I’ve said it and will say it again. Though I know technology is catching up on us in almost every sector of life I’m not yet fully into saying “Yes, that’s it.” Look when organizations fail to serve you due to system failure, when the dudes try to fool you with the criminal phone calls and when only one of the multiple ATMs is working you can’t help having a hundred shades of suspicion. (Just for the record nothing to do with ‘Fifty Shades of Gray.’) More and more we’re paying bills electronically. But I’m one of those who waits until such things become mandatory before rushing to comply. The very presence of the receipt in your breast pocket gives you more confidence than those text messages.
Of course there is no argument that we need the use of technology more than ever. Going to various offices and organizations you feel that we’re really in a race to fully join the world of modern technology seeing all these PCs and laptops racing all the tables. In fact you wonder if you really need all this stuff or are they doing it just to prop up their public images! Thinking the hundreds of thousands even millions of birr those places spend on the modern gear you expect that the use of modern technology is spreading like anything.
But then despite so many PCs calling for attention in some places you must be a very observant person to point out the PCs that are actually active. You’d be pardoned to wonder what the hell is going on. Why in the world do they need so many PCs and laptops when they are still shuffling tons of papers! Why do they need to search for dusty files in the archives when they could have put all documents on the many PCs! You can’t help wondering. “If they are still dealing with dusty paper documents, if the PCs look as if they are there for decoration purposes like the plastic flowers the table what kind of management approves their purchase.
There is this middle-age domestic worker I know. She’s barely could read and write. But when you talk to her about all the social media stuff and phone applications you can’t help pondering “Maybe I’m the ignorant apple in the basket.” Once we were talking about people abroad we know and she tells me she had regular contact. I took as if she was telling me they regularly phone her. Well that said until she dropped the bombshell “I call them two three times a week.” What! Was I listening right! Yes I was listening right. Yes, there really must be changes. Yes, I’m way, way back in the use of these modern appliances. Ha! I mean if you have the financial muscle to make regular long-distance calls you really must be having it nice. Yes, I can tell you that if given the economic squeezes if you can afford to make long distance calls that must be what the soccer transfer guys call breaking the bank.
“Are you telling me you call them so regularly?”
“Yes. I do.” She must have thought of me. “I can’t believe me he’s asking me such stupid questions.
“I mean making long distance calls must be expensive.” That’s when the technological revelation came.
“I use imo.” Imo! What the hell is imo! That’s how she pronounced it “i” pronounced as in ‘impossible!’ What in the world was this ‘imo’ thing? Well she was telling me she uses the IMO application. I’ve have never used it not because I hate free lunches but because I’ve yet to orient myself how to use it. Then, here is when I was really dealt the “Ahs!” and the Ohs! The ball was in her court so she asks;
“Do you use TikTok?”
“No I don’t!” well, actually a couple of times guys told me to look some outrageous material and I did so. That was my first and last engagement with TikTok. But this middle aged lady who could barely read and write was a regular user of TikTok! To the extent that she asks me if I also was a user!
Phone frauds, we are told are on the rise. “I’m calling from such and such bank. We’re upgrading our mobile banking…” Shut up you dude! I never went anywhere to your mobile banking stuff! The bad sheep are aplenty in every flock. Yes that’s a reality we’d have liked to avoid. Of course we might haggle about what we exactly mean by bad sheep. Only those who abuse rather that use their technological knowhow to dig through the ins and outs and we the rank and file are just innocent victims begin warned “Beware!”
For the third time in a couple of weeks someone calls and claims he’s was from some bank. He talked for minutes about mobile banking and said that his bank was upgrading their mobile banking system and needed information from me. He asked me for some confirmation code. I asked him from which branch he was calling. I think I caught him in midflight. He was searching for words when I told him at the moment I was at a certain branch of the bank he mentioned. Is the noise so loud when people hang up on you! I never thought that such loud sounds came from cell phones.
PCs are expensive these days. Especially, if you are after brand new gadget you have to dig deeper into your wallets and that is becoming more painful by the day. And when it comes to enterprises government or private we hear of tight budgets preventing them from realizing all their plans. So what is the logical spending so much many on PCs which month after month gather dust and their only use if any is form some staff members to play solitaire? Is ‘PC on the table’ the new normal in enterprises? Are performances measured by the number of PCs you display?
Questions, questions and more questions. Is ‘PCs in the Table’ the New Normal!
Ephrem Endale Contributer
The Ethiopian Herald September 24/2023