Mark Twain was an avid fan of technology. He was so fascinated by new inventions that by 1894 he had invested $300,000 ($700 million in today’s dollars) in an incredibly complex contraption called the Paige Compositor.
The Page composer went bankrupt and Twain lost his entire investment. He later wrote of its inventor, James Page, “He could persuade a fish to come out and walk with him. I always believed in him when he was there: I couldn’t help it. When he left, all belief evaporated. He was the most daring and majestic liar.”
I also tend to adopt the latest technology. Therefore, I can feel Twain’s pain.
The advent of the computer age was supposed to relieve most of humanity’s pain, especially the pain caused by our species’ woeful lack of a built-in spell checker. Just like the Paige Compositor, the principles behind the computer look great on paper. Like Paige Compositor, computers are so numbingly complex that no one can understand them.
Computers are wonderful until they don’t do what you want. When they don’t do what you think you tell them to do, it can lead to outbursts of profanity that make pirate parrots blush.
Take for example what happened to me recently. Some time ago my employer decided to switch their email host from a local company to the all-powerful and all-knowing Google. I’m fine with that. The only problem is that the email program I use refuses to switch.
The program in question is called Windows Live Mail. It’s a solid little program, although it’s old enough to be used by Fred Flintstone.
Microsoft discontinued support for Windows Live Mail around the end of the Ice Age. I don’t care as long as the program continues to send, receive and store my emails.
When I try to sign up to use Google as my email host, it won’t let me because it feels like my Windows Live Mail account is still active. I was instructed to delete my old account and told me everything would automatically and smoothly migrate to Google.
As we’ve learned from nature documentaries, migrations often don’t go as planned. There are always wildebeests who don’t wear hydrofoils before trying to cross a turbulent river, and some male reindeer who get lost because they refuse to ask for directions.
To complete the transfer, I followed the instructions and deleted my work Windows Live Mail account. Then I signed up for google services expecting everything to be there.
Nothing at all!
All my past emails and my email address have not jumped. They seem to be lost somewhere in cyberspace. It was as if the migrating snow geese all over the sky evaporated into a blue sky.
“you idiot!” are you thinking “You should backup everything before trying to switch!”
But I have.Everything is backed up on three different sites “Cloud.” But it seems that if it is deleted here, it will be automatically deleted there.
Hours of agony frantically trying to get my old emails back. I’m trying to do computer-based stuff that is beyond the knowledge of ordinary civilians.
It’s like being told you have to assemble an automatic transmission before you can drive.
I tried “system Restore” function but not. I called my local computer repair guy and he said my files may be gone forever. When a magician tells you he has no skills, that’s bad news.
In my increasingly desperate efforts, at one point, my computer screen was filled with strange new icons, each a shortcut to an email. Where are my desktop icons? ! The amount and volume of the curse may have stripped the rust from the old plow.
These shortcuts led to emails more than a decade ago. I don’t want emails from 10 years ago! I want my email from 10 hours ago! Oops, I’d love to restore emails from ten months ago.
I wasted a lot of time and energy trying to get rid of nasty shortcuts. When my computer desktop looked normal again, I did a jig dance that showed how horrible things had become.
This isn’t the first time—and probably not the last—that I’ve sacrificed too much time on the altar of high tech. As a technical master Mr. Spock once said, “Computers are good and efficient servants, but I don’t want to serve them.”
Amen, brother.