I'm sorry to read that Ina has given up on the PBS Forum. I'm sorry, but
I'm not surprised.
In the mid-1990s, when workplace email access became common, I had older
friends who were retiring. We kept in touch over the years, but it became
obvious that they had missed the electronic revolution which was starting.
They never got comfortable with email (which they eventually got in
response to the clamor that "everyone has to have email"), never discovered
the innumerable doors which Google would open. I felt sorry for them.
Now, twenty years later, I'm in the same boat. I'm still on a computer.
Family members are telling me I have to get an iPhone - I'm still on a land
line. When I was out in the working world, the only people who had
wireless communication devices were the janitors. I used to think "I'm sure
glad I don't have to have one of those things with people bugging me all
day and night". My senses of privacy and personal space are evidently very
old fashioned. It's not uncommon now to step outside and hear one of my
neighbors discussing financial and other personal matters in a loud voice
on their front steps (the reception inside is not so good), matters which I
would be mortified to reveal to neighbors.
Every day the daily newspaper provides plenty of evidence that the grammar
and spelling conventions I grew up with are changing rapidly.
I've been marginalized, and I'm sure it's just starting.
A little voice keeps telling me "Get used to it".
Many of the old horticultural organizations are all moaning about dropping
membership and the lack of younger members. But some of those same
organizations refuse to read the writing on the wall: they continue to try
to publish expensive paper journals and hold meetings so sited that the
membership has to travel across a continent to attend. They could save
loads of money by putting their journals on line and using modern
telecommunication innovations to conduct meetings. But they're balking.
And while they balk, they overlook what is really happening on the
ground: there are in fact loads of people with a keen interest in
horticulture, people who for one reason or another did not participate in
the old-style forums. Evidently Facebook gives them the sort of platform
they want.
The old ways of doing things are fading away. I read recently that Yahoo
is starting to distance itself from the Yahoo groups many special interest
groups depend on for communication.
I may be getting old, but I still want to be able to be current, to be
able to keep an eye on what is going on.
Maybe it's time to get an iPhone and check out Facebook.

Jim McKenney
Montgomery County, Maryland, USA, USDA zone 7, not that any of that is
relevant to this topic.
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