HAS TECHNOLOGY TAKEN OVER YOUR LIFE?
Most of this was taken off the Internet.
Technology has taken over your life if you can relate to the following:
- You think of the gadgets in your office as "friends," but you forget to send your father a birthday card.
- You can no longer sit through an entire movie without having at least one device on your body beep or buzz.
- Your stationery is more cluttered than Warren Beatty's address book. The letterhead lists a fax number, e-mail addresses for two on-line services, and your Internet address, which spreads across the breadth of the letterhead and continues to the back. In essence, you have conceded that the first page of any letter you write is letterhead.
- Your network monthly bill is more than your house mortgage.
- You never say excuse me, but instead "service an interrupt."
- When you go into a computer store, you eavesdrop on a salesperson talking with customers Then you butt in to correct him and spend twenty minutes answering the customers' questions, while the salesperson stands by silently, nodding his head.
- You disdain people who use low Baud rates.
- You need to fill out a form that must be typewritten, but you can't because there isn't one typewriter in your house -- only computers with laser printers.
- You know it's when to have breakfast. Sunrise causes you to squint at the screen glare.
- You use the phrase "digital compression" in a conversation without thinking how strange your mouth feels when you say it.
- You sign Christmas cards by putting :-) next to your signature.
- You know what smilies are and can read the following symbols
- :-) 8:-) :@) :-? :-C ;-) :-{) :-D :-o [:-)
- Off the top of your head, you can think of nineteen keystroke symbols that are far more clever than :-).
- You constantly find yourself in groups of people to whom you say the phrase "digital compression." Everyone understands what you mean, and you are not surprised that you did not have to explain it.
- You know Bill Gates' e-mail address, but you have to look up your own social security number.
- Your mouse pad is the only clean area on your desk.
- You own a set of itty-bitty screwdrivers and you actually know where they are.
- You think jokes about being unable to program a VCR are stupid.
- When you burn dinner into an unrecognizable mass by trying to multitask, you attempt to restart by pushing "anykey".
- You go to a computer trade show and map out your path of the exhibit hall in advance. But you cannot give someone directions to your house without looking up the street names.
- You know more about Captain Picard than President Clinton.
- On vacation, you are reading a computer manual and turning the pages faster than everyone else who is reading John Grisham novels.
- When in an airport, you look for power plugs near the phones. Even though your battery and the backup are at full charge.
- Your definition of a third world country is one without data jacks.
- You are able to argue persuasively that Ross Perot's phrase "electronic town hall" makes more sense than the term "information superhighway," but you don't because, after all, the man still uses hand-drawn pie charts.
- Al Gore strikes you as an "intriguing" fellow.
- Rather than talk to the person at the next desk, you e-mail over the LAN.
- You have a functioning home copier, fax and computer, but every toaster you own turns bread into charcoal.
- You have ended friendships because of irreconcilably different opinions about which is better -- the track ball or the track pad.
- You understand all the jokes in this column. If so, my friend, technology has taken over your life. We suggest, for your own good, that you go lie under a tree and write a haiku. And don't use a laptop.
As appeared in Manufacturing Systems Magazine March 1995 Page 12
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