Our society is becoming more and more reliant on technology, which is inherently unreliable. It's getting to the point where we expect the Link Bar of Wonder to go down for a month (and Jim to be too lazy to fix it), yet my television is infinitely more complex than the Link Bar and it actually works.

After completing a project at work involving Microsoft and spending countless hours on the phone with them trying to debug their software, I wonder if perhaps more time and money should be spent making computer software and hardware more stable rather than faster and flashier. The problem is, we the customers won't let this happen. If 2 products got released next year: Microsoft FiXP: Stable, secure XP operating system and Microsoft Longhorn: Loads of new features and interconnectivity and a redesigned interface, which do you think would sell?

People expect everything to keep speeding up and our graphics to keep getting better at the same pace that we've had for the past 20 years, but the better technology is more complex, and a competitive market means that companies must continue innovating with reckless abandon and no regard for stability. Plus, what incentive is there to design something that will last 10 years when you make more money if people replace your product every 2 years when the next hot release comes out?

Finally, thanks to Paco for pointing me in the direction of this outstanding news article about a man raised by chickens. Do you think he cares how many gigabits can be transferred over a wireless network? More importantly, is this hysterical or sad? I can't decide.

Posted by: Brian at July 19, 2004 1:01 PM