TylerDeadPine wrote: Sat Sep 07, 2024 1:19 am it’s weird seeing a kind of argument in the Tech forum.

Oh, I haven't been paying attention so it's a slower-moving one than in the past. It's always the same argument though.

If you think that the text in a book, as in the ink on the page, is a digital representation of the words, then I understand why we can’t come close to agreeing.

What you’ve just said is objectively, and categorically false.

You're probably right about us never agreeing about this. If you can't understand what I'm saying here then you don't understand the difference between analogue and digital information. And everything I've said about information theory and mathematics will just be whooshing straight past. The qualities of the ink, paper and typeface have no bearing on the information content of the book, which is encoded in the letters, and which can be reproduced perfectly by copying the letters. Hence, we still have copies of books written thousands of years ago. What I am saying is objectively, and categorically, correct. Text is digital information. Digital is not a synonym for computer.

Film isn't my world but I wonder if there are industry equivalents of Steve Albini, Walter Sear, etc.

There are people like Steven Spielberg who, while they accept that 35mm film is a dying medium, still like to shoot on it because that's what they've always done and that's what they like to do. And he can afford it. Then there's others like David Lynch who decided "fuck that, it's the art that's important and digital is cheaper and better" and gave up shooting on film years ago. But I don't think there's many people silly enough to think that 35mm film is a good archival format. It's notoriously unstable and has a habit of spontaneously catching fire.

When you say "other industries have been wooed by ephemeral digital formats" though, understand it's ALL other industries. As well as the music industry too. It's all industries. It's all information. Skipping over "ephemeral" since I already talked at length about how popular digital formats have stuck around for many decades. Nobody thinks analogue tape is the best archival format for storing anything in ANY business any more. I understand some people here decided a long time that analogue tape had been declared the winner for all time, but the opposite has clearly happened. Even in the music industry.

But why so emotionally attached? I don't talk about this emotionally, I think it's an interesting topic, but if I talk about it on here people always get very upset. I think part of it has to do with feelings about time, impermanence, change, the eventual destruction of all things, and wanting something stable to hold onto, to reassure us that the things we create have permanence... but they don't.

Digital information is stored with ones and zeroes.

Words on a page are stored with a common language in alphanumeric characters.

Not a lot of hair to split here.

Alphanumeric characters and ones and zeros are fundamentally the same thing, just a different number of characters. They're interchangeable.

Because we know that English text represents a language, that just means there is a lot of redundancy in the letters, which acts as a kind of error correction. The information density of English text is less than 1, which makes it pretty easy to compress. Like with those examples of sentences which you can still read even though half the letters are missing, you've probably seen those. You can look up the information density of English writing, it's been studied.

I'm not trying to be antagonistic here. This isn't some TimeCube theory I cooked up in my head. This is the fundamental difference between analogue and digital information and it's not controversial. Text is digital information.

Wikipedia entry on digital data. Paragraph numero uno:

Digital data, in information theory and information systems, is information represented as a string of discrete symbols, each of which can take on one of only a finite number of values from some alphabet, such as letters or digits. An example is a text document, which consists of a string of alphanumeric characters.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Digital_data

Carry on. Hex, alphanumeric, etc are all still non digital that needs to be encoded for compilation in the processing steps regardless.

Your argument makes a post it note with i heart you on the mirror to my wife digital.

Carry on. Hex, alphanumeric, etc are all still non digita

No. No they are not. Fucking hell. Are you trying to gaslight me? I've described what digital data is, I've given you a definition, and a link to the Wikipedia article, how much more do I have to do to convince you that I AM NOT MAKING THIS UP

Hex, alphanumeric etc. are SO GOD DAMN DIGITAL, they are AS DIGITAL AS CAN BE. Your understanding of what "digital" means is WRONG, you are INCORRECT and you are dealing with it badly. Don't fight with me about it, go and read any number of books that will explain it if you don't believe me. Go ahead, don't take my word for it. Read a book. Check a website. Ask google search if text is digital data.

Why are you being so hostile? It's ridiculous.

Your argument makes a post it note with i heart you on the mirror to my wife digital.

YES! So is your shopping list. So is the bible. The first human revolution in digital technology was the invention of writing. Writing is a digital encoding, one that you have learned to do automatically in your head.

It's not MY argument. I keep having to repeat this: Information Theory IS A THING

Innocent bystander here, but is this whole disagreement down to the semantics of digital being strictly binary vs digital also being other code?

Seems like it.

I'm hesitant to continue the argument, but it seems like after quite a bit of digging today to understand FM AF's perspective on this theory, and given my occupation, training and education in CS and networking, it all still comes back to binary, hex, encapsulation and transmission. The rest is just perfume

In digital information theory, "analog" refers to signals or data that are continuous in nature, as opposed to discrete, which is a characteristic of digital information. Here are some key distinctions:

Nature of Representation:
Analog: Represents information using continuous signals. For example, sound waves can be captured in their natural form as varying voltage levels.
Digital: Represents information using discrete values, typically in binary (0s and 1s). For instance, an audio file is encoded into a series of binary numbers.

losthighway wrote: Fri Oct 11, 2024 7:26 pm Innocent bystander here, but is this whole disagreement down to the semantics of digital being strictly binary vs digital also being other code?

At heart I think it is about tangibility but It's falling off the sides. It all boils down to this for me, Analog, tangible media isn't as safe as you might believe, and the Cloud is probably as risky as anything else, so take care of your shit and keep your fingers crossed.

I was going to say sorry for the detour, but at this point I think people probably would welcome a break...Everybody's favorite boomer, Mssr. Beato has an new interview with Rick Rubin, and he confirms he is a very successful sycophant and dilletante masquerading as a guru/tastemaker. My bad as OP for not being educated on the depths of his willful technical ignorance, and unhealthy RHCP fixation. Seems like guy would definitely have some good kombucha recipes though.