Being part of the silver surfer generation I have more than once on these pages contemplated the incredible changes that have taken place in our lifetime. Some of those changes, I believe, are not for the better – regular family breakup causing more demand for smaller housing units, but let’s not go down that path. Many of the changes have been incredibly good. We live longer and are generally more healthy and when we need it, operations are available that keep us mobile.
But it is in this realm of communications and technology that the biggest changes have come. The world out there is now in here. It wasn’t until the kids were making fun of us that I realised how much we do use our tablets now. (Incidentally if you are not sure about ‘tablets’ go to our Computing pages and see the article ‘Understanding the Technology’ which provoked this article).
Now I have to confess I think it’s a bit of a nerve the kids making fun of us because
we only have to be out, as a family, in a restaurant say, and conversation ensues
and the subject of who was in what James Bond film crops up because of an old poster
on the wall, and my son-
This has made me wonder why we ever need to buy books or go to school even. I just tried saying to it, “Learning Calculus” and it immediately shows me a number of easy sites for learning calculus. So I tried, “Quantum Mechanics” and instantly ‘she’ replied, “According to Wikipedia Quantum Mechanics is....” and rambled on for about five seconds and also gave me a load of sites to check out. All I need do it actually spend time with these sites!!!! But the point is that the information is there instantly and it seems it is ANY information.
I think on these pages somewhere in the past I have commented that we have the technology
to record everything we are doing. If you want to see the outworking of that, go
to that article on the Computing pages and see the paragraph about the “Google Glass”
which is a headset that allows you to see a mini-
I am the user of one of the cheapest smart-
Increasingly the boundaries between technologies have been blurred. It is now a computer-
As always, let’s have a few quotes to ponder on this subject:
It has become appallingly obvious that our technology has exceeded our humanity.
Albert Einstein
He said that?????
The world is very different now. For man holds in his mortal hands the power to abolish all forms of human poverty, and all forms of human life.
John F. Kennedy
Scary!
Everybody gets so much information all day long that they lose their common sense.
Gertrude Stein
Perhaps what this article has been all about
I am sorry to say that there is too much point to the wisecrack that life is extinct on other planets because their scientists were more advanced than ours.
John F. Kennedy
He did get morbid sometimes didn’t he!
Getting information off the Internet is like taking a drink from a fire hydrant.
Mitchell Kapor
A good parallel!
Compaq is considering changing the command 'Press any key' to 'Press Enter key' because of the flood of calls asking where is the 'Any' key.
We can be daft with our technology, can’t we!
True story from a Novel Netware SysOp:
caller: "Hello, Is this tech support ? "
Tech:
"Yes, It is. How may I help you ?"
caller: "The cup holder on my PC is broken and
I am within my warranty period. How do I go about getting that fixed ?"
Tech: "Did
you say a Cup holder ? "
caller: "Yes ! it is attached to the front of my computer"
Tech:
"Please excuse me If I seem a bit stumped, It's because I am. Did you received this
as part of a promotional, at a trade show?"
caller: "It came with my computer, I
don't know anything about a promotional, It just has 4X on it."
At this point the
tech rep had to mute the caller because he couldn't stand it He was laughing too
high. The caller had been Using the load drawer of CD-
Ditto ditto
Alpha. Software undergoes alpha testing as a first step in getting user feedback. Alpha is Greek for "doesn't work."
I like it!
A printer consists of three main parts: the case, the jammed paper tray and the blinking red light.
How true!
There are only 10 types of people in the world: those that understand binary and those that don’t.
An intellectual finish!