The Battle for Attention
May 1, 2024 5:39 PM Subscribe
Nathan Heller on the secretive Order of the Third Bird: There is a long-standing, widespread belief that attention carries value. In English, attention is something that we “pay.” In Spanish, it is “lent.” The Swiss literary scholar Yves Citton, whose study of the digital age, “The Ecology of Attention,” argues against reducing attention to economic terms, suggested to me that it was traditionally considered valuable because it was capable of bestowing value. “By paying attention to something as if it’s interesting, you make it interesting. By evaluating it, you valorize it,” he said. To treat it as a mere market currency, he thought, was to undersell what it could do.
The article started out promising, but when it started describing the colour of some guy's pants I lost focus. Why, exactly, was that relevant?
I can understand why the author brought the guy into it and mentioned his name - they were starting to talk about the man's ideas on the subject of attention and media. It's relevant background to say where the ideas in the article came from. But describing his hair style and his wardrobe? Lost me completely at that point.
posted by Jane the Brown at 7:03 PM on May 1 [4 favorites]
I can understand why the author brought the guy into it and mentioned his name - they were starting to talk about the man's ideas on the subject of attention and media. It's relevant background to say where the ideas in the article came from. But describing his hair style and his wardrobe? Lost me completely at that point.
posted by Jane the Brown at 7:03 PM on May 1 [4 favorites]
haven’t read the article yet but i’m reminded of one of my dad’s favorite sayings when I was a kid.
we’d be driving along or walking and out of nowhere he’d say, “what’s the most important bill you can ever pay?”
and i’d look at him with all of the wisdom of a four year old and be like, “the water bill is pretty important I think,” very proud that I knew there was a water bill.
“attention!” he’d yell excitedly.
maybe I should RTFA
posted by one-half-ole at 11:23 PM on May 1 [1 favorite]
we’d be driving along or walking and out of nowhere he’d say, “what’s the most important bill you can ever pay?”
and i’d look at him with all of the wisdom of a four year old and be like, “the water bill is pretty important I think,” very proud that I knew there was a water bill.
“attention!” he’d yell excitedly.
maybe I should RTFA
posted by one-half-ole at 11:23 PM on May 1 [1 favorite]
In a sense, it is bizarre that estar(ser)—an acronym that, being two forms of the Spanish “to be,” is largely un-Googleable—has become the Order’s public front, mounting lectures and exhibitions across the country.
Lol. Birds aren't real.
I googled estar(ser) and the Third Bird Site is in the top 20 results.
posted by chavenet at 3:49 AM on May 2
Lol. Birds aren't real.
I googled estar(ser) and the Third Bird Site is in the top 20 results.
posted by chavenet at 3:49 AM on May 2
Oh marine
oh boy
una de tus dificultades consiste en que no sabes
distinguir el ser del estar
para ti todo es to be
así que probemos a aclarar las cosas
por ejemplo
una mujer es buena
cuando entona desafinadamente los salmos
y cada dos años cambia el refrigerador
y envía mensualmente su perro al analista
y sólo enfrenta el sexo los sábados de noche
en cambio una mujer está buena
cuando la miras y pones los perplejos ojos en blanco
y la imaginas y la imaginas y la imaginas
y hasta crees que tomando un martini te vendrá el coraje
pero ni así
por ejemplo
un hombre es listo
cuando obtiene millones por teléfono
y evade la conciencia y los impuestos
y abre una buena póliza de seguros
a cobrar cuando llegue a sus setenta
y sea el momento de viajar en excursión a capri y a parís
y consiga violar a la gioconda en pleno louvre
con la vertiginosa polaroid
en cambio
un hombre está listo
cuando ustedes
oh marine
oh boy
aparecen en el horizonte
para inyectarle democracia.
posted by signal at 6:16 AM on May 2 [5 favorites]
oh boy
una de tus dificultades consiste en que no sabes
distinguir el ser del estar
para ti todo es to be
así que probemos a aclarar las cosas
por ejemplo
una mujer es buena
cuando entona desafinadamente los salmos
y cada dos años cambia el refrigerador
y envía mensualmente su perro al analista
y sólo enfrenta el sexo los sábados de noche
en cambio una mujer está buena
cuando la miras y pones los perplejos ojos en blanco
y la imaginas y la imaginas y la imaginas
y hasta crees que tomando un martini te vendrá el coraje
pero ni así
por ejemplo
un hombre es listo
cuando obtiene millones por teléfono
y evade la conciencia y los impuestos
y abre una buena póliza de seguros
a cobrar cuando llegue a sus setenta
y sea el momento de viajar en excursión a capri y a parís
y consiga violar a la gioconda en pleno louvre
con la vertiginosa polaroid
en cambio
un hombre está listo
cuando ustedes
oh marine
oh boy
aparecen en el horizonte
para inyectarle democracia.
posted by signal at 6:16 AM on May 2 [5 favorites]
Maybe the author of the article was trying to subtlety demonstrate how your attention can shift beyond your control. I can imagine sitting listening to somebody talk and when the speech fails to engage my attention, my brain will switch to something more interesting like hair style and pants. OR… The author had intuitively felt that they were loosing the reader’s attention and needed to refocus the reader’s attention by shifting to hair and pants. Maybe we are witnessing advanced rhetorical techniques camouflaged as poor writing.
posted by njohnson23 at 6:24 AM on May 2
posted by njohnson23 at 6:24 AM on May 2
New Yorker articles describe peoples' clothes. It's a thing the magazine does.
posted by paper chromatographologist at 6:58 AM on May 2 [2 favorites]
posted by paper chromatographologist at 6:58 AM on May 2 [2 favorites]
I'd (without strong evidence) assume it is because they want to describe the clothes and appearance of women, and someone said "it is unfair we only do that to women", and it came up with the brilliant solution "so lets describe men's clothing as well".
posted by NotAYakk at 7:12 AM on May 2 [3 favorites]
posted by NotAYakk at 7:12 AM on May 2 [3 favorites]
Also, they don't print (very many) pictures. So they have to describe things. Including people.
this is, I think, the offending paragraph:
As an academic at the lectern, Burnett cut a curious figure. He was tall, with a graying backpacker’s beard and light-brown hair pulled into a topknot. He wore sixteen silver rings, gunmetal nail polish, and an outfit—T-shirt, V-neck sweater-vest, climbing pants—entirely in shades of light gray. He looked as if he had arrived from soldering metal in an abandoned loft.
It's not really about the color of his pants
posted by chavenet at 7:24 AM on May 2 [3 favorites]
this is, I think, the offending paragraph:
As an academic at the lectern, Burnett cut a curious figure. He was tall, with a graying backpacker’s beard and light-brown hair pulled into a topknot. He wore sixteen silver rings, gunmetal nail polish, and an outfit—T-shirt, V-neck sweater-vest, climbing pants—entirely in shades of light gray. He looked as if he had arrived from soldering metal in an abandoned loft.
It's not really about the color of his pants
posted by chavenet at 7:24 AM on May 2 [3 favorites]
I bet the level of detail there is the highest in the article!
posted by njohnson23 at 7:29 AM on May 2
posted by njohnson23 at 7:29 AM on May 2
signal, that absolutely made my day and if I were still TAing Spanish...
Flagged for fabulosity.
posted by humbug at 2:31 PM on May 2 [1 favorite]
Flagged for fabulosity.
posted by humbug at 2:31 PM on May 2 [1 favorite]
What a great idea for a secret society: focused on art, somewhat open source, headless, of unclear origin (maybe), with shared rituals. Bravo, you all.
posted by doctornemo at 7:46 PM on May 3
posted by doctornemo at 7:46 PM on May 3
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