An "Old Dog" CAN Learn New Tricks!

[NOTE: this is another story that has taken way too long to post here--it was originally from February!] 

The Dayton Daily News dragged me into the "e-edition" world of newspaper reading.

First there were the introduction of symbols (cave paintings, petroglyphs, pictograms, and ideograms).  After writing and alphabets were developed, humans now had systems to document and record events.  Through smoke signals, drums, horns, runners, pigeons, lamps, telegraphy, radio and television, the dissemination of those events could now be more widely and, via those last three, almost instantaneously announced to a global audience.  The introduction of computers and internet-based communications exponentially enhanced this process to the point of almost reversing course and replicating the mediums it replaced.  Streaming audio and video have eliminated the temporal demands of radio and television programming.  Now, with devices and software interfaces to closely resemble the newspaper reading experience, another long-held tradition appears to be biting the dust.

I'm "Old School", Too

Sunday's "Hi and Lois" comic strip (courtesy of King Features Syndicate)

I love being educated when I least expect it and this Sunday's edition of the Hi and Lois comic strip did not disappoint me. In the 8-panel strip seen above, Hirum 'Hi' Flagston announces to his family members that he is heading out to the local market to buy a copy of the Sunday newspaper.  When he tells his wife Lois, she gives him an automatic "that's nice" response while typing away on her desktop computer.  When he walks down the hallway, he informs the twins of his plans and they give similar nonchalant replies while engrossed in their portable electronic devices (a laptop computer and some sort of tablet device).  As he heads out the door, he tells his older son Chip, who is lying on the couch with a laptop, what he's doing and gets a somewhat ageist--although authentic teenaged-- comment in return ("so old school").

My Sentiments Exactly!

"Hi and Lois" courtesy of King Features Syndicate

It's not often that a comic strip attracts undue attention from me but yesterday's edition of Hi and Lois appeared to take a page directly out of my day-to-day life.  In the two panels above, we see a short but succinct representation of the current transition of the newspaper industry from a paper-based paradigm to one with an online domain.  'Thirsty' Thurston, on the left with his impartially branded laptop computer, represents the future of information distribution to consumers.  Hiram "Hi" Flagston, on the right with an equally impartial newspaper, is a fan of the more traditional medium.