Typewriter-Hoarding Pundit Robert Samuelson Hates the Internet

[phantom power]

worth reading the whole thing

Earlier this summer, Samuelson wrote, “If I could, I would repeal the Internet,” but couched his argument in the form of a warning against cyberterror. Sunday’s column scrapes away the cold policy rationale and strikes right at the heart of his fear of journalistic modernity, the cyberterror he already experiences every day.

Samuelson freely intermingles appeals to the public good with confessions of personal anxiety. He is stunned that Don Graham, a friend since college, would sell the newspaper; he considers journalism distributed via the Internet “spotty and unreliable” in comparison with journalism distributed via newsprint; he devoutly wishes we could return to the old days: “I’m a dinosaur. I’ve got three manual typewriters at home awaiting the Internet’s collapse, which I would celebrate.” Not one but three manual typewriters! When the collapse comes, Samuelson will command a mighty publishing empire, churning out vital commentary in triplicate, while desperate Ezra Klein pounds helplessly on his door.

One ought to feel some natural sympathy for anybody presented with larger social change they cannot adjust themselves to. But the plight of the displaced newspaper columnist tugs less at the heartstrings than the plight of any number of other people struggling to adapt to economic change. Writing a weekly newspaper column was never a demanding job, but it used to be harder when I started at the dawn of the Internet age. The easy availability of information now — reports, statistics, books, and quotes that used to take hours to track down can now be found instantly — dramatically increases potential output. Yet Samuelson churns out his same two columns a week, and while he senses his influence has fallen into eclipse, he attributes it not to the rise of very smart, hardworking economic policy writers who vastly surpass him in quantity and quality but to a general reduction of standards on the Internet.

...

Samuelson has spent 30 years lecturing Americans threatened by competition that they should suck it up. Only now, in the twilight of his career, does he see himself among them, and his response to this misfortune — a still-theoretical threat to his comfortable sinecure — is to wish the source of that competition out of existence.

http://nymag.com/daily/intelligencer/2013/08/typewriter-hoarding-samuelson-hates-internet.html?imw=Y&f=most-viewed-24h10

[Jenoch]

1. He is correct when he implies the internet

is the downfall of the printed newspaper. I agree that is not a good thing.

[PowerToThePeople]

2. Typewriters? Computer printers can work without the internet... n/t

[Pretzel_Warrior]

5. but he does his best economic writing when he's pounding on keys using mechanical

advantage. This weird/wired way of typing, saving, and printing is the stuff of Lucifer.

[Warren DeMontague]

3. Yeah, and he's still waiting for cheesy moustaches to come back into style, too.

Talk about having your finger on the pulse.

[Pretzel_Warrior]

4. That...was an AWESOME READ!! Thanks for that.

I have loathed Samuelson for some time now.

[DCBob]

6. Sorry Sam, if you can keep up then retire and let those who are more capable do your job.

The Internet has tremendously increased information availability to people home and abroad and to the farthest reaches of the planet. Yes, he is dinosaur in need of extinction.

[hunter]

7. I have three typewriters, one manual, two electric.

I've been on the internet since 1979.

I worked for my university daily newspaper. We had four electronic terminals -- two for the typists, two for the editors. The AP feed was an noisy teletype. Pasteup was hot glue. (I miss that smell...)

I've never made a living writing news. It's just another art, and most artists are starving.

The way our society is heading owners, robots, slaves, and propagandists will do everything.

What's everyone else to do? Starve???