So Much Change

 Since the advent of the internet and the personal phone, my generation has seen perhaps the greatest change since the invention of the light bulb.  I watched an old military training film that was deemed classified at the time on how to put up a telephone pole and string telephone lines.  Nothing invented is going to ever be environmentally friendly, but there were millions and millions of telephone poles dotting the landscape everywhere in the country.  

Then there were films about the same time this one above was made, around 1950, about the recruitment and training of what was then Ma Bell operators.  Everytime one dialed a number a switchboard operator manually directed the call.  Then when dial phones were introduced, there was no need for the operator except for long distance phone calls, which were logged manually by the operator.  

It's more tedious to write about these things than to see for yourself just how much things have changed.  But there is no question as to how much a handheld computer/communication device has changed the world.  Everything is on your phone with instant access to the world literally at your fingertips.  

Television script writers are on strike because they fear AI will take their jobs and they won't be needed.  Ashton Kutcher says any company that does not begin utilizing AI will become obsolete in just a few years.  Of course, he's heavily invested in AI programming.  But AI could do away with actors, prop people, set designers, and change the entire movie industry.  In fact there are futurists, like Elon Musk,who fears AI could possibly make humans obsolete.  

But when you go back and watch old videos on how things were done back in the day, you realize how much people depended on people to get things done.  So much was manual labor, from switchboard operators to those who installed telephone lines on telephone poles.  And today writers fear for their jobs being taken over by AI.

I used to know how telephones worked.  I've disassembled many dial telephones.  But that is because the insides were all mechanical.  If I took my back off this Android phone I am using, I would have no idea what any of the components are.  I have no idea how my phone works.  And after a year of ownership of this phone I'm still learning what it does.

I'm not smoking a pipe this morning, but I did order some tobacco on Tuesday.  I ordered some Vanilla Custard and some more Tropical Export.  I did smoke a bowl of Tropical Export in my Sherlock Holmes pipe by the pool at my son's house yesterday.  But I notice I don't sleep as well when I am not smoking my pipe.  But that could be due to living in a new place and I'm still not accustomed to living here.  But I'm hoping next week things will get back to normal, whatever that is.  Thank you for your time and Peace to each one of you.

Dave