Category Archives: general stuff

Scam Alert: Quantum Vision System

OK, I knew better. Nevertheless I wasted nearly 3/4 of an hour watching (or rather, listening while attempting not to hurl) an infomercial on the net about how you can improve your vision to 20/20 in just a week. Guaranteed.

I am far more skeptical than most of the people around me, but I followed a link with a title of how to improve your eyes by using this simple secret. A redirect to a page with minimal information and a video that played without any controls (no pause, volume control, or clue as to how much longer it lasted). It went on with teasers as to why you might want to improve your life (and who would NOT want to, eh?) and veiled hints that this program was going to go corporate shortly, with substantially less “public” access and increased costs.

Eventually you are told it is the “Quantum Vision System” and was going to be patented soon, so watch and act now. There was a claim of a 10 minute sample you could use to prove to yourself it was effective and worth obtaining.

Then 30 more minutes pass. There are “man on the street” interviews where the “doctor” brings people wandering past into his office and shows a 2-4 point improvement in their vision after only 10 minutes. The people are amazed at the results.

Finally you are asked how much would you expect to pay for such a program. He works the price down from thousands to the unbelievable price of $37 (USD). Just press the HUGE “Add To Cart” button that suddenly appears below the video and use one of the dozen or so methods of payment to gain these life changing benefits.

Of course I didn’t. But I was incensed to think I wasted nearly an hour of my time for such a lame presentation. Now, I could have just left anytime (and should of) but after a while, my ire grew and I was becoming more interested to see just how bad it would truly get. Finally the video ended and I found a faint menu at the bottom of the screen that included a “Contact Us” link. I started to send them an e-mail to get more information and the audio on my computer came back on (I had switched to another tab in Firefox to send the e-mail) with the comment “You are still here? What are you waiting for? Just press the button and fill out the form that comes up….” Unbelievable, that a company would be so bold as to press for a close after waiting for nearly 5 minutes of inaction. (I suspect the video was still “running” after appearing to end. There was no way of knowing.)

I finished my rant (including the point that if they really would refund all fees without any explaination and for any reason, why not present product as a try before you buy and bill 30 days after delivery) and sent the message. Then (and only then, to my sorrow) I did a quick Google search. As I pointed out in a prior post (Information Overload, Confidence Underload) any research on the net should involve a fair amount of action on your part. I was not interested in too much details, just to see if the company appeared to be legitimate.

The first result was the company website itself (link to site). Short version was they were offering the program for $27 (ten dollars less than on the video) and included 5 free bonus items (the video only had 3 of them). So if I HAD pushed the button I would have paid more and gotten less. VERY VERY BAD.

The second search result was a scam alert from San Diego. CA giving a scam alert (link to alert). Pretty much what I thought while I was watching the video. I thought the alert link hit the main points fully and was right on the point.

I actually have read the book on the Bates method mentioned in both locations. I did notice some benefits but it was not as easy as would have been expected by the presentation. (I bought the book for less than a dollar at a used book store about 25 years ago).

So, I waited till now to allow the “We received your mail and will respond in the next 48 hours” message to bear fruit. It didn’t. I am not surprised. It was not expected. Now this is a “unhappy” customer posting to warn others of less than expected results from a service provider.

Snake oil sales is still alive and well, apparently… beyond that peddled within politics.

Phred

post 45 of n

[settings] Fog_Of_Life_Enabled=True

I am something of a game collector. (People that know me say this is something of an understatement, as I own several hundred board games.) While my collection has suffered greatly over the last decade (a foreclosure and divorce along the way), there still remains a wide variety of genres, styles, and mechanics of play. I collect mostly board games and tend to stay away from what a typical American would immediately think of (monopoly, life, sorry, other family games), leaning rather toward games with complex rules and interactions, requiring longer time to explain and teach others to play (which is a primary reason most are shelved and collecting dust). Pretty much if I find a game at a grunge shop that I neither have nor have heard of, it tends to leap into my cart for further research.

This morning I was awakened from a dream where I was playing a board game. I don’t remember too much about it, but the significant elements involved taking my turn. I was moving a piece and sort of understood what I needed to do, but the rest of the map/board was devoid of pieces. When I said I needed to know where the pieces to collect were, another person added a couple of tokens on the board. I also mentioned that I needed to know where the other people’s pieces were, to plan how to avoid their influence. Another person got the rules and read all player’s pieces were to be removed from the board after each turn. I complained that I had a short-term memory problem and that it wasn’t fair to play that way, then I woke up in a poor mood.

