YouSaid · the spoken record

Chris Haughton

lines on the record

27

first

2024-10-14

most recent

2024-10-14

sittings or episodes

1

sources

podcast

Every line below is reproduced as it was said and linked to the record it came from. Nothing here is summarised or generated. Directory · Search · Corrections

1. “Drawing leads us directly then to writing, writing to print, print, media and mass media and then social media and then that's all harvested to AI. It's one timeline really. So really, and that's kind of how I saw it as one big, almost graphic timeline from sort of drawing to AI and how we got from one to the other. And then there's these interesting stories that happen along the way, but it must be that narrative of, you know, but how did we get to print from writing? And that's the thrust of the story.”

   2024-10-14 · Intelligence Squared · The History of Information, with Chris Haughton · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT

2. “Computing couldn't have happened, you know, if we hadn't invented binary. And, you know, if you trace these things back, each one, you need to step up onto this step before you can get onto this step. So there needs to be this thread. And it is incredible. I mean, you know, drawing literally our alphabet began as drawings, you know, A was an oxhead that turned upside down.”

   2024-10-14 · Intelligence Squared · The History of Information, with Chris Haughton · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT

3. “Yeah, as Paul said, you know just a few months ago, like, literally, Chris, anything, any two facts that you have here between those two facts, you could write a book, you know, like this is, and this is the problem with this. This history And this is why I love their course so much because the history of information, it's basically, you know, showing how, because really each of these technologies lead to the next, you know, each one, there is some element of it that brings us to, you know.”

   2024-10-14 · Intelligence Squared · The History of Information, with Chris Haughton · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT

4. “I was doing all of this sort of advertising and earning money through that, but it wasn't ultimately fulfilling. And I wanted to do something that I really believed in. And I took some time off, did that. And people then did respond to it. And we all have to do that in our own way. I mean, we're all part of the system, but we need to sort of... Know because it's ultimately helping if we manage to do that, the system becomes a bit more You know, not quite so cutthroat, and everybody wants to do it. It benefits everyone. So just take some time off and make your picture book or make your whatever work in education or do something inspiring for others, I think is all we can do, right?”

   2024-10-14 · Intelligence Squared · The History of Information, with Chris Haughton · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT

5. “I know that this is the problem. I mean, really. And that is the point that Nam Chomsky has in manufacturing consent, that this argument that... In the USSR, they'll come after journalists and people in the media in the middle of the night, whereas here they come after you in the middle of the day to take your house because you can't afford rent if you're not working doing sort of PR or some sort of not particularly ethical work. But yeah, it's just, I think... Know, I mean, we all have to survive, we all have to do things, but do things that you really believe in. And I think ultimately people respond to that. You know, one of the reasons that I made my picture books was.”

   2024-10-14 · Intelligence Squared · The History of Information, with Chris Haughton · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT

6. “You know, on the bookshelf and do the exact opposite, make the cover like bright pink with just a single eye on it. It's advertising. You've got one shot. You've got to do the opposite of whatever else is doing.”

   2024-10-14 · Intelligence Squared · The History of Information, with Chris Haughton · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT

7. “No logo and reading about Noam Chomsky and manufacturing consent. And then literally you leave our college. And the only thing that will pay you enough to cover rent is advertising. So I was straight into, you know, and I was sort of doing, I actually really enjoyed doing it. It's very creatively fulfilling if you sort of switch that part of your mind off because, you know, it's so much fun and coming up with taglines and this sort of thing. But yeah, ultimately it's, I mean, it is a form of disinformation and it's just playing on all of these things that make us tick and trying to hijack the attention. Here you are in a busy street or looking at a phone. How do you grab attention? Did that with my book? I mean, I basically kind of looked at what all of the other covers look like.”

   2024-10-14 · Intelligence Squared · The History of Information, with Chris Haughton · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT

8. “Absolutely. No advertising, you know, as I said with the At the four oars, the rhythm Rhine repetition redundancy, you see that again and again in advertising. I worked in advertising for 10 years before I began making picture books. And it was something that I felt kind of uncomfortable with. Visually, you know, in art college Doing sort of”

   2024-10-14 · Intelligence Squared · The History of Information, with Chris Haughton · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT

9. “Propaganda had a bad name. He coined the term public relations. So, you know, they are very much connected. And that's something that we don't, you know, I am a being a bit cheeky, but really it's absolutely true that they're entirely connected. And a lot of these theories of psychology, group psychology came from propaganda and moved into consumer culture and created the consumer world that we have today.”

   2024-10-14 · Intelligence Squared · The History of Information, with Chris Haughton · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT

10. “And we see a real change in the communication between advertising before the 1920 and advertising afterwards. And the real pioneer in this is Edward Bernays, who is Sigmund Freud's nephew. And in actual fact, Bernays probably has a very large hand in how he created Freud really as a personality. He was promoting his uncle and all of the sort of the sexual, the theories, it's pure Edward Bernays and it's very media friendly. A lot of Freud's theories that sort of people think of when we think of Freudian. At Edward Bernay's wrote a book called Propaganda in the 1920s. Really instrumental part of the CPI that the Committee for Public Information. And then after...”

