once highly regarded, now virtually unread. Reading about this reminded me of a fact that even Objectivists don't seem to be aware of. John Cheever won the National Book Award for Fiction in 1958 for "The Wapshot Chronicle". There were ten other finalists. One of them was Ayn Rand's "Atlas Shrugged".
The first few paragraphs in Ted's article are about the decline and fall in the sales and reputation of the novelist, John Cheever. Once highly regarded, now virtually unread. Reading about this reminded me of a fact that even Objectivists don't seem to be aware of. John Cheever won the National Book Award for Fiction in 1958 for "The Wapshot Chronicle". There were ten other finalists. One of them was Ayn Rand's "Atlas Shrugged".
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