Everything stands still
Pierre C. Meier, editor-in-chief of *Werbewoche*, has time to write columns.
Just three days after the iPad craze made huge waves and a few determined individuals pulled an all-nighter just to be among the first to buy one of the coveted electronic toys, nothing is happening in our editorial office. On Monday of all days, when the production of the current advertising week normally reaches its first peak, the disaster begins. First, access to the Internet goes down, followed shortly afterwards by e-mail. The GAU is here!
After the initial excitement has subsided and the necessary measures have been taken or initiated, there is not only time for reflection, but also for writing this column.
The situation is paradoxical: on the one hand, the iPad hype, which to a large extent lives from the constant connection to the all-encompassing and omniscient web, and at the same time the archaic emergency scenario of an editorial team that receives texts by fax or sends them for authorization, approves individual statements by telephone and has pictures delivered by courier, as in times long forgotten. There are no press releases, the only way to find out what's happening in the world is via your personal smartphone, and the Werbewoche.ch website remains as it was on Sunday evening. Thanks to a trick, it was at least possible to publish a breakdown report on the site.
Our private and professional lives are already so strongly oriented towards the Internet that we only realize how the Internet makes our lives easier when we no longer have it. Woe betide anyone who needs a telephone number for a search: The good old telephone directory has long since ended up in the waste paper bin, so you just use directory assistance or annoy all your colleagues. But unlike Google, both the directory enquiries service and your colleagues have to get the question absolutely right, otherwise there will be no answer. No more of the familiar Google phrase "Did you mean blah blah blah". Printed encyclopaedias and dictionaries have been given a new lease of life. Even reference books are being searched for on the back shelf and consulted again for the first time.
Everything takes longer, much longer. We don't even want to think about how the final production will be carried out the next day. Might we even have to deliver the finished print data to the print shop by courier? A quick prayer to the patron saint of the Internet, Isidore of Seville, that everything will run as it should tomorrow. Apart from that, the patron saint is no joke. The good bishop Isidore (*560, †636) was considered one of the most learned people in the Western world in his time. In his encyclopaedia "Etymologiarum sive originum libri XX", he compiled the knowledge of antiquity still available towards the end of the 6th century. Isidore is considered the patron saint of the Internet, programmers and computer users. Thanks to Wikipedia via iPhone!
Who said anything about iPad?
After the initial excitement has subsided and the necessary measures have been taken or initiated, there is not only time for reflection, but also for writing this column.
The situation is paradoxical: on the one hand, the iPad hype, which to a large extent lives from the constant connection to the all-encompassing and omniscient web, and at the same time the archaic emergency scenario of an editorial team that receives texts by fax or sends them for authorization, approves individual statements by telephone and has pictures delivered by courier, as in times long forgotten. There are no press releases, the only way to find out what's happening in the world is via your personal smartphone, and the Werbewoche.ch website remains as it was on Sunday evening. Thanks to a trick, it was at least possible to publish a breakdown report on the site.
Our private and professional lives are already so strongly oriented towards the Internet that we only realize how the Internet makes our lives easier when we no longer have it. Woe betide anyone who needs a telephone number for a search: The good old telephone directory has long since ended up in the waste paper bin, so you just use directory assistance or annoy all your colleagues. But unlike Google, both the directory enquiries service and your colleagues have to get the question absolutely right, otherwise there will be no answer. No more of the familiar Google phrase "Did you mean blah blah blah". Printed encyclopaedias and dictionaries have been given a new lease of life. Even reference books are being searched for on the back shelf and consulted again for the first time.
Everything takes longer, much longer. We don't even want to think about how the final production will be carried out the next day. Might we even have to deliver the finished print data to the print shop by courier? A quick prayer to the patron saint of the Internet, Isidore of Seville, that everything will run as it should tomorrow. Apart from that, the patron saint is no joke. The good bishop Isidore (*560, †636) was considered one of the most learned people in the Western world in his time. In his encyclopaedia "Etymologiarum sive originum libri XX", he compiled the knowledge of antiquity still available towards the end of the 6th century. Isidore is considered the patron saint of the Internet, programmers and computer users. Thanks to Wikipedia via iPhone!
Who said anything about iPad?
