Mastodawn

Clive Thompson Sep 30, 2023

"Let's Stop Calling It 'Content''

I first starting noticing the word "content" in the late 90s

Companies looking to put writing, animation, video or art on their web sites would call it "content"

It flattened innumerable forms of culture into a sort of *goo*, extruded from a tube

25 years on, the term "content" has metastasized, eating whole the way many people talk about -- *think* about -- culture.

Let's stop now

My essay: https://clivethompson.medium.com/lets-stop-calling-it-content-8410bf5f94a9

A free link: https://clivethompson.medium.com/lets-stop-calling-it-content-8410bf5f94a9?sk=7a2668c44c31a4359876cfcd25a5f2d0

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Tim Carmody Sep 30, 2023

@clive I totally disagree! I think we need to change the contexts where we use the word “content” and yes, specificity when possible is better. But it’s a one hundred percent useful word in the proper context (usually when contrasting with the equally capacious “form” or “design”) and often the only word that will do!

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argonaut

@tim @clive saying that information is content is like saying that water or juice or sauce are content. It’s useful for those who care mostly about the glass, but neither for the drinker, nor for the juicemaker, nor the waterer, nor the chef, because it hides its value by describing it by its shape, which is not intrinsic, and not its substance.