The concept of masking the information of other players (or areas you are not currently located in) is referred to as the “fog of war” and is common in video (and computer) games. The idea is you can only know what you have experienced and many games will have map information fade away over time if you move away, hiding changes occurring while you are absent. Significantly, any enemies entering the area after you make life “interesting” when you return. Especially true if you presume the world to be the same as when you left it. Generally speaking, I do less well in this setup than games where I can see the whole world all of the time. My memory condition mentioned above (perhaps I wasn’t dropped on my head enough times to make things stick?) means enabling fog increases a game’s difficulty for me (probably more than for others), and I usually don’t get additional credit or experience for playing at this “level of difficulty.

Truth is, though, there is a “fog of life” that works essentially the same way in the “real” world. I went to visit my mom last week and drove through a neighborhood I lived in a couple of decades ago. While most of the places aligned with the images in my memories, there were other areas where changes occurred under the mask of fog. Some buildings changed colours (owners paint or stain since my last transit). Others had additions built on or were torn down totally, a couple being replaced by vacant lots, others by parks or businesses. Most notably was the business district, where the buildings were essentially the same, but the products or services were wildly different. Furniture replaced by food, carpet by insurance. The old hardware store does tanning and nails. Business was still business, but not MY business.

The old stomping grounds are old still, and there’s ground there, but the idea of stomping there would never occur to me. The trees (the ones still there, anyway) don’t lend themselves to climbing, nor do the bushes work for hiding anymore. One extreme example was a place we used to sled in the winter. There was a steep, seldom used street that would attract kids to slide down most of the winter. After a period of time covered in the Fog of Life I came back to discover the road was just gone! It’s now a tree covered hillside and the Texaco gas station at the base transformed to an ice cream parlor (closed in the winter).

I understand (intellectually, anyway) that time changes things and “you can never go home” really means that today is different than yesterday, but it’s not fair. I don’t have a lot of memories of times past, but to find there is increasingly little to verify what was real and what was an (semi-overactive) imaginary dream scape is hardly reassuring. What is to prevent coming back from church or the store only to find an amusement park covering the lot where my apartment was just a (perceived) few hours earlier? Or to find my keys won’t open my car (at least it’s where I parked “my” car)? As far as I can tell, I am correctly oriented in 3-space, but if a tesseract opens and I move sideways through space-time into a parallel universe that is hauntingly similar to (but not the same) as I remember, how could I tell? Others argue this is the way things always were. Who’s perception is “correct?”

Maybe this is the actual cause of Alzheimer’s….

Phred

post 43 of n

The Dream Is Over…

There are a lot of sad folks in the area around here as the dream is over for a national championship. It was fun while it lasted, but we lost and that’s it.

Reality has a way of sneaking up behind and biting you in the soft parts on a regular basis, say, constantly. You wake up and look in the mirror only to find you are not as young/smart/good looking/talented/ rich/famous/wise/desirable/lovable/[your favorite driver here] as you thought/dreamed/wished/wanted/needed/desired. You are what you are, only a day older than you were just 86,400 seconds ago.

This is (can be) a good thing. Because you are able to look in the mirror means you are still alive and therefore able to make a change, which can make a difference. Funny thing about time, there exists only an incredibly tiny area where you can actually affect change, the NOW. The past is fixed (at least as far as we can detect…the makers and users of the time machine have been incredibly careful about not telegraphing its existence) and the future is an imaginary construct that will never actually cross our path (when tomorrow gets here, for example, it will be now, just like it occurred today, and yesterday, and…) so we are really just stuck with this one, continuous now.

Using the right point of view, this is extremely powerful. So much so there will be enormous push back against anyone willing to live fully within the moment. By not spending energy worrying about some now not yet current, you have increased the reserve you have to invest in this now. If you can avoid dwelling upon outcomes resulting from previous (but no longer current) nows enables you to bring increased focus on the exact now you can influence (the only one in fact).

