Is Simple, Good? – Complex, Bad?
As set out in Part I of this series, the “technologies” that the Curmudgeon classifies as “good” and “useful” for his own purposes seem mostly to have a set of common characteristics, while those that are considered “bad” and “annoying” often have characteristics opposite from the first set. These characteristics seem almost self-evident, but most people probably have not given much thought to classifying them.
The Good
The overriding characteristics for the good set, represented by six personal technology items described in Part I, seem to be simplicity and directness. The items each do one task, do it simply and well, and don’t seem to have any pretensions to be otherwise. The following is a non-exhaustive list of these characteristics.
1. Optimized to do a single task
2. Straightforward, simple, almost self-evident operating requirements
3. Little or no set-up required before using
4. Small, short “learning curve”
5. Few, if any, maintenance requirements
6. High degree of reliability
7. Ability to remain unassertive and unobtrusive while operating
8. Few, if any, requirements for “updates”
Thus the blood pressure cuff and the pedometer each do just one thing, both require a “one time” simple provision of a few parameters which are then retained in permanent memory, the cuff is stored away in a drawer when not in use while the pedometer hides in a pants pocket. Both operate from standard replaceable batteries. (Since almost every other electronic device today also operates from batteries, occasional battery replacement or recharging isn’t really “counted” as a significant maintenance requirement.)
The battery-operated “atomic clocks” possess almost the same characteristics. They have a visual indicator that confirms signal reception from the NIST Ft. Collins, CO transmitter, although even without synchronization from a recent received signal the time drift is very small over the course of several days. NIST even automatically provides the correction for Daylight Saving Time transitions. [GPS-based personal time keeping would provide an even higher, laboratory-quality time-keeping accuracy level, but at the cost of considerably more complexity.]
Simple, but effective – the “pocket” calculator.
The pocket digital calculators have become extremely adapted to purpose, and they provide routine calculation capabilities undreamt of during the Curmudgeon’s student days. This is one area of technology where machines are so clearly superior to human abilities that there is no longer any point in having humans attempt to compete operationally. Of course humans still remain responsible for understanding the mechanics and logic behind the mathematics, but we have probably already seen the last human generation that will attempt to operate as biological calculators.
Telephone network automatic number identification is both a naturally obvious function and one which requires no user effort or involvement. On suitably-equipped networks, it is just “present” with each arriving call. And it markedly decreases annoyances by letting its users make their own informed decisions in advance of taking a call. Invaluable during the Campaign of 2012!
The desktop ex-automotive radio is simplicity itself, and it fills an obvious need/desire. A quick reach across the desktop, one swift push of a button to apply power, a second button push to change the station (if needed), and the effort is met with instant program reception. There no longer is a requirement to walk somewhere to turn on a radio and no need to wait for the “warm-up delay.”
The Bad
These above devices are all successful because they can be depended upon to do what needs to be done and then get out of the way, and they don’t distract the user from more important events and activities. But now let’s look at the (opposite) characteristics of the “bad” technologies.
Microprocessor-based consumer entertainment devices (radios, televisions, and players) create annoyance in part because they are unusable and uncontrollable during their “warm-up period.” They become, in a sense, “a dog who won’t obey his master!” Furthermore, even after warm-up some of these devices (especially the televisions) have very complex command/control sequences that frustrate users’ attempts to make simple choices and easy, rapid changes, and they also include the kinds of surplus, little-used functions characteristic of “creeping featuritis.”
So many remotes, so little time!
The selling-point behind “cloud computing” is that, after storing your data “in the cloud,” you can get to your stuff from anywhere in the world via the ubiquitous “Web.” The flaw in the concept is that, if you can get to your remotely-stored data from anywhere in the world, potentially so can any other skilled and motivated person! Almost every Internet node of any importance has already been hacked, so why would anyone want to store his personal and sensitive data someplace whose location is unknown and which is potentially hackable? Cloud-based computing is, ipso facto, a huge security risk, and really should (but probably won’t) be rejected on that basis alone. It is, potentially, one large very large annoyance factor, especially if your data are compromised and, if the data are somehow lost within the cloud, there may be no back-up for them
Some major virtues will always remain in storing sensitive data in physical locations that have never seen an Internet-originated IP packet! Local data storage devices are now so inexpensive that anyone who needs to keep huge data banks should be able to afford his own storage. Even “data back-up technology” is now simple and inexpensive, and thus there is little need to ship things up to the anonymous “cloud” for storage. Meanwhile the Curmudgeon has a portable 1 Gbyte hard drive that fits easily into a briefcase. Similarly to the POTUS’s nuclear weapons release codes, the data travels with its owner. Not a perfect solution, of course, but a “better” one.
