Information is a product. And as with any product, it competes for space. Perhaps we – society –, perhaps we have less time, or more distractions, or some sort of cultural attention deficit disorder. Here’s my Top, well, my Top Four List. Who’s got time for ten anymore?

1. Top Ten Lists You’ve seen these, right? How could you not? In magazines: The 10 richest men in America. The 10 most charitable Hollywood celebrities. The 10 secrets to tantric orgasms. Ten steps to do it yourself Nirvana. TV Shows: The 10 most startling disasters. The 10 hottest booties in music. The 10 most ancient rock bands.

2. Factoids The new news for the very very busy. A number, usually, followed by some information. 4,000: Number of existing viruses on Earth today. 87: The number of people out of 100 who lose interest in any one thing or one story after 30 seconds. 0: Number of successful movie stars named Corey.

3. Sound Bites The new news for the very very busy and illiterate. The average length of a sound bite is 7 seconds. Wait, let me do it this way. 7: The length of time, in seconds, of news sound bites. 7 seconds gets me to the word disorder in my third sentence.

4. Headline News I don’t know about your town but here we have subway newspapers that take regular newspapers and regular newspaper articles and shrink them down to about 40 or 50 words. News for the kind of person who buys 5 second microwaveable bacon.

Perhaps, as we become an international culture, there is more news, more information to absorb, to hear, to shrink down into 7 second bits. Perhaps we are just busier. Perhaps there is too much competition for our attention. Or perhaps, because we have been fed spoon-sized information, it’s the only way we know how to take our medicine.

I’ve exceeded, I think, the maximum length for a blurb. And, it seems, I’ve already lost 87% of you anyway.

SS