This thought came to me while I was sitting in a Barnes & Noble bookstore, drinking a cup of coffee and working through the last few pages of a book on multidimensional physics.

My acquaintances, John and Dan, and I went out for lunch last Sunday. I picked up Dan and together we drove to John’s house. As I hoped, John was ready to go, when we arrived—it was almost 2:30, and I was hungry. We had not seen one another in a while, so we were interested in catching up with one another’s news—especially John’s academic studies. John had a laughing about his falling asleep while reading a less-the-gripping textbook, a problem that plagues all scholars on occasion.

It did not strike us a unusual that a student would find a textbook dry until we remembered that John is blind. It was Dan who first remembered, and he asked John if he were reading the book or listening to the book on tape. I got to thinking about the problems that John might face while completing his academic work—what if a text were not published in audio format? I asked him about this, and he explained how he converts digital texts to audio format.

His comments have been twisting and turning in the back of my mind for the last few days. I am an academic, a full time faculty member. All of my texts are delivered in digital format, as either HTML or Adobe PDF documents. With the exception of two grammatical style manuals, all texts are digitized and delivered electronically, to both students and faculty. The university has a fully-digitized reference library, so with the exception of two writing references, all books are available in digital format.

Many of the Adobe PDF books are protected from unauthorized distribution by DRM (digital rights management) encryption, a system that allows only authorized recipients to open, view, and print the books.

Many of my students have complained that the publishers’ DRM encryption fails to work on home computers, so they are left to read each chapter in HTML, without being able to download and print the entire properly-formatted text,

As much as I advocated within the university for a conversion from physical to digital texts, I never imagined that the publishers would so bungle the books’ distribution chain. Protection of copyright is vital in America, and I so believer in copyright and other intellectual property protections that I made the topic the focus of my dissertation. However, unless the works are accessible to the scholars—the book’s consumers—who pay the bills, the DRM protections defeat their purpose: making the texts accessible only to those who have paid for the text.

 

When I originally wrote this article, I was visiting one of my favoriate vacation spots in the United States: Hilton Head Island, South Carolina. I am shocked that a paucity of public life line networks the coffee shop down the road from our resort offers free wireless Internet service and the sundry store on the other side of the shopping doubles as an Internet café selling access for $6.00 a day.

One of the Marriott facilities has a public a spot in the lobby, and that is about it. I’ve run across over a dozen guests with notebook computers; how many more could there be a who haven’t brought their computers down to the pool? What is the facility manager thinking? I wonder if there are 100 or more guests who would jump at the chance to get on the net for a bit–there are four of us, just in my vacation party.

I am disappointed that there are not more public wi-fi hot spots on the island. The hot spot that I found in our resort’s lobby is not really designed to be accessed by notebook computers,rather it is for owners of wireless digital cameras that would like to access the photo printer.
The owner of sundries store in the shopping plaza a half mile from our resort is friendly enough, and he opens the store early in the morning, at 6 o’clock. However, in order to use his wi-fi network to log into my class newsgroups or to check e-mail or the day’s news, I have to either walk with my backpack down to the plaza or jump in the family van and drive off in either case I’m gone for my family for the better part of an hour or two, which is not something that I find appealing while on vacation.

I have spoken with resort manager few times over the last few years asking when wi fi network will be more readily accessible across the complex and I’ve received platitudes and broad promises that next year we should have wi-fi access available in each of the condos. To me, that’s just not a good answer, given the business climate in which were expected to be accessible for at least a few minutes, each day.

At this ski chalet that we visit each winter during Super Bowl weekend, wi-fi access is available, and I am able to maintain a consistent all be at abbreviated work schedule during that vacation. I feel much more comfortable during that vacation—even though I am really up each person—because I can check in with my classes very easily both first thing in the morning and again after dinner, and I stay up with national and international news by leaving my rss feed reader open on my notebook computer.

How does it work for you? Are you able to find wi-fi access when you’re on vacation?

 

Reliance on digital technology creates a sense of emphasis on keeping busy and productive. The internet and the burgeoning world of e-business allow both geographic and chronologic flexibility. Word, both commercial and personal, may be attended with greater individual flexibility than ever before. No longer are many white collar professional—am I am not sure that this term is any longer appropriate, as casual dress is now encouraged during the entire work week—required to complete work at the corporate office.

