We are increasingly likely to find ourselves in places with background music. No composers have thought to write for these modern spaces, which represent 30% of our musical experience.
Brian EnoRead
You can't have a relationship with a device whose limits are unknown to you, because without limits, it keeps becoming something else.
Interpretation
What this quote means
Understanding the limitations of technology is crucial for meaningful interactions with it.
This quote by Brian Eno emphasizes the importance of knowing the boundaries and constraints of the devices we use. Without a clear understanding of these limits, our relationship with technology becomes unstable and ever-changing, leading to confusion and a lack of effective use.
Themes
TechnologyRelationshipsLimitsUnderstandingInteraction
In practice
Example use cases
In a seminar on technology and society, one might reference this quote to illustrate the implications of seamless technology on human interaction.
More from Brian Eno
All quotes βI think that technology is always invented for historical reasons, to solve a historical problem. But they very soon reveal themselves to be capable of doing things that aren't historical that nobody had ever thought of doing before.
Brian EnoRead
When I first started making ambient music, I was setting up systems using synthesizers that generated pulses more or less randomly. The end result is a kind of music that continuously changes. Of course, until computers came along, all I could actually present of that work was a piece of its output.
Brian EnoRead
People do dismiss ambient music, don't they? They call it 'easy listening,' as if to suggest that it should be hard to listen to.
Brian EnoRead
In the future, you won't buy artists' works; you'll buy software that makes original pieces of 'their' works, or that recreates their way of looking at things. You could buy a Shostakovich box, or you could buy a Brahms box. You might want some Shostakovich slow-movement-like music to be generated. So then you use that box.
Brian EnoRead
Ambient music must be as ignorable as it is interesting.
Brian EnoRead
Similar quotes
States vote to take away my marriage rights, and even though I don't want to get married, it tends to hurt my feelings. I guess what bugs me is that it was put to a vote in the first place. If you don't want to marry a homosexual, then don't. But what gives you the right to weigh in on your neighbor's options? It's like voting whether or not redheads should be allowed to celebrate Christmas.
David SedarisRead
Marriage is the truest goal for ninety-nine per cent of the human race, and they will live the happiest life as soon as they have learnt and are ready to abide by the eternal lesson - that we are bound to bear and forbear and that life to every one must be a compromise.
Swami VivekanandaRead
Marriage is a series of desperate arguments people feel passionately about.
Katharine HepburnRead
And that's the insult of it, how always it comes back to a woman being a "good" mother in the world's eyes or a "bad" mother, how everything in a woman's life is funneled through her body between her legs.
Joyce Carol OatesRead
There are plenty of men who philander during the summer, to be sure, but they are usually the same lot who philander during the winter - albeit with less convenience.
Nora EphronRead
Nothing echoes like an empty mailbox.
Charles M. SchulzRead