25 Years Ago Tonight The World Stopped!

Actually, it was not the whole world but rather the World Series! At 5:04 PM Pacific Time the Loma Prieta earthquake hit about ten miles from Santa Cruz. That is where the name of the earthquake came from.

Reports differ in size from 6.9 to 7.2 on the Richter scale. It was felt on the San Francisco Peninsula and North up into Marin County. There is all kinds of information on it on the Internet. Videos, articles and opinions are abundant. I could spend an entire post discussing the effects of the earthquake, but that is not the point of this post.

If you were alive during the earthquake and live in California, you constantly live in a state of knowing anyone of the fault lines could fracture at any time.

Personally, I was watching the game with several friends who came over to watch Game Three of what was called, "The Battle of the Bay World Series." We were a bunch of frustrated, former baseball players living out our fantasies with a monthly meeting where we did our fantasy managerial and ownership trades, drops and adds of new players. It was great fun!

Just as everyone was settling in to watch Game Three and Al Michaels was beginning to talk about the game, everything went to black. We were all upset and cursed ABC because they were messing up our evening and taking away our baseball game. Notice, I said, "our baseball game." After all, nobody knew at the time what was going on, we knew the world revolved around us!

As we sat for a while, not quite knowing what to do as our evening unfolded, reports started flowing in about what had happened. Before we knew anything someone made a joke about there was an earthquake. It was a joke! Little did we know exactly what was happening!

When they started showing footage of the Bay Bridge section collapsing, the Nimitz Freeway collapsing on itself and San Francisco on fire we knew there really was an earthquake! All of a sudden, our joke was not so funny!

Nobody had smart phones and instant access to videos and cell phone technology was not there yet, so almost 62,000 people in Candlestick Park were left wondering what to do. As more and more information came out about the earthquake, Commissioner Fay Vincent had to decide what he was going to do about playing game three or evacuate the stadium.

I just watched an ESPN 30 for 30 episode showing players, fans, broadcasters, cameramen and interviews with people throughout the bay trying to figure out what they were going to do. If you have the interest, I am sure you can find that episode somewhere on your cable or Internet connection. It is quite fascinating to see just how far technology has come in twenty-five short years!

Just think how social media today would have changed the coverage of the way this earthquake was covered!

One of the most striking images for me was watching Candlestick Park's upper deck swaying up-and-down the circle as the quake hit. It is a good thing buildings, bridges and freeways are built earthquake resistant in that part of the country or we would have seen many more than sixty-three people perish, especially in an area where people were concentrated like Candlestick Park! Imagine what could have happened if the epicenter would have been closer to the ballpark?

The GOODYEAR blimp provided images like this were shown on television, people began to understand the gravity of the situation:

Click on the image to make it larger:

It was a night to remember. It was an experience when the entire country realized baseball is just a game. Earthquakes change your perspective about real-life in a hurry! I believe we all realized what is important at least for the week or so after the earthquake.

The World Series was put on hold for a week while the two stadiums were structurally repaired to make usable so the umpire could yell, "Play ball," again, and life was back to normal for some of us.

Please feel free to share your memories of this post.

I look forward to your comments.

Later,

Mike

Our Ever-changing Technology Part II

If you read my last post on changing technology and how rapidly we are seeing the entire world change around us, you know how I feel about some of the changes. After reading that post, one of my subscribers who happens to be a very high-level quadriplegic with no arm function, sent me an article showing this next high-tech toy soon to be on the market that will have the capability to grow that change even more dramatically.

It is called Google Glass and looks like this:

As always, click on the image to make it larger:

According to articles in New Mobility magazine, Popular Science magazine and a Wikipedia entry, Google Project Glass had originally been designed for paraplegics and quadriplegics who cannot use their arms as a way to maneuver their wheelchairs with voice recognition software. It is expected to be released to the general public sometime in 2014.

Initially, the idea was to wear them as you see them in the picture. However, they are still working on a version where someone could wear them with prescription glasses. They are even working on a version that would come with your prescription glasses built into the unit itself.

I can see tremendous opportunities for everyone, not just people with disabilities to benefit from an item like this.

However, I see a huge downside in this technology and how it could be misused by that multitasking person who is already trying to drive, text, eat a sandwich and keep his or her children behaved on the way to school during the morning commute.

As if distracted drivers do not cause enough traffic accidents already, just imagine what introducing this technology could do to that distracted driver in the lane next to you!

I am all for this technology and its appropriate applications for people with disabilities and/or able-bodied people in the workplace, or in the comfort of his or her own home. It does scare me to think of how it has a huge potential to be misused and will cause people to be even more distracted from their already busy lives.

Like I stated in my last post, I am all for new technology and the changes we see coming. But, like everything else, if it is not used properly, I see some tremendous downside to this new idea.

I look forward to your comments.

Later,

Mike

Our Ever-changing Technology

I had an interesting experience yesterday with a virtual friend. While chatting on Facebook with her I watched an entire football game and she was about fifteen hundred miles away from me. I have never done that before. It was a reminder about how much our technology has advanced in the last several years.

We all know change is happening exponentially. This was just one more example of how we are communicating in the twenty-first century. It was the perfect example of multitasking.

We were watching the Washington Redskins played the Chicago Bears and commenting about the game as well as carrying on a three-hour discussion about a number of things. It was fun because we would be in the middle of discussing something and all of a sudden I would see "TOUCHDOWