Technology

Before I begin let me say that in no way, shape, or form am I a Luddite. I have been around technology for decades; have friends who are responsible for you being able to read these words right now; had an email address continually since the 80’s. So it’s not technology that bugs me.

It’s the users.

When cellphones first came out I thought that was good. Then I saw a child pedaling a Big Wheel down the street talking on a cellphone and had second thoughts. Sure, decades of walking past people hearing,

“I’m at the corner. I’ll be there in two minutes.”

I found annoying. Why is that a necessary call? You are afraid of walking in on a crime scene? Dude, wait two minutes and you’ll be standing right there. Just because you have technology (in my case, a gun) doesn’t mean you have to use it (in my case, shoot you).

Then they started bundling cameras with phones. Granted, two awesome technologies but together? Why? That makes no sense. It’s like putting a toaster and hammer together. Both awesome tools but together? I barely like clock radios.

I also wondered who’d need those two things together. They are not remotely connected. I’ve taken a ton on pictures and talked on numerous phones but never have I done them together.

Talking on the phone is pretty much a daily thing. Taking pictures? Not so much. Remember, taking pictures is about documenting, as the old Kodak commercial said, The Times Of Your Life. Who’d want a camera with them all the time?

Turns out fucking EVERYONE! Wow! I’ve been wrong before but, damn! Turns out everyone thinks every moment they have is a time of their life moment.

But I don’t have to like it.

But the real kicker for me came the other day. I’m sitting with someone who is playing with their phone. Let me copy and paste that again. I’m sitting with someone who is playing with their phone. Not talking. Not taking pictures. Not one of the now gazillion things the once simple phone was responsible for. Just playing with it.

Turns out they were playing with something called ‘voice recognition’ which I always thought was what the person on the other end of the phone did if they knew you.

Once again, I was wrong.

What she was doing was ‘talking’ into the ‘telephone’ to see how good the ‘voice recognition’ was to allow her to ‘send’ a ‘text message.’

Wait now, what?

Let me get this straight. This person is ‘talking’ into a ‘telephonic’ device which was ‘invented’ so we no longer had to send ‘cables’ from one party to the next so instead we could ‘talk’ directly to that person thereby saving time and money.

But this person is TALKING INTO A TELEPHONE TO MAKE IT SEND NOTHING MORE THAN A GLORIFIED CABLE??????????

Wait now, what?

Technology has finally made it happen. They’ve invented a time machine. A stupid, stupid time machine.