Gary's News and views
Gary writes a weekly article which appears in the Plympton Plymstock and Ivybridge News in South West Devon. The articles are published here.
Thursday 12 February 2015
THE WORLD AS I KNOW IT
One of my grandchildren asked me recently what kind of computer games I used to play when I was a child. Where to begin? No computers, no internet, no smart phones, no colour TV, no Sky. I told him about the plastic soldiers we played with and the tank that fired a matchstick from its gun – that all seemed very high-tech to us at the time.
It started me thinking about the dramatic changes we have seen in technology and communications during my lifetime. 1965 when I was 10, we had a black and white TV and watched the world cup on it in the following year. We did not get a colour TV until the early seventies, just in time for the Ashes test matches that summer. If we wanted to know something we read a book (remember Encyclopaedia Britannica?) or asked my parents who pretended to know the answer.
In 1990 when my daughter was 10, there were still no mobile phones or e-mails. In my office we thought we were cutting edge because we had replaced the telex with the fax machine. About that time the Ping-Pong game on television came around, the one where you moved the handles up and down to return the moving ball. It was the start of an electronic revolution.
What a spurt there has been since then, in just 25 years. Now, at a meeting with the Tax Payer's Alliance last week, I learnt for the first time that there is now something called phone poverty – if you do not have a smart phone you might be deemed to be living in poverty. I did not know whether to laugh or cry.
Our grandchildren are growing up in a world where connectivity is all. They have instant access to the internet for all knowledge. The computer based games they play are vivid and all-consuming. Such a different world.
Yet in many ways the old maxim: "plus ca change, plus c'est la meme chose" rings true. The technology has changed but the coming generation still want the same things out of life: to be loved, to do well, , travel a bit, get a job, to meet the right person, settle down, work hard, get a house, have kids… Human nature has not changed. One of the joys of my job is to interact with school children a lot. I always come away from such sessions optimistic about the future.
One of my grandchildren asked me recently what kind of computer games I used to play when I was a child. Where to begin? No computers, no internet, no smart phones, no colour TV, no Sky. I told him about the plastic soldiers we played with and the tank that fired a matchstick from its gun – that all seemed very high-tech to us at the time.
It started me thinking about the dramatic changes we have seen in technology and communications during my lifetime. 1965 when I was 10, we had a black and white TV and watched the world cup on it in the following year. We did not get a colour TV until the early seventies, just in time for the Ashes test matches that summer. If we wanted to know something we read a book (remember Encyclopaedia Britannica?) or asked my parents who pretended to know the answer.
In 1990 when my daughter was 10, there were still no mobile phones or e-mails. In my office we thought we were cutting edge because we had replaced the telex with the fax machine. About that time the Ping-Pong game on television came around, the one where you moved the handles up and down to return the moving ball. It was the start of an electronic revolution.
What a spurt there has been since then, in just 25 years. Now, at a meeting with the Tax Payer's Alliance last week, I learnt for the first time that there is now something called phone poverty – if you do not have a smart phone you might be deemed to be living in poverty. I did not know whether to laugh or cry.
Our grandchildren are growing up in a world where connectivity is all. They have instant access to the internet for all knowledge. The computer based games they play are vivid and all-consuming. Such a different world.
Yet in many ways the old maxim: "plus ca change, plus c'est la meme chose" rings true. The technology has changed but the coming generation still want the same things out of life: to be loved, to do well, , travel a bit, get a job, to meet the right person, settle down, work hard, get a house, have kids… Human nature has not changed. One of the joys of my job is to interact with school children a lot. I always come away from such sessions optimistic about the future.
posted by Gary @ 10:37
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