Two Bits: The world will never be run by machines

There is nothing designed to set me on edge more than a lengthy involvement with IT specialists.

Last week we were supposed to be changing internet providers because the new one could give us a data and voice connection at a pretty good price.

What we’ve signed up for is data over fibre with – we’re promised – blazingly fast speeds, plus the bonus of moving all our Telkom phone connections over to fibre.

I won’t bore you with the technicalities, but all in all it should save us a bit and improve our connectivity.

It wasn’t all that long ago that we were tremendously excited to get a dial-up connection to the Internet and little did we know that our lives would be changed forever.

Today the business cannot survive without Internet connectivity and it has become hungrier and hungrier, demanding to be fed more and more machinery and connections (i.e. money) to do all the things we ask of it.

The switchover we’d planned for last week was months in the making but required two IT teams to talk to one another to make it happen.

The first day it didn’t work and then halfway through the second day during a lengthy silence when nothing was happening, I picked up the phone and soon realised that each was waiting for the other to do a crucial something. But they hadn’t told each other.

That’s why nothing was happening.

What is it with IT people? They’re all rocket scientists but they have to be the world’s worst communicators. I now know that the world will never be run by machines. They may invent computers with artificial intelligence that learn how to make our beds and analyse the universe and all that, but they will still be relying on people to fix them.

And those people will be IT specialists who, for inexplicable reasons, maybe it’s pride or ego or something, won’t be talking to one another and there will be endless mix-ups.

The chances of a perfect robot that works without the attention of a human (or is it inattention?) are about zero.

It was a strange day, because later a well-meaning woman told me that the reason for the rise of the LGBTF community (that stands for Lesbian Gay Bisexual Transgender and Friends, if you really wanted to know) and the apparent low sperm counts of men worldwide is an oversupply of oestrogen in our food chain and water supply.

So, I went from too little information to too much information in the swift passage of a few hours. Such is life in a newspaper office – never boring!

* * * Internet connectivity is a hot topic in Salt Rock, where most of us are still on ADSL and probably would do better with a runner and forked stick. Telkom is not interested in my complaints about the slowness of the line. Most days we cannot connect to the bank because the connection times out.

Their attitude is that the line works, so I should be happy.

I suspect that there are too many connections using one itty-bitty little line that was used to operate the dial-up party line way back when. A few companies advertise that they can supply fibre in the area, but it’s false advertising because when push comes to shove, they can’t.

They use it as a selling point to get people to call them, and then offer adsl or wireless instead.

I’m still shaking my head about the guy I rang to ask about fibre. He didn’t want to discuss it, he quite rudely (I thought) told me to fill in an application form on his website before he would discuss anything. So I did fill in the form and that was six weeks ago.

He never called back and with that kind of attitude and service, he has lost a customer forever. Two of my neighbours have opted for wireless and they’re happy with the results, though I have been assured that fibre to my street is only a few months away so I’ll wait a bit.

Perhaps it will happen, perhaps not. On the subject of strange service, I’m on the body corporate of a building that needs a roof replacement.

I have asked two local firms for quotations and guess what – neither has bothered to get back to me!

On a job worth upwards of R200 000! People complain about it being ‘hard out there’ and work being difficult to find, but I really do wonder about our attitude to business, generally. I keep coming across poor service and I’m sure it’s the same for everyone.

* * * Last night a Chinese guy came to my favourite bar. I asked him if he knew Kung Fu or some other martial art. He said, “Why do you ask me that? Is it just because I’m Chinese?” “No, it’s because you’re drinking MY beer!”