Television vs Books

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What do you think? Do you want to watch TV or read a book? The purpose of television is this: Information - advertising, news, sports Identity - people to emulate and things to identify with Social Interaction - as a basis for conversation or substituted for companionship to ease sense of isolation Entertainment - escape, relaxation The purpose of a book is this: Information - story, how-to Identity - to provide characters or a voice to identify with, to be identified with an author or book Social Interaction - to create a basis for discussion and/or conversation between you and others Entertainment - interacts with reader's imagination One difference between television and a book is that television works from the outside in while a book works from the inside out. InformationTelevision distributes information in the moment whereas a book lets the information lie there for you to review repeatedly if you so desire. Information on television is communicated through voices and pictures that flash on the screen and are gone. Words sit on the pages of a book waiting around for somebody to read them. If you walk into a room and there is a TV on, you may find it difficult not to pay attention to it at least on some level. The sounds and pictures are designed to attract your attention. It is an active, perhaps even aggressive, means of communication. If you walk into a room where someone is reading a book, you might not even notice. One of the chief drawbacks of TV is advertising, however, more and more means of avoiding television advertising are becoming a available every day. So if you don't want to watch advertising, chances are you will be able to find a way to avoid it. The temporal nature of the information television conveys means that the viewer has only a moment to absorb the information. In order to maximize impact,

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