As a baby boomer, I am essentially a living meme for technological incompetence. Clichés are clichés for a reason.
Back when this newspaper was still being run out of a brick-and-mortar office, I relied heavily on my Millennial co-workers to help me navigate my computer. Whenever I called out, “Hey, can you come here a second?” you could practically hear their eyes roll from the other room.
One friend of mine used to use the Tinder app for her dating life. I kept calling it Binder.
“No, Bob. It’s called Tinder.”
“Oh. Well, what’s Binder?”
“I don’t know. Something you put papers in?”
I have a long and distinguished history of being spectacularly wrong about technological advancements. After collecting nearly 500 vinyl albums as a teen, I smugly declared compact discs were a passing fancy.
After amassing about 1,500 CDs, I confidently proclaimed that streaming would never catch on.
“People want to own music,” I insisted. “They want something tangible.”
Oh, well.
When Twitter debuted in 2006 with its 140-character limit — that’s characters, not words — I was bemused. Even when they doubled it to 280, I wasn’t impressed. What could anyone possibly say in 280 characters that would even matter?
I gave it six months before it went the way of the 8-track tape.
It didn't go away. It eventually became X, for reasons that nobody fully understands, including the people who renamed it. And it somehow evolved into a primary delivery system for federal policy and presidential pronouncements. In my day, major announcements required a podium. Now they require a thumbs-up emoji and a Wi-Fi signal.
Who knew?
Apparently, everyone but me.
Around the same time that Twitter made its (in my mind) inauspicious debut, my sister began pestering me to join Facebook. I responded with mockery and derision. I am not a soccer mom or a middle-school nerd.
Eventually, I was dragged kicking and screaming into creating an account. Fine. I’ll sign up. But you can’t make me use it.
My sister soon informed me that people who have Facebook accounts but rarely use them are known as “creepers.”
Great. I didn’t want the bloody thing to begin with, and now I’m a creeper. That hardly seems fair.
Then something unexpected happened: I started receiving friend requests. Cousins I hadn’t seen in decades. High school classmates — some dear friends; others were people I had gone through K-12 with but probably never exchanged more than seven words.
“Can I borrow a pencil?”
“Sure.”
End of relationship.
Former work colleagues surfaced, and it was fascinating to see where life had taken them. Moves. Grandkids. Boats. So many boats.
Before long, I was engaged. Commenting. Liking. Occasionally poking, though I never quite understood what that meant and suspect it was discontinued for legal reasons.
But I still reserved the right to ridicule anyone who posted pictures of their lunch. Who cares about your duck confit?
Then, just a few days ago, I proudly posted a photo of the bread rolls I made from scratch.
The recipe? It came from Facebook.
Facebook has also become integral to my job. We use it to drive traffic to our newspaper’s website. I monitor police and emergency services pages to track crime, car accidents, road closures, weather alerts, and fires. Police and fire departments and EMS now issue press releases directly on social media, allowing us to follow breaking news in real time.
In other words, the very platform I once mocked as frivolous is now a cornerstone of my professional life.
This is what personal growth looks like, apparently. It looks like a senior citizen refreshing his news feed while wearing reading glasses he can’t find because they’re on his head.
But after nearly 20 years on Facebook, I believe the algorithm has officially run out of ideas.
Under “People You May Know,” it now suggests individuals who are friends of someone I’m already friends with. When I click to see the connection, I often blink and say aloud, “Who the hell is that, and when did we become friends?”
It’s gotten so desperate that two of my recent friend suggestions were Johnson’s Welding and Fabrication and Believe Gluten-Free Bakery.
First of all, I am not much of a welder. Second, I love gluten. I always ask for extra.
The Meta algorithm took a big swing and a miss there.
Still, I can’t complain too much. Technology may have left me dazed, confused and occasionally yelling at inanimate objects, but it’s also reconnected me with friends, enhanced my work and taught me how to bake respectable bread rolls.
And if that makes me a slightly less inept baby boomer — or at least a better-fed one — I’ll take it.
Now if you’ll excuse me, I need to go reset my password again.
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