An Interesting Coincidence...

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gsmcten's picture
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An Interesting Coincidence...

One of the Apple II threads happened to mention Typewriters.
I believe it had to do with the feel of keyboards.
When I get up on Sundays my favorite morning show is "Sunday Morning" on CBS.
One of todays segments happened to be on the resurgence of the use of Typewriters, not just in this country, but all over the world. Folks are going back to the days before computers. There are new Typewriter Repair Shops opening all across the country.
It seems that Typewriters are becoming the next "Retro" items.

Any thoughts? Smile

Leografix's picture
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Re: An Interesting Coincidence...

Hmmm.... I thought about it for some time by now. Compared to digital text writing (and sending via mail over the internet) typewritten letters seem to be more secure somehow. I always wanted to eliminate "paper" off my beaureau in favour of digital media in any kind but thinkig of information security and other aspects typewriters seem to make sense. At last they don't need any electricity - depending on type of machine. I am always watching my power consumption - especially when running old "power suckers" like the G5 or the Apple Network Server....

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Re: An Interesting Coincidence...

I didn´t recognize that the revival of the typewriters was that widely spread...
but the revival of the typewriters might have another aspect beside of the points mentioned above...
the point i´d rather think about to be worth of a resume is the kind of way typewriters are used...
at least to me - there is a difference about how to write with the typewriter ....
i recognized, that when i use the computer i rather often type very fast "out of the belly" meaning that i don´t bother at the moment of typing the "totel view" and the style or formatting of the text and leave that for the task of "proof-reading" and correction ...
while using the typewriter i am forced to some kind of "self-reflection" to my text before typing it....
this affects to several behaviors - a typing "out of the belly" isn´t usefull - unless i´d like to waiste plenty time with the tipex-fluid - i.e. i must think about what to write before i start typing it ( fashion. expresion, synonyms etc, ) - instead of typing at the conputer where i think about the text while i´m typing it - in a way to get something like "raw-text" to the screen and bothering about the other aspects after it has been typed....
another point is that writing with a typewriter forces to keep more concetration to the style - because the typewriter forces me to "plain text" i.e. there are less "style-tools" availiable ( i.e. missing change of lettersize for capitals - missing change of font-character like the use of "italic-option", missing use of "bold-option" and so on - so the the use of the typewriter forces by some kind of "self-reflection-to the text and style" before typing the thought about where to set new paragraph, where to locate the end of a thought and the begin of a new thought.... and so on...
probably the revival of the typewriters is related somehow to this aspect too....

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Re: An Interesting Coincidence...

True! Writing with a typewriter differs a lot from writing with a computer. I am also writing "out of my belly" here but as I began writing with a typewriter I never forgot to think about all this while actually writing. Seems to make a difference how and when someone started writing, I suppose. Long before owning my first computer I used to write by hand or typewriter. "Old school", so to say.

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Re: An Interesting Coincidence...

yeah, your right ... for example i started with the computer at the age of about 22 and one of the things that i recognize in nowaday-use is - that with long text - i first fix at the computer the structure (i.e. i type the chapter-names or the titels of paragraphs in ) and then afterwards i start inserting the text to the structure....

in school i always had the problem with handwriten text that my brain started at the very beginning to "jump around" trying to cover as many aspects as possible and i started making notes beside on a paper and thereafter i had to "asort" the stuff before starting to write to get it in an acceptable order and "timeline" and "logical structure" before getting the stuff to the paper that was afterwards given to the teacher....

it seems that in some kind of way this behavior rescued itself to the "computer-typing-usage" .... i recognize that difference by the way i´ve written some stuff at highschool at the one side - similar to the "old-style-writing" with a note-sheet beside and placing numbers to the points after fixing them to the sheet - and at the other side the texts written for university later with Word at the computer where the structure was placed first and the text added later....

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Re: An Interesting Coincidence...

I prefer Notepad in Windows or the text editor in Proterm 3.1 to write stuff. It's basic, to the point, and pretty close to bare metal as far as electronic word processing goes.

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Re: An Interesting Coincidence...

I prefer Notepad in Windows or the text editor in Proterm 3.1 to write stuff. It's basic, to the point, and pretty close to bare metal as far as electronic word processing goes.

Keatah,

The differences in Word Processing Software is not the point.
The point is the differences between using a computer for word processing, versus using a Typewriter. Speedy G and Leo are both correct. Using a typewriter for composing documents of any kind is different from using a computer.
Using any Word Processing Software allows you a lot of leeway and slop. You can go back and make revisions and insert things before you finally print out your document.
Using a Typewriter forces you to think about what you are about to place on a page, because (with older machines) you cannot go back and erase what you have done. You have to start all over again.
Here is another point: Forget about placing a Chart or a Table into a document using a Typewriter. It ain't happening!

Believe me...It is NOT fun. lol Smile

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Re: An Interesting Coincidence...

yeah, your right ... for example i started with the computer at the age of about 22 and one of the things that i recognize in nowaday-use is - that with long text - i first fix at the computer the structure (i.e. i type the chapter-names or the titels of paragraphs in ) and then afterwards i start inserting the text to the structure....

in school i always had the problem with handwriten text that my brain started at the very beginning to "jump around" trying to cover as many aspects as possible and i started making notes beside on a paper and thereafter i had to "asort" the stuff before starting to write to get it in an acceptable order and "timeline" and "logical structure" before getting the stuff to the paper that was afterwards given to the teacher....

it seems that in some kind of way this behavior rescued itself to the "computer-typing-usage" .... i recognize that difference by the way i´ve written some stuff at highschool at the one side - similar to the "old-style-writing" with a note-sheet beside and placing numbers to the points after fixing them to the sheet - and at the other side the texts written for university later with Word at the computer where the structure was placed first and the text added later....

I have had many of these same issues when using paper. I will often devote a sheet to each sub-topic in what I am writing as the first draft. I then take those pencil and pen scribblings and make them somewhat presentable somewhere down the road. Your final 2 paragraphs sum that up better than I did.

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Re: An Interesting Coincidence...

Really strange....

Mentioning the word "scribbling" I noticed that I am making sidenotes more often the older I get. Surely it has something to do with the brain's vanishing capacities somehow but I am not that old by now. The interesting thing is that the more complex a topic isthe more scribbeld notes I am taking. And what is even more strange: although I tend to use a typewriter more often I am scribbling my notes digitally on my iPad. Strange how human's brain can be conditioned...

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