We’ve already looked back at the technology stories from 2011 that had us waiting in long lines (thanks, iPhone 4S ), waxing nostalgic (RIP Steve Jobs ) or, in some cases, just scratching our heads ( Qwikster? Huh? ). But what will the new year bring? What storylines will dominate the conversation about the tech industry? We’ve scoured forecasts released by analysts, journalists and industry insiders to find what they say will dominate the conversation about the tech industry next year. Here’s what to watch for: Read full article > >

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Big technology trends and storylines of 2012

Coverage of the gang-rape of an 11-year-old girl in Cleveland, Texas has sparked a discussion about how the media covers rape. However, the conversation could soon end, as the Liberty County District Attorney’s office has asked for a gag order…

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Gang-Rape Lawyer Seeks Gag Order

On February 2, 2011, Harper’s Magazine and New York University’s Creative Writing Program held a discussion between Harper’s New Books columnist Zadie Smith and Reviews editor Gemma Sieff. The following is a transcript of their conversation, which covered such topics as the influence of motherhood on female novelists throughout history, the peculiar pitfalls faced by authors who write both fiction and criticism, and the place of Eminem in the hip-hop canon. Smith’s first New Books column for Harper’s appears in the March 2011 issue, now available on newsstands and to subscribers on harpers.org. . . .

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New Books: A conversation with Zadie Smith

A friend of mine sent me the video below as an expansion on our conversation around cable news. It’s a discussion from the 1980s about why Noam Chomsky had never been on Nightline. I dislike many of the sweeping generalizations which Chomsky makes at the end. Still, there’s an interesting debate here about “intellectuals who can talk on TV.” Talking on TV means concision, making your point directly, and pointedly, in a short amount of time. But Chomsky points out that “concision” actually favors the spouting of conventional thinking.  So for instance, making this specific to me, let’s say I go on television and say “We can salute the bravery of the Confederate Army, while deploring their aims.” This is a fairly conventional point which relies on relatively established mores. They are, in this case, 1.) Slavery was bad 2.) The men who died at Gettysburg, Antietam, and Vicksburg on both sides, were brave. Or some such. Moreover it makes me sound fair-minded in my willingness to allow for a kind of moral out for all sides, regardless of their sympathies.  But let’s say I go on television and say, “Confederate bravery is neither unique, nor in and of itself, praise-worthy. Mohammad Atta was brave. The kamikazes were brave. But bravery in service of evil should never be commemorated.” This is a problem. Even in writing it, I’ve had to take up more space then the previous assertion. Likely, I could edit it down to a sentence or two. But I leave it this way to show how much space and time it takes me to make the more contentious point, one that challenges our accepted thinking, (the 9/11 bombers were brave) and leaves no room for an honorable retreat. Pushing the point further, I could, as was done the other night, simply call the firing on Fort Sumter a terrorist attack. This is almost certainly untrue, but it incites our visceral disgust for terrorism and thus leaves the point of commemorating implicit.  To be, all at once, accurate, concise and emotive strikes me as a difficult task, and I agree with Chomsky that it’s especially difficult when you’re going against the grain. That said, I’m not convinced that it’s a challenge which academics and intellectuals should avoid, or even have the luxury of avoiding. Surely concision, favors the simple and conventional, but this is as true in writing as it is talking on cable news. The problem is that intellectuals are (hopefully) trained to write. They aren’t trained to talk. Going into the next few years, we need historians debating the Civil War’s causes not “liberal columnists” who could just as easily be debating health care or TARP. I’m a liberal, but I don’t really see how pointing out that the South seceded to preserve and expand slavery necessarily leads to an argument for single-payer health care. I mean, I hope it does. But there’s no real reason why it has to.

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Concision and the Public Intellectual

Visit msnbc.com for breaking news , world news , and news about the economy A few days ago a friend of mine who works at MSNBC asked if I’d come on to talk about Haley Barbour. I declined because Kenyatta had a final that evening and my son had math homework, as well as a bedtime. But as I mentioned to my friend, I also, generally, try to avoid cable news–both as a participant and as a viewer.  I’m not opposed to doing media–I’ve been on the NewsHour twice and found it thoroughly fulfilling. One of the high points of my life as writer was being interviewed by Terry Gross. Moreover, I’m not totally opposed to cable news. Not that anyone is pining for my approval but, as I’ve said before , I think Rachel Maddow frequently commits laudable acts of journalism.  The outlines of the problem are becoming clear–I’m a snob. More seriously, it’s my impression that much of cable news is rigged. Complicated questions are forced into small spaces of time, and guests frequently dissemble in order to score debate points and avoid being intellectually honest. Finally, many of the guests don’t seem to be actual experts in the field of which they’re addressing, so much as they’re “strategists” or “analysts.” I strongly suspect that part of the reason this is the case is talking on TV is, itself, a craft and one that requires a skill-set very different than what is required of academics.  I’m sure many academics themselves share the disdain for the format that I’ve outlined. Finally, the handful of scholars who regularly appear on the talk shows, generally aren’t of the sort that hold my interests.  With that said, it’s very difficult to inveigh against these shows when you refuse to participate. The discomfiting facts is that cable news reaches a ton of people, many of whom–presuming they’re interested–could use the information.  The problem is aptly exhibited in the video above on the Secession Ball, which Kevin Levin links to , in which Chris Matthews hosts a debate between Thomas Hiter from the Sons of Confederate Veterans and columnist Eugene Robinson. During the course of the conversation, Robinson repeatedly charges that the “The Civil War was about slavery” and then claims that the firing on Fort Sumter qualifies as terrorism. The panel ends with Matthews asking Hiter whether he would have been on John Brown side in the 19th Century. There are many problems here. I have tremendous respect for the journalism of Eugene Robinson, but I don’t really understand why would be the go-to guy for understanding secession. A fair-minded viewer would likely have been unswayed by Robinson simply repeating “The Civil War was about slavery,” without offering up evidence that this was the case. Moreover, the charge that firing on Fort Sumter was a terrorist act strikes me as only true in the sense that terrorism, in our present political discourse, has come to mean “things we do not like.” But the core of the problem is Matthews’s John Brown question, which carries with it the implication that people have intrinsic qualities and are not the product of a historical process. I obviously have no sympathy for neo-Confederates, but I’m unconvinced that this kind of discourse–indeed the format itself–does anything more than verify the notion that this really is just another “liberal vs. conservative” debate with no real objective truth. Much of what we’re discussing is how academia has, to some extent by its own actions, been cleaved away from public life. I hesitate to speak on television about the Civil War, because there are people who’ve made this the work of their life–actual experts–who should be speaking. But I also recoil at the notion of a host looking at me and saying, “John Brown–good guy or bad, guy? Go.” I imagine those experts feel the same way. As in all things, I don’t write this to offer a definitive answer. My sense is that the reluctance among people like me–and people smarter than me–to engage, is as problematic as the form itself.

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Crisis Of The Public Intellectual

Peruvian author Mario Vargas Llosa has won the 2010 Nobel Prize for Literature, a surprise given that Vargas Llosa wasn’t considered a favorite to win the award. The author of The Time of the Hero. The Green House, and Conversation in the Cathedral…

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Mario Vargas Llosa Wins Nobel