Bloody Luddites and Debate Geeks

Little in this world angers me more than technology resistance and ignorance.

I am currently trying to figure out some of the specifics regarding the logistics of our upcoming National Forensics League national qualifying tournament, and I can't find the appropriate information on the website. Sure the site looks pretty nifty, with lots of mouse-overs, but the overall architecture of the site is Byzantine and confusing. And in the end, a lot of the information that I would expect to find either just isn't there or is impossible to find. This is, I believe, symptomatic of a larger problem amongst those born pre-1975...

So many of the pre-computer, pre-internet generations - yes, they've been around the technology for certain, but unlike those of us born after 1975, they weren't steeped in the technology throughout their formative years - have a steadfast resistance to modern technology and/or a critically limited understanding of it. For those few that do decide to delve into modern technology a bit, there seem to be several recurring problems. The first, as illustrated by the above example is the "'Good Enough' Website."

Yes indeed... So many businesses and organization owned and/or run by boomers and the like, or by luddites in general, tend to, if and when they do put up a website, do the minimal amount of work. This means a poorly designed page, with perhaps one grainy image, a horrendous logo, and little to no content. No substantial information about the business, poor site architecture, and no means of contact outside, perhaps, the listing of a rarely-checked e-mail and a telephone number. It's as if they think by simply putting up a website, business will come to them. Though some sites do end up with more polish, as with the NFL site, there are still the content and architecture problems.

Then there's the e-mail issue. It seems to me that many luddites, young and old alike, seem to think that they are less accountable for e-mail than they are for telephone or direct inter-personal contact. Send an e-mail to someone? No imperative to reply. Call someone? Well, there's a little more there. Talk to one of the old fogies in person and they finally feel the social pressure to actually acknowledge you and address your problems. Worst offenders on this front? The bloated mass of mid-level administrative staff at my district.

Oy. The structure of this post is getting lost, and it's really just a bunch of complaining on my part, but what I really want to get to is this... Perhaps the worst offence commited by Luddites against me would be the decision on the part of my debate league to tab tournaments by hand rather than use the software that is increasingly becoming the standard throughout the rest of the debate world. The steadfast resistance of these Luddite dinosaurs, their insistance that a well-tested computer program is not to be trusted over emotional, tired, and fallable humans infuriates me. It infuriates me because their insistance on doing everything by hand, on paper, makes tournament days arduous and hectic, when things could be greatly simplified by the use of the software.

I'll be glad when the boomers retire and the dinosaurs die. I really will.