Lancelot Braithwaite cannot get through my visit without bursting forth a mantra that once served him and thousands of consumers well: “Read the frickin’ instruction manual!” he bellows. “And don’t throw it out unless you’re pretty good at memorizing it!” Never mind that products—from iPhones to Facebook—have made manuals into curious artifacts of a distant era. That era is alive if not well in Braithwaite’s smokey, cramped one-bedroom on West 14th Street.
Before tech product reviewers were brand names, there was Braithwaite, thundering his wisdom and geekery from publications that now exist only in yellowing copies. It was a time when the best critics were so familiar with technical specifications that their knowledge rivaled the engineers who built the products. And none were as omnipresent or as savvy as Braithwaite, who even served on industry standards committees.
Manuals are for sissies.
(Score: 2) by Snotnose on Tuesday November 07 2017, @05:27PM (1 child)
And never let on that you WTFM.
When the dust settled America realized it was saved by a porn star.
(Score: 2) by DannyB on Tuesday November 07 2017, @07:23PM
Manual writers think their bugs are so important. But . . .
A bug in the code is worth two in the documentation.
The lower I set my standards the more accomplishments I have.