Monday, April 9, 2012

Progress



Things we take for granted now really are special. Think of the 911 system.  Punch in three digits and you are connected to help. Even if you can’t talk, your location can be traced.

Back in the day, I worked a series of crappy jobs while trying to finish college. One was a swing shift clerk job for an airfreight forwarder. One night our roof mounted HVAC unit caught fire. The foreman called the number for the fire department (from a sticker stuck to the phone) and the conversation went like this. “The fucker is on fire! Send the fire trucks!” and he hung up. “Ah Tom”, I said, “Think you might call them back and give them our address.”

Maybe not as big an advance is ready access to porn. At this same time, porn theaters were just starting up. Damn expensive to visit. We had a customer who supplied the theaters. The film reels were shipped around the country labeled “machine parts”. Tom and friends had the brilliant idea of renting a projector and viewing the films in our warehouse.  They all gathered one evening and set up the equipment. Quite a party was planned. There were refreshments, beer, etc. Film was loaded and the movie began. Turned out the genre shown wasn’t meant for a male heterosexual orientation audience. Alas, the group was disappointed. Tom suffered a considerable loss of prestige among his peers.

Our ability to communicate grows daily. Latter Day Luddites like me will likely not Twitter (whatever the hell that is) but can appreciate things like Skype. A memory that will last, for me, was receiving a call from my son while he was in Kandahar and I was outside Ft Morgan, CO.

Does anyone remember mobile FM radio? I only used it to receive a message. I would then find a pay telephone (try find one of those today) and make my PRIVATE call.  My first pager required four D Cell batteries. What a pain to have hanging off your belt. Remember how damn expensive all this was? 

Today walk into any 7 Eleven, lay out $40 or so, and you can communicate.

This whole Internet thing allows us to communicate our ideas with people we may never meet face to face. What an impact it has on our society. No wonder the “elite” want to muzzle it. Can’t have the peasants getting the wrong ideas, can we?

Like everything, abuses will occur. Humans don’t change. Texting while driving. Flash mobs.  Freedom isn’t free nor is progress. 

Speaking of progress, this wholesale change Google has made to blogger is forcing me to think, damn them!

7 comments:

dmarks said...

Are there good changes with Google and Blogger? All I see is the degredation of the comments by adding "threading", and how posting pictures doesn't work as well any more.

Oh yeah. And the capcha's are way too hard.

Old NFO said...

Yeah, 'progress' has driven us to be 'instantly' available; whether we want to be or not... sigh

Well Seasoned Fool said...

@ dmarks For an old fart like me, thee are seldom any good changes.

Well Seasoned Fool said...

@ NFO Oh yes, we can plagued by twits 24/7. Maybe that is why there is Twitter?

I seem to be some people's Google. Their time is so much more important than mine that they call me for information they can look up. Then they wonder why I'm such a grumpy old man.

Scotty said...

Does anyone remember mobile FM radio?

You betcha!! As a HAM radio guy I STILL use it!

_.. . KH6AME

You can blame, much smarter HAMs than me, HAM radio folks for having a hand in creating much of the misery you're in WSF!

Well Seasoned Fool said...

@ Scotty Mobile FM is fine for hams. Not so good for business where everyone hears your business. I couldn't afford to install the equipment in more than one vehicle. That was the gas hog 4x4 By God Get There no matter what.

One uncle was a ham. KzeroCNV.Taught me a lot.

http://www.qsl.net/colorado-yls/Business/joewhite.htm

Scotty said...

"@ Scotty Mobile FM is fine for hams. Not so good for business where everyone hears your business."

If people think that their conversations are secure on cell phones....they're in for a rude awakening there too!

You're uncle's call sign sounds familiar, I'll go through my logs. I may have worked him on the HF bands.....