Paper

Sometimes, people mistake me for an environmentalist. It's probably something to do with the sandals, long hair and spectacular annoyance directed at people who print out things that were sitting perfectly happy on a computer screen.*

Seriously, I've seen people who will print out a document (that we can both see perfectly well on the screen in the room), scribble (in pen) the changes that we want to make, type the changes back into the document...and then print it out to see if everything is OK. To quote Mil - I have not the words.

Then we've got lovely, sweet, dear, Aston University. The Computer Science department in particular, who I'm sure you'd believe were a bunch of hip, switched on, technologically inclined folks. Right?


_{Woooooo, an orange triangle. That timeless symbol of intellect.}

We've started using a new system on placements now, called Profile, which allows students to keep an electronic diary of their placement. Tutors can view this in real time, and leave helpful feedback, as well as constant marking - rather than one big batch at the end of the year. This is implemented and working well in over a dozen Universities, including Aston. Just not in the Computer Science department...

Over here, the electronic system is completely ignored. Twice a year, students are ordered to print out the information (that the lecturers can access electronically whenever they wish) and Post It In. After much complaining, they now accept CDs...so I sent one in. They couldn't read it. So I emailed in my work. That's not good enough, it has to be paper or CD. Why? For a good reason? No, because the rules (that they wrote) say so. I suggested that they simply print out my email if they want a paper copy, I wonder how well that bit of logic will go down..


But I don't mean to rant.


I wanted to talk to you about the beauty of paper, and the few times I actually encourage its use. See, I'm not some eco-hippy after all. Despite the haircut.

Music. I quite like music, as you may have inferred. I'm up in Birmingham practising some music for a couple of weeks at the moment (more on that later), and now that the music itself is coming along nicely, I'm adding in some of the fringe details. Like lyrics for the vocal tracks.

Somehow, it just wouldn't feel right to write ('right to write', should be a campaign of some sort) these on a computer, no matter how hard I try. I don't quite see why - all of my other creative writing is done on a screen - perhaps it's simply that I enjoy the purity of music, and find that best represented through the human touch, and its untidiness (especially in my handwriting) and innocence. Perhaps it's that technology is one major part of my life, and music another, and I naturally separate them.


_{From the 'sketches' series at TDH}

I also love the drawings on Tie-Dye Heart (by the way, did you know I had a comic? Did you? Click the damn link), with simple strokes of pencil on paper. I know there's plenty of webcomics out there that harness the full power of digital art & effects, with each new image a triumph of technology..but somehow the purity and personalisation of this simplicity is far more satisfying to me.

Thoughts?

--

* _{This is an example of an unattached modifier. I leave it there, offering myself as a sacrifice, in order to bring this blight on the English language to your attention. Please, never commit this heinous crime in your own writing.}