February 26th, 2008
Elton John to Larry King: I don't have a computer or a mobile phone
During last night’s Larry King show, Larry asked Elton John for the Web address of the Elton John AIDS Foundation. BTW, a noble cause- a benefit for which Elton played after the Academy Awards Sunday night.
As to Larry’s question, Elton admitted:
I don’t know what our website number is. I don’t have a computer or mobile phone or anything.
I know your first reaction will be, well, Elton is almost 61 and is a superstar, so not surprising he doesn’t have a PC or cell, and apparently doesn’t know much about the Internet.
But I can tell you of at least three other superstars, each older than Elton, who have professed Internet use. Eric Clapton wrote his latest book on a PC. Mick Jagger has referenced personal Internet use. And in 1999, when I wrote a streaming media guide for RealNetworks (ultimately not published due to a strategic shift), guess who wrote the preface:
Yes, RealNetworks communicated directly with David Bowie.
But here’s the good part. Just a few seconds after Elton professed ignorance about his charity’s website number, a producer put the website addy on screen.
“There you go,” Elton then said. “It’s terrible I don’t know that. “
Russell Shaw is an enterprise computing journalist, analyst and author based in Portland, Oregon. See his full profile and disclosure of his industry affiliations.
