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Tech Geezers vs. Young Bloods
Lam1969 writes "Robert Mitchell talks about how technology is dividing him from younger generations: "The technologies I've watched grow have shaped an entire culture of which I am not a part." Adds Dinosaur: "Ask them [members of the younger generation] HOW the things work, and they have no idea. They are really riding on the backs of the 'old folks' like us that built the goodies they enjoy.""
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~ |rip/\/\aster /\/\onkey
Quantum computers to be obselete by 2025. You heard it here first.
That's what repair shops and 1-800 numbers are for.
" Remember, people are stupid. "
Excluding CyberBill of course. He's smart. So all you stupid people should agree with him.
"I'm oooooold! And I'm not happy! And I don't like things now compared to the way they used to be. All this progress -- phooey!"
:(
Dana Carvey, Grumpy Old Man
Sounds more like my wife...and you have no idea how much trouble I'm in for saying that (not to mention how depressing it is to discover that your wife is a grumpy old man)
A goal is a dream with a deadline
How many people can produce a fire out of just sticks?
Depends... are the sticks USB-enabled?
Indeed, I'm nearing 70, and have worked in the computer industry for a very long time. There have been a number of times that I have envied the young.
One such time was at work, probably around 1995 or 1996. In order to increase the productivity at our firm we installed several Internet-enabled workstations for various managers, secretaries and workers.
After a while we noticed some rather work-unrelated web sites showing up as being accessed from a particular workstation, which happened to be in the office of one of the young guys in finance. They were rather peculiar fetish sites. In any case, some of us in IT thought that we should alert this worker's higher-up to what was happening.
It was decided that several of us would discuss the matter with him. So we headed up to his office, and knocked on his door, and opened it. Much to our surprise, he was there with a massive boner, ejaculate all over. He must have been in the middle of it when we knocked, because he was quickly trying to clean the mess off of the keyboard and his pants.
It didn't bother me that he was whacking his cock in the office, or that he got his semen on the computer's keyboard. What bothered me was that he was able to get an erection, and I wasn't. So even though I knew far more about technology than he did, he was able to get a boner and I couldn't. I was trumped.
Cyric Zndovzny at your service.
Cotton Gin -- basically, pulls the cotton from the unwanted plant parts by pulling it through a filter with, and I haven't seen one since I was a kid, a brush of needles.
Steam Locomotion -- easy: burn something to heat water resultant expansion pushes piston/turbine to make motion
Similar to above except uses small amount of gas which is ingited with a spark, or diesel fuel which is ignited through pressure and the resultant locomotion is powered through the driveshaft to turn the wheels. All the accessories are run off of a belt system from the driveshaft: water pump to keep the motor cool, alternator to keep the battery charged and the sparkplugs popping...
Electricity -- similar to above except instead of turning a wheel or drive shaft a magnet is spun inside a coil of wires and the electricity is produced and transmitted across a grid of wires and transformers to your home. Alternately, running water, nuclear fusion and wind can do this too.
Telephone: it's basically like pulling the tail of a cat and at the other end the cat screams.
over the air broadcast system -- same as above, but without the cat.
Wheel of Fortune -- Vanna White is the oracle of the goddess Fortuna and the wheel intereprets your fate.
any other smart questions whippersnapper?
I must say I disapprove of this wave of user friendly technology. Normal people shouldn't be able to use technology, no. They should pay me £70 an hour to do it for them.
Why, that's silly. Everybody knows how a flush toilet works:
1. User drops load into toilet
2. User operates flush lever
3. Water gizmos and channels create various bits of suction
4. Shit clogs stupid low-flow toilet, lacking sufficient water to lubricate and push/pull it through
5. User applies plunger, which fails to seal over odd-shaped low-flow orifice
6. Unsealed plunger in angry user's hand, while not pulling shit back up, does manage to push shit through the toilet, resulting in complete flush.
Optionally,
7. Angry user in fit of rage operates flush lever again before step 6 is completed, resulting in shit raining down in basement onto clean laundry
That's a sufficiently detailed technical explanation of the flush cycle. Tell me again why residential toilets can't go "WHOOOSH!!!!!" like commercial toilets?
Procrastination -- because good things come to those who wait.
Two posts, one of which is correct, one of which is overly simplified. I think he proved your point.
Can you be Even More Awesome?!
Demigods huh, where do I sign up for this lucrative and no doubt enjoyable lifestyle?
(let's just ignore the fact that "IQ" is stupid and "intelligence" (whatever that means) is a multi-variable function)
Oh, IQ can be very handy: anyone who brags about their score can be immediately dismissed as a worthless putz.
-jcr
The only title of honor that a tyrant can grant is "Enemy of the State."
I can, I can... I use these things called "matches"
....HOW the things work, and they have no idea. They are really riding on the backs of the 'old folks' like us that built the goodies they enjoy.
Yeah? Well, in my day, on the way to my punchcard programming job, I'd have to walk to work in 6 feet of snow, in my bare feet, only stopping to warm them in fresh cow-pats along the way!
In post Patriot Act America, the library books scan you.
What are you like 5 years older than your stepson?
We'll see what you think about that when nearly everyone who can maintain a computer ssytem from the mid 1990s has retired.
The computer systems from the mid 1990s will have retired long before the High Priests who know how to maintain them (re: paper MCSE's and Bachelor-degree holding *nix geeks) are gone.
Old retired COBOL guys got a little "bounce" during all the panic over Y2K, but that "crisis" merely provoked a lot of companies to realize the need to move on from those old, cobweb-covered "big iron" mainframes.
Information wants to be anthropomorphized.
back in the old days, we had to telnet in to the slashdot server and read the MOTD to see the articles! Comment were through talk(1). I knew things were going downhill when on that fateful day Taco "upgraded" ./ to gopher.