By Bradley J. Fikes, C.O.R.
“Is everyone at the LAT 97 years old and terrified of technology?”
That’s the question posed on Facebook by Kate Coe in response to a particularly insipid piece of technology-takes-away-our-humanity drivel by LATer Sandy Banks, “Friending is better done in person.”
In it, Banks relates her unsatisfying, bewildering experience in Facebook. I’ll give this to Banks, she’s completely fearless about revealing her ignorance, even to saying she thought when joining Facebook (in February!) she was “ahead of the curve”.
Perhaps ahead of the curve at the LA Times, which as Coe noted, seems to be overrun with Luddite hacks who think their shopworn discoveries about the Internets are sooooo insightful.
And Banks even admits she was “ordered offline” by her own daughter, embarrassed at a scolding she got on Facebook that all of her daughter’s friends could see. So let’s see, Banks can’t even get online anymore, or can she just not go on Facebook? Does Banks even know the difference? Doubtful.
Isn’t it rather ridiculous for an adult woman to be ordered by her own daughter to do anything? Two of my sisters are on Facebook, and their children don’t mind at all. It’s like a perpetual family reunion. But then, my sisters are quite a bit more clueful about Facebook than the babbling Banks.
Sandy Banks is typical of journo lifers who always thought the printed page would be the vox dei. This doesn’t necessarily have to do with age. Mike K, the senior blogger here, is or will be soon 70, and he set up A Brief History on his own, installing the software directly and not using the canned WordPress.com version. That would have been a very difficult task for me, a whippersnapper of 51, and probably next to impossible for most LATers of any age. It’s the lifer mentality.
Journo lifers, who formed their basic assumptions decades ago and never updated them, often don’t know how to deal with the online world, and so make fools of themselves. But they comfort themselves by concluding there’s nothing wrong with them, technology isn’t all it’s cracked up to be, fire up the Linotype and ignore that bad ol’ Internet.
Or, like consumer columnist David Lazarus, they pursue ill-informed ideas such as making online readers pay. He wrote that in 2007 while at the San Francisco Chronicle, and is still pursuing that will-o’-the-wisp at the LA Times. Lazarus still thinks what would work offline works online. If the major news sites all agreed to charge readers, the public would simply leave them for free news sites. Television and radio stations, who already give away their product, would be delighted to profit from newspapers shutting themselves out of the Internet.
There’s infinite competition on the Internet, but Lazarus still hasn’t figured it out.
And Lazarus still thinks slamming blogs is a sign of insight, instead of losing touch with reality:
“Meanwhile, blogs will continue sprouting like crab grass throughout the electronic ether. Soon, the line separating quality journalism from utter hokum will be too blurry to discern.”
What Lazarus can’t see the LA Times and many other MSM outfits deliver bargeloads of utter hokum every day, while blogs correct their mistakes. Lazarus is too invested in the old order to see that it’s dying. And the stultifying thinking of colleagues like Banks are helping to kill it.
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Disclaimer: As with all I write here, the views expressed are my own, and not necessarily those of my employer, the North County Times.
Banks embarrasses middle-aged women everywhere. It’s ironic because you’d think it would be a reasonable assumption that those in the written media would be the very *first* to be drawn to and master the new media of the internet. It’s always a surprise o be reminded they are the last group on board, and most reluctantly so or feeling resentful about it’s intrusion in their well ordered old school way of doing things.
Such incurious fuddy-duds.
I have some sympathy though because my daughter was furious at me for commenting (not on facebook but by e-mail) that her profile photo was not a good idea because she and another girl were in bikinis. Perverts could see it. Anyway, she told me she was sorry she had friended me. So I unfriended her and she hasn’t spoken to me since.
Oh well.
The bearer of uncomfortable truths is seldom celebrated, Dr. K.
Oh, the LAT is an embarrassment of riches when it comes to fear of all things tech. Click on the link above for a real classic.
Every time LA Observed publishes a missive from some former subscriber who announces that after 40 years of home delivery, he canceled the paper, it just proves the point–only old people read the LAT.
And then there was the story about the 50ish editor who had to learn new tricks–that was a warning to everyone at the LAT, not just the public.
http://www.latimes.com/news/nationworld/nation/la-na-senior-intern6-2009mar06,0,3048189,full.story
Nice to see your name here, Kate! What was the “real classic” link? I didn’t see it in your comment.
Best,
Bradley
“Wow-o-Wow”, Kate! I was embarrassed reading your linked article. Hard to believe they weren’t as well.
Again, I’m just always surprised that journalists weren’t the first ones to jump on the new technology… ahead of the curve, etc….
Dana, you’d think so, but some of the most technophobic people around are journalists. They think they know everything, and that guarantees they will be blindsided by change. Many of them are just waking up to realizing their sinecures are evaporating. And what do they do? Blame Google, technology in general, and the ingrate public that does not appreciate their stellar contributions to civilization.
Here is a sad example of this invincible ignorance, from someone who should know better: http://tinyurl.com/chcc5h
Hey Dr. K,
I got mad at my dad once for urging me (in his wry, sarcastic manner, it must be said) to avoid four-letter words on my blog, but over time I came to see his point of view made sense. Here’s hoping your daughter comes ’round to at least understanding your point, if not agreeing with it.
TOP THREE LATEST SALES PITCHES FOR THE LA TIMES
3. “Hey, if you think it’s so easy to run a newspaper, YOU do it!!!1!”
2. “All the news and opinion that’s NOT fit to print”
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🙂
I’m currently read “The Narcissism Epidemic” on my Kindle as I attend the American Society of Geriatrics meeting. How’s that for culture clash ? Interesting trends coming. Only 1.2% of medical students plan to specialize in geriatrics while it is the fastest growing segment of the population. One reason is poor reimbursement; by definition all geriatric patients are Medicare members. Medicare payment is lousy. Of course, Obama will soon see us all in Medicare.
You must attract some attention with your Kindle, Dr. Capt.!
I had wondered where you were, thanks for checking in. I’m removing spam several times a day, just trying to keep the place clean.