Ten technologies that refuse to disappear How can objects and technologies with 2000, 3000 or 4000 years still remain pervasive in our lives? Is it possible that the failure to have an instrument designed 600 years before Christ can still ruin the evening? Were not we in the XXI century? Had we not released all ties with the past mechanical and analog?
Yes, well, that is precisely the confusion faced by many hasty enthusiasts who have not had time to observe the changes in perspective. The digital revolution is no different from others that have occurred since the invention of the wheel or the discovery of agriculture. That is, not uniform. A current scene, today's it was, always is a combination of new and old, from emerging and persistent.
Look around and notice it instantly. Notebook next to his shiny 2010 model almost certainly has one other paper (2200 years old) and a pen (72 years since his patent registered Bíró), and maybe a bunch of keys (a technology with no less than 4000 years history).
then ten archaic technologies and tools have been noting in recent months and the reasons why, in my opinion, they still have for a while longer with us.
wristwatch (1868)
When I was in Europe in early fall, I decided not to take my watch. It was one less thing to lose. "And, I reasoned, I can see the time on the phone, which is also digital and computerized, so I can set it up to a dozen local time, et cetera."
Nonsense. In taking this decision I missed something fundamental. When carrying a backpack, you are missing a train or a plane, and your hands are busy with maps, bags, tickets and coffee, which has been your only food that morning because I fell asleep, a simple flick of the wrist lets you know when instantly and without complications, distractions or arrests. As long as a) you have taken your watch and b) is not the same hand holding the coffee.
In short, I swore never to leave my house without a watch. Digital, analog, ecological, with hands, LCD, Calculator, never mind, the idea of \u200b\u200bconsulting the clock, no handle no device is so very good that there is no computer, cell phone, smartphone or online service that surpasses it.
Side note: for more than a month the battery ran out at my watch and I'm planning to get one of those that do not require changing the battery.
The pencil and paper (4000 BC)
I still have a column on the paper. For the time will tell, only that no other record is more reliable, except as carved in stone, or more immediate.
If you want to take a note with my iPhone I have to press the unlock button, enter the password, open the Notes application, tap the screen and, finally, typing on a keyboard that is anything but comfortable. On the computer I have a shortcut to open Notepad. Fast and comfortable, but remember to save the document (with pencil and paper is saved as you type), the shortcut must be configured, the computer should not be hung and it is not very portable. In the If the netbook, I need at least out of the sleep mode or hibernation to make a note. Say, anything that comes to our aid when the swift passing taxi outside a house we like, that is for sale and want to record the your property.
not just because we still use pen and paper daily.
Remote Control (1950)
If the Xbox 360 has the Kinect, if smartphones accept voice commands, why something as simple as a TV or DVD player remote control need a table about as complicated as the dashboard of the Space Shuttle? It would seem a typical case of obsolete technology is among us it is cheap. That is, replace the remote gestures or voice commands raise the cost of unnecessary equipment. No way.
This infrared control, though ancient and hated, has a number of advantages over voice control or the controls on the Wii (Nintendo), Kinect (Microsoft) and Move (Sony). Advantages, say, when it comes to appliances, not to play FIFA.
First, are well known. It may cost us all something from the remote program, but the basics are obvious. No need to read a manual to learn what gesture or verbal command change channels or put the DVD pause.
Second, do not make noise. We can watch TV with headphones and not wake the spouse whenever we ask Channel Up or Channel Down.
Third, did you notice the amount of remote is in a typical living room table? That's another problem. Why? Because while the infrared coding is transparent to the user, if I had to make gestures or verbal commands to each should be unique to the device and action. It would be like learning to speak again. In the case of gesture, let alone ... read what follows.
Fourth, its use is accepted and no one feels silly to be lying on the sofa pointing a plastic thing to change TV channels. It would be otherwise, I fear, if we were forced to make gestures a la Minority Report. But there's more. Anyone who has played with a Wii knows that change channels through gestures implies a serious risk to put him a nudge that we sat on the side.
The phone line (1876)
Despite the spread of mobile phones and Skype, the physical line still has a number of advantages. No runs low or no signal, and works even if you cut the light. In my case, use only the phone, but the physical line is still there for DSL Internet service.
