At this point, time is beginning to fly by, which is indicative of the fact that I’m finally getting settled in. Entering the middle of my second month abroad I think I have finally adjusted to this new lifestyle, albeit food is still an issue. As a team we’re doing well, 2-0 in Trophy Games and we sit atop the standings. The crazy thing is I have yet to become home sick, although I’m just a little bit America sick and I have technology to thank for this. Technology is steadily shrinking the world, while we aren’t yet at the level where we can physically touch and interact with each other over these vast distances, we can openly and easily connect with anyone at anytime. Through broadband internet and smartphones we’re virtually always accessible. It may be via BBM, skype, email, Facebook, Twitter or a myriad of other methods of social networking and communication. Many members of my generation fail to appreciate how far we have come technologically because it’s all we know and we are native to it. While many members of older generations are just fascinated and struggle to understand it. Here is a great example, http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=FcN08Tg3PWw&feature=related .
But the bottom line is as of 2011, it is substantially easier for us to communicate with those we love and care about who are on different continents. We’ve become so accustomed to this these conveniences that we no longer know how to function without them, which leads us to expect these technologies to work perfectly. As of early this week this hasn’t been the case for one key method of networking. RIM, the manufacturing company of all blackberry’s, has been having issues with its BIS. For those of you who don’t know, BIS stands for Blackberry internet service, but all are familiar with what runs on the service.
A blackberry lover’s BBM and email access in addition to the internet browser itself. From a timing and public relations stand point this couldn’t occur at a worse time for RIM, with the recent release of IOS5 and the Iphone 4gs. Many blackberry faithful people have parted ways and jumped on the Iphone bandwagon and after this week I wouldn’t be surprised to see many more leave. But in reality, was a day without the use of our smartphones really that bad? Was it really that bad that we were forced to do what past generations had to do and seek out face to face interactions with each other? Or even just had to pick up the phone to actually use our phones to make a call? Was it really so bad that almost all blackberry users in Europe, Asia and Africa had to actually be present and handle some awkward situations they would attempt to exit by diving into a mobile digital world? I don’t think so. It really shows how dependent we now are on technology and how times have completely changed. Many of the actions that we all participate in were previously viewed as nerdy and geekish activities, but not anymore.
If anything this glitch, bug, whatever you want to call it should provide us with a little bit of perspective on the things we rely on.
BeLikeMikee 