Technophilia
When Blackberry’s worlwide lost their connection to each other and the world many of Blackberry’s customers loudly proclaimed that they would chuck their handsets in for iPhones (other phones are also available).
Some of their customers even went as far as writing to newspapers to tell them that their whole life came crashing down on the loss of their Blackberry’s communication facilities. They feared that they would become social outcasts as they lost out on their friend’s news and events and couldn’t tell their friends when they were picking their nose.
And on the news that some technophile has made a video of their daughter playing naturally with an iPad but having problems turning the page of a real magzine you start to wonder how much technology is changing humanity.
I know I can’t live my day without access to the internet via my laptop and smartphone. How I coped with daily life without such gadgets I don’t know.
But what about you? Which piece of technology can’t you live without anymore.
SBML
PS. Normal service will be resumed as soon as possible, all the staff behind the bar are having a fag break.
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1
October 16, 2011 at 09:22 -
Toothbrush.
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2
October 16, 2011 at 09:39 -
Can live without but don’t want to: Flushing indoor toilet
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3
October 16, 2011 at 10:48 -
^
This!
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4
October 16, 2011 at 10:49 -
For me, it’d have to be internet access.
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5
October 16, 2011 at 10:54 -
“Some of their customers even went as far as writing to newspapers……..”
Find paper & pen, get an envelope, buy a stamp, use Royal Mail………………I bet that process brought back a few memories for them.
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6
October 16, 2011 at 21:35 -
Spelling must have been a bugger though…….
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7
October 16, 2011 at 11:06 -
Wish I could remember which programme it was (maybe even something I’d recorded), but last night my wife and I looked at each in horror/despair when a boy – 7/8ish – when asked who was his best friend, replied ‘My computer’. This wasn’t a set-up.
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8
October 16, 2011 at 13:18 -
The Telephone.
My telephone was down for six days back along thereby depriving me of my Internet Connection. It didn’t occur to me that it was the telephone because I don’t actually use it anymore, if you know what I mean.
Anyway, I nearly died from worrying about all those people trying to contact me urgently.
The sad fact that no one actually was trying to contact me urgently is entirely beside the point. -
9
October 16, 2011 at 14:10 -
Central heating.
I’m not old enough to remember the winters of 1947, and wasn’t old enough to be taking much notice of the winter of 1962/3, but the stories of household plumbing systems that froze solid and stayed that way for weeks are sufficient to make me very grateful for at least enough background heat to keep me reasonably comfortable. If it wasn’t there, I’m sure I’d cope (people did for centuries!) but I’m fairly sure I’d grumble about it.
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10
October 16, 2011 at 23:38 -
@Engineer – I am ‘old enough’ to remember both . In ’47 – SW London – the (full pressure) main stayed running, but all the rest of the system froze. Christmas ’62 – just married. We had street standpipes after the main in our road burst. Later the lead pipe feeding the (only/outside) WC also split and grew a pretty icicle – and we needed a kettle full of hot water to melt the pan before use. Solid fuel stoves though – snug.
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11
October 17, 2011 at 14:04 -
I remember both – with vivid clarity. 1947 was particularly bad. It was still freezing in April the following year. Many people died and not just elderly folk.
Now an elderly old thing am I grateful for central heating? You bet I am.Internet access: I’d hate to be without it. In my crippled state – access to services and goods via this dear old Mac is an absolute God send.
Stay warm everyone.
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12
October 16, 2011 at 14:41 -
Hope that fag break is in a non-public space……otherwise I’ll have the environmental cops on your backs!
I couldn’t ‘manage’ without my MacBook, it’s absolutely brilliant and gives me ‘magical’ access to all these strange web sites….
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13
October 16, 2011 at 16:46 -
And that’s another one. Mac Forever.
PS. I did half consider getting a life while I was off line, but I couldn’t concentrate for long enough to do anything about it.
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16
October 16, 2011 at 15:55 -
My customers in the Raccoon Arms – first time I’ve hqd a sniff of internet in dqys, and there you all are God bless you. Back tomorrow sometime.