What tremendous power it is that lies within your grasp! By being fully in the now you can make a conscious decision to do exactly what needs to be done. There and then, in the only point of time you can influence. You can choose to eat or not eat, to say or not say, to invoke strong emotion or remain neutral. You can really drive the direction of your life rather than to hurl along on whatever path the inertia of dwelling on the NOT NOW has you drifting in (at best a sort of autopilot in an ambiguous direction, at worst a blind hurling towards the impending cliff of disaster).

Wake up! The steering wheel of your life is truly in your hands and you can turn (or go straight, too) at will. You just need to be here, now. You can win.

Unless you follow the [REDACTED]… sorry.

Phred

post 42 of n

You Must Be At Least This -> Tall To Read This Posting.

I am the youngest person living at my apartment complex. We are an age-restricted location where you must be at least 55 years old to live here. I moved in on my birthday, so by definition I am the youngest person (for me to reach the average age I need to live here about another 30 years, give or take a couple). It is a nice, quiet place to live. There are weekly and monthly events that the occupants can take part in, from a coffee klatch on Tuesday mornings to (age appropriate) exercise workouts on Friday before noon. It’s pretty much like living in any other apartment except there are fewer noisy parties and ambulances visit considerably more often.

One activity that occurs with considerable regularity is the discussion of names in the obituary columns of the local paper. Since many (perhaps most) of the residents have lived in the community 30 to 70 years (or more), they recognize many of the names listed in the paper. I am an import, so I am clueless about the locals and the ongoing change in the demographics of the area, but I am not clueless about the passing of time. My awareness comes from the national news broadcasts each weeknight.

Just about each week there is a brief reference to the death of someone reasonably famous on the nightly news, along with a brief description of the person’s life or reason for fame. The most recent was the passing of Robert Schuller, the tel-evangelist. I am not disturbed or affected by his death apart from the recognition of the name and some of his history. For much of my life, the obits named on the programs were just noise. Some might recognize them, but no one in my circle of influence (well, maybe mom and dad, but you get what I mean). With my advancing years, I find the names of the dead to be more recognizable than before.

A long time ago, I was presented with the “habit” most people do when faced with the death of someone, comparing the dearly departed’s age with my own (thus seeing how many years I might have “left”). Recently (last decade or so) the result of this formula is depressing if not outright terrifying. Some of the numbers have negative signs before them, suggesting the victim (obviously) died several decades before their time. That the difference in our ages is progressively getting smaller each passing day is a sobering reminder my plan to see the American Tri-centennial is less likely than when I watched the Bi-centennial from the deck of my ship (one of the national broadcast locations was the flight deck of the USS Constellation, CVA-64, where I served as a TV repairman).

Occasionally (increasingly frequently, sadly enough) I am made aware of the passing of someone I had the opportunity to know personally. The names on the school reunion lists shrinks over time, and while I do not attend, I am still aware of the shrinkage. I have fewer friends and relatives today than a dozen years ago and will be astonished to find the same number a dozen years hence. It is just a fact of life, even with the amazing advances in medicine and technology this millennium. They may be moving the finish line further from the start, but it is apparent it is not advancing quickly or far enough.

I remember when my son was too small (read: young) to go on some of the rides at the fair. Eventually he grew tall enough, and the whole world was opened to him. Now it is his daughter that has the sign restrictions to deal with. And so on.

When I meet with the folk for our Tuesday coffee, I am keenly aware of the passing of time. All are widowed (only a single couple still resides here, and I think they are the oldest residents here) and many are the last family members still above ground, having outlived both spouses and siblings. It gets really hard around the major holidays, to recognize that we neighbors are the only people in the world left to care. A few have older children (most older than I am) that might visit or call, but the greater share of the branches in the forest of lives living here have few leaves left on them. And it’s late autumn, with winter fast approaching.

I had the opportunity to share a nearly 10 hour car trip with a couple from my church this week, traveling to and from Chicago to pickup the wife from a hospital there (she suffers from debilitating migraine headaches and spent over a week in-patient trying to bring relief to her condition). As a result, I spent the next day in bed from the pain of riding in a foreign car (not my own, so not sized to fit well) and being confined for so long a time. It was totally worth it to see the interaction of the couple upon reuniting, and when she came home to her daughter. I would do it again. And again. And again, as needed, to keep connections linked.

Which reminds me… I need to take a trip to see my family and link local connections, too. Guess I’ll buy a ticket and get in line.

