Bible Study: Comparing Gutenberg's invention with the rise of the World Wide Web

The course I am taking this semester -- Survey of Publishing: From Text to Hypertext -- is getting quite interesting. In the past few classes we've gone over the transition from manuscripts to printing, and it's quite remarkable how the developments in Mainz in the 1450s parallel the Internet publishing revolution of the 1990s. Consider the page from this Latin bible (from the Library of Congress website):Compare it with this one, from a different bible now housed in the Free Library of Philadelphia:The top example is a Gutenberg bible, while the bottom image is from a "Paris" bible made two hundred years earlier. Gutenberg basically tried to mimic the illuminated manuscripts that had been made by scribes, in terms of the lettering and the use of hand-painted letters at the beginnings of new sections. He did not immediately see the potential of his application for new styles of books and new uses of printing.

When our instructor, Matthew Battles, showed us similar slides in class, I was immediately reminded of the Web publishing models used by many media companies in their initial approaches to the Internet. Web designs and content-production strategies were often based on the same strategies used for paper products.

It's not just a 1990s thing, either. Even though the WWW has been around for about 13 years, we still see print media models dictating website content. I heard from a Chinese magazine editor last year that their news cycle is based on the deadlines and submission processes used for their weekly print edition. A friend who works for a recently launched U.S. monthly said the Web design was carried out by the print graphics team, and was basically a copy of the print edition.

While I am comparing the rise of the printing press and the World Wide Web, it is important to note a few other historical developments. First, manuscript editions didn't immediately die out with the printing explosion that burst across Europe in the 1460s and 1470s. Manuscripts continued to be produced into the 16th century, many decades after presses had spread to most minor cities in Western Europe. Additionally, while the printers of this era quickly discovered new applications for printing presses (e.g., the use of scientific charts, the creation of mass-produced handbills, and illustrated children's books), they could have never conceived of the magazine, book, and newspaper innovations developed in the 20th century. We are seeing something similar happening right now -- paper-based printing is still widespread, while the Web world is gleefully experimenting with new applications and media models. And while we have vague ideas that virtual reality and virtual worlds are the future of the Web, we have no idea of what these technologies will turn into 100 or 200 years from now.

Quick Taipei

Last April, during a family trip to Taipei, I took some video of life on the street and in the temples and night markets, and made a short documentary/travelogue about it, using iMovie. My intention was to immediately post it on Google Video, but the submission requirements for video were too stringent -- the Quicktime Pro export formats weren't acceptable.

How quickly the technology changes! Google has since bought YouTube, and now accepts many Quicktime export formats, including AVI and mp4. I had to mess around with the settings to get the file small enough (YouTube limits file sizes to 100 MB, and the only way I could get it that small was by using mpeg4), but you can still get the gist of the program, despite the resulting loss of quality:



You can see more images from my April, 2006 trip on my posts about Bishan Temple and Taipei street photos: Life under the overpass.

Harvard from street level

I took these shots Oct. 5, when dropping off my thesis, and attending HESA's First Friday event:

The Old Yard, seen from one of the gates on the Science Center side:


Harvard Extension School HQ -- 51 Brattle Street -- as seen from Church Street:


An all-too-familiar rush-hour scene: Harvard Square from the Mass. Ave crosswalk at Church Street:



Memorial Hall, seen from the corner of Quincy Street:

Thesis printing

Last week, I picked up my printed and bound thesis from the bindery. The Harvard Extension School recommends two binderies, Wells Bindery in Waltham and another in Chelsea. I used Wells, because it is quite close to where I live. It's located off High Street in Waltham, within walking distance of Moody St. (NOTE: the company has shut down and the building has been demolished since this post was written).

It was interesting to see the facility. It's old -- the building, much of the printing equipment, the office furniture and even the frosted glass doors appear date from the first half of the 20th century. There are a few computer terminals lying around, but other than that, stepping into Wells is like stepping back in time 50 years.

In many ways, it's not surprising. The technologies used for binding books rely on many of the same materials -- paper, cardboard, and glue -- that have been used for centuries. And while the president of the company told me that the early years of the Internet age led to a tough business climate, things have since turned around. Several parts of the operations rely heavily on digital technologies, including submission of draft materials (in PDF format), credit-card processing, and of course, communication with clients (via email and the company website). Wells now has customers from across the country.

Even if the publication of scholarly theses drops away in the decades to come, Wells still has a solid customer base serving libraries and doing custom restorations and reproductions -- such a project might involve recreating a high school yearbook, or making a duplicate 19th-century embossed book cover, I was told.

The cost of printing and binding my thesis was actually quite reasonable. Three copies using high-quality paper (100% rag) and even some color pages (to handle the charts) cost less than $150 total. One copy has already been submitted to the Extension School ALM office, and I dropped off another in the mailbox of my thesis director. The third is in my bookshelf at home, and the document exists electronically on my personal Harvard website until I graduate (click here to download a copy -- it's the hyperlinked title).

Writing an ALM thesis: Solo effort, a personal marathon, and finding a sounding board

As I described earlier in the week, there is another ALM thesis blog in progress. The other student -- a government concentrator -- is in the early stages of thesis research, but made a few statements about the personal issues involved in writing a thesis. Here is an excerpt from the "Thesis Blueprint" entry:

There is no blueprint. There is a general thesis manual. There is an advisor. There is something of a ‘broad stroke’ roadmap but the specific focus, effort, and persistence is all on the student. A solo effort throughout the early phases — reading, searching, pondering, narrowing down.