Amateur radio manufactured gear, as mentioned in an earlier Curmudgeon post, now competes in a consumer-driven market, not an engineering-driven one. “Features” sell hardware, and so there will undoubtedly be a steady progression of “new” features well into the future. Hardware will remain “confusing to operate” for many inexperienced hams, although complexity by itself should not necessarily be considered a negative for experienced operators. If a new radio needs a “portable, plastic-laminated user’s guide” for its routine daily operation, there’s certainly room for simplification, leading to improved operating ease and enjoyment.
The reality is, though, that fundamental radio technology is now well worked out, and any future technological developments should be incremental rather than revolutionary in nature. Only “new and improved features!” can now sell hardware. That is why twenty-year old radio hardware still meets most user needs, save for “bragging rights!”
Complex computer application packages for major computing requirements are the software analog of the creeping featuritis of the Amateur radio world. Realistically, basic functionality has already been advanced to the point where any further development would be marginal. PC operating systems, word processor packages, spreadsheets and databases already are more than sufficiently capable for all but the most demanding professional users. Tossing in even more “features” in order to resell the current packages to existing users adds even more unused functions. It also increases the operating complexity of applications that are already probably too complex. Simplicity, reliability, unobtrusiveness are not present here!
By way of contrast, the Curmudgeon has a very small, DOS-based, menu-driven engineering program for calculating RF transmission path values. It was probably written (but not by him!) in the late 1980s. And it still runs quite well, has never required any “updates,” and can provide results as quickly as the data can be loaded from the keyboard and the <F10> key depressed.
Smartphone capabilities and features are staggering!
Smartphones are the ultimate technology distraction and the prime demonstration of the corrosive effects of virtuality-based technology. To an adult living during the 1960s, the idea of a distracted user of a portable data processing device involuntarily stumbling into an open manhole in the street would have been beyond comprehension! No one then had shifted that far away from the physical into the virtual world, but today many of us have!
A smartphone is the antipode to the Curmudgeon’s pedometer and his desktop radio. The smartphone distracts constantly, raises anxiety levels, requires continuing care and attention, and arguably does a large number of tasks that do not really need to be performed “on the spot.” Aldous Huxley got it wrong in his novel “Brave New World:” his “Soma” soporific for the masses ultimately proved to be electronic, not chemical in nature!
Whence, From Here
In the next posting, we’ll look more deeply at this matter of the adoption of new technology and how it is changing our lives, not always for the better.
What do you think?
“Let’s save the universe for RF!”
The Old RF Curmudgeon
Since 1963, LBA has been providing RF equipment, engineering consulting services and safety training for radio/television broadcast, wireless communications, and industrial RF.
10 Comments on "Good Technology, Bad Technology – Part 2"
Lawrence, discussion should make for an extremely robust spectrum of comments?
Many times, I’m nostalgic about the vacum tube era, pre cellular phones, pre computers. No such thing as a virtual electronic avatar, etc. Just old school stuff, likely some degree of higher education or trade, and especially looking forward to hanging out with friends and socializing.
*With that said, my industry…(DTV Broadcasting) things have definitely changed IMO for the better. No more marginal quality video & or AUDIO (yes, I know there are still plenty clueless examples aka Peter Principle). But technology has now risen to speeds and capacity necessary where assets virtually work as designed and most important all “together” in an elegant concert aka digital/file-based workflow. Now keeping legal records, key events or diagnostic history “automatic”. Heck, your desktop dispaly & GUI raises a flag when something is off-line. Paramount, is cost $$, fractions of what their legacy or ancestors price tags commanded. A good example is FCP…anyone with a reasonable budget can produce a bleeding edge Motion Picture, with stunning EFX, sublime subject matter and all at a fraction of the cost. One caveat…the “intellect” !
ln
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Mr. Brunet:
Perhaps there is a small disconnect here. I did not intend the focus of the piece to be a comparison of “simple” vs. “complex” technologies and the corresponding value judgements drawn therefrom. Even the cited “good” modern technologies, such as the home blood pressure cuff, are very complex in design and function, approaching unrealizable by 1960 (vacuum tube) standards. As you correctly point out, we can do projects today that would have been impossible or prohibitively costly before the advent of our current level of technology. You do such projects in the DTV industry, while on an ordinary PC I am assembling a digital library and database of more than 16,000 still images of family, friends, and events. Impossible to do in 1960!
