Last week, I reminded everyone that Irreal doesn’t hold journalists in high regard and that Apple, in particular, appears to bring out the worst in tech reporters. The Paper of Record must have been feeling left out because they published a column by Charlie Warzel that combines what I consider the two worst aspects of the modern web:
- The ascendancy of the New Luddites with their constant carping about how technology is destroying civilization and the world, and
- The inexorable need to drag jejune politics into every damn discussion on the Internet.
The ostensible point of the column was that Apple should stop holding its Keynote Events but it quickly devolved into the usual “we’re killing gaia” nonsense and the assertion that we have more important things, like income inequality, to worry about than new iPhones.
Being famously curmudgeonly, Irreal’s inclination is to dismiss this nonsense with words best omitted from a blog that might be read by women or children but you don’t have to depend on me to take down this silliness. Over at Daring Fireball, John Gruber delivers a long and excellent rant on how vacuous Warzel’s column really is. It’s a righteous takedown and you should definitely read it even if you aren’t an Apple user or fan.
The worst thing about Warzel’s fatuous column is that it appeared not in Joe’s Fishing and Tech Webzine but in the freaking New York Times. If you had any remaining respect for the Times, you can let it go. This column is one more example of how they’ve forfeited that respect.
Added in editing: The Macalope weighs in.