Boy, it feels good to watch TV these days! I know, I know – I’ve recently trounced TV programming for offering little uplifting entertainment, as it did in a bygone era. And last August I boldly reported (perhaps “complained”?) that I’d watched 250 commercials in seven hours of television viewing (which was true). I noted that NBC Nightly News aired 34 different product commercials in 30 minutes of programming! In that same article I also reported that, according to my data, 15% of commercial spots are sponsored by pharmaceuticals, which seemed a much smaller percentage than I’d expected.

Drowning in words, overwhelmed by thoughtless tweets and angry posts, consumed by conjecture that spins out of control as the day unwinds, deafened by TV “news reporters” who no longer even try to differentiate between hard truth, allegations, guesses and opinions… That’s communication today. Talk, talk, talk, talk, talk… Say, tell, opine, assert, claim, blather… Not much time for listening. Not much interest in reflection. Noise.

How amazing, then, to be plunged into the world of communication by touch. Tactile talk. Messaging via proximity. Shoulder to shoulder, cheek to cheek, arm in arm, chest to chest – hugging!

That’s right, communication by hug!

Where do we go from here?

When I wrote “The Election: Who Stands to Lose the Most?” last week, after agonizing about it for quite some time, I really expected people to voice their opinions, share their perspectives, post some comments of one sort or another. Frank Robinson, Licensed Mental Health Counselor, posted a most substantive comment (and the only one), building on the case I had made and further explaining it from a psychological point of view. (The comment is there; you can still read it.) So I did get a response – just not a public one. And, you know what? It wasn’t the response I expected

by Clive James, as posted on The Writer's Almanac

(It pains me to say that Mr. James is probably right.)

Windows is shutting down, and grammar are
On their last leg. So what am we to do?

I suggested this a few days ago, and so I feel obligated (and enthusiastically so) to return to that assertion to expand and clarify. So, can we have too much communication? You know, we probably can’t. Human communication probably cannot ever be excessive, but that assumes that communication is actually taking place. And I think the “exchange” and the “streaming” far exceed the sum total of actual communication. Permit me to explain.

"To Stream or to Batch" - a response

Responding to our guest post of a few days ago (“To Stream or to Batch”), I hate to say this, but might this streaming and batching stuff be “generational”? (Why does that always feel uncomfortable, as if the real meaning is “You’re just too old”?) I do admit, though, that my generation couldn’t possibly have streamed communication as young people do today. Consider, for example, how children, teens and college students used to communicate with each other in perfect batches. (Warning: If you’re a millennial, this might frighten you.)

Guest Feature by Dale L. Oldham

I'll mirror Malcolm Gladwell and write about the obvious. Clearly Mr. Gladwell isn't accountable for my resentment over his success, because countless textbooks have likewise stated the obvious, but that gentleman has become famous and rich just because he can label indisputable phenomena (give me a break: "tipping point"??), provide countless supporting examples, entertain me and leave me seething that he wrote it before I did.

Recently I was cleaning out old – really, really old – files on my computer, the kind that, had they been food, would now be covered with mold and crawling with bugs. Old files! And I came across this story I wrote – oh, probably 12 or 13 years ago. I never did anything with it; maybe I wrote it just to vent. Who knows? It’s a pretty good story, though, so I want to share it with you. Pretty unbelievable, actually. It’s about customer service gone very, very wrong.