“We need to work up our ignorance muscles”
Sam Anderson in the New York Times discussing information overload, James Gleick’s new book The Information: A History, A Theory, A Flood, and the overwhelming inclusiveness of the internet on one hand and the restraint of the traditional almanac on the other:
Like the Web, the almanac aspires to be a total information delivery system – the source of every datum you will ever need. Unlike the Web, however, the almanac aims for exhaustiveness within clearly defined limits. It has a front cover and a back cover. Compared with the Internet, it feels wonderfully contained and stable – it is curated omniscience, portion-control Google. Much of its value comes from the empty spaces around its edges, the missing entries in its index, the silence that descends when you close it.