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posted by martyb on Tuesday November 07 2017, @03:25PM   Printer-friendly
from the if-manuals-are-for-sissies,-who-are-automatics-for? dept.

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.


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  • (Score: 2) by tibman on Tuesday November 07 2017, @07:35PM

    by tibman (134) Subscriber Badge on Tuesday November 07 2017, @07:35PM (#593781)

    Once reading becomes unpopular and nobody does it anymore then society will be rescued by hipsters. They'll write EcmaScript++ by day and read/write books by night : P

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