Home desktop computers and especially portable notebook computers allow professionals to attend ot responsibilities at locations other than the office or rather, the personal computers enable the “office” to be flexible, as to location. For example, I am writing this article at our vacation beach house on a Sunday morning. I have significant discretion in choosing where and when I write because I am able to easily carry my notebook computer with me…in other words, I can easily carry my workplace with me.

As a full-time academic, my notebook computer has allowed me to change the way that I do library research. I take it with me to the library, use the wi-fi service to access the internet, and search the card catalog—all without leaving my study carrel. My time in the library is more productive, as I save time in physical movement, and I am able to cut and past data from the catalog (or other research reference) into my digital documents, ensuring greater accuracy for my reference citations.

The outcome of this available flexibility is a reliance on the digital technology as an aid to constantly-available work. I often find the I squeeze in work when I would otherwise be at ease or engaged in other pursuits. The always-available work environment intrudes into my life, at times.

 

I am not sure that most retail associates would be able to calculate the correct change for a $37.63 charge if the customer presented a $100 bill. Retail clerks rely on the cash register to calculate the sales tax and change that should be returned to the customer. Some registers even suggest alternative combinations of bills and coins to hand to the customer so that the proper change is delivered.

I am not sure that most retail associates would be able to calculate the correct change for a $37.63 charge if the customer presented a $100 bill. Retail clerks rely on the cash register to calculate the sales tax and change that should be returned to the customer. Some registers even suggest alternative combinations of bills and coins to hand to the customer so that the proper change is delivered.As a child, I was taught to accurately compute my sales totals, estimate the sales tax, and determine the anticipated change that I would receive for each purchase that I made. I was even taught to do these calculations in my head, without the help of a pencil and paper, let alone a calculator or automatic cash register—not that I would have been able to bring a cash register along in my pocket! To this day, I can quickly do a fast estimation of arithmetic, especially summations. This is a skill that serves me well as I move through the checkout line at the grocery store.

I find it difficult to believe that the proliferation of electronic calculators, spreadsheet applications, and yes, self-totaling cash registers has not had a deleterious effect on the general population’s skills at arithmetic. Skills, once learned but rarely practiced, are lost. Skills never learned are, by definition, lost to the user.

The general population, by all accounts, feels no need to learn, let alone practice, arithmetic, in its daily activities. Prove this to yourself by mentally estimating the cost of a fuel for an 850 mile road trip in a vehicle that yields 28 miles per gallon of gasoline at a cost of $3.05 per gallon. Even a quick estimate, without minor rounding of $1.00 per 10 miles, times 85 (or $0.10 per mile times 850) equals a rough estimate of $85 in gasoline cost (close to the actual cost of $92.59).

My mother, who was graduated from only high school just after World War II and had no further academic training amazed me recently during a phone call by arguing that airline fares would cost less than the cost of fuel and lodging should she and Dad come for a visit. It is just this type of numeracy that is lost to the current generation of Americans. Why have we lost this skill?

Without a calculator, most of us are innumerate. As helpful as a calculator or spreadsheet is to use—and I own at least a dozen calculators of various sizes—I rue our loss of the skills that were once considered academic de rigueur.

 

How does the public access to weblogs (blogs) affect our culture? Recently, online pundits have considered the effect that blogs have had on our nation’s political process. The presidential election of 2004 was the first to receive significant effect from bloggers, rather than just from those pseudo-journalists who report live from the national political conventions. Both major parties, the Republicans and Democrats, as well as the second-tier parties made full and good use of the low-cost (free) and concurrent interaction afforded by the blogosphere. I call this concurrent interaction because blogging allows readers immediate access to posted articles.

Just as soon as an article is posted to a blog, by the blog’s author, it is available to be read by anyone, anywhere in the world using no technology more sophisticated than a web browser.
Not only blogging, but also branding and the creation of a vertical mass of support came on the wave of digital activism in the 2004 election. Gradually, as with most new media, the net, blogging in particular, became an essential component of American politics.

However, like a hometown newspaper, yet to a global venue, the internet served the purposes of the candidates, themselves; the professional journalists in addition to their traditional outlets of television, radio, magazines, and newspapers; the active political voices: pollsters, pundits, and activists, both organized and individual, and citizen individuals, in addition to offering front yards and automobile bumpers and letters to the editor, through digital publications, including blogs and their follow-on comments and feedback tools.

An excellent example of the net’s political power netted candidate, Vermont Governor Howard Dean a half million dollars in a digital campaign to raise donations in competition with a forthcoming Republican fundraiser. The Republican fundraiser, a $2,000-a-plate luncheon netted a quarter million dollars in donations, while in the same time, the online Dean campaign netted a cool half million dollars. Also of note, the Republicans touched only 125 guests (donors), while the Dean campaign touched 9,700 donors.

Not only did the Dan campaign raise significantly more money and tap almost two magnitudes more supporters, it did so for less cost and effort.

Dean’s campaign slogan, “You have the power,” reflected not only poetically, but also, directly, the influence of digital politics.

However, by the time of each major party’s convention, the lessons of Howard Dean’s campaign were already forgotten–or maybe they were yet to be internalized–because at nether convention were leading candidates’ website URLs prominently displayed or promoted.

Further campaigns will likely play out in the digital arena, more so than in the past. Driven by a desire to promote populist values and inclusion of an increasingly diverse electorate, candidates’ managers will seek to parlay the low-cost, immediate publication of simultaneous interaction services of the net; blogging is but the first of the new technologies to be developed.

 

The first distinction, for most personal computer users, is one of hardware and software: Microsoft Windows or Macintosh, IBM-style or Apple. Is the computer one that runs Microsoft Windows or Mac OS (operating system)? Fundamentally, is it one made of nonproprietary components, capable of running multiple operating systems (i.e. DOS, Windows, Linux, and Solaris)? Is the system designed specifically to operate the hardware vendor’s operating system, Mac OS, an operating system that, interestingly, is based on the open source Linux operating system?

While both computer designs can function well for the fundamental office and home tasks: word processing, calculation of numeric columns, keeping database of customer and friends’ names. However, one of the first distinctions that most users learn is that not all data created on one computer system can be easily transferred to another system.

It is not unexpected, by the technically-trainer experts, that data on different computer systems may not be interchangeable; however, to the less-skilled user, this may seem unexpected. After all, both pieces of equipment are computers. Two cars of different manufacture probably use the same fuel, both transport equally well, so why not expect similar simplicity from two computers?

Part of the reason that the automotive and information technology products may be ill suited for comparison is the relative development period of the two. Automobiles have been consumer products for a century; digital computers have been available for only two decades.

Even more so, most consumers have thousands of hours of practice driving cars in all seasons and many diverse road conditions, but under generally controlled and similar situations. After a few hundred hours’ practice, all roads begin to look alike to a driver. On the other hand, computer software applications often appear substantially different, to the end user. The only similarity shared by a database, spreadsheet, and word processing application is the keyboard—as far as most users can tell.

Many of the distinctions and technical details of personal computer systems become apparent only after years of near-daily use and exposure to many different computer systems and software applications. Even so, after exposure to diverse software applications (i.e. word processing, spreadsheets, databases, email, and web browsing), most users still do not understand the fundamental differences that make an Apple Mac OS system different than one running Microsoft Windows—or Linux.

The operating system, whether Mac OS, Microsoft Windows, Linux—an open source product created by a generous community of volunteer software programmers—determines which software applications will efficiently operate on the example system.

Even more confusing, both to technical experts and the general population of digital users, is the overlap amongst the alternative operating systems: Mac OS is actually Linux; Mac OS can emulate Microsoft Windows, using an operating environment called SoftPC; Linux can run most software programs written for Microsoft Windows by using a free program, called Wine: Windows Emulator. Speaking of free, Linux is—totally free.

Although we may find commercial releases of Linux on retail shelves, these are actually neatly packaged copies of Linux that are also available for free, as digital downloads from the vendors’ websites. The downloadable versions can often be customized and may include additional applications, both business and entertainment, than the packaged retail versions. The benefit of the retail version is that some period, usually 90 days, of technical support is included. Even that is not an issue for technically adept users who recognize that more detailed, higher quality, support is available free through tens of thousands of websites dedicated to supporting Linux users.

 

How well do users accept responsibility for the perceived complexity of digital systems?

Although I judge that popular digital computers are less secure and more difficult to use than they could easily otherwise be, primarily because buyers are swayed in their decision making by marketing influences, I also judge that most end users don’t accept sufficient responsibility to learn the nuances, strengths, and weaknesses of the systems that purchase or use.

All systems have a degree of complexity. Procedures All systems and constituent components require specific operating procedures. Even systems as manual as writing required a pencil to be sharpened and fresh paper made available. If the pencil were not sharpened, it would not write well. In elementary school, students are taught to use a manual rotary pencil sharpener, and in some homes, even at an early age, children were taught to use a battery-powered electric sharpener.

Even earlier, the Crayola box of 64 crayons and the sharpener on the back of the box teach many children that rudimentary skill of creating a writing point. Knowing that a sharp point can create both a thin line and, with a twist of the wrist, a gentle, broad shadow, is fundamental to fully using the drawing pencil. All users recognize this and are able to meet the rudimentary skill set expectations of an elementary school art teacher.

If artistic skills develop further, the user may learn to make finer distinctions and learn more application details regarding the pencil. For example, knowing and being able to apply the soft and dark 6B pencil lead through the hard and light 6H pencil lead, the wood versus mechanical pencil body, not to mention graphite versus charcoal media are critical to having developing a broad diversity of artistic forms.

The range of knowledge, both of the tool (pencil, in discussion) designs and how and when to most effectively use each degree of the tool’s diversity grants the user flexibility to select the most appropriate tool version for the intended application. Does the average user need to know the same range of distinctions as the expert, the artist? No; however, as more distinctions are made available to the user, more fluid and unrestricted applications follow.

Just as the knowledge of pencil distinctions offers greater flexibility to the artists-and writer-knowledge of how a personal computer and its attendant software applications offers greater flexibility of application to the digital end user.

What are some of the common distinctions that may aid the digital user?

 

It is difficult to accept digital failures and the all-too-often human failure to properly use digital technology as it was designed to be used.

Many information technology experts place blame on the designers of digital systems, especially software vendors (both those who create operating systems and those who author applications) for users’ difficulties in properly using computers. Much of the criticism is aptly directed, For example, the Microsoft Windows system registry, first introduced in 1993 with Windows 95, while a boon to hardware and peripheral makers, is actually a poorly-designed total system management tool, because once corrupted, the registry is very nearly impossible to repair. There is no easily accessible means of backing up and restoring the registry automatically without risking misconfigurations.
Early versions of Microsoft Windows, up to version 3.11 for Workgroups, and all versions of Linux use a system of initialization and configuration files that can quickly be duplicated and individually—or collectively—restored, in the event of a system failure.

Regardless, personal computers are complex, and believe it or not, quite delicate instruments—as most users will attest after spending a few hours (or days) attempting to repair a corrupted application or coaxing an inkjet printer to create the proper shade of rouge on family pictures.

With all of this software (and hardware) bashing, pushing forward with full force, most users forget that all technologies require training and proper procedures. Most consumers do not want to recognize that a toaster oven should be unplugged when not in use; that is, until their toasting unit spontaneously bursts into flames, one day. Actually, the oven most likely heat up of its own volition, but rather a family member mishandled the oven, possibly bumping the on/off switch during a routine kitchen counter activity.

Soup and pasta with tomato sauce should not be heated in an uncovered microwaveable container, unless the sight of red splatters in the microwave is appealing to you. Surely, the designers of these consumer systems could have created better systems: guarded on/off switches, containers with hinged, no-loss lids. All it takes to prevent these common problems is two simple system changes. However, repairing these two problems creates new problems. By repositioning the on/off switch on the toaster oven, the unit becomes more difficult to operate. Installing a hinge on microwavable container lids makes dishwashing—manual and automatic—cumbersome. I should know, as I am my family’s dishwasher.

What perception and judgment paradigm allows is to accept these system failing, but not those of our personal computer? If you are quick to say price, think again, we could just as easily find examples of frustrating system designs in our automobiles and home construction, two items that generally cost more than a personal computer.

I judge that the world, our lives, is complicated. WE look to the personal computer to help us organize and control our lives. When the control system, itself, adds a layer of complication, we react quickly and often out of proportion to the actual incident.

 

Weblogs—blogs—are a product of the need to make it easier to publish on the web. For the less technically adept user, blogs are a venue to online publishing that requires almost no special training. I have read many articles that describe blogs as a source for writers, web publishers. When I discuss blogs with adult university students, especially business management majors, a common reaction is that the blogging software is a facilitation tool that the could use to build web content without leaning heavily on the support of information systems staff or contract computer advisors or webmasters.

These students’ observations that blogging is a tool, not solely the result, presents a perspective that is significantly different from that which most technology pundits present.

WHO BLOGS?
Most bloggers are young, technically-savvy computer users; although, I anticipate that blogs will follow the expectations put forth by my business management students: viz., blogs will become business tools for disseminating information, both internally and externally.
?
Why will blogs become a business publishing tool?

 

I am writing this text by using my favorite writing implement: a finely crafted Waterman fountain pen with an extra fine nib and an ultra smooth light ink (South Sea Blue in color). My paper is a smooth, eggshell writing journal, bound in a calfskin leather jacket with a corresponding leather thong closing wraps. The only metal I touch is in my pen’s sleeve connectors, and even that is minimal. I will eventually type my words into my notebook computer and word processing software for editing and layout. You may be thinking, why not initially compose at the keyboard? I compose by hand because my words flow more smoothly if I write by hand, manually without digital assistance.

I write more slowly using pen and paper, and this allows me time to consider my words. I am a persnickety writer when I compose at the keyboard: fussing over each word and phrase. Writing by hand frees me to let my ideas flow, without any editing and evaluation. I am able to test multiple alternatives of phrasing and content, where, if I were to compose at my keyboard, my composition rate (typing speed) often outpaces my thoughts. I find myself writing quickly, but writing the first thing that comes to mind. During the manual writing process, I think of a few turns of phrase before committing my words to paper, yet I feel fully engaged and productive because my hand is in constant motion, albeit, always a moment behind my mental composition.

This is but one example of an activity that works best, for me, if I do it manually. By way of creating the proper paradigm and perspective, I do almost all of my composition at the computer keyboard; however, most of my writing is the creation of academic syllabi, lecture note, blog and e-zine articles, and technical manuals. These are brisk, factual and come out my recent experience; the content is often dispassionate and dry. My personal works: this text, personal notes, and notes to family members are all composed manually using pen and paper so that my feelings and broader thoughts have time to develop fully during the comparatively slower manual writing process.

 

It may take decades, even longer, for us to grasp the significance of the digital lifestyle and revolution and the breadth of changes the revolution has wrought on us.

The ability to share easily information, especially on a global scale, is democratizing. How will this effect organizations or institutions that attempt to control and repress individual thoughts and actions?

However, no-cost digital publishing, such as blogs, allows the formal media to discredit the sources of ax grinding and soapbox standing Computers that offer feedback to the human users are perceived as more friendly, and the users enjoy the interaction more, if the computer offers positive feedback or compliments.

How well do we use computers as tools to benefit our activities, as compared to using alternative technologies?
The personal computer is eminently suited for many indispensable modern tasks, such as surfing the web, sending e-mail messages, and communicating in the fast-paced digital environment of instant messaging. However, other tools are available for these tasks: cell phones are the most notable alternative technology. We use computers for many other tasks, many of which predate the personal computer, and while the tasks can be accomplished on the personal computer, the tasks were not developed because of having access to a computer.

These digitally-optimal tasks include composing letters and notecards; recording class or meeting notes; and researching spelling, definitions, and etymologies. Arguably, as an academic, I often find the freely available web based dictionaries to lack substance and reliability, especially when comparing synonyms. Traditionally published dictionaries often, in my opinion, present a more complete linguistic evaluation.

It is not worth considering the quality of most word processor-based thesauri. The software vendors should leave these functions out of the products, unless they are willing to design properly an accurate thesaurus database.
Maintaining a personal calendar is one example of tasks that does not require a personal computer. In fact, many folk who have a strong reliance on a personal computer for most other administrative tasks continue to maintain a manual pencil & paper calendar. Until operational necessity forced me to share my personal calendar with coworkers, in the early 1990s, I had a near religious attachment to my leather notebook calendar. It was only after the value of sharing my calendar data became significant did I finally acquiesce and begin to use an electronic calendar as my primarily appointment management tool. To share my calendar data, I needed an application that seamlessly integrated in my company’s local area network. Even after beginning—for five years– to use a digital calendar, I printed my schedule and carried it in my leather notebook. This meant that in order to always have a current calendar with me, I would have to print six pages, sometimes four or five times a day…a fresh copy each time I left the office, just in case a change had been made since I last printed the calendar. At an average cost of 4¢ per page, this habit became a noticeable budget line item.

In the mid 90s, I purchased a handheld computer, one running the popular and powerful Palm operating system. With this device (and the four updated versions that I have since purchased), I can synchronize all of my calendar entries with the application running on our network server, enabling bi directional updates: insertions, deletions, and changes.

My current handheld computer has wireless capability, and it allows me to access my networked data and the internet. I occasionally use my handheld to browse the web and check my e mail when I am out of the office at a wi-fi hotspot: airport terminal, hotel, client site, or coffee shop (along with bookstores, one of my favorite relaxation haunts).

Regardless of my personal choice, do I need an electronic calendar? Yes, because I must easily share my data with coworkers. However, if someone who operates independently, and does not need to share data, chooses to keep a paper calendar, there is no loss of functionality: the possible exception is the ease of making a backup copy of valuable appointment data.

I have found another helpful use for my handheld computer: logging my aircraft flights. Federal air regulations require that I maintain a record of my flights as a pilot. All pilots that I have met rigorously log all flight time, even if as a passenger in the right seat, they took control of the aircraft for only a few minutes, while the pilot in command read a chart or took a break from the tedium of a long flight. Interesting, the Federal Air Regulations do not specify the format in which pilots must keep their flight data. So, in addition to a traditional hardbound paper logbook, I maintain a digital database of all flight data in my handheld computer. Not only do I have automatic calculations of each flight (fuel used, duration of flight, type of aircraft flown), I also have a complete backup copy of my paper logbook (or vice versa, as you prefer). Pilots that keep only a handwritten, paper logbook must take time, every once in a while, to make photocopies of their logbooks. Unless a pilot has a current logbook, he may not take off.

 

To what degree do we fail to evaluate the use of technology and the available interface designs of the technology that we use?

I am still thinking about my conversation with George. Those of us who see value in the full use of technology have to embrace technology, not just accept it. Embracing is the twisting tweaking and fully applying to an application the interaction of effort.

I compare embracing to a faith in the virtue of technology: not that it is solely using a computer; rather it is an emotional bond to the system of digital development. Embracing technology requires recognizing that the more important question is “How best can I use this new device?” rather than, “How do I use this new device?”
Looking for the application, focusing on the outcome, is more important than being concerned about learning to use the catalyst device. Seeing value in the intrinsic nature of a technology is at the heart of embracement. It is as if it were an act of faith. Looking past the functional steps toward the applicability and the outcome-creation potential forms the bond of trust that is inherent in an embracing of any technology.

1981: IBM introduces its first Personal Computer. VisiCalc, Lotus 1 2 3, word processing applications, especially WordPerfect, change the processes by which businesses and later, consumers, collect, store, retrieve, examine, and refer to data.

Access to a digital storage and processing device, especially one that plays games, as an individual and personal tool, created a new paradigm: my data.
My PC=my data.

? How did a “personal” computer create a paradigm of “personal” data?
? How prevalent is this paradigm?
? How did the personal computer create the paradigm of personal data?

Alternatively, was it vice versa? Which came first, the personal computer or personal data? It seems transparent that the personal computer came first, but could its success have been fueled by the masses’ readiness for personal data?

The me first 70s were followed by the go go 80s—the fast development of business following the ecological catastrophes of the mid and late 80s—were people ready to self manages their data?
It is the personal computer that drove the desire for personal data, because the tool created the work. Before spreadsheets, financial and manufacturing data were predominantly reviewed in the aggregate. VisiCalc and, especially, Lotus 1 2 3 created the desire to micromanage data, and they developed a new paradigm for business: the what-if scenario.

With an electronic spreadsheet, business analysts were able to compare potential outcomes, modeling possible alternatives, without investing in expensive prototypes or manual calculation, the professional title given to men, later women, who performed columns of calculations, often logarithmic.

?Data Addiction
I received the PC games Microsoft Zoo Tycoon 2 and Rollercoaster Tycoon 2 for Christmas, and I found that I can easily become addicted to the games, playing them well into the wee hours of the morning…and I am not a normally a computer gamer! The games are not even that interesting, and, in fact, they are boring and repetitive. What is it about these games that makes them so enticing and engaging? The competitive aspect of these games encourages me to practice, learn tricks, seek tips and cheat codes online, and try again and again.

 

How the PC has affected the face of America is one of the questions that have been rolling around inside of my head for over two decades. Most people would agree that the computer revolution has created a brave, new world; however, few may recognize that the availability of personalized, individualized data processing has not only altered our patterns of common behavior, but more so, our expectations of the availability to and delivery of data.

Business professionals speak of information processing; however, computers, even personal computers, are actually a data processing tool. The bits (electrical signals of computerized minutia) are actually data: facts, figures, recorded portions of human activity. Information is an ephemeral evaluation, a cognitive judgment that the human mind creates when data are read and understood. Information exists solely as a mental construct.

I am a university faculty member. I facilitate adult academic classes, in both face-to-face (onground) and computer-mediated (online) classrooms. Some of my students are pursuing the Bachelor of Science in information technology (BS/IT) degree. These students are generally highly competent in the use of technology, both for personal and commercial applications. One recent evening, while teaching a course in critical thinking to a class of about two dozen BS/IT majors, I asked the cohort to describe the distinction between data and information. Most students quickly used their notebook computers to search an online dictionary for the words’ definitions. They were surprised to find the two words define one another: the distinction is not clear in a descriptive dictionary, the most common type of dictionary available online. A commonly used tool offered no help; the students would have to evaluate the distinction themselves.

I frequently consider the distinction: data are the digital products stored, processed, and produced by a computer; information is the conceptualized outcome of the data processing. To me, it is patently clear that data and computer are paired, as are information and the human cognitive process. Why did the students not intuitively recognize this distinction? Not a few of the students were equally competent at many computer applications as I.

Most people seem to be taking their personal computers for granted: relegating the devices to the status of personal household or office appliance. Consumers purchase computers at mass-market retailers, like so many microwave ovens and toasters, rather than at specialty retailers that offer knowledgeable advice and guidance. However, a personal computer has the potential, in properly trained hands, to effect life-altering outcomes: cancer research, protein folding, financial evaluations, and yes, electronic mail and instant messaging. Try any of those tasks with the kitchen toaster!

I recently talked with an academic colleague about the development and application of digital computer technology, especially toward the data retrieval and classification process. Our conversation started following George’s lamenting that much of the peer-reviewed academic literature that he uses in his research is available only in hardcopy, print form. The cream of the published research was not yet available to internet users. While I enjoyed our discussion immensely and I look forward to each of my discussions with George, I disagree, or at least our initial comments lead me to question, how much value we can be found in computer-mediated data that are archived and retrieved, especially regarding the crass referencing systems of multi disciplinary academic literature.

We agreed that PC databases of formatted data—address lists and the like—work well and are sufficiently mature to allow storage and retrieval of desire data in a reasonable timeframe. However, unformatted data, such as a corpus of literature or multidisciplinary scholarship cannot be stored in a computer system without significant expertise in both the subject area and storage system, nor can the literary data be retrieve, except by one with similar skills.

I do not disagree with George on all points; however, I judge that most researchers must acquire requisite skills, prior to successfully conducting data searches, at least with any significant measure of accuracy. Scholarly research has, traditionally, required specialized cataloging and search skills: knowing the alphabet in which the data is cataloged, the library’s cataloging system, Boolean logic, and the grammar of the search engine.

Skills have developed to compensate for the changing requirements of technology. Digital search skills are, in principle, if not in practice, not substantively different.

? Have the requisite skills changed—substantively—in the face of digital data storage?

? Do people, today, react differently to digital data storage than those who faced previous storage systems?

Peer-reviewed journals are available online, there is no longer need a need to visit, physically, a university graduate library. The cost of purchasing the digital copies of literature can be compared to the cost of travel and photocopies, when visiting a physical library. Digital access grants flexibility, both in time and space.

 

As I transfer my book from my writer’s notebook to my digital notebook, I will post sections to this blog; I look forward to your constructive feedback in the comments section of each post.

