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Frame from Nick Burns, Your Company's Computer Guy: New Tech Guy - Saturday Night Live Plays via YouTube's privacy-enhanced embed

Nick Burns, Your Company's Computer Guy: New Tech Guy - Saturday Night Live

14 videos recommended on HN
YouTube
Cited on HN 4 times, 2021–2024, never outright recommended score 0
Years with an HN recommendation, 2007–2026

Used as shorthand for the arrogant, dismissive tech support person in jokes and comparisons.

An SNL sketch in which Nick Burns, the condescending IT guy, trains a new tech support hire to mock users over simple computer problems.

1 citations · 3 jokes · Comedy

4 Hacker News comments

From the HN archive; up to 20 kept per video, favoring different commenters. Recommendations first.

@softwaredoug Aug 2021 Cites it
on HN thread My love-hate affair with technology
Read more
There's something here between the lines I think I empathize with. That there's been a cultural shift from the tinkerer PC ethos, with decentralized vendors, respect for being "open" (whether open source or standard). This way of thinking seemed to be the default for those of us brought up into computing in the 80s up until the mid 2000s. Even on Microsoft products, the Evil Empire of these times, the amount of customizability and range of hardware and software supported in Windows shows how baked in these assumptions were. Of course, the average user struggled during these times given the endlessly complexity and configurability of technology. A lot of work with tech required someone speaking technobabble to get everything to work -- Someone like the old SNL sketch "Nick Burns, Your Company's Computer Guy" ( [this video] ). Users don't care about the idealism behind the original PC movement, maybe to their detriment. They just want it to work. Those of us getting in the way to espouse ideal of open source this and that just seem to be getting in their way of the thing that "just works" regardless of what MegaCorp they have to turn their personal lives over to.
SNL sketch of the condescending computer guy
@lob_it Nov 2022 Makes a joke
on HN thread Was everyone stupid back then?
Nick burns would disagree :) [this video] Technology natives skipped social to enjoy innovation without the emotional fodder. They were left on their own with nobody to coddle them. Its 2022.. Illiteracy is obvious
@mberning Dec 2022 Makes a joke
on HN thread No Hello: A New Wave
Usually the biggest office asshole and last person you want to talk to for anything. The living embodiment of Nick Burns. [this video]

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