The Guns and Forts of Vung Tau: making it even more useful.
By Paul Rowe
Article two
As promised article two will look at the pros and cons of a shoe box.
A shoe box is the metaphor for a compilation/work in progress.
The Guns and Forts of Vung Tau is a compilation which is an on-going work in progress.
The advantages of a compilation are two fold:
So, if The Guns and Forts of Vung Tau was written to be useful, AND IT WAS, then we are in a predicament young Ern.
By Paul Rowe
Article two
As promised article two will look at the pros and cons of a shoe box.
A shoe box is the metaphor for a compilation/work in progress.
The Guns and Forts of Vung Tau is a compilation which is an on-going work in progress.
The advantages of a compilation are two fold:
- The author uses the compilation to quickly and easily gather and store content (a bit like a shoe box which collects random “important” stuff across time, but spends its entire life in the bottom of some wardrobe).
- The other advantage is that authors/compilers know that compilations are not criticized as personally as author-produced material might be, because the content is written by others. Both advantages of compilations are advantages for the compiler not the reader.
- Compilations are often more difficult to read and ultimately understand. This is because a compilation contains the work of many authors. Authors have their own writing styles and idiosyncrasies. In a book written by a single author, readers have time to adjust to the author’s writing style and idiosyncrasies. This “adjustment” can manifest itself as appreciation by the reader. However, within a compilation the reader is expected to read/wade-through content that is written by multiple authors. Jumping in and out of multiple writing styles is difficult reading. This is magnified in a compilation recording history, because historical writing is not that fluid and easy to read because it often moves from fact to fact with few adjectives. This disadvantage is a disadvantage to the readers.
So, if The Guns and Forts of Vung Tau was written to be useful, AND IT WAS, then we are in a predicament young Ern.