the modern common book

the internet’s sprawling databases, real-time social-media networks, and globe-spanning e-commerce platforms have made almost everything immediately searchable, knowable, or purchasable—curbing the social value of sharing new things. Cultural arbitrage now happens so frequently and rapidly as to be nearly undetectable, usually with no extraordinary... See more

When research is your leisure activity, you’ll end up making connections between your existing interests and new ideas or topics. Everything gets pulled into the orbit of your intellectual curiosity. You can go deeper and deeper into a narrow topic, one that seems fascinatingly trivial and end up learning about the big topics: gender, culture, econ... See more

On the decidedly informal and amateur end (I use the term amateur lovingly and respectfully!)...I’d also say that the best content on the internet is created by people who have turned research into their leisure activity.

Who is doing this kind of research as leisure activity? Artists, often. To return to the site that originally inspired this post—I’d say that the artist/designer/educator Laurel Schwulst uses Are.na to develop and refine particular themes, directions, topics of inquiry...some of which become artworks or essays or classes that she teaches.

People wh... See more

Research as leisure activity is directed by passions and instincts . It’s fundamentally very personal: What are you interested in now ? It’s fine, and maybe even better, if the topic isn’t explicitly intellectual or academic in nature. And if one topic leads you to another topic that seems totally unrelated, that’s something to get excited about—no... See more

Concretely: researchers need to do a literature review that is simultaneously comprehensive and specific, that helps situate them in existing bodies of knowledge.

Research begins with a desire to ask and answer questions, thereby contributing to the greater sum of human knowledge and culture .

The idea of research as leisure activity has stayed with me because it seems to describe a kind of intellectual inquiry that comes from idiosyncratic passion and interest. It’s not about the formal credentials. It’s fundamentally about play . It seems to describe a life where it’s just fun to be reading, learning, writing, and collaborating on idea... See more

Wildenhaus’s description has stayed with me because it reflects how the best software products aren’t just assemblages of functionality ,exposed by particular formal elements (links, buttons, icons, menus). Rather, they organize and shape how you think, and they create or sustain a particular lifestyle:

• How you think: In 1985, the writer and critic

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