Back when a book was the 'only game in town,' some people wrote enormous ones... Dickens, Melville, Tolstoy... they wrote books that could be used as bookends to hold up other books.
Editorials 100 years ago filled an entire page of the newspaper. 50 years ago they were called 'columns' because they only took a few columns of a newspaper page. Today's 'blogs' are shorter than columns. I notice Google won't give me a '+1' unless my blog fits on one 'page.'
Today's media is small and fast. Look at Twitter... 'tweet' it in 180 characters or keep your beak shut. Campaign speeches used to last an hour or more. Now it's all sound bytes. People often watch the day's top news story on their phone's screen, delivered by a 'talking head.'
Personal communication is quicker too. People used to exchange long letters. Now there's texting, which is best kept to 1 or 2 sentences. After all, the message has to fit on a phone display. I see why so many abbreviations are used these days.
Speaking of abbreviations, one is 'tl; dr.' It stands for 'too long; didn't read.' It's rude, it's lazy, it's mean to use that on somebody who has taken the time to craft a message to you. The only thing meaner is to not bother to tell someone you didn't read it.
So what does 'smaller media' mean to me as a writer? Several things:
- The day of the full-blown novel has passed. If I have so much to say, I should break it into a series and re-use the characters. That worked well for Harry Potter, for example.
- If I want to write news or editorials, I shouldn't look to newspapers for a paycheck. I should prepare material to be delivered by a talking head, though it won't be mine.
- There are many non-reading options for everything that once required reading. Somebody still has to write the words, but one might also need to say them aloud, accompanied by appropriate visuals.
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