"The Overly Documented LIfe"
In his article, "The Overly Documented Life", A.J. Jacobs explores the culture of a newly forthcoming movement called 'Lifelogging'. In a short nine week experiment, Jacobs wears a tiny camera attached as an ear piece, shown to the right, that records anything and everything. Jacobs organizes his piece in a chronological, story-telling structure, in which he explains his experiment and the different ups and downs of it. Jacobs utilizes two main types of evidence: Images and clips of recordings from his camera and also personal examples from his experiment. Jacobs bolds the descriptions of the snapshots, also adding emphasis to his evidence, and then includes the photo below. For example, Jacobs states, "Should I really be checking out the cleavage of that woman" (Page 2), followed by a snapshot of the woman. These snapshots add credibility to Jacobs' argument that lifelogging is a great concept and although it has some downfalls, the pros greatly outweigh the cons, by showing real-life examples of such instances. Lifelogging would allow people "to have recordings of childhood conversations with your best friend, or a complete audio library of the millions of priceless things your kids said" (1). Even finding your lost cell phone or keys would be a breeze. In general, the fact that A.J. Jacobs is writing the article from extremely detailed personal experience, aids his credibility immensely. The argument is pretty solid throughout the piece, however when Jacobs includes the cons of the new movement, Jacobs weakens his argument: "We'll have to censor ourselves... that's the problem with reality-- it's not really life" (10). Including cons to the cultural movement, makes readers feel doubtful of Jacobs' certainty and confidence in his argument.
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