Topic: Will modern technology, such as the Internet, ever replace the book or the written word as the sole source of information?

Recently there has been a very controversial debate as to whether or not the new technology, such as the internet would doom¹ an older one, such as the book or the written word as the sole source of information. Different people hold different attitudes towards this issue. Some people believe that modern technology will eventually replace the written materials as the main source of information; other people argue that it would never take place.

As for me, the Internet and CD-ROMs will change the way we read and write but books as we know them will remain the fundamental currency of language.

The car is faster than the bicycle, but cars have not made bicycles obsolete² and no new technological³ improvement can make a bicycle better than it was before. The idea that a new technology abolishes a previous role is much too simplistic

As the oldest media form, books are still of great influence in recording⁴ information and spreading knowledge, books have a touch upon almost all the aspects of our life. However, in comparison with technology-assisted media---internet, books’ shortcoming are also apparent: they cannot sustain long-time storage and are comparatively lagging behind the time in delivering information.

While internet, the information superhighway, despite plenty of its obvious merits, is not perfect, too. Without written word like books, newspapers, where could people get information if the whole internet system is being paralyzed by hackers⁵. And in terms of health, the radiation from computer exerts great adverse⁶ influence on human body which has been ignored for a long time.

Books will remain indispensable not only for literature but for any circumstance in which one needs to read carefully not only to receive information but also to speculate and to reflect about it. Sometimes the newest, coolest, digital solution isn't the best way to go. To read a computer screen is not the same as to read a book. Books still represent the more economical, flexible, wash-and-wear way to transport information at a very low cost."

We are marching toward a more liberated⁷ society in which free creativity will co-exist with textual interpretation⁸. But we must not say that we have substituted an old thing for a new one.