    2024-10-14 · Intelligence Squared · The History of Information, with Chris Haughton · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT

11. “Yeah, well, there is a big connection to advertising and PR stepped up a level after the First World War because the First World War, I mean, it's crazy the numbers. Committee for Public Information, which was the US Propaganda Arm, I think they hired 150,000 people within a year, something like that, just enormous amounts of people. I am all crafting these messages and going to cinemas and giving these four minute talks, the four minute men.”

    2024-10-14 · Intelligence Squared · The History of Information, with Chris Haughton · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT

12. “And really, that is what it is. So they make this argument that, well, you know, we're sharing information through language, then we're sharing information through writing and print. And as our systems of sharing information get better and better, our Our ability to control and to create technology gets better and better. So, you know, and now today, I mean, you know, literally everything is being recorded. We have just all of this metadata, you know, even things that you don't think are being recorded or being recorded and flight paths and all of our location services and everything, you know. And we have AI that is seeing all these connections, even humans can't see. So, yeah, it's accelerating and accelerating, yeah.”

    2024-10-14 · Intelligence Squared · The History of Information, with Chris Haughton · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT

13. “Yeah, well, this is that, you know, really the sort of point of the book, the very first. Lectured that started this course off that Jeff and Paul did, they said, Why does technology improve? And they just asked the class, you know. And so everyone was coming back with, you know, just different things that, you know, more experienced craft makers and technology and better materials and all this sort of thing. And none of them were really very satisfactory. But Jeff and Paul said, well, no, it's information. You know, it's just we have better and better information. And once you have information on how to make this thing like that and you have information about how it goes wrong, then you can make a better product or a better phone or computer. And I mean, it's so dafty, you know, simple. It's just brilliant, you know.”

    2024-10-14 · Intelligence Squared · The History of Information, with Chris Haughton · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT

14. “Going to have much more influence. So we see this, and printers became, you know, especially then when we get to industrialization, they become enormously expensive. You know, literally the people who are running these printers were the richest people in the world. So we see the Pope and all the power of the church being the richest bodies in the world to these press barons, hugely wealthy media owners who then become the richest people in the world literally and then all the way up today in our own generation we've seen the disruptive power of internet and social media and these young kids basically who developing something in their bedroom or in their college dorm and then suddenly it disrupts the entire power system and they become now the richest people in the world.”

    2024-10-14 · Intelligence Squared · The History of Information, with Chris Haughton · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT

15. “There's no evidence that we have that he nails the ninety-five thesis to the church door. But we do actually have evidence that he had a friend who was a printer and he gave the 95 thesis to the printer. This printed then text spread all across Germany within two weeks and within two months it was all across Europe. And, you know, this completely split Europe into two and has all of these repercussions and really, you know, the power of the church starts to drop and we see the power of the printers and those who own the printers. Because as soon as printing takes off, it's very important with printing technology, you know, if you have a printer that can print more copies than your competitor.”

    2024-10-14 · Intelligence Squared · The History of Information, with Chris Haughton · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT

16. “Yeah, I mean, was sort of the point at the very end of the book is, you know, what is information? And it is the core of our entire society. Everything runs through information. So every time there is this new information technology, it completely changes the structure of society. So yes, we have during medieval times the most advanced information technology was the written word and so we see the church uses the written word and becomes the most powerful body in Europe. And then this monopoly is broken once the printing press comes out and we see, you know, Martin Luther, really sort of the first person to go viral, you know, that's actually a myth about...”

    2024-10-14 · Intelligence Squared · The History of Information, with Chris Haughton · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT

17. “Is student Plato learned to write and became enthusiastic about writing? And then Aristotle, his students then had a library. So, you know, the attitude changed, but, you know, Socrates did have a point. And with all of these people, at every information technology, there are these sort of early adopters and skeptics. And they all have points. A lot of the points that Socrates raised came to pass. You know, religions, the world religions rose and people just weren't questioning. They were following these laws without thinking about it, which caused all sorts of trouble later on down the road. So, you know, he had some very good points.”

    2024-10-14 · Intelligence Squared · The History of Information, with Chris Haughton · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT

18. “Exactly. Yeah. So Socrates was not an early adopter for writing. So I did a page on early writing and I had Socrates as the skeptic. It was like, I don't know, there's no knowledge in this writing. It's just people will lose the memory and you can't interrogate it. And it's not intelligent. And Confucius was the opposite. It was an early adopter. And he lived at a time when there was a lot of war and he thought, well, look, if we write everything down and have different laws and we'll have a smoother society, there'll be less war if we can all agree on these things. But Socrates, I mean, Socrates had some great points, but then obviously his...”

    2024-10-14 · Intelligence Squared · The History of Information, with Chris Haughton · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT

19. “There's all of these traits that the characters in myths tend to be bananas. They have snakes for hair and they are born from a golden egg and all of these things that are very, very memorable. And because it's the myth that have these unusual characteristics are the ones that will stay with us because the other ones will just be forgotten. And what we're left with are these highly unusual, very memorable characters and events.”

