Computers and Writing

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Reading Response 5 – Chapter Summaries

November 10th, 2005 · 12 Comments
Philip




Chapter 13 explores the way corporate web-sites use technology to influence consumers to purchase their products. Citing Marshall McLuhan’s book Understanding Media, Rice points out two media types: hot and cool. Hot media requires little participation from the audience, while cool media requires “so much participation that they force media forms to participate in each other’s production and meaning” (137). CNN Headline News, for example, juxtaposes various news updates in weather, sports, and the stock market on the same screen. Corporations also use a marketing technique called creating tie-ins. Products that promote movies are good examples of how corporations use tie-ins to interlink two or more products. By studying how technology has influenced modern commercialism, we can incorporate these techniques in writing cool “to forge complex connections that will persuade our readers to agree with points we want to make” (141).

In chapter 14, Rice refers to cyberspace as a “collage of unfinished works that become complete only when we, the readers or viewers, determine their meanings” (145). We as readers become actively involved in the works as we try to find the associations and connections in the information presented. SportsLine, a CBS sports website, for example, contains articles from independent writers, but by posting these articles on this website, SportsLine implies they are related. On the other hand, Everything2.com illustrates how hyperlinking different texts can lead to a common idea. Everything2.com’s collaborative writing process forces the reader to become actively involved in determining the connections made through its hyperlinks. Rice also demonstrates how cool writing can be allusive, therefore again requiring the reader to make assumptions not explicitly stated. Rice reiterates because the reader is actively involved in reading process, cool writing must prompt participation.

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