This blogger (Nathan Bierma) noticed the same thing I did about Habits of the High-Tech Heart, a book to which I have reacted quite a bit over the past week. I recall reading portions of "Dancing in the Dark" several years ago and recall being impressed with it....and so my surprise at finding so much of the "dark side" of technology in Schultze's latest. I tend to take these kinds of things personally. It bothers me because this kind of treatment; the almost exclusive attention to how technology and specifically the Internet culture, can lead us astray, with scarcely any alternatives for the Christian who wishes to do something positive wirth their communication gifts. The blogger writes:
A book that asks such good questions begs more answers, or at least more suggestions. We’re not going back to an un-wired world, after all; e-mail and the Internet are here to stay. So how do Christians go forward, besides embracing their traditional and moral roots, and faithfully engage new digital technology? In his incisive 1992 book, Redeeming Television, Schultze offers several practical measures Christians can take as citizens, churchgoers, and media professionals in their interaction with the medium of television. A similar prescription, or a discussion of whether one is possible, would have enhanced his latest book.
I must draw a quite different conclusion than Nathan, however. He finishes with:
Nonetheless, Schultze has penned the authoritative theological analysis of digital technology in the new century. It is fitting that he do so; there are few media experts who have the theological depth of Schultze, and likewise few religious scholars who have Schultze’s experience and expertise in the field of communications. This book teaches much about both areas, and, true to its theme, answers the noise of the digital age with a voice of wisdom.
I think that anything considered authoritative would have to be more balanced. Although I cannot dismiss the warnings Schultze sounds, they do not give a clear picture. I got the feeling that Church people reading this book would be discouraged even longer from effectively studying Net Culture. It's already a difficult nut to crack, this penchant in the Church for fleeing effective appropriation of technology. The factions and sub-groups that do tend to "assimilate" much too willingly and uncritically. The book Schultze has written would have been much more valuable if it had explored more of the alternatives; to give some examples of how to do "High-tech with Heart". The book leaves one feeling that there is so much damaging stuff that can happen to a person that it is better to shuck the whole scene. If we do that (and I won't stand for it), then we miss an opportunity; and much of what I mean by that is scattered all over this Weblog.
9:42:45 PM 
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