I could use a hug anyway.

Phred

post 41 of n

The Answer Is NOT Three

There was a commercial in my past that continues to haunt my life. It was of a boy asking an owl how many licks it takes to get to the middle of a Tootsie-Pop sucker. The owl says “lets find out” and starts licking. “One…two…three…CRACK…Three!” He bites the sucker after the third lick and proclaims the answer as three since he is unable to resist the temptation to rush to the treat in the center.

I have a confession to make: I am a victim of my choices. A willing, sometimes eager participant, but a victim never the less. You see, I am possessing of a compulsive personality trait that nudges me toward actions that (in the long run) are less than optimal. As a result, I am an overly large person (allows me to make the “valid” point that “I carry a lot or weight in this [any] organization”) that knows the ultimate result of poor lifestyle choices (and even cares about the choices) but still makes them anyway..

I am not as strong a person as I like to tell myself I am. I live alone and have “complete” control of my surroundings, so I should be able to do what I want and enjoy the freedom of my choices. Instead, I am compelled to follow the Pavlovian programming of nearly six decades of historic influences. I want to go in one direction and find myself several miles off course, drifting further away as the tides of history drag me out to sea.

I was not abused as a child, nor was I raised in a (abnormally) dysfunctional home (I believe we are ALL from dysfunctional homes, some are just more dysfunctional than others). My younger sisters and I lived with both of our natural parents (no abandonment or divorce related issues) in a small(ish) town about 50 miles from here (in [REDACTED]). We were raised in neither affluence nor poverty, being raised in a rather middle class environment. We had everything we needed, much that we wanted, and were, in general, pretty normal and happy.

And yet, I have fuzzy memories of denial and hoarding (probably skewed by a childish point of view – of course I WAS a child at the time, but…).  I didn’t get to eat cookies and ice cream  when I wanted. I had to share, and sometimes (often? always?) had to let my siblings go first (because I was “older” and by extension “more mature”). I had to go to bed before I wanted to and couldn’t watch what I wanted to on TV (sometimes I could sneak downstairs late at night to watch TV when spending the night at grandma’s house, as long as I kept the volume way down). I had to do chores and clean my room at the most inopportune times (like when my mom told me to), and wash the dishes far more often than my sisters. It just wasn’t fair.

Now I am an adult and am empowered to make my own choices without needing to get input from others (the kid has grown up, married, and moved away, and the wife left, divorced me and remarried years ago). Or so the theory states. Yet when I am confronted with a choice of actions the ghosts of the past haunt me and shove me in directions I don’t necessarily want to go. I often finish the bag of cookies now rather than leave some for tomorrow (lest the invisible sibling hordes steal them away in the night). I will eat beyond satiety to make sure I get “my share” and won’t have to go without by others consuming what could have been mine. I buy things I don’t need (but think I want) to drown out the echos of “no’s” from my childhood . I stay up late to play video games and sleep in late because I can (now). My sink is full of dirty dishes (clean ones are in the dishwasher when I need them), clean clothes in the hamper from the last laundry run (dirty ones in a heap pile stack in the corner) and the bed is made twice a year (whether it needs it or not) for the annual inspections. In short, I do what I want and am miserable as a result.

What I really “want” is to be able to enjoy eating my cake without the hassle of making, baking, and breaking down the process afterward. I want to be fully indulged in my selfish desires without the downsides of effort or repercussion. I am insane (along with a large percentage of society). I read and apply (briefly) suggestions and rules from books, web pages, and media presentations about how to organize, simplify, and enhance my life, to acquire great habits and positive lifestyle changes and break self-destructive behaviors that damage my self esteem and physique. I have a juicer, rice steamer, and vacuum food saver to improve my choices in eating and storing healthy foods. (I do NOT have a Nordic-Trac in my basement. Never went down that rabbit hole, although I DID have both a treadmill and a personal gym at one time.) I have yoga and tai-chi videos, shelves of self-improvement books, follow several (many?) blogs and sites about health and fitness.

I am neither fit nor healthy. I don’t juice, steam, or suck air from the packages I put in the freezer. I am about as flexible as iron and as gracefully balanced as a still top. in short, I am only a good intention. I am a really, REALLY bad implementer of change. I have asked for answers and wisdom from others and have heard the CRACK of my desire to make hard changes shatter to get to the yummy center of self-indulgence. I lack the patience and perseverance to stick to actions long enough to implement real change, preferring instead to continue along the path of pain and weakness, whining all the way.

