WHO'S THE WINNER?

I should disqualify myself as irrelevant. The high tech craze seems to be growing, for reasons I simply can’t comprehend. Understand? Yes. But truly and actually absorb into my faltering intellect – no.

It was with a combination of elderly bemusement and financial disorientation that I saw this morning’s G&M piece about how high tech gadgets are selling while big ticket items like refrigerators and clothing are sagging. One person who commented: a 25 year old schoolteacher said that he has to keep up with all the latest in smart phones and other such clutterata, but his toaster doesn’t need updating. There are two possible conclusions to be drawn: that there is an entire generation brain-buzzed over gadgets, or there is an imperative not to be “left behind” – i.e. to be using last month’s cell phone when this month’s has it beaten.

I really don’t understand the current dust-up between Apple, which has already sold a staggering number of IPhones (in the millions) and Blackberry which has been the gold standard of portable telephone-foolery. Of course, I always talk about “looking ahead” but I don’t have either of these two devices.

But in another world, they are “must haves.” A good friend of mine was enthralled with the IPad. She simply had to have one. I looked at it and marveled. Yes, it is miles ahead of my old steam-driven EBook reader, and generations beyond my now ancient little computer. (I forget what they’re called, but the size is somewhere between a laptop and a digital camera.)

I do have a digital camera however. I do know how to use it. I do know how to transfer the photographs to my computer. I have even learned how to download without the agonizing distress of many minute of poking, prodding, and hunt-and-pecking my computer.

I am not appalled or outraged or disconcerted. I confess – I am, still puzzled. I know that my kids in Austin, Texas and their kids, all have or soon will have, the very latest. Our visitor Tom, from Avignon, has already proved that his cellphone takes wonderful pictures. He tramped solo through Killarney and Manitoulin, taking pictures of everything, including a huge porcupine which he though was a small bear.

I am not really saying that these things are not worth all the trouble. That’s because I am not an addict. I guess what I am trying to say is that if the economy is ever to move forward it will have to see a lot of purse-loosening. It will have to be far beyond the allure of things that click and whistle and sing and dance.

The other night Andre Laplante left the stage without taking a bow after a thundering performance of Liszt. Somewhere in the audience a cell phone went off.
Wait – I’m not longing for the good old days. I am just wondering if the good-new-days are really all that good.