Neil Postman: Informing Ourselves to Death

I assume many of you are familiar with Neil Postman’s writings on culture and technology. I recently read the manuscript of a speech Postman gave at the German Informatics Society in October 1990 entitled, Informing Ourselves to Death (delivered 5 years after publishing his classic, Amusing Ourselves to Death). I found the following excerpt from his speech especially striking, especially given that these statistics and concerns come from 17 years ago:

“Nothing could be more misleading than the idea that computer technology introduced the age of information. The printing press began that age, and we have not been free of it since.

“But what started out as a liberating stream has turned into a deluge of chaos. If I may take my country as an example, here is what we are faced with: In America, there are 260,000 billboards; 11,520 newspapers; 11,556 periodicals; 27,000 video outlets for renting tapes; 362 million TV sets; and over 400 million radios. There are 40,000 new book titles published every year (300,000 world-wide) and every day in America 41 million photographs are taken, and just for the record, over 60 billion pieces of advertising junk mail come into our mail boxes every year. Everything from telegraphy and photography in the 19th century to the silicon chip in the twentieth has amplified the din of information, until matters have reached such proportions today that for the average person, information no longer has any relation to the solution of problems.

“The tie between information and action has been severed. Information is now a commodity that can be bought and sold, or used as a form of entertainment, or worn like a garment to enhance one’s status. It comes indiscriminately, directed at no one in particular, disconnected from usefulness; we are glutted with information, drowning in information, have no control over it, don’t know what to do with it.”