Leo Laporte Returns to G4TV
TimeForGuinness writes "Leo Laporte returns to G4TV along with the show Call For Help. It premieres Monday the 29th of August at 11am ET/8am PT. As a long time ZDTV and TechTV fan, I am happy to see him return." Agreed. Good to see him back on a cable show. The first few episode topics include: "Waterproof Your Gadgets, Find a Wi-Fi Hotspot, Tweak Your TV Tones, Network Enabled DVD Players"
after g4 took over
.. *glances at the TV* .. *kicks the dirt*..
*unblocks G4 from his receiver*
ok, you got me this time, but I'm not enjoying it!
What do you expect Leo to be?! He's a fucking television host/radio host who explains tech to average people. A lot of people at Slashdot have careers a lot like that, you know? Just because you're helping people figure their shit out instead of writing the next BitTorrent client or 200-mile wifi cantenna doesn't mean you're a n00b.
And yes, aside form his commentary, his "instructional" information could be learned from a book. You know what book? Probably the book HE WROTE. He writes an extremely popular technical almanac every year and has for quite a few years now. It's not bad. I wouldn't buy it, but if I had a tech-interested family member who was somewhat short on the actual tech experience or knowledge, I'd completely refer them to it.
Leo is a communicator. He's calm and polite and interesting and has a very smooth and helpful way of explaining things that would otherwise be very difficult for non-tech people to understand. He performs an important job in the tech industry - helping people. Some of us could learn a thing or two. If you want to draw in more customers and a larger tech community, you have to start somewhere. You're not going to get it by insulting people and turning them away if they aren't as incredibly 31337 as you and I. you're going to do it by empowering them. Help them through problems. Explain things to them. Maybe expose them to some stuff they weren't familiar with before. I gaurantee the first time a lot of people will hear about what P2P really is or wifi or the RIAA or Windows Update are through that guy.
He isn't going to tell you how to write your own software and port it to the iPod. He's going to tell you how to get your ipod to synch with your mac properly. He's not going to tell you how to create and post a bit torrent... but he'll tell you what bit torrent is and point you to some clients and some information about it.
There are a lot of hack "tech support genius" guys on the radio. They all suck and stay the stupidest shit. Laporte actually knows his stuff. You should listen to his show on KFI on the weekend some time. Or his podcast. Or watch him on TV. Or read one of his books.