Yet, this project (the blog) has been different (so far…). I have been able to continue to keep up the 3-a-week schedule (barely) for over a month. This is nearly a record for me to keep up an activity without a fat/sugar/calorie-laden treat dangling on a string before me as an encouragement to continue. I may not be losing weight (except the reduced fat in my typing fingers) or becoming an Olympic athlete from this activity, but the success provides a glint of a shimmer of a shadow of a possibility that I can accomplish other dreams as well. So it is (at least in theory) worth it. I may actually be able to overcome temptation long enough to become a better, more positive person. It is worth the attempt. But maybe the announcer in the commercial got it right at the end after all…

“The world may never know.”

Phred

post 40 of n

Q&A: What Do Girl Scout Cookies Have In Common With Viagra?

I failed my first business in 1993. I was in a partnership providing small and medium businesses with computerized accounting software products and services. We did serious research and provided a couple of marvelous products to our clients. We did sales, setup, and training, and were able to assist companies in making intelligent decisions regarding their needs and how to address and meet them.  It only took us 6 months to drain our resources to the point where the partnership required dissolution and we went our separate ways.

What went wrong was we failed to adequately market our product. We did not generate enough sales to maintain our business (wonderful as it was) and we died from insufficient cash flow. About 9 of every 10 new businesses travel down a similar pathway within the first three years of operation. In a small business seminar I attended (a couple of years before my fiasco) the idea was presented most small businesses are made of two people coming together: someone that knows how to do/make something, and someone that knows how to sell something. Unfortunately for these people, there needs to be a third person that knows how to run a business (specifically how to manage the money, both incoming and outgoing).

We (probably) should have known better, but failed none the less. We knew how to sell and how to use the product. We didn’t know how to market it (well enough). If we had been better at marketing we would have had a larger group of people to provide goods and services for, and then we would have had a larger group of people to shower us with money…

It was shortly after this trauma in my (business) life that I came to despise the Girl Scouts. Not the individual participants, they were still cute and adorable, but rather the devious and insidious marketing methods of the parent organization. Specifically, the cookie sales machine. My ex-sister-in-law was involved in the supply channel of cookie distribution and it came to light the $5.00 box of cookies would net less than 75 cents for the local group (and that did not include the copious amount of money spent on gasoline to haul the cookies from distribution center to troop home and again to the various sucker’s customer’s location). Shame on you, Mr. Ouaker!

It quickly became known in every office I worked in I was the curmudgeon to avoid like the plague when it came to kid-based fund-raising activities. Band-based citrus fruit, troop centered candy bar sales, pack pitched popcorn tins, in general any and every possible method of squeezing cash from the associates of parental units was utilized in my various workplace locations. In every case, I was identified as the LAST person to ask as it would invoke a ten-minute rant about the evils of “guilt-driven” marketing practices and when (read:if) the victim was able to escape they would be wiser next time. The number of such encounters decreased in frequency quite quickly (to the relief of co-workers in adjacent cubicles, being subjected to the anti-sales pitch several times in any given time period), eventually diminishing to winning lottery ticket occurrence regularity.

It was even worse when my son reached marketable age. I explained to his band director in person that he would not be productive in the fund raising activity of mercilessly pleading with family to buy endless quantities of needless materials thereby  funding the parent company (less a trickle for the local school system). I said I would rather write a check to the band (where every penny was given to the project) than spend (read: waste) my money buying an inflated product, only a mere pittance of which would befall upon the needy students involved.  I was not very popular in several circles (other parents, their kids, or my son himself) but I was confident I had secured the moral high ground.

So, how does this rant connect to the “little blue pill?”  There is a great similarity in the current marketing procedure for pharmaceuticals presented on television and in magazines to the little-league candy bar sales of old. Rather than putting in the required effort to market and sell your product yourself, you enlist the efforts of grossly underpaid amateur staff to hawk your wares to the general public. In the fund raising process, it is the children (or more often in my experience, their parents) plying on the associated guilt of “I need you to buy this in order for me to be able to: go to camp/win a bicycle/get a t-shirt/keep from being beaten up by my peers….” In the slick multimedia marketing presentation from the drug companies, it is the patient (or rather the customer) plying on the associated guilt of “I need you to prescribe this in order for me to be able to: avoid searching for bathrooms/obtain and maintain an erection/lower my cholesterol/eliminate frequent heartburn/help me breathe easier/eliminate painful intercourse/reduce bladder leakage….” In essence, the patient has become the unpaid sale representative of the drug companies.

