The television, that insidious beast, that Medusa which freezes a billion people to stone every night, staring fixedly, that Siren which called and sang and promised so much and gave, after all, so little.
Interpretation
The quote criticizes television for its deceptive allure and the way it immobilizes viewers without providing true value.
Ray Bradbury's quote describes television as a powerful and dangerous entity that captivates audiences much like the mythological figures Medusa and the Sirens. He emphasizes the idea that while television entices with promises of entertainment and knowledge, in reality, it often leaves its viewers feeling empty and unfulfilled, ultimately rendering them inactive and passive.
In practice
This quote can be used in a speech about the impact of media on society.
I've written about 2,000 short stories; I've only published 300 and I feel I'm still learning. Any man who keeps working is not a failure. He may not be a great writer, but if he applies the old fashioned virtues of hard, constant labor, he'll eventually make some kind of career for himself as a writer. Ray Bradbury, 1967 interview (Doing the Math - that means for every story he sold, he wrote six "un-publishable" ones. Keep typing!)
I never went to college, so I went to the library.
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You can't try to do things; you simply must do them.
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We say that the world's magnificence has been enriched by a new beauty: the beauty of speed. Time and Space died yesterday. We already live in the absolute, because we have created eternal, omnipresent speed.
Technological society leads to increasing numbers of people who cannot adapt to the inhuman rhythm of modern life with its emphasis on specialization. A class of people is growing up who are unexploitable because they are not worth employing even for the minimum wage. Technological progress makes whole categories of people useless without making it possible to support them with the wealth produced by the progress.
It used to be that we imagined that our mobile phones would be for us to talk to each other. Now, our mobile phones are there to talk to us.
In computing, turning the obvious into the useful is a living definition of the word "frustration".
Technology magnifies differences, and it's been replacing or obviating jobs for a long time. But what happens as that case accelerates? I'm not one of these doomsayers who says, 'There will be no jobs.'
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