But doing a thesis isn’t only about academics; it’s also about emotions. A personal marathon. Frustration, excitement, confusion, hope, uncertainty. Did I mention doubt? So there are two parallel experiences in the thesis: the academic one and the personal one. My personal blueprint: have someone close to you who will act as a sounding board, emotional conduit, a grounding force, a reality check. Academic friends who take the same classes or professors, live nearby, hang out at Pete's Coffee and share gossip — they are the support system we lack because as older grad. students, most of us have busy lives, quite separate from both Harvard Square and Extension.

I totally agree with several points that the writer makes. The ALM thesis really is a solo effort. We're on our own 99% of the time, without peer feedback and peer pressure. We are really responsible for keeping ourselves motivated -- we don't have departmental affiliations and the regular contact with fellow grad students and professors that exist at other graduate-level programs. It is kind of like a "personal marathon," albeit one in slow-motion.

However, I would like to say that the blueprint you use doesn't have to include "someone close to you who will act as a sounding board, emotional conduit, a grounding force, a reality check." It's great if you have someone like that who is willing and able to take that role, but I would like to note that you can get by without a friend or family member to serve as a sounding board.

That said, some feedback is useful, and important. I turned to this blog, and the ALM thesis writers' group to serve as my feedback loop.

Check out the rest of the Mission Control blog, on the Harvard Law School blogging site.

UMass undergraduate sues for poor grade

From the pages of the Boston Globe this morning:

[Brian] Marquis, a 51-year-old paralegal seeking bachelor's degrees in legal studies and sociology, filed a 15-count lawsuit in US District Court in Springfield in January after a teaching assistant graded a political philosophy class on a curve and turned Marquis's A-minus into a C. Marquis contends that the university violated his civil rights and contractual rights and intentionally inflicted "emotional distress." ...

... Based on that formula, Marquis figured he scored a 92.5 percent, or an A-minus. But when the Lanesborough resident checked his grade online in early January, he saw a C and e-mailed Cushing to complain.

Cushing wrote back that he graded the students more stringently on the third exam because they had had a full semester to learn how to write for a philosophy class. As a result, Cushing wrote, Marquis got an 84 for the class. But the students' numerical scores struck Cushing as too high, so he graded everyone on a curve before assigning letter grades. Marquis ended up with a C.

Yes, making a federal case out of a bad grade is ridiculous, but I wouldn't be too happy about getting a C in such circumstances, either -- it seems arbitrary and unfair.

On the other hand, the UMass ombudsman says that "faculty have their own grading scales and that one professor might view an 84 as an A-minus, while another might view it as a C," reports the Globe.

UC Berkeley's free lectures on YouTube

Last year, I pointed to the University of California, Berkeley, and its efforts to spread knowledge using audio podcasts and video. Now, UC Berkeley has expanded the video offerings to YouTube and its huge audience. CNet reports that 300 hours of lectures will be posted on the school's YouTube channel. Most are "hard science" topics. Here's a sample, a 2005 lecture, "User Experience Issues in Web Search":



There's a very lively discussion thread about this effort on Slashdot. Here's what some people have to say:

Anonymous coward:

I'm surprised the internet hasn't made us reexamine the entire nature of our higher education system. Is congregating people in one spot for four years to learn something really the best way to do it? Of course there are physical things that you need access to for a lot of classes, but we could be looking at a future where education is a lot more accessible, transparent, and open. If you could sit in on lectures and classes just because they interest you, there may be a lot more people learning things and getting exposed to knowledge they otherwise wouldn't have. You're right that there would need to be some way to certify and verify things, and that's really the main strength of the current system. I can't help but thinking there's got to be a better way.

GnarlyDoug:

This is the start of education for the masses. Books are nice, but they don't convey enough information of certain types. The lectures will help go beyond that. Even barely literate people will be able to use these to learn. It will also be a huge boon to people with dyslexia and other issues. Even more important is the time-shifting aspect. Learn when you have time. Thanks to this trend a lot of people who might not have otherwise been able to get access to this type of education will now be able to do so. In time they'll probably be able to take tests as well and for very little money get a degree at their own pace and within the needs of their own life.

The exciting thing about this is that it will actually allow the internet to do something really great. Provide effective, free, and high quality education to ANYONE who can get a computer and an internet connection. Which is rapidly becoming almost everybody in the world.

GnarlyDoug again, responding to a comparison with broadcast television (e.g., Open University, early PBS programming, etc.):

The fact that a handful of people said that about TV has what to say about this argument? The technologies aren't even remotely similar. Also, unlike with TV, we are already seeing that the educational possibilities are beginning to emerge on their own. It's not ivory tower speak. It's happening.

Posting content to the internet is basically free and mostly unregulated. The content is available on demand. The internet also provides a means for feedback, chatting, and community discussions about the content to instantly spring up.

Broadcasting on the airwaves is regulated by governmental monopolies and is a scarce commodity. It is regulated, censored, and horribly expensive. No ability for feedback loops or interaction.

The internet reduces the cost of transmitting, storing, and replicating all forms of information to almost zero. Education is mainly a form of information. That is why it will become a tool of education. Even if only 0.1% are interested in using it that way, it will provide that function.

GnarlyDoug again, responding to a comment about the role of books in education:

... This is just the start. Soon these educational videos will include dynamic information. You can't show a heart pumping in a book. You can't show a sterling engine in operation in a book. It's static. With video you can show, well, video. These lectures won't stay just being a video of some professor. Eventually someone will start putting out educational video that is much richer in content and leverages what you can do with video. There are tons of things you can do with video that you can't do with a printed page.

... Thanks to the feedback loops of the internet and network effects, the best videos will be found, rated highly, and rise to the top. So the best sources of information will soon be easy to find.

The current crop of videos aren't all that important. It's what they probably portend for the future that is important. Fully dynamic, multiple approach (written, visual, auditory), interactive, free, at will education.

You can read some more 'Net reaction/regurgitation via the blogs highlighted on Techmeme.