Techno, Techno, Techno

I read in The Guardian online yesterday that Miffy has gone digital and now has her very own iPad app*. Apparently Dick Bruna, her creator, thinks he has an old-fashioned view that "....babies and toddlers [who the app is apparently aimed at] need to get used to books first..." before graduating to a reading and learning via an electronic tablet. The Guardian article refers to research whereby a four-month old baby is using an iPad.

Far from making me think about the death of the book, the article made me wonder about the death of technologies and 'new fangled things'. When a friend bought a new top of the range VHS recorder many moons ago, his toddler daughter thought it was a toaster and didn't understand why she couldn't brown her bread (and yes, butter and jam were involved).

When my VHS/DVD combi finally dies, how will I be able to watch the films I have that will never be on DVD or whatever format comes after that? Will anyone that inherits my collection know what VHS Videos are, let alone know how to play them? In other related news the last vehicle with an in-car cassette rolled off the production line in the last twelve months. I'd better set to converting my cassette collection to MP3 as soon as I have a free minute. That may be some time....

*By the way, my favourite Dick Bruna book was The Apple, which would be ripe for use in a digital flight simulator game.