Media-anxiety critiques are wrong about apocalypse but right about real dangers.

Evidence

Doom-laden anxiety about the pernicious effects of new media is as old as the world: from Plato proclaiming the degradation of our memory under the effects of writing to Nicholas Carr decrying the erosion of our attention with the distractive temptations of the internet – all of these critiques are simultaneously wrong to prophesy the apocalypse and right to bring to light certain dangers inherent in the introduction and distribution of new technologies. The digitalization of our attention is as rich in its promise as it is threatening in its commercialization. — Yves Citton, The Ecology of Attention, 233

Categorization

• XREF: The Plato-to-Carr genealogy of media critique connects to both Frankfurt School and to Nichol’s critique of attention economy.