The image
First published in 1962, this book introduced the notion of “pseudo-events”—events such as press conferences and presidential debates, which are manufactured solely in order to be reported—and the contemporary definition of celebrity as “a person who is known for his well-knownness.” Since then Daniel J. Boorstin’s prophetic vision of an America inundated by its own illusions has become an essential resource for any reader who wants to distinguish the manifold deceptions of our culture from its few enduring truths.
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What Hacker News says
- I recommend The Image by Daniel Boorstin. Smart phone is not the dawn at all but I guess more like high noon. The world is replaced by graphics (more generally , images) for a century at least. Books by "digests", heroism by celebrity and so forth. A little bit of media theory goes a long way to making the world "legible" again. Since we are absolutely steeped in media culture.
- "The Image: A Guide to Pseudo-Events in America", by Daniel Boorstin
- His moral character is the same but we have seen more of it now.
This book from the early 1960s
https://www.amazon.com/Image-Guide-Pseudo-Events-America/dp/...
made the case that ordinary politicians would be made obsolete by celebrities, the question today is “Why did it take so long?”. In 2016 Trump showed stupendous charisma, energy and ambition. He doesn’t come across the way anymore. I think the age issue weighs more heavily on Biden because a certain voter might want to vote for a candidate that seems more vital or “full of life” and if you are mentally comparing 2024 Biden with 2016 Trump, Biden fails the comparison. If you really watch Trump now he is a grumpy old man who is fighting yesterday’s battles.
- Not sure if this is what you're interested in, but a friend recently recommended reading these two in tandem:
"The Image" by David Boorstin, and "Palo Alto" by Malcom Harris
Both offer views on the evolution of technology, but from authors with somewhat opposing viewpoints.
"The Image" is particularly interesting to read today, because it was written in 1962, with the advent of TV, and back then one of the core concerns was edited video and how it was becoming increasingly difficult to differentiate fact from fiction.
Interesting overlap with some of the concerns around LLMs
- I don't know what "intra-elite coordination system" means, but it probably doesn't concern me. I know stuff from Twitter gets on the news and maybe affects what some people do, but mostly the controversies that erupt on social media have to do with the social media platforms.
The biggest thing that ever happened on Twitter (which somehow contributed to Musk buying it) was Trump getting banned. That led to all kinds of earnest and serious-seeming "conversations" and "debates" about free speech and public squares and all that, but in the end what Trump tweeted all day long amounted to nonsense. Just like following what Kanye or the Kardashians do, it seems to mean something, it seems important, but think about it and all you have is spectacle and celebrity worship and gossip. Social media gives us a firehose of pseudo-events, spectacles that seem to mean something but don't. They occur only to get reported on and liked or repeated in the same social media sphere. Daniel Boorstin describes that phenomenon -- which predates social media -- in his book The Image: A Guide to Pseudo-Events in America. Read that instead of Twitter or Facebook to learn how pointless and manipulative social media has become in our culture. That some people may find nuggets of value here or there in the dumpster fire doesn't make it a good thing.
- Ever since I read Boorstin's book "The Image: A Guide to Pseudo-Events in America," everything looks like a pseudo-event to me. Clearly Facebook is being thrown under the bus. Any one of us could say the things she is saying, but congress and the press wouldn't have made any fuss.
I agree with what she's saying, but I'm tired of being manipulated by the media circus.
