Analog Media Log

UNHEARD VOICES EDITS-2

This last week I kept a log of my media consumption through digital devices (desktop, laptop and cellphone). Quickly it became evident that I was logging nearly everything that I did except sleeping. In some cases I was also leaving out talking to people (when it didn’t involve Skype, the quick Google to illustrate a point or notes typed out in a Word Doc) and on occasion I would spend time walking from place to place without texting or listening to a podcast but I learned this was rare.

 

I am reminded of my first Bikram yoga class as I reflect on my experience over the last week. The 90 minutes of class felt like the longest stretch of time I had gone while being awake in the last 2 years without wanting to reach for my phone and check my email and Facebook. For those blissful 90 minutes I just tried not to die in that over heated room. I wasn’t fighting the impulse to check my phone, instead my brain was occupied with just trying to fight for the most basic of my needs in Maslow’s Hierarchy. If I couldn’t breathe I couldn’t think about my cellphone.

 

The next class when I returned it was easier to breathe, my body had acclimated a bit and I found my attention drifting. This week I learned that I basically need to be in complete physical peril, focused on an immediate task that will have real time consequences without my undivided attention or, asleep, to not be either thinking about consuming media and fighting the occasional impulse or just succumbing to that impulse.

 

UNHEARD VOICES EDITS

The other reflection I have about the week is that I couldn’t figure out a good way to measure engagement. I was constantly acknowledging the existence of media surrounding me (advertisements on digital screens at the T stop or catching a glimpse of a neighbor’s laptop screen) that I did not engage with in a meaningful way. Instead this content just fluttered in and out of my periphery. But what I felt more curious about was how much content I chose to engage with (i.e. I clicked on something to learn more, selected a podcast or played a TV show) without feeling like I had comprehended it, consumed it or leaned from it. Throughout the week my use of media broke down into the following primary categories

 

  • media as background white noise
  • media as stimulation and elected distraction
  • media for learning through consumption
  • media for tools for learning through production
  • media for communication

 

SIDE NOTE:I was fairly effective at tracking numbers 1, 3, 4, and 5 but media as stimulation and elected distraction was very hard to log. This type of consumption is often so automatic it is inconspicuous. I would get home and realize that I had checked my email and Facebook on the train but had forgotten to log it.

 UNHEARD VOICES EDITS-3UNHEARD VOICES EDITS-4

(media log and coding)

The bulk of my media consumption was to stimulate, distract or sooth me while I was engaging in another auxiliary activity. I would often find myself re-listening to episodes of podcasts because I would disengage in the narrative for long periods of time while I focused on something else and then re-engage only to realize I had lost my place in the story. But also sometimes this would not bother me. XFiles would play in the background as I edited videos while I had no intention of following the story plot.

 

By the end of the week I felt like it was not enough to have tracked what I had consumed but I also wanted to know what I had retained and my level of comprehension from the content consumption. (I couldn’t tell you the title of one article I clicked to from Facebook this week but I know I clicked on at least 20. ) That exercise I suppose is for another time.