Contrary to popular opinion, I am not the Luddite that I portray myself to be when it comes to technology. Having grown up in a the time when there was no public internet, BASIC & COBOL programming, rotary dial telephones, etc. etc. etc. Over the preceding decades, I come to appreciate most of the technology advances, either willingly or with trepidation.
Take cell phones for instance. While I appreciate the relative ease in being able to talk to someone at a moment's notice, compared to growing up with payphones, change and long bouts of peace and quiet, I am not a fan of having phones that do virtually everything except feed you and make you use the facilities. I'm more than happy to whip out my 8 year old flip phone, pull out the antenna, dial someone up and chat away.
Or c.d.'s. When c.d.'s first came out, I wasn't a big fan of them, especially since the average price was around $35. But again, as the decades progressed, I learned to tolerate them to the point of eventually wanting to convert my entire vinyl collection to them.
However, what I will not tolerate is having certain technological "improvements" forced down my throat, simply because the company wants it that way.
Take Big Brother...ummm...Google for example.
Google started pursuing a plan of synergy with all of their products about a year or two ago. What I mean by synergy is that all you need to access the various Google products is one account and one password. Good on paper, bad in execution. Why?
Because what they do the minute you agree to synchronize all of your accounts, which in my case would be Blogger, Gmail and YouTube, they automatically throw you into Google+. Personally, I can't stand Google+ to begin with, and to be made a part of it against my will with no viable means of escape, just deepens my dislike of Goggle even more.
Another fine example would be Microsoft.
Microsoft recently created a new version of their popular browser for Windows 8 called, obviously enough, IE 11. Which is fine by me, in that I have IE 10 on mine. However, in its infinite wisdom, Microsoft decided to let those with Windows 7 try it out.
An astute observer of the previous paragraph would notice that the words "let" and "try it out" were italicized. That's because Microsoft doesn't let anyone participate voluntarily in a new product, they just foist it on you whether you want it or not.
The fallout of getting this forced upgrade of my browser was instantaneous. I briefly lost about 20+ blog subscriptions to Tumblr and about 12 with Blogger because of this upgrade. I was able to resolve the RSS feeds to Tumblr by adding the website to the "Compatibility View" option.
However, restoring the lost Blogger/custom domain subscriptions was a bit problematic. Normally, I use the RSS feed button on my toolbar to subscribe to blogs, but with this upgrade, I immediately lost that function with certain blogs/custom domain blogs, and the only way I was able to restore those subscriptions was to make them an e-mail only subscription, which I seriously detest.
I'm sure I can come up with others, but these are two of the more blatant tech advances I was forced to deep throat until I gagged.
I know this will fall on deaf ears, but you know, not everyone wants or needs the latest bell and whistle for the product they use. Especially if the upgrade takes away a feature that they readily use.
My cell phone feeds me. I use it to call delivery haha
ReplyDeleteTotally with you. I hate the big brother bullshit, and the idea that you have to upgrade every five seconds.
ReplyDeleteBearman: I rarely use mine to feed me, but I do use it be my alter ego from time to time.
ReplyDeleteM: One of the few good things about FB is that allow you to pick and choose what upgrades to use for yourself.