The age-old fight of Internet v/s Books -By Aniket from IIM Trichy

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Through this article, I will (try to) resolve the age-old fight – Internet v/s books by sharing my experiences and opinions.

Firstly, stating what is obvious and also applies to my usage, that the internet and books serve different purposes in this world. Although I agree that there is an overlap here and there in their usage. To expand on this idea, I’ll give you an example. Being an MBA student we have a rigorous curriculum and have to submit assignments almost every day. We have courses covering subjects from how organizations behave to how an individual behaves in an organization! But these assignments in their selves don’t cover the whole domain. They are very specific and time-bounded which is very little. 

For instance, an assignment won’t cover how every company conducts its marketing campaigns. It will only cover how a particular company did its marketing for that particular product at that particular point in time. So if we get a mail on an afternoon that we have to submit an assignment by three in the morning of the next day long with attending classes till five in the evening, I don’t think we have the time to go to the library, search for a book which will be appropriate in the context of the assignment and actually find it unissued by anyone.

Round one - The ubiquity

Here comes the savior, the messiah, the rightful heir to the Iron Throne, the protector of the seven kingdoms and the first of his name ‘Internet’, to our rescue. Herewith our expert googling skills and licenses for stat-websites we can find what we want in a very short period. After which we actually have to make the assignments before the deadline and make sure that there isn’t any plagiarism. So, the Internet wins this round in the battle of internet v/s books.

Round two - The concept of detailing

All of this doesn’t mean that books are of no use. To put it nicely, books are like giant warriors who are slow to their feet compared to the quick ninjas, Internet, but their blow will hit so hard that it can throw the ninja out of the arena if the hammer connects.

So, to put this in context, I have been a reader myself for a very long time. Books have given me so much in life that I can’t quantify it. For an introvert kid like me, it was like a friend whom I can always count on. Harry Potter and Hardy Boys were my best friends, Sherlock the coolest person on the planet and librarian was the job I wanted to do when I grow up.

But when I grew up and entered college life, I got my first smartphone. Even though my reading didn’t die, it still went on a hiatus. I started using Google to settle my curiosity now. I was slowly drifting away from my beloved hobby and losing my mind over the miracles that the Internet can do. I was starting to think that I don’t need books that much as I can learn new things on the Internet quickly and in more quantity, rather than sticking to an idea for a whole week or a whole month until I finish that book. I started being satisfied with three to four lines of content on a particular idea. I ignored the whole coverage on any issue or event.

But after a few months I realized that even though I know a lot of things now, I don’t fathom everything about a particular thing. For example, I know that Hennessy Venom GT is the fastest car on the planet but I don’t know what makes it the fastest car. Or I know that John Kennedy was murdered by Lee Harvey Oswald but I don’t know what was his motive. So now I know a lot of things but I don’t know everything in detail and this needed to change. So, after a few months, I used the Internet to help me recommend books that I should read.

The first non-fiction book I read after my hiatus was “A River in Darkness” by Masaji Ishikawa and translated by Risa Kobayashi and Martin Brown. This book is an autobiography of a person who lived in North Korea and about his escape from the hell on earth. Even though I knew about how life was in North Korea, I never gained real empathy for them because I never entered their minds and saw the world from their lens. But after reading this book and getting to know about their struggles to get even get the basic necessities of survival my eyes were jarred open. For example, the mother of Masaji had to sell her blood to buy her family a few grams of rice for a single day. This piece of information would have never reached my brain if I didn’t read that book.

The perspective of a Fictional book 

I am more of a fiction reader than non-fiction. Many people will ignore the things you gain from reading a fictional book. People won’t understand what will you earn from reading about a character who doesn’t exist and lives in a city that also doesn’t exist. But fiction gives you the greatest gift and skill which every person should possess in this cruel world and that is empathy. We live in a world where no-one wants to know why is that person behaving the way he is or what does a gay man has to face on a day to day life. In a world where we are trying to open our minds to concepts that were unheard of in the past but still don’t understand how much pain a woman goes through each month when she gets her period. In a world where the cause of many crimes our male-ego we need to start reading fiction than anything else.

When you get into the mind of a person you understand every-bit of thing that goes into her actions. You understand concepts that no non-fiction book can make you understand. Because the human brain is programmed in a way where we understand things better and retain things longer when we hear it in the form of a story. So, I will give a lot of credit to reading for the personality that I possess. Because reading has helped me understand so much about this world which I never would have understood without it. So in the battle of internet v/s books, books win this round by a huge margin.

The final call: Internet v/s books?

As I said earlier, they both serve different purposes for me and for many. Books will give you empathy and the sheer amount of detail that the internet can never give. But on the other side, the Internet will keep you updated on the miracles and debacles of humans and serve you all this information with just a few clicks. I know that we don’t like a tie. But we have to settle for a tie here and we don’t have a super-over to break it!

This article was submitted as an entry to Become an Author 2.0 with Dare2Compete.