Meshing Wesch and Thompson

This article and video explain how the web helps us become better writers and also how it destroys our writing techniques. The article “New Literacy” by Clive Thompson and the video “The Machine is Us/ing Us” by Michael Wesch both imply that the Internet is a place that can help us become great writers, but can also destroy our ability to write as well.

Clive Thompson described how texting, Facebook, and PowerPoint, have all contributed to turning our language and literacy into a, “Bleak, bald, sad, shorthand.” How will this affect our writing in the future? Well, it will literally kill our ability to write essays and all sorts of formal papers. All this new technology can indeed help us out, but if we abuse the technology’s power we could be heading towards a literacy revolution. Michael Wesch on the other hand explained how the new Web 2.0 is helping us become more involved with our writing and discussions around the world. He believes that the new technology is reviving our writing, not killing it. Wesch thinks that if we use the web in a responsible way to help us become better writers then it will help us become better writers. In English class this year, we are learning how to think deeper into what we are reading and writing. The video and article help explain how we can deepen our thoughts about what we are reading and writing and it helps us understand who we’re writing for and why we’re writing. Everywhere around the world people are blogging and discussing how Web 2.0 helps further enhance our writing skills, and by learning how to deepen our thoughts, we too, will be able join the discussions around the world.

Is technology killing or reviving our ability to write? In a way it’s killing our ability to write due to all the texting on phones and abbreviations for words. We are forgetting the Revising Process, capitalization,and punctuation because all we do is text, text, text all day long. The web isn’t all that bad though, due to all the information it can give us and how it can get us involved with the world and the people in it. Take blogging for example, blogging gets people interacted and involved in discussions with other people around the world. Getting involved in discussions can definitely help enhance our writing and reading. There’s a lot that we can lose and gain from the web, but if we gain that information and use it to our advantage, we will definitely enhance our writing capabilities.