Alfredo writes:

> I received this from my Australian friend Bob O'Brien.
>
>  The Diary of a Digital Homeowner:
>
>  Nov 28, 1997:

[funny, semi-fictional story snipped]


First Rejoinder:

In exacly that same semi-fictional vein, Steve Cooper (I presume) faxed me
the April 9th editorial cartoon from the San Jose Mercury News. The cartoon
has two panels. The first panel has the headline: "Microsoft to buy Web TV",
and directly underneath that headline is the subheader: "TV Now."

In this "TV Now" panel, a balding, slightly rotund couch potato-type is
smiling contently, standing in front of his TV, holding a newspaper in one
hand and his remote control in the other. The buttons on the controller are
labeled: "channels, volume, power."

In the second panel, labeled, "TV of the Future," the same couch potato is
standing with a greatly perplexed frown on his face, holding a new remote
controller that has these buttons: "sign on, sign off, file manager,
microsoft office, boot, reboot, microsoft mail, file, edit, save, program
manager, volume, channels, joystick, microsoft word, cut, paste, print, etc.,
etc., etc." In his other hand, the couch potato has a now-familar, thick
yellow and black book, entitled, "TV for Dummies."


A Second Note on Computers Making Life Easier:

As for computers making life easier, just this last Saturday I asked Clint
Godfrey, a 14-year old boy who works us and who some of you have met, to run
down to the convenience store to get some gasoline for the company lawnmower.
The store is only four blocks away -- and Clint has a new BMX bicycle. He now
covers four blocks about as fast as you can blink. And Clint is about as
computer-literate as anybody you might know that isn't a professional
software developer.

I gave Clint a dollar and a plastic gas can. But then he disappeared for 25
minutes. I asked him when he got back what in the heck took so long? He said
that they converted the gas pumps at the convenience store to those that have
computer terminals built into the pump and that the choices that he was given
were confusing. When he apparently picked the wrong options in the wrong
sequence he crashed the gas pump -- but it had already eaten his dollar,
which was the only one he had. So they had to reboot the pump. And then he
had to convince them that he had put the dollar into the pump. Then they had
to figure out how to dispense a dollar's worth of gas without putting another
dollar into the pump. All of this took 25 minutes.

Wirt Atmar