Talk:Information–action ratio

Obscure reference: At least for me as a non-native speaker with a central European higher education, the reference to "Adelaide's whooping coughs" is completely obscure. What is it? --87.149.179.3 (talk) 19:25, 21 July 2011 (UTC)[reply]

In "Amusing Ourselves to Death", in the chapter on the telegraph, Postman quotes somebody from the time who predicted that the new technology of the telegraph would not contribute to humans' understanding of the world, and that its effect would be to encourage the transmission of information such as "Princess Adelaide has the whooping cough". Postman argues that this comment was prescient, and that the decontextualised information conveyed by the telegraph presaged the bulletin format of television news: a hurricane is happening in the Carribean, Bruce Forsyth is in hospital in critical condition, a mass shooting occurred in New Zealand, the cathedral of Notre Dame went on fire, here is a video of a cute puppy, the Mets lost the series, it will rain tomorrow. 62.239.159.69 (talk) 12:25, 17 April 2019 (UTC)[reply]

Here it is: "We are in great haste to construct a magnetic telegraph from Maine to Texas; but Maine and Texas, it may be, have nothing important to communicate. . . . We are eager to tunnel under the Atlantic and bring the old world some weeks nearer to the new; but perchance the first news that will leak through into the broad flapping American ear will be that Princess Adelaide has the whooping cough." ~ Henry David Thoreau 62.239.159.69 (talk) 12:40, 17 April 2019 (UTC)[reply]

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