In the past, agents would be sent to the doctor’s office to provide samples and encourage physicians to prescribe a companies products. Now, (potential) customers are encouraged to pester their doctors for prescriptions to relieve conditions they were not aware they “were suffering from” until watching the TV. And if you act quickly you might be able to get your “first” prescription/month’s prescription/year’s prescription free (or at reduced cost). Why pay for an employee to distribute your wares when you can have the snake-oil purchasers do it for you (for free)?

At least the cookies came directly to your door….

Phred

post 39 of n

Name Calling In Soda Culture

I have come to understand where I am changes what I get when I ask for something from a “native.” I have lived most of my life in Michigan, apart from a brief stint in the Navy where I spent a half year north of Chicago and a year in California. So I was under the (mistaken) understanding that everyone did things the right way (that is, the way WE did things). HAHAHAHA!, What a foolish idea.

Take tho process of ordering a beverage with your meal. Here we drink pop, defined as a sweetened, bubbly drink usually served over ice. Different flavors exist and each restaurant usually only serves options from one of the major brand suppliers. So if you chose a cola, root beer, lemon-lime, orange, or a citrus flavored beverage at one establishment you get a Pepsi, Mug, 7-Up, Crush, or Mountain Dew. At the eatery next door your beverage is a Coke, Barqs, Sprite, Fanta, or Mellow Yellow. Purchase a ginger ale beverage and you get a Vernors. Iced tea comes straight up (although you can have a sliver of lemon added if you ask) and unsweetened (the way nature intended). Simple and straight forward.

Except for most of the other 49 states and hundreds of other countries on the globe. Ask for a pop some places gets you a bloody nose or the senior male member of the family. A soda comes without ice cream (my first real job was as a soda-jerk in a soft serve ice cream stand… and I was the only employee other than the owner that could make a proper soda, according to a number of loyal customers) and results in one of the (again, brand specific) beverages listed above. To make things even more confusing I have been in places where asking for a coke evokes the question “what flavor?” (and they don’t mean plain or cherry). Apparently in Canada and the southern US diabetics order iced tea at their peril (my first adult trip to Toronto involved a shocking slurp of tea-flavored sugar syrup from a fast food establishment… most of which ended up on the windshield).

The year in California was one spent in a wasteland without Lay’s potato chips, Kogel’s hot dogs, or Miracle Whip salad dressing (this was in 1976, things have changed since then, but the trauma remains). I have never been inside of a Waffle House, being forced to take starch-based breakfast food at the International House of Pancakes instead.

So many names for the same products (or maybe a variety of products with the same name… confusion reigns in either case). There is indeed a strong sense of culture shock when you move beyond the hundred-acre woods for the first time.  Usually there is enough information exchanged eventually to place an acceptable order. Using the worst-case scenario, pointing at the menu and asking for “one of these” will allow for an unexpected adventure not (necessarily) soon to be forgotten (a favorite ploy at establishments offering world cuisine not commonly found in rural mid-Michigan). I keep Maalox in the glovebox just in case…

So when I travel (not all that often, nor all that far anymore, I must sadly confess) I have learned to accept (if not embrace) the challenge of dealing with nomenclature regarding the local “pop” culture. To make life easier, I eventually just end up with a glass of ice water with my meal, and a cup of coffee with desert (I like pie). But I am reasonably sure of one thing.

Ordering a caffeine-laced-carbonated-soda-beverage in most places results in a blank stare.

Phred

post 38 of n

A 1 Month Anniversary

It is official, this blog is a month old as of yesterday. I have been writing a whole month consistently and have had a ball. While it may not be important in the overall scheme of things, it is nevertheless a milestone (well, more of a ‘yardstone’ but it is progress) in my career as a writer. Eventually I will be able to add additional markers along the way, the first-quarter, 100th posting, first paycheck, first million likes, first world domination. (Aim small and hit your target.)

