Knitting as a Metaphor for the Digital Life
Librarian. Skeptic. Knitter. That’s me. (Among other things of course – wife, mom, emigrant, reader, lover of puzzles and mysteries – but none of those are relevant here.)
As a librarian, I spend a lot of time thinking about information, how it’s organized, how we interact with it, and how it affects us. That’s why I started Entrelac Information.
The name comes from my knitting hobby. Entrelac is a knitting technique that involves creating an interlocking basketweave pattern by picking up the stitches along the edge of one square and knitting them to form the next. It looks gorgeous when knitted in a multi-colored yarn.
CC BY-SA Wendymoon Designs
Digital information is also interlocking. Data from different systems talk to each other. Sometimes this is innocent and necessary (your bank talking to a merchant so your debit card works). Other times, it’s less so (the ad that follows you around for weeks after you searched for a red leather jacket at 2am). If we can take control of the structure, we can minimize the second scenario.
Oddly enough, knitting provides a great metaphor for the information landscape. Let’s take a look.
If you’ve ever knitted, you know that, while it can be an easy and relaxing hobby, there are a few things you have to pay attention to. If you drop a stitch, intentionally or unintentionally, you’ll have a hole. If you don’t keep your tension, your fabric will be a weird shape, if you don’t add some kind of border, it’ll curl up around the edges. Sometimes, the only thing to do is frog back (“rip it, rip it, rip it” out) and start again.
Before I moved to Uruguay, I had a huge yarn stash. Every time I had a little extra money and saw some pretty yarn in a store, I’d buy it. But I never had a project in mind, so the yarn would end up in a bin, waiting with all the other random yarns I’d bought over the years. A collection destined to languish, with no purpose, growing and growing until it overflowed the bins and stressed me out. Then I’d have to purge. Then the whole cycle would start again.
Sound familiar? This is how our digital lives are, isn’t it? We keep consuming more and more stuff. More newsletters, AI tools, organizational systems, more and more tabs – all under the guise of staying informed. Be honest. How often do you open a tab, never get around to going back to it, then close it when the sheer number of tabs gets overwhelming?
All the way back in 1989, Richard Saul Wurman, the founder of TED, called this “information bulimia.” The fear of not being informed enough leads to signing up for more and more subscriptions (bingeing) until you have so many coming in there’s no way you can get through them all so you start unsubscribing (purging) to avoid the guilt.
And just think how much worse it’s gotten in the almost 40 years since!
Untangling the Skein
All this bingeing and purging – the opened and closed tabs, the subscribed and unsubscribed newsletters, the endless bookmarks we’ll never look at again – is creating a massive, tangled skein of information that frustrates and overwhelms us and gets us no closer to our goals. The answer to this is not a bigger project bag or more yarn bins. It’s twofold. First, a set of rules to help you easily determine what is good enough to hold onto and what you should turn away. And second, an easy to implement organizational system that works with how you think.
Checking the Gauge (Curation)
Gauge in knitting tells you how tight or loose your stitches are. If a pattern calls for 16 stitches in 4 inches, but you’re using really thin yarn and small needles, you won’t get gauge and your sweater will be too small. Similarly, when vetting information, if you use the wrong source, you won’t have a good understanding and your conclusion will be wrong.
We use concepts from information literacy, digital literacy, and media literacy, along with tool mastery, to ensure all of the information in your system is reliable and relevant. We’re not just buying more yarn because it’s pretty.
Creating the Fabric (Organization)
So, we curate. Before we create a bookmark, before we subscribe to a newsletter, before we add any information into our new system, we need to determine if it’s relevant and if it’s reliable. We’re not just buying yarn because it looks pretty.
Of course, before we start bringing things into the system, we have to build the system. The Entrelac MethodTM sorts all of your information into WIPs, Stash, and Finished Objects. In crafting, WIP is short for “work in progress.” I’m borrowing it here because it’s memorable and it works.
W - Working (on the needles): Anything that supports your active projects.
I - Infrastructure (in the project bag): Anything that supports ongoing projects (e.g., banking, home, healthcare)
P - Patterns: Reference documents, SOPs, business plans, etc.
Stash: Your curated collection of future possibilities and raw fiber.
Finished objects: Your archive. Everything you’ve finished and past patterns you don’t need anymore.
To do all this, we use tools you are probably already using: email filters, bookmarks, RSS, file structure, and tagging.
Securing the Edges (Privacy & Autonomy)
The selvedge edge is the edge of the knitted fabric created by repeating particular stitches at the beginning and end of every row. This creates neat, even edges with stitches that are easy to pick up. The cast-on and bind-off edges are the edges where the knitting is started and finished, respectively. All these edges provide structure and stability, prevent damage, and allow the fabric to be joined with other pieces safely. The edges of your digital life are your privacy barrier – your passwords, your two-factor authentication, and using tools like privacy-forward browsers and search engines. They are a necessary structure to keep you safe and intact.
Customizing the Pattern
If feels like everything is about “productivity” these days. But who are we being productive for? The idea seems to be something like this. If you implement this productivity software, it’ll buy you back 20% of your time. Then you can give that time to either your boss or social media ads.
I reject that. “Productivity” turns us into cogs in a machine. I want to get my work done faster so I can go play with my kids, knit a shawl, or sit on the beach with a good mystery novel.
Even when we do implement the software, it often doesn’t fit our needs. We try to shape our workflow to fit what the software allows.
In knitting, if the pattern doesn’t work for you, you alter it. This takes some skill. If you’re a beginner, you might need some help. But it’s possible. And it results in a better fit and a style that’s uniquely your own.
You need to take control of your digital life in a way that works for you. Determine your priorities, learn a few new skills, and make the system your own.
Let’s stop tangling and start knitting…. Contact Entrelac Information to schedule a Digital Audit.
