BKGRUPDI.RVW   971107

"Growing Up Digital", Don Tapscott, 1997, 0-07-063361-4,
U$22.95/C$32.95
%A   Don Tapscott
%C   300 Water Street, Whitby, Ontario   L1N 9B6
%D   1997
%G   0-07-063361-4
%I   McGraw-Hill Ryerson/Osborne
%O   U$22.95/C$32.95 800-565-5758 fax: 905-430-5020
%O   lisah@McGrawHill.ca
%P   256
%T   "Growing Up Digital: The Rise of the Net Generation"

Don Tapscott apparently gets a lot of mileage out of the story about
his kids being unimpressed by Tapscott's TV appearance that had him
demonstrating how to surf the Web.  According to Tapscott, this proves
that his kids are N-Geners: yet another "generation", this one that
has grown up with, and is attuned to, the massive international
networks, and the technology behind them.  Experienced network users
might take a different interpretation from the story.  Web surfing is
a particularly pedestrian skill, if it is a skill at all, and
"demonstrating" the use of a graphical browser, with its point and
click interface, tends to be both pointless and rather boring for the
observer.

This book takes a rather dubious premise, and extends it as far as
possible, and probably considerably beyond.  In the first chapter
Tapscott looks at demographics to chart the Baby Boom generation
(those born from 1946 to 1964), Douglas Coupland's Generation X (1964
to 1978), and N-Gen (1978 to 2000).  However, a look at real
demographic statistics points out an unfortunate fact: while most of
those in the N-Gen group will have heard of the net, and a great
number might have had some experience on it, even among the singularly
fortunate population of North America only a minority elite have
regular and consistent access to it.  The book itself appears to be
based on research conducted with a small sample of subjects culled
from a single site representing a ridiculously small number of
individuals in comparison to the population of the United States
alone.  (A great deal of the book is based on self-reports from those
subjects.)  The N-Gen may come, but it probably hasn't been born yet.

(The author does, rather frequently, admit that the presence of
technology "haves" and "have nots" is a problem, but he never really
analyzes the situation, the potential outcomes, or possible fixes. 
While there is an entire chapter devoted to the topic, it tends to
recycle anecdotes rather than look seriously at the issue.  In the
course of the review I burst out laughing, and had to explain the
guffaw to my wife by reading the sentence on page 266 that occasioned
it: "Homeless people online at the local library can log on to the
community information bulletin board to find beds in a shelter, a hot
shower, or even medical and counseling services."  Her response was an
immediate and disbelieving "Yeah, right!" followed by the observation
that the statement was pathetically naive and unrealistic.  I really
couldn't argue with her.  I spend considerable time at our regional
libraries, and while we are blessed with access to Freenet through all
the card catalogue terminals, and have, in addition, a number of
graphical Web browsing terminals, I can't say that I've ever seen one
of the homeless looking up a shelter.  The Vancouver CommunityNet and
Victoria TeleCommunity Net seem to agree with me: they don't even have
a listing for shelter for the homeless, although Vancouver does have
one for wildlife.  I think Tapscott has been getting his information
from "Doonesbury.")

One of the great unchallenged assertions of our day is that children
feel more comfortable with technology, and learn it faster than
adults.  Tapscott holds fast to this premise, and uses it frequently
in telling how our kids are going to be much different than we are, or
were.  His most important assertion based upon this fact is the
Generation Lap, which he uses to mean that traditional teaching roles
are becoming reversed as children are becoming instructors of their
parents in regard to computers.  There is only one problem: the
central statement is not true.  Those under the age of eighteen do not
have any magical skill or empathy with technology.  They are just as
confused and frightened about technology as anyone else.  If they tend
to learn more than those around them, that has more to do with the
general lack of experience with computing in the population as a
whole.  If I have dealt with many adults who couldn't remember that a
Window out of sight is not also necessarily out of memory, I have
equally taught children who were so afraid of computers that they
wouldn't input a program without typing on a typewriter first, and
others who had so much trouble with the concept of double clicking
that they had to be taught to click and then hit return in order to
invoke a program.  Even if it were true, though, that children learn
software applications by some sort of effortless osmosis, I fail to
understand why that would automatically lead to an understanding of
the fundamental technologies involved, as Tapscott implies when
talking about education.

The book does make some interesting observations.  Those who use the
net tend to accept diversity, to be more curious, and to be confident. 
However, these occasional insights tend to be buried in a mass of
commentary that is either trivial and obvious (computers are fun!) or
questionable (the Internet automatically teaches children how to
learn).  Repeated statements about the "success" enjoyed by some of
the young people contacted in the course of writing the book seem to
say much more about entrepreneurship than technology.  A defence of
the violence of video games makes a weak nod toward the work of
Bandura, but unconvincingly states that it really isn't important. 
(The makers of violent computer games, toys, and television programmes
will undoubtedly be relieved to hear it.)

Some points in the book may well be true, but unhelpful.  Tapscott's
statement that mass education is a product of the industrial economy
falls into this category.  "Individual" instruction probably *is*
better for the student.  The text fails, however, to look at how such
education might realistically (and economically) be provided, and how
a free-for-all curriculum might result in some kind of graduation or
assessment that would convince potential employers as to the skills of
the products of this type of schooling.  (OK, that statement is a
product of an industrial economy too.  Generalize it, then: how are we
to know anything about the success of such an educational system?)

Other parts of the book are best described as pseudoprofound.  There
are frequent quotes from the young participants that, on first glance,
seem to point out some kind of new age wisdom.  Chapter ten has the N-
Gen focus group express surprise that adults would have trouble
sharing information: a relatively easy statement to make if you have
never put a lot of work into study and the development of information. 
Given a moment's thought, though, the statements tend to demonstrate a
kind of naive ignorance.  This is simply a result of lack of
experience and study of history on the part of the young.  It is not
their fault, of course, and may provide a brief moment of amusement in
comparing their blind spots with our own.

Those who are experienced with the net will find that this book
doesn't say anything that isn't pretty widely known already.  But I
dare say the knowledgeable user is not the target audience.  For the
uninitiated, then, Tapscott provides a bewildering variety of new
insights.  I use the word bewildering deliberately, since many of
these insights are either trivial or untrue, and it will be quite
difficult for the reader from the general public to sort the wheat
from the chaff.

copyright Robert M. Slade, 1997   BKGRUPDI.RVW   971107