So it isn’t “degree of complexity” which is the focus here. Rather it’s the quality of the “human technology interaction.” Does the specific technology, regardless of its complexity, aid or hinder the quality of one’s life? Does it create more problems and more work for the user than it solves? Does it distract us from direct (not virtual) human-to-human interactions and activities (i.e., “looking forward to hanging out with friends and socializing”)? And, fundamentally, can we control the technology we now use and that which is now under development before it controls us? These questions will be considered in the next Part, to be posted soon.
Finally, you are unerringly correct about “the intellect” part! Without that, DTV for example would be little more useful than an Etch-a-sketch!
—ORFC
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Just a comment from another curmudgeon. In my college days there were no computers or even electroneic calculaters. When one has to use a slide rule it does two things. First you develop a deep appreciation of logarithms, and secondly you have to get good at estimating at least order of magnitude. I ge quite upset when a young engineer brings me results of some computation that is obviously in error and is a result, I guess of the GIGO syndrome.
Keep it up Old Timer.
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There’s no such thing as “Bad Technology” – it’s only the way it’s used.
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I couldn’t agree with you more. From my point of view, what most of these so called “new technologies” are doing is adding complexity. Unfortunately most of our young engineers and technician are skipping the chemistry and physics, and hence the building blocks, of these technologies. What a future we are building for ourselves. Especially for the developing world.
ln
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John, excellent observation. I’m sure you,the Curmudgeon, and I all shared significant science background. Without those tools, and critical thinking skills, it would be very difficult for an engineer to be analytical in his thinking, and I believe that is a true engineer’s most important attribute!
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“A good example is FCP…anyone with a reasonable budget can produce a bleeding edge Motion Picture, with stunning EFX, sublime subject matter and all at a fraction of the cost”
Yet most all of it looks like it was shot on an iPhone with Vaseline on the lens and edited by a ADHD chimpanzee on a double expresso.
The advantage of “expensive” was it limited the number of idiots…
ln
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Mike, you left out my adjective “caveat”
In the hands of competent, gifted & inspired individuals… FCP, Canon 5D MK-III, HQ lens, steadicam… may surprise many IMO
http://www.dpreview.com/reviews/canon-eos-5d-mark-iii
Mike your conjecture, i.e. said “pro quality look & content” can only come from relatively old school “state-of-the-art tech” / huge budget $$ productions & infrastructure … all streaming from highly recognized icons (DoP) in the industry.
ln
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An interesting article, thanks for posting. Having some expertise in this area, I’d add that a 2011 (?) Aberdeen report showed that cloud-based software solutions incur *fewer* security risks than on-premises software.
You hear occasionally that cloud isn’t as secure as on-premises software — but you hear that less and less. Cloud has become smarter. And “on-premises” doesn’t necessarily mean “optimal or omni-pervasive security.”
Aberdeen report summary is here with relevant links from CMSWire, if interested:
http://bit.ly/8ZzqYy ln
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Ms. Hurley:
Point taken. Certainly strong-security cloud storage beats poor- (or no-) security local storage. But that serves to demonstrate that security is a universal requirement, and not one which is location-dependent. And I did read the Aberdeen report summary link.
My point still stands: almost all important networks have already been hacked. Certainly the U.S. Department of Defense has been penetrated, and we’ll never know whether the CIA also has. Why might I believe that the likes of Amazon, Google, and other (unknown) players “do it better” than DOD?
Part of my working history was spent in the public utility industry. If I were still in that industry I would take a great deal of comfort in knowing that, at times of disaster, my primary operating and customer billing data were on drives located in the server room just down the hall from the Emergency Operations Center (of course, there are back-up copies off-site, but they exist only for contingency purposes). And that my data are not located in some nondescript building in Thailand, with a few thousand miles of “virtual cable” between it and me.
My own practice (and my goal) is to keep my personal data unconditionally “private.” It is very satisfying to me to know that, for example, my (password-protected) income tax files reside on an external hard drive that is stored, unpowered, in a locked file cabinet in my house. Why would I then want to transfer them to the cloud, or want to prepare my taxes in the cloud? [And I would do exactly the same thing were I still involved in the business world.] Of course I cannot protect against the possibility that the IRS itself might be hacked, but at least I can maintain control over my end of the transaction.
A very old fashioned, Curmudgeonly approach? Yes, of course! But I also still endorse “Pournelle’s Law, “One man……one CPU!” ( Jerry Pournelle was a columnist for the old Byte Magazine, at a time when “cloud computing” was called “time-share computing” and ran on DEC minicomputers).
“Youse payz yer money, and youse takes yer cherses.”
—ORFC
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