    2024-10-14 · Intelligence Squared · The History of Information, with Chris Haughton · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT

20. “So in a rook, the Sumerians actually sort of did this ceremony for when somebody bought a house, they would have this sort of big, almost like comedy nail that they'd hammer into the lintel above the door. And everyone would gather round. And that was, you know, you've bought this house. So that then if there was some issue later on, 10, 20 years later, people would go, wait a minute, I remember it wasn't you that hammered that big name. And above the door, it was, you know, your uncle or this sort of thing. So these things are very important just ways to remember. And yeah, I mean, I could talk for ages about this, but myths, you know, myths have myths obviously mean from the mouth, Greek for oral culture. And, you know, we...”

    2024-10-14 · Intelligence Squared · The History of Information, with Chris Haughton · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT

21. “You have to reiterate again and again and again just to make sure that your audience is getting it because this is an important part of the story and if they miss that then they lose the rest of the story whereas with writing you know you can loop back and it doesn't need to be emphasized so much so this is There's so many interesting sort of parts of sort of oral culture, but there's that. It has sort of these links to musicality and song. So if you all parents or adults when they talk to a very small child they have what's known as infant directed speech. So it's this sort of talking to children through with sort of with song. So emphasizing, oh, you know, ah, you okay, you know, this sort of thing. It's emphasizing all. Of the sounds of our language and doing it through tone as well. And then we have great difficulty”

    2024-10-14 · Intelligence Squared · The History of Information, with Chris Haughton · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT

22. “Yeah, this is something that I'm really interested in myself as a picture bookmaker. I usually make pictures for the very young. And really that's kind of oral culture. You know, I'm writing a book that will be performed in front of young child so that there's certain techniques that are very effective in oral culture. And they call it the four ores, rhythm, rhyme, repetition, and redundancy. And we see these all throughout, you know, any sort of jokes, you know, knock-not jokes and, you know, the three paddy Englishmen, Irishmen, Scotsmen, this sort of this rule of three and repetition and redundancy is the only one that needs explaining. You say things, say in the three little pigs, he huffs and he puffs.”

    2024-10-14 · Intelligence Squared · The History of Information, with Chris Haughton · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT

23. “And so we had this sort of relationship where they would, you know, they'd add a few things or say, tell me about things that they thought it was missing, or I was getting sort of the wrong end of the stick. But really, it is their story. The only major change that I did was I added a chapter on drawing, which as an illustrator, I think it deserved its own chapter. So it goes from language to drawing in my version to writing and then print and then electronic media, well, newspapers electronic media, radio, TV, computers, and the internet.”

    2024-10-14 · Intelligence Squared · The History of Information, with Chris Haughton · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT

24. “Quite busy, and I was like, Do you mind if I do it? And I'm really fascinated by this and would that be all right? And they said, sure, yeah. And they gave me all the reading materials and it started from there. So I emailed them in 2009 for the first time. And literally then I sort of went off. Six months a year, two years. Every so often I just come back with some visuals and say, what do you think of that? And they were basically saying sort of, Grace, you know.”

    2024-10-14 · Intelligence Squared · The History of Information, with Chris Haughton · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT

25. “I think this history is so crucial to our whole history, and it's not really taught as much. You know, the sort of history of the mass media, the history of newspapers, the history of, you know, when did advertising start on TV and what effect that had. When did all of these things, which I learned in college, you know, sort of these innovations in print technology have these massive effects on the world, you know, the beginnings of mass media. And I always thought, wow, this is so crucial to, you know, where we've got now. And nobody really knows anything about it, apart from these very specialist sort of graphic and design history books. So in answer to why did I have to write my own one, I emailed that the lecturers, Jeff Nunberg and Paul Dugood, and I said, I absolutely.”

    2024-10-14 · Intelligence Squared · The History of Information, with Chris Haughton · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT

26. “My background as a graphic designer and sort of the history of graphic design, the course was about the history, you know, the history of information technologies, computers, internet, phones, but they took this very wide view and looking at drawing as an information technology and writing as an information technology and connecting all of this.”

    2024-10-14 · Intelligence Squared · The History of Information, with Chris Haughton · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT

27. “Yeah, so I've been an illustrator for many, many years and I studied visual communication. And I loved that part of it, you know, the sort of graphic design and communicating visually. And even in college, I loved all that sort of the media theories, you know, and visual communication theories. And then I heard in 2006 UC Berkeley was putting all of its undergraduate lectures online. They were the first in the world to do this. It was part of the MOOC massive online open courses. And so I went on to that and I listened to a few lectures on philosophy and psychology and this sort of thing. And then this one popped up called the History of Information. And I clicked on that and I was just absolutely hooked from the very first lecture. And it sort of fed in really closely with.”

    2024-10-14 · Intelligence Squared · The History of Information, with Chris Haughton · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT