Welcome to the Future
I want to talk about a few seemingly unrelated things.
A couple of days ago you probably woke up and wondered why you had to do the things you do. Most of you probably thought they have a boring life and some even probably wanted more excitement or a different life.
A couple of days ago a girl from Russia lands in Washington DC and meets a friend. They call a friend who's moving to LA and driving a vehicle full of his/her stuff somewhere in the middle of Wyoming. It seems that the girl from Russia came on some travel exchange program which promised her a job. The job fell thru, but both girls were told that if they went to NYC and met this other guy in a lounge around midnight, they could work as hostesses.
Now, we all heard of stories like this, probably saw an episode or two of Law&Order or CSI about it., right?
What happened after that call is a nail-biting, roller coaster ride, posted in real time to MetaFilter. The person in Wyoming had a smartphone and asked for help on MetaFilter. I saw the thread after the entire story was over (thank you rmd) and even knowing that the story ended up well and two girls were saved from human trafficking and becoming sex slaves, I can't tell you how stressful it was just to read it. (You can check it out if you want to: http://ask.metafilter.com/154334/Help-me-help-my-friend-in-DC)
I'm glad that so many strangers could get together and help. I like living in the future and in a better world where we can stop bad stuff from happening.
But then I started thinking about you.
Y'see, infrastructure is really hard. It's made of people and parts and it's intricate and hard to build. And it costs time and money. It depends on people buying into it. And electronics, and manufacturing, and software, and business. So, when all those people picked up a phone, posted messages etc, there was an awful lot of people involved in making it all work. People who wrote databases and software, people who wrote and/or published technical books, user guides and training courses, high-level languages, low-level languages, compilers, operating systems, people who designed telephony equipment, satellites, people who maintained all the equipment, installed and kept networks and people who directly or indirectly supported all of the other people. Farmers, truckers, supermarket employees, people who built homes and schools and commercial buildings. We need everyone so we can make it all work. The person designing the newest life-saving gadget can't possibly do that if they don't have everyone else working some other part of the system so everyone can eat and have a roof over their heads.
So today I want to thank all of you in my flist. I don't know any of the three primary people involved in that story. But I know what it's like to pick up the phone and have lots of people helping me and people I love. And I know how much is involved in making it all work, how many people woke up tired and trudged thru snow, or took the subway, bus or commuter rail, or drove thru rain or a traffic jam one more day so they could stock the supermarkets, teach another generation, keep the network working, write that piece of software or design another piece of equipment or staff the pool of customer reps that take the calls that make everything be in place and work properly when we need it.
We need everyone so we can bring things to life and live in the future. Less than twenty years ago most people would have thought that a smartphone was so far off that only people in Startrek would use it. But it's here now. Thanks to you and people you know.
So thanks for your help in bringing the future to now and thank you for being kind to your fellows. You make me proud to be human.
A couple of days ago you probably woke up and wondered why you had to do the things you do. Most of you probably thought they have a boring life and some even probably wanted more excitement or a different life.
A couple of days ago a girl from Russia lands in Washington DC and meets a friend. They call a friend who's moving to LA and driving a vehicle full of his/her stuff somewhere in the middle of Wyoming. It seems that the girl from Russia came on some travel exchange program which promised her a job. The job fell thru, but both girls were told that if they went to NYC and met this other guy in a lounge around midnight, they could work as hostesses.
Now, we all heard of stories like this, probably saw an episode or two of Law&Order or CSI about it., right?
What happened after that call is a nail-biting, roller coaster ride, posted in real time to MetaFilter. The person in Wyoming had a smartphone and asked for help on MetaFilter. I saw the thread after the entire story was over (thank you rmd) and even knowing that the story ended up well and two girls were saved from human trafficking and becoming sex slaves, I can't tell you how stressful it was just to read it. (You can check it out if you want to: http://ask.metafilter.com/154334/Help-me-help-my-friend-in-DC)
I'm glad that so many strangers could get together and help. I like living in the future and in a better world where we can stop bad stuff from happening.
But then I started thinking about you.
Y'see, infrastructure is really hard. It's made of people and parts and it's intricate and hard to build. And it costs time and money. It depends on people buying into it. And electronics, and manufacturing, and software, and business. So, when all those people picked up a phone, posted messages etc, there was an awful lot of people involved in making it all work. People who wrote databases and software, people who wrote and/or published technical books, user guides and training courses, high-level languages, low-level languages, compilers, operating systems, people who designed telephony equipment, satellites, people who maintained all the equipment, installed and kept networks and people who directly or indirectly supported all of the other people. Farmers, truckers, supermarket employees, people who built homes and schools and commercial buildings. We need everyone so we can make it all work. The person designing the newest life-saving gadget can't possibly do that if they don't have everyone else working some other part of the system so everyone can eat and have a roof over their heads.
So today I want to thank all of you in my flist. I don't know any of the three primary people involved in that story. But I know what it's like to pick up the phone and have lots of people helping me and people I love. And I know how much is involved in making it all work, how many people woke up tired and trudged thru snow, or took the subway, bus or commuter rail, or drove thru rain or a traffic jam one more day so they could stock the supermarkets, teach another generation, keep the network working, write that piece of software or design another piece of equipment or staff the pool of customer reps that take the calls that make everything be in place and work properly when we need it.
We need everyone so we can bring things to life and live in the future. Less than twenty years ago most people would have thought that a smartphone was so far off that only people in Startrek would use it. But it's here now. Thanks to you and people you know.
So thanks for your help in bringing the future to now and thank you for being kind to your fellows. You make me proud to be human.