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17
October 16, 2011 at 17:29 -
hqd / dqys – French keyboard?
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18
October 16, 2011 at 18:45 -
Just adjacent, probably. I do it all of the time, when I don’t hit the Caps Button.
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19
October 16, 2011 at 21:40 -
Don’t think so,
On a french keyboard athe A and Q are swapped as are the W and Z and poor old M gets moved up beside L.
If you touch type making those mistakes is very easy. I do it all the time when someone brings in a computer for me to look at and it has a French keyboard – gets strange results sometimes
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20
October 16, 2011 at 21:01 -
Life would become very difficult without the internal combustion engine, in all its forms………
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21
October 16, 2011 at 21:52 -
Of course if we didn’t have electricity to power all the devices we seem to accumulate where would we be?
As to the device – actually a collection of devices but they work together – I’d miss the most, my computer system. It allows me to draw objects and get a 3D view to see the overall picture as well as being much easier writing – no more stuffing paper into a mechanical typewriter and accumulating a pile of waste paper when I invariably change something.
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22
October 16, 2011 at 21:52 -
It has to be electricity.
No pumps=no water=death by thirst
No transport=no food=death by starvation.
No medical facilities of any kind=death by disease,
No electric signals in the brain
=no questions like the one I’m answering
=death by boredom -
23
October 16, 2011 at 23:47 -
Re “Electricity” – There’s still time to watch “Shock and Awe: The Story of Electricity” on BBC4 –
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24
October 16, 2011 at 23:49 -
Oh dear -Peter Melia – here in Australia they seem to be planning on not using electricity much more . The Carbon tax , shutting down power stations etc. Mark you back in the 70s when the unions went on strike ad lib we got by with candles and such stuff.
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25
October 17, 2011 at 12:19 -
Assuming technology that needs external power source to operate; nothing invented in the last fifty years or so. I am not a luddite or a technophobe, but life does go on without all this incessant data floating about.
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26
October 17, 2011 at 12:39 -
Shoes.
I’m fairly confident I could get by removing the skins of various beasts and wrapping them about myself, but footwear that stays on, protects the sole and keeps the feet warm is beyond my wit, I’m sure. -
27
October 17, 2011 at 15:38 -
First of all Blackberry went down. Then Apple iphones. Did any of the red tops have a headline saying…..
“Blackberry and Apple Crumble”
Would have been cool.
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28
October 18, 2011 at 00:16 -
@John //“Blackberry and Apple Crumble”//
Facebooking friends asked similar Qs . My contribution was about failure-to-floss after a blackberry download (with custard) – and having a Bluetooth in the morning.
[IGMC]
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29
October 17, 2011 at 18:00 -
I hate to say it because it probably makes me a bad person but, nothing amuses me more when an iphone ceases to work. The look of stunned misapprehension on the look of the face of the gonk holding it fills me with warmth.
Equally, I’ve witnessed children and adolescents go into a blind panic when deprived of internet or games console, this is also hugely entertaining.
iphones are horrible things, great for communication people say, except they’re not really. Any gains made in improving communication with friends who aren’t sitting right next to them are quickly and rudely cancelled out when they come to understand they are facetiming someone in Upper Volta but entirely ignoring the friend sitting right next to them.
Even mobile phone calls in company, if you’re talking to someone and your phone goes you don’t answer it because that is tantamount to the person on the line (if he or she was actually there) running up, making a really irritating noise then interupting an already flowing conversation. You just wouldn’t do that.
Sure, it might be important but given they’re phoning you on your mobile means they’re far away, if they’ve opened an artery there’s not going to be a whole hell of a lot you can do from the pub.
I don’t like mobile phones actually, they are rubbish, I hate that I have to have one.
I couldn’t live without my toaster, all I eat is toast. Is a box of wine a gadget? I like a box of wine, so much more efficient than bottles.
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30
October 17, 2011 at 19:02 -
Tempur mattress
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31
October 17, 2011 at 19:03 -
That was me, not Jeremy. He’s been at my computer again.
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{ 31 comments }