J3- Max Dietz

Writing, technology, and circulation are the angles of a triangle. The sum of their parts must equal 180 degrees (or the complete communication), but each angle does not have to be equal. Verbal communication is an example of a high circulation angle, almost nonexistent technology angle (depending on what platform someone is speaking on, be it TV or radio or a lectern with a microphone), and a low writing angle (the actual speech). Before the printing press, when every piece of correspondence and literature was hand written and hand delivered, the writing angle was very obtuse while the technology and circulation corners were much smaller. This is because the entire text had to stand by itself and convey all of the necessary information in one place. Email correspondence would be more represented of an equilateral triangle where all angles are equivalent. The Twitter example, as explained in “Occupy Wall Street,” relies almost exclusively on technology and circulation. The actual text did not matter nearly as much as the constant need text to be created. As increasing technology allows for widespread and instantaneous circulation, the need for thoughtful texts is decreasing. It is actually almost impossible to create a thoughtful text on Twitter. 140 characters is enough for a soundbite or a quick thought, but you cannot make an argument in that time. This is what I believe led to the rise of just saying, “Sad” at the end of a post. Three characters give people a way to express disappointment of disapproval of an idea without forcing them to explain (to themselves and others) why the content makes them feel that way. Still, quantity is worth more than quality. Is it worth it to put a day into writing a letter when you could have sent out hundreds tweets and a clickbait news story in the same time? Besides, most people would have already moved on by then.  Facebook also has a large technological angle, but the circulation angle is much smaller than that of twitter because the publisher has significantly more, but not complete, control over who sees the post. Text is also a much greater factor because there is no word limit. Technology is arguably an even larger part of Facebook than twitter because of how Facebook allows users to combine external media sources with text.