The Bluestocking, vol XXXVI: Dark days, dad duds and digital detox
helenlewis.substack.com
Happy Labour conference eve! Still a few tickets left to see me and Stephen Bush present the New Statesman podcast LIVE on Sunday. Helen A Decade Lived in the Dark Lyndsey also asks reporters not to bring recording devices, explaining, “I can record the interview using my own technology (this is to avoid dictaphones, mobile phones, etc.)—a special microphone on a long cable attached to our laptop in the next room (the microphone is an electrically passive fibre-optic mic).” She requires that “all electronic gadgets” be left at home or in the car, and adds, “Please can they not wear strong perfume or aftershave.” The display of my dictaphone, a tiny Olympus that uses two triple-A batteries, emits a very faint yellow light. Thomas Ruenger, a dermatologist at Boston University who specializes in light-sensitivity disorders, told me that he found it “very, very hard to believe” that such a display could cause discomfort to even the most acutely light-sensitive person, because the energy level would be “so low” by the time the light reached the skin.
The Bluestocking, vol XXXVI: Dark days, dad duds and digital detox
The Bluestocking, vol XXXVI: Dark days, dad…
The Bluestocking, vol XXXVI: Dark days, dad duds and digital detox
Happy Labour conference eve! Still a few tickets left to see me and Stephen Bush present the New Statesman podcast LIVE on Sunday. Helen A Decade Lived in the Dark Lyndsey also asks reporters not to bring recording devices, explaining, “I can record the interview using my own technology (this is to avoid dictaphones, mobile phones, etc.)—a special microphone on a long cable attached to our laptop in the next room (the microphone is an electrically passive fibre-optic mic).” She requires that “all electronic gadgets” be left at home or in the car, and adds, “Please can they not wear strong perfume or aftershave.” The display of my dictaphone, a tiny Olympus that uses two triple-A batteries, emits a very faint yellow light. Thomas Ruenger, a dermatologist at Boston University who specializes in light-sensitivity disorders, told me that he found it “very, very hard to believe” that such a display could cause discomfort to even the most acutely light-sensitive person, because the energy level would be “so low” by the time the light reached the skin.