I’ve been in journalism for close to 30 years. As one would expect, my skills, the tools of the trade and the state of the industry itself have evolved dramatically over that time.

Newsrooms that once functioned under a cloud of cigarette smoke now work in a cloud computing environment. Writers who once tucked a reporter’s notebook in their back pocket now wield a digital voice recorder or a Flip camcorder. Editors who once redlined copy and haggled over how headlines matched the lead art now stress over Web analytics and keyword selection.

What’s the best jargon generator, Google Buzz or iPad?

Nobody actually knows what impact either of these technologies will have, but everybody still wants to say something about them. Here’s a totally unscientific sampling from a bunch of blogs highlighting the best jargon describing each of them.

Can people get even dumber? Forgive me for the cynical view of my own species but … well, some of my best friends are human. Actually dumber is not quite accurate. Can they get even more ignorant? If our lack of interest in anything besides ourselves wasn’t bad enough, now humanity is being aided and abetted by the latest in technology.

To wit, this advance being unveiled at the MSN homepage:

Audiences want to interact with media brands on mobile devices—via “untethered digital content”  said John Loughlin, Hearst Magazines EVP and general manager, at the recent Digital Innovators' Summit in Berlin.