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Plumber, Electrician... Digitician?
Alien54 writes "This article from the Sunday Boston Globe describes the rise of a new type of tradesman called, for lack of a better term, a digitician, a label describing the burgeoning army of overqualified, unemployed, or free-spirited computer technicians being deployed to front porches around the country."
Will people now start referring to "digitician's butt"?
"Molest me not with this pocket calculator stuff."
- Deep Thought
Finally, microwave and VCR clocks across the country won't be flashing 12:00!
Finally, a job that WON'T be outsources to India!! *crosses fingers*
"Yeah, the whole computer needs an overhaul. Your modem is shot, and really, you might be able to get another 1,000 megs out of it, it's not too safe to be ridin' around on the internet like that. And while I was in there I noticed your processor is kind of old, we might want to go ahead and update that for ya. And with that comes driver updates and refits. Should have it by Tuesday. Wednesday at the latest. Here's the estimate."
"500 dollars!?"
"Yes. Legally, I can't even let you take it home because of the modem."
"What's this at the bottom? Rust proofing? Collision insurance?"
"when life gets complicated, I like to take a nap in a tree and wait for dinner" - Hobbes.
Exactly. :)
I am not a Nerd. I am a "digitician"
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Except unlike the other *ticians people find it acceptable to pay digiticians in cookies and soda.
There's this tale (many adapations exist I'm sure):
* There was an engineer who had an exceptional gift for fixing all things mechanical. After serving his company loyally for over 30 years, he happily retired.
Several years later the company contacted him regarding a seemingly impossible problem they were having with one of their multi-million dollar machines. They had tried everything and everyone else to get the machine fixed, but to no avail. In desperation, they called on the retired engineer who had solved so many of their problems in the past. The engineer reluctantly took the challenge.
He spent a day studying the huge machine. At the end of the day, he marked a small "x" in chalk on a particular component of the machine and proudly stated, "This is where your problem is".
The part was replaced and the machine worked perfectly again. The company received a bill for $50,000 from the engineer for his service. They demanded an itemized accounting of his charges.
The engineer responded briefly:
One chalk mark: $1
Knowing where to put it: $49,999
It was paid in full and the engineer retired again in peace.
$cat
Obviously, this didn't work for George W. Bush.