How our obsession with technological advaces destroyed the quality of college education this week in California

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I've been teaching at the same California Community College for more than 15 years. I've written scores of recommendations that sent my students off to UC Berkeley, UC Davis, Carnegie-Mellon University, and several other excellent 4-year schools. In one of the classes I teach, I've shown the same movie for more than ten years. It deals with advertising's role in making women feel inferior, and encouraging them to buy products they don't need. This past week, I requested that film for my class. When I got to the Library to pick it up, I said, Oh, I want the VCR version, not the DVD version. I don't trust DVDs. They sometimes won't play. The student behind the counter looked at me as if I was some kind of dinosaur, but he searched for the VCR version "upstairs." It's been destroyed, he said, after I stood there for about five minutes. The DVD version will work fine, he assured me. I lectured brilliantly, kept the (evening) class awake with passionate discussion and Trader Joe's cookies, and built toward the climax: the showing of "Killing Us Softly," a well-done documentary about how advertising tries to make women feel inferior, so they will buy unnecessary products. Disk can't be played, read the DVD/VCR machine. I went to plan B, let the class out early, and allowed myself a few unkind words (in my mind only) about those who are obsessed with "modernizing" and "streamlining," but can't do so competently. This group of 40 students will never see the movie I intended for them to see. I have checked the internet. It's not there. When I return the movie to the Library, I will let them know that the DVD they gave me is either corrupted or incompatible with some of the machines in our college's classroom.s Getting angry is not my style. Have you had others' incompetence, or their obsession with technology, undermine something you were trying to do?