It all started bit by bit.

It all started for me with a father employed by IBM. International Business Machines was the largest employer in my hometown of Poughkeepsie, New York, and I had more than a few friends who had fathers employed by Big Blue. We were an IBM family. Dad felt that he owed much of his personal success to his being fortunate to earn a job with IBM after returning home from the Korean Conflict. IBM paid for our healthcare, and the doctor’s waiting room was cozy with IBM wives and their children. My parents paid for treatment for coughs, fractures, and the assortment of pre-adolescent maladies with blue dollars.

The IBM country club was host for the annual family holiday party, and summertime swimming lessons were given at the country club pool. I even learned to play golf at the club. The IBM softball team kept the younger employees in shape, and both of my parents were ace bowlers, occasionally practicing at club’s lanes.

For me, growing up with the IBM family, I had a picture of an idyllic corporate environment, a place that I would want to work. Dad worked hard, from nine-to-five each day, helping to manage development projects that would eventually end up as huge computers running corporate payroll databases and calculating the trajectories of the Mercury, Gemini, and Apollo space missions. At home, I was secure in the knowledge that IBM and its line of big iron computers would always be there to provide for our family’s needs.

In the 70s, I left home for college and then military service, so I was not living at home to hear first-hand of the changes at the IBM plants in and around Poughkeepsie. The early 80s found Dad transferred to Boca Raton, Florida to work on a new development project that was to become the IBM Personal Computer.

The IBM PC, as most people called it, was to change the face of data processing. Businesses then, just as today, run on data, and although I did not recognize it at first, individual’s lives were to become much more sensitive to data processing needs, as time progressed.

Dad had occasionally encouraged me, in his gentle handed way, to study how computers work: programming and computer science. I wanted to be a high school music teacher, and I had no interest in things mechanical, let alone a data processing device without obviously moving parts. To me, a computer was a mechanical device with hidden components that shuffled decks of 80-column punch cards and made more noise than I cared to hear. Try as he might to encourage me otherwise, Dad kept his promise to support my career choice, and I left to study music education. Ironically, my first choice for music school was on the campus of one of the State University of New York’s premier computer science colleges…it is too bad that while I was at school I still thought computers were noisy and less interesting than playing the French horn and piano.

It was not until a decade after I first left home that I was to come to recognize that a computer could actually be useful to me. In the mid 80s I came face-to-face with a computer, but this time it was on my terms and I had an immediate need to learn how to use the box. I was a graduate student at The Johns Hopkins University in Baltimore, taking the writing seminars. It was summer, and anyone who has spent a summer near the Chesapeake Bay knows how humid and muggy it can be. My classes required me to write up to 40 pages of prose each week, sometimes through three revisions. I had an electric typewriter and it was turning into a torture device. My housemate, another serviceman and I, being bachelors and perpetually broke, didn’t turn on the air conditioning—I typed and sweat my way through a set of summer writing seminars. During a visit late that summer, Dad surprised me with the gift of an IBM PC Portable. He had bought it used from IBM, but it became a welcome tool as my writing requirements increased.

The PC Portable was a clunky device with two 5.25 inch diskette drives, 640 KB (Kilobytes) of RAM (Random Access Memory), and a six-inch monochrome monitor: all packed in to a travelling case that weighed more than my overseas duffle bag. Dad and Mom were also thoughtful enough to give me a 12 inch color monitor that sat on top of the luggage-sized case.

In less than an hour, Dad was able to teach me to use the PC Editor software application to type my papers, and from that day on, I’ve only used my typewriter to fill out pre printed forms.

Within a week, I teaching myself WordPerfect and Lotus 1 2 3, two applications that demonstrated true excellence in software programming and application interface design. Within the month, I was learning dBase III Plus, another excellent software application.

I took to the IBM PC like quite like a duck takes to water, but like a drowning man takes to flotsam: I saw the personal computer as a tool that would make my life much easier.

Not only was I beginning to breeze through my academic papers, but I was enveloped in a learning process about a device that I intuitively guessed was changing my life. Within a year, I was teaching undergraduate software classes, and I saw my career laid out before me. I resigned from the military, started a computer consulting practice, and I never looked back, not once—probably because the digital world was coming at me too fast for me to dare take my eyes off the road ahead.