I was asked when I was going to quit this whole blog thing. I had to think about it for a while and I think I finally know the answer…

I’ll quit when I can no longer carry the royalties check to the bank because it’s so big…

Phred

posting 37 of n

Fear And Loathing In The Driver’s Seat

OK, just to be clear: I am NOT a Luddite. I happen to like a lot of what passes as technology these days. I had a picture of an “etch-a-stone” with the caption “to show the grand-kids what we played with when we were young. It was a piece of granite with a chisel and hammer in a plastic frame. I enjoy having electricity (less so on the 21st of the month when the bill is due) and eating food that is caught and cleaned for me. And (perhaps the most important element of all time ) PLEASE don’t take my spell checker away (although the grammar checker is over rated). But there are limits to my credibility and tolerance for making life “easier” unnecessarily.

My most vehement protest involves the movement to make driving a car “safer” by making it (the car, that is) more intelligent. Frankly, I think this will ultimately prove to be a bad idea, because there will be the inevitable corollary that the driver will become more stupid. I am not sure how this is possible in many (perhaps most) cases but I continue to be amazed at human ingenuity, so I’m pretty sure people will figure something out. I am convinced that global intelligence is a constant…

A perfect example is the movement by car makers to include high(er) tech gadgets to “improve the driving experience.” In Michigan, it is against the law to text on your phone or tablet while driving. So why does the car designers think installing a tablet as the primary device controller will be a good idea? In every single car I have ever owned I could control the radio, heater and air-conditioner, lights and wipers by feel (usually within a couple of hours of driving). I never had to take my eyes from the road to turn the radio to another station after turning the defrosters on. Each device has its own knob or slider switch that was in a fixed position and had a specific shape. I worked by feel. “Advanced” cars have a single interactive touch display to handle navigation, entertainment, climate control, and personal communication. All at the touch/swipe of the screen. In the dark without looking, ALL controls feel exactly the same…like the surface of the mirror over my bathroom sink. I must look at the dashboard to see which icon I need to touch to bring up another screen with additional controls. Will someone please tell me HOW (and WHY) this is a good idea?

Even more scary in the long run is the intrinsic intelligence that is being added to high-end vehicles (and will eventually trickle down to the rest of the market). The cars of tomorrow (later today, actually) have sensors that look out for and announce if there is a car in your blind spot, if you are drifting out of your lane, even apply the brakes automatically if you don’t react in time to avoid an accident with an obstruction in front of your car. (In fairness, the rear-view camera is a pretty good idea as even with the best of mirrors it can be hard to see directly behind your vehicle, and the self-parallel parking car feature in a couple of models is a feature I would engage in a heart beat…I haven’t parallel parked by car in several years unless I could pull in at either end. I would rather walk several blocks than risk a stress-induced heart attack.)

Ultimately, the end result of making the car safer and easier to drive is for drivers to become less attentive and more distracted than they already are. The last thing we need is drivers paying less attention to their surroundings and other vehicles than are out here already. As a former biker and truck driver you come to realize that you need to drive every car on the road, not just yours. You really have to exercise defensive driving when you are either driving a bomb (propane truck) or are surrounded by nature rather than several thousand pounds of metal (motorcycle and bicycle). You have to anticipate the actions of everyone else around you and prepare to take evasive actions at a moments notice. (From experience, I would rather drive behind a drunk driver than one possessing a cell phone. At least I can predict what the reaction of the drunk will be…a distracted phone user is totally random.)

Now the last and ultimate direction this will go is the vehicle that you don’t have to drive at all. Google is working on self-driving cars that will be able (?) to compete with human-directed missiles. I have serious doubts about the wisdom of this as I currently live in one of the most dangerous locales on the planet. I have seen more vehicles run red lights here in [REDACTED] than driving in vastly larger metropolitan cities like Chicago, Detroit, Los Angeles, and San Francisco/Oakland. Waiting less than 5 seconds after the light changes to green in your direction is a modern form of Russian Roulette. To place enough computational power in a car to safely transit our roads without an organic brain in control seems highly unlikely anytime soon (say, in MY lifetime…or what is left of it). And besides, Google is too late, anyway. They already make vehicles you don’t have to drive.

They are called taxi’s.

Phred

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