The cash (between 3000 and 600 BC)
every month or month and a half hits the news of some new and exotic form of payment from the cell uses up mental waves, but cash can still save the day. Or night.
A week ago, one of the restaurants I visit often had run out of Posnet (device that reads the debit and credit cards). Fortunately I carried cash, otherwise I would have been without the plate that came all the planning and maneuvering to park the car for safekeeping have been in vain. Nothing serious compared to what happened to me a couple of months.
had to give a lecture at the University of Salvador and extravagant stuff Buenos Aires I was unable to get a taxi. Sure, it was rush hour. Finally, without comments.
could walk from the newspaper to Córdoba and Callao, but it was a little hot and was loaded. I decided to take a collective. Really, why spend on a taxi for twenty blocks! Then I remembered that he had only a pathetic 5-cent coin in his coat pocket. I wanted to get change in two or three kiosks. I looked like I just stepped off a UFO.
I continued my walking while muttering ancient technology because he could still get in check. Clink, safe.
Keys (4000 BC)
They are among the most ancient mechanisms that exist, but are still there, firm. We have qualms about replacing them with electronic devices in automobiles, for example, but, with few exceptions, the rest of us still rely on mechanical lock with bronze key. Why?
lock requires no electricity and is remarkably resistant to wear. If the bunch of keys we fall to the ground or water, if exposed to sunlight in a car or if our dog decides it's fun to rob us and get their teeth for twenty minutes will remain as the first day.
A little lube every so often and we know from 4000 years of experience that can leave the house. And, possibly most importantly, re-enter.
light switch (1884)
Something similar happens with the keys to the light. How come they have not yet been replaced by mass sensors perceive if we are there, they recognize who we are and what mood we are, to determine the amount of adequate lighting?
Simple: because it would be useless. We are not geraniums. Our relationship with the light is much more complicated than computers can still be evaluated. While a switch in our hands can do a better job than all sensors in the world. Just imagine the failure would be a surprise party though we've left the light switches compliant. Furthermore, based on a simple principle that reaches that are more or less built to last decades. Are perhaps warranted in this case noted, much cheaper.
Curious as it may sound, do not need electricity to operate, are completely mechanical. Sure, why would one want to light a candle with a smart switch if power is cut? That's not the point. What happens if the power does not reach the switch? What happens if you suffer a power failure?
Of course, home automation mixed solutions considered to have the best of both worlds, but in the vast majority of households and offices still use conventional switches. I'm sure I would be very entertaining myself to program the intelligence of the lights of my house (I love the automation), but since the stack of books I read keeps growing and my time is increasingly scarce, better arm stretch I turn on the lamp that is next to my couch and return to the page where I left last night.
maps (16,500 BC)
is the oldest technology of my list and so include it. Not only are facts on paper, which could wrongly unrelated second mention of this inventory, but the idea of \u200b\u200ban overview of the area you want to navigate.
who are on paper, of course, sum. One of my friends told me that computer has dozens of drawings of buildings on their iPhone for work. But that never lacks for the others, the paper obsolete, "to make notes," he explains.
But there is more than just the map, any map, offers: perspective, awareness of where you are for everything else. The GPS guides you, and for those born with profound and irreversible forgetfulness is a blessing. But I would not start a journey through unfamiliar cities without the proper paper map, that does not depend on the 3G connection or satellite signal. Is it that I am not aggiornamiento enough? That is unlikely, but mostly irrelevant. What I've been raised is why some old technologies are still so popular. If the camera rolls disappeared in just ten years and is a rarity, why thousands of tourists that I see in my travels have a digital camera and, in turn, wield your paper map as if both a banner and a lifeguard? Because they know that will take them back to the hotel and, eventually, to their distant home.
The magnetic compass (1400 BC)
In a story that will very soon (I'm still doing some experiments and are by no means easy) will be how to compete with a digital compass and a magnetic, and why it is still more reliable. Not only for the reasons already cited in the case of keys and paper and pencil, but because it is much harder than being confused or need to be recalibrated. Given the consequences of choosing the wrong direction (geographically or in any other way), the magnetic compass remains, with its immutable and almost eternal bond with Mother Earth, an unmistakable reference.
Copier (1948).
Nevertheless, the good old photocopier she refuses to disappear. Their fate is tied to the paper, it appears that while there need each other.
