Kathleen Fitzpatrick wears many hats. She is the Director of Scholarly Communication at the Modern Language Association. She is a Visiting Research Professor of English at New York University. And she is the author of two books, The Anxiety of Obsolescence: The American Novel in the Age of Television and Planned Obsolescence: Publishing, Technology, and the Future of the Academy, both of which address issues of the text as a form of expression in an age of constantly fluctuating and amorphous information. This blog (also called Planned Obsolescence) is a continually evolving, polymorphous addendum of Fitzpatrick's thoughts on issues ranging from given names to all-girl a cappella groups to the problems and possibilities of digital networks. While the backlog of entries is extensive, there was a long break between December 2014 and September 2015. However, Fitzpatrick seems to be writing and posting once more.