Some things are just inexplicable. I took Alesia to summer school yesterday and then went straight to the unemployment office, where I was told that I will not be able to get an extension on my unemployment benefits. No more help there. Then I got an email from a friend who is also unemployed, and he said they approved him for 6 more months! Guess I didn't look pitiful enough. Hmmm...
I had a 2 hour meeting yesterday with a company that hires freelance writers to write articles for them to help them promote their services. That is a potential source of a bit of income, but not a huge amount, and it's not a real job. However, it was a really interesting meeting. I learned a lot about marketing on the internet.
As Mother says, we will get by. It just won't be easy.
I got an email about changes in our lives that are coming or almost here due to rapidly changing technology, and I wanted to share it and get your reactions. I don't know if all of it is valid. I remember about 20 years ago my dad, who was a banker, saying that one day all we would use is debit cards, not cash. We're rapidly approaching that time right now.
Future
Technology – Get ready to say farewell to many things that have been a
part of our lives.
Whether these changes are good or bad depends
in part on how we adapt to them. But, ready or not, here they come!
1.
The Post Office. Get ready
to imagine a world without the post office. They are so deeply in
financial trouble that there is probably no way to sustain it long
term. Email, Fed Ex, and UPS have just about wiped out the minimum
revenue needed to keep the post office alive. Most of your mail every
day is junk mail and bills.
2. The Check.
Britain
is already laying the groundwork to do away with checks by 2018. It
costs the financial system billions of dollars a year to process
checks. Plastic cards and online transactions will lead to the eventual
demise of the check. This plays right into the death of the post
office. If you never paid your bills by mail and never received them by
mail, the post office would absolutely go out of business.
3.
The Newspaper.
The younger generation simply doesn't read the newspaper. They
certainly don't subscribe to a daily delivered print edition. That may
go the way of the milkman and the laundry man. As for reading the paper
online, get ready to pay for it. The rise in mobile Internet devices
and e-readers has caused all the newspaper and magazine publishers to
form an
alliance. They have met with Apple, Amazon, and the major cell phone companies to
develop a model for paid subscription services.
4.
The Book. You say you will never give up the physical book that you
hold in your hand and turn the literal pages. I said the same thing
about downloading music from iTunes. I wanted my hard copy CD. But I
quickly changed my mind when I discovered that I could get albums for
half the price without ever leaving home to get the latest music. The
same thing will happen with books. You can browse a bookstore online
and even read a preview chapter before you buy. And the price is less
than half that of a real book. And think of the convenience! Once you
start flicking your fingers on the screen instead of the book, you find
that you
are lost in the story, can't wait to see what happens next, and you
forget that you're holding a gadget instead of a book.
5.
The Land Line Telephone. Unless you have a large family and make a lot
of local calls,
you don't need it anymore. Most people keep it simply because they're
always had it. But you are paying double charges for that extra
service. All the cell phone companies will let you call customers using
the same cell provider for no charge against your minutes.
6.
Music. This is one of the saddest parts of the change story. The
music industry is dying a slow
death. Not just because of illegal downloading. It's the lack
of innovative new music being given a chance to get to the people who
would like to hear it. Greed and
corruption is the problem. The record labels and the radio
conglomerates simply self-destruction. Over 40% of the music purchased
today is "catalog items," meaning traditional music that the public is
familiar with. Older established artists. This is also true on the live concert circuit.
To explore this fascinating and disturbing topic further, check out the
book, "Appetite for Self-Destruction" by Steve Knopper, and the video
documentary, "Before the
Music Dies."
7. Television.
Revenues to the networks are down dramatically. Not just because of the
economy. People are watching TV and movies streamed from their
computers. And they're playing games and doing all lots of other things
that take up the time that used to be spent watching TV. Prime time shows
have degenerated down to lower than the lowest common denominator.
Cable rates are skyrocketing and commercials run about every 4 minutes
and 30 seconds. I say good riddance to most of it It's time for the
cable companies to be put out of our misery. Let the people choose what
they want to watch online and through Netflix.
7.
The "Things" That You Own. Many of the very possessions that we used to
own are still in our lives, but we may not actually own them in the
future. They may simply reside in "the cloud." Today your computer has
a hard drive and you store your pictures, music, movies, and
documents. Your software is on a CD or DVD, and you can always
re-install it if need be. But all of that is changing. Apple,
Microsoft, and Google
are all finishing up their
latest "cloud services." That means that when you turn on a computer,
the Internet will be built into the operating system. So, Windows,
Google, and the Mac OS will be tied straight into the Internet. If you
click an icon, it will open something in the Internet cloud. If you
save something, it will be saved to the cloud. And you may pay a
monthly subscription fee to the cloud provider.
In
this virtual world, you can access your music or your books, or your
whatever from any laptop or handheld device. That's the good news.
But, will you actually own any of this "stuff" or will it all be able to
disappear at any moment in a big "Poof?" Will most of the things in
our lives be disposable and whimsical? It makes you want to run to the
closet and pull out that photo album,
grab a book from the shelf, or open up a CD case and pull out the
insert.
8. Privacy. If there ever was a
concept that we can look back on nostalgically, it would be privacy.
That's gone. It's been gone for a long time anyway. There are cameras
on the street, in most of the buildings, and even built into your
computer and cell phone. But you can be sure that 24/7 "They" know who
you are and where you are, right down to the GPS coordinates, and the
Google Street View. If you buy something, your habit is put into a
zillion profiles, and your ads will change to reflect those habits. And
"They" will try to get you to buy something else. Again and again.
All
we will have that
can't be changed are Memories.
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