He's right. Why open a book when you can plug into the web to blast space invaders and assorted nasties?
Yet, what uncluttered teen instinct has speedily grasped, forty-somethings in designer masks have failed to comprehend. Five years ago if you'd uttered the words "web" or "value-up" or "exit strategy" in any pint-sized media or publishing company, you'd have had a riot with beaming top management all over you like a rash. Those were the heady days of "willing suspension of disbelief".
Lively, upward company valuations on the sole strength of instant internet forays were not based on any business model. They were based on the premise a fool and his money are easily parted. As with most fantasies, there were two parts to the equation - the fact, and the furphy. The fact was simple, if incredible. An amorphous networking of computers and spaghetti wires had created a global highway of shared information and access. But it was not what interested companies. People were riveted by the sight of venture capital firms pouring money into unknown firms to add a web component and thus "value up". No one looked at balance sheets. They were too busy looking at exit strategies.
The grim, unshaven morning after revealed the value-up bride was a fiction.
By then it was too late. Shareholders challenged the slick accounting gobbledegook and clamoured for business strategies. There were none. The web crash-landed.
Having spent small fortunes on fancy websites, publishing companies cut IT staff and re-focussed on "bricks-and-mortar". Print magazines have unlearned their smooth HTML jargon and gone back to selling print advertising the familiar way - prostration and lots of free space.
The real power of the web has never resided in its ability to "value up" but in its spectacular ability to "add value" - at the speed of light.
Whereas print offers a finite footprint, no matter what the "readership" patter, viral internet marketing can create any footprint in any language.
The web is instant. It is global. It is transparent. It does not require a tedious wait for an ABC audit. It cuts out middlemen and cost, automates dreary accounting functions and enables real business growth. This bride is feisty indeed. And now technology has come to the rescue.
Whereas a few years ago an average computer game would crash your machine, today's hardware runs 3D, multimedia and video without breaking a sweat.
Internet reach permits a whole new level of dialogue that enables speedy upstream adjustments before the product reaches consumers downstream.
The language of the web and business are the same. Don't throw out baby with the bath water.