As a child my mother got into Video Games, yes, you read
that right, my mother was the first in our household to buy any kind of gaming
machine – for herself I might add. It was a Commodore 64* (behold
it’s glory http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Commodore_64). My first computer
was an Amstrad cpc 464 (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Amstrad_CPC_464) It was
the combination of this and the c64 that started me down a road in IT**.
I have spent most of my life around computers in one way or another and have
always been able to pick up a new operating system or machine without two much
fuss. That was until recently when my wife got an Iphone.
This Easter I spent some time with my Sister in Law and her family in
break from Barbie and the Crystal Castle (her favourite DVD; Quick review – it
sucks) I pulled out the Iphone to surf the net for a bit. Try as I might I
could not get the web page to zoom in as I had heard it could do, so with an
cry of “I give up” I put it on the table.
Now my niece is almost four years old, keep that in mind for this next
bit.
“What’s wrong Uncle Ken?” she asked.
“I can’t zoom in on this webpage” I replied, not expecting her to
understand what the hell I was talking about.
“That’s easy, you do this!” she said picking up the phone and
demonstrating what to do.
You can imagine how I felt, a guy who works in the software industry being
shown how to use an Iphone by his four year old niece, not good for the ego.
But it got me thinking, she has never known a world where technology is so prevalent,
whereas I grew up as part of the last generation not to have computers in every
school. I didn’t experience the internet till University; she can access it
(with supervision) any time she wants. To her a mobile phone will always be
able to do more than just make phone calls, I worked at Orange when the
introduction of WAP*** was a big thing.
The point I’m trying to make is that this weekend I realised I have stopped
being a teenager with my finger on the pulse of technology and I am in fact a
33 year old man who can be schooled by a 4 year old.
In short I have become my father.
*It still works, I booted it up the other day out of curiosity, of course it
took 15 minutes to load a game and I got an R type loading error but that’s
part of the fun.
** Information Technology – a fancy way of saying working with computers.
*** Wireless Application Protocol – a sort of 8 bit internet.