Just like my desk! A Computer and Typewriter.
It Wasn’t That Long Ago…
It’s hard to remember a time when we did not have instant access to the world. Email or Google. Facebook or Instagram. Games and Shopping, It’s become such an easy habit to think about something, pick up your laptop, phone or tablet to search the topic, and get an answer or book a table or find directions to anywhere in the world. Even Mars if you have Google.Mars! And don’t get me started on the ease with which we can all put every random thought out into the ether world via social media… good, bad, significant, stupid, malicious, thoughtless; you catch my drift. And marketing strategies and tactics, forget-about-it; that’s a topic for another day and another blog.
I started my career when desktop computers were just hitting the business world. There were two IBM PCs sitting in an unused office when I showed up at my first real job as a Media Director, and since my mother was in the computer world (she was one of the first programmers in the 70s that developed business applications and software programs), I assumed that by osmosis I could figure it out, so I asked if I could turn one on. Everyone looked a little shocked and asked if I knew how… so I pulled out the manual and spent several days learning Word Perfect and Lotus. How many remember those original programs today??
While we had the computers, which did not yet show us on the screen what would print out (there was a lot of programming code that you had to know), there was little or no consumer access to what we know today as the internet. But WOW, I created some lovely charts and forms, and fell in love with ignoring my typewriter in favor of instant corrections to documents and spellcheck, and no Whiteout! To some reading this blog, none of this paragraph makes any sense… but it was such a giant leap for me.
The next step was email and a limited internet. I remember sitting in my office and emailing my secretary, who was sitting 10 feet away, just because I could! It was pretty amazing and took over communications so rapidly. Of course I had an AOL account, joined chat rooms and acted surprised when someone said they did not have email. It killed phone conversations and snail-mail almost instantly. You could tell ALL your friends something in ONE email! And sharing jokes and funny picture, well that became the order of the day! Wow… how did we communicate before those marvels took over our lives?
And the world wide web… I remember heading to the library to research demographics for clients, compiling reports, pulling out my calculator to tabulate data, all for a simple print and TV media buy. Now? It’s a simple search and thousands of articles, documents and more are at your fingertips. The trick is to sift through all of the offerings to make sure the information is real, pertinent and not corrupted. Even Wikipedia can’t agree on how much of the content is User-Generated (UGC), but their explanation uses the words “significant” and “pervasive” several times! A tip for searching for info on the web is to look at more than one source, and try to find an opposing opinion or significantly different conclusions and then keep digging until you get closer to the real information.
We are bombarded with instantaneous world news, real-time sensationalized tragedies and 24-hour news cycles on a plethora of outlets. This has led to a lot of erroneous initial reporting and too much speculation for this girl. Sometimes I like waiting to look into a breaking story for a day or so, so that the facts actually emerge. Difficult for someone who lacks patience, but worthwhile in the end.
But back to the beauty and awesomeness of the world wide web and all things online… if you take the time, you can thoroughly research something, even in another language and use the instant translation, and form a completely thought-out opinion or resolution to your initial query.
And why this blog topic? Well, thanks to all of the options that the web offers, I was able,
Yams, Blueberries, Veggies, Brewer’s Yeast and Flax Seed… yumm!
on several occasions, to correctly diagnose, treat and save several of our pets over the last few years. Through a combination of Facebook posts asking friends for input, to veterinary and “Ask the Vet” sites, to blogs and comment sites where real people shared real answers, I was able to put the pieces together that resulted in success. Our dog Jade, who showed signs of liver failure turned out to be only a blockage and through the miracle Liver-Cleanse diet I found online, she was cured in 2 weeks. Shocked our vet, but that was 3 years ago and she’s going strong at 15. Recently, our lab, Bailey, started having seizures. After the initial panic and call to the vet on a Sunday night, we searched it online, found lots of suggested home treatments, visited the vet and came up with a treatment program that, 2 months later, has Bailey back to normal and living a happy life. I even took up making dog food, again using several recipes from the web!
It’s great that we have this amazing tool at our fingertips 24/7/365. But like all good things, it might be best to use it wisely, with caution and taking the time to get all of the information to make your own, best conclusion. And when it comes to researching health issues or injuries, I always remind myself that I probably still need to seek a professional opinion… even though I think I can fix and cure anything!
And as my husband is fond of saying, “The greatest thing about the internet is that you can find anything at anytime… the worst thing about the internet is that you can find anything at anytime.” Happy searching!