31 December 2021

Will Future Biographers Comb through Feeds?

«Who would throw away a personal letter? Not one, not unless she was good and angry, and in that case, the letter would be burned, at least in the movies, where it would be tossed into an open fireplace or else lit by hand and held until the recipient's fingers nearly ignited with symbolic fury. Otherwise, letters were tidily folded back into their original envelopes and (if you were an organizer) tucked into files marked "Correspondence" or, at the very least, shoved into a shoebox or the bottom of a desk drawer. Postcards might spend some time affixed to the refrigerator first.
    Instead of letters, will future biographers comb through Facebook feeds, Twitter threads, email chains, and collected texts? Is there any choice?»

Pamela Paul, 100 Things We've Lost to the Internet

2 comments:

  1. I know I plan to spend some part of the New Year weekend combing through favorite blogs I have not had time to stay caught up with. Of course, I'm not a biographer :)

    ReplyDelete

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