On the first floor of the Times Free Press building on East 11th Street there's an old teletype machine.
Sometimes I imagine being in a Chattanooga newsroom on Nov. 22, 1963, when the word of JFK's assassination came across the noisy old teletype machine, which was probably in use into the 1970s.
There was television and radio news in the 1960s, of course, but they were reliant on the same news-wire technology that delivered on-the-scene reports from The Associated Press and United Press International.
I think of Twitter as a modern-day teletype machine: good for relaying breaking news, but not much else.
Twitter has been in the news lately because of its purchase by tech billionaire Elon Musk. There seems to be a daily outrage story in the news about Musk and his management style from those who live in their Twitter feed.
From the rest of us, it's mostly a big yawn.
The only time I look at Twitter is if I'm trying to track down a high school sports score or checking on a storm report. I can't imagine going to Twitter for serious advice on daily living.
I do post articles there from time to time, but it feels a little like launching notes in a bottle -- which, honestly, may be more of a commentary on the quality of my articles.
Our 16-year-old son recently discovered that my Twitter account has a blue validation check mark. He was impressed. (For the record: I am not.)
"How did you get that blue check mark," he asked one night.
"I don't know, really," I explained. "Somebody at work got them for us. You can have mine."
"No, I can't," he said. "It doesn't work that way."
What is a blue check mark really worth? Well, now we know. It's worth $8 a month, apparently. That's what Musk is charging for an upgraded Twitter membership -- blue check mark included. That's roughly the price of lunch at Krystal, which I would argue is a much better deal.
But while Twitter is grabbing the headlines, the stodgy old Facebook has become the go-to social-media platform for baby boomers like me. I've noticed that most younger people who have Facebook pages seem to have stopped posting there long ago.
My kids live on YouTube, post on Instagram and browse on TikTok.
Meanwhile, most of us boomers treat Facebook as if it were one of the relics of our youth -- scrapbooks, photo albums, diaries and family Bibles.
Most of our mothers had bound scrapbooks and photo albums filled with photos made with Instamatic cameras. Family Bibles were repositories for birth and death records, as is Facebook today.
Interestingly, Facebook users in the United States (about 239 million) outnumber Twitter users (77 millions) by about a 3-to-1 margin, according to Statistica.com. You wouldn't know that from the recent spate of Twitter headlines.
My theory is that Facebook will always be associated in the U.S. with the boomer generation, for whom it will be a digital scrapbook of our post-50 years. And then, when we leave this earthly realm, it will be the left-behind record of our lifetimes.
So, choose your Facebook posts wisely. Be kind. Share freely. Post your accomplishments, absolutely, but be honest about your struggles, too.
And think of the great-grandchildren who may one day learn everything they can know about you from your mushy old Facebook posts -- much like we would look at a box full of 19th-century letters.
And give little thought to Twitter, which amplifies conflict and paints a dim picture of life in the 2020s. At some point it will blow away in a gust of indifference, blue check marks and all.
The Family Life column publishes on Sundays in Life. Contact Mark Kennedy at mkennedy@timesfreepress.com or 423-757-6645.