I have been given a rare opportunity to return to a more simplistic time before technology revolutionized our lives with the internet. Not by choice, but by circumstance, I’ve been without internet and cable for about 2 weeks as I recently moved into a new apartment in Boston..
Waiting for the cable installation has been an exercise in a recall. I’ve had to tap into my memory banks and ask myself; what did we do before the internet? How did we find information, and answer our questions daily? Enter the phonebook. Yes, that large yellowish book that is dropped off on your doorstep every year for free. You may have one, or a collection of them just sitting idle in your kitchen cabinet. I was never a fan of the phonebook, I felt it was hard to find information as you had to determine what category something would fall under. For example: CAR INSPECTION. Would I find this under Automotive, or Service Stations or Gas Stations? After searching diligently for about a ½ an hour, I resorted to asking a friend. Yes, personal connections and contacts got me the answer I needed.
I’ve subsequently used this magic phone book to map my route to different places around town, verify stops on the subway system, find numbers for the local power and gas companies, and find the number for the cable company. Wow, this book is pretty useful, good thing I have one!
Now onto cable. I have to admit, I bought a pair of rabbit ears for my Flat Panel High Def, LCD TV. Something is amiss when you see the sleek design of a modern appliance attached to 2 metal rods coming out of a plastic box. They ran me 7.99$ and the cashier told me “You know these will be obsolete in a few weeks?” Due to the change over to all HD broadcast, analog singles will no longer be used on Febuary 17th. I explained my dilemma and wish to “just watch the NFL playoff games this weekend.” The main catalyst behind the purchase, I was excited I could at least pick up about 7 stations if I was lucky. Unfortunately there is a reason Cable and Satellite are so popular, as rabbit ears are very unreliable for picking up TV broadcasts. I was fortunate enough to get CBS, so I could watch the AFC Championship, but FOX wouldn’t come in, so no luck watching the NFC Championship. Foiled again! I feel like Inspector Clusoe’ constantly stumbling over the clues in the case of the Pink Panther.
Racking my brain, and not wanted to spend money sitting at a bar drinking and watching the game, I pulled my clock radio alarm into service, as it was proud to offer up the game on AM radio. AM radio! I can’t believe I am listening to AM radio, the choppy broadcast, the fuzzy voices, the bad commercials, it’s all here on my little clock radio.
Interestingly enough I have survived this technology dead zone I’ve exist in for the last few weeks. I honestly had to fill my time with other things then Twitter, Google News, email and random browsing. I am not going to lie, I have been hitting up cafes with free WIFI to go online to check email every couple days, and my phone can access GMAIL, but I can live with out that. I did pay a few bills online, sorry I cannot be a complete throwback.
I guess my experience with this technology dead zone has taught me a few things about the hold technology has on us as a society. I think we are at the crossroads were we may eventually not have phone books in the future, or newspapers for our source of information. (Yes, I did buy and read an entire newspaper on Saturday!) It is almost the night before the dawn where our only way to gather information will be with some device that needs power. I think as a society once technology holds the key to information, whether that be servers, Smart Phones, web browsers, etc we are dangerously dependent on that technology to exist and function as we expect it to. I see that we don’t need the technology as a society, it just makes things “easier” or so we think. Sometimes it feels as technology allows us to hide from ourselves, and become something we are not. It seems to bring the world together but at the same time re-write the way humans interact with each other. Throughout history inventions have revolutionized the way humanity communications and shares information, it is common for something like the internet to re-invent the rules of engagement and the rules of information sourcing and gathering. However, this is the first time an invention has the source of information in bits and bytes, 1s and 0s, or machine language. Without those machines this information is not understandable by us human beings. Perhaps the dependency on the machine to decipher the information for us, will lead to a struggle between us and our technological creations. Now, we can always power these devices on and off, we control their functionality, however someday the machines may have the cognitive ability to shut themselves on an off and determine if they are willing to decipher the 1s and 0s into human readable information. I’ve never heard of a phonebook refusing to open, or a newspaper protesting a bad story by not showing the headline on the page.
We don’t need our technology to live, we just like it too much to give it up. Let’s hope that we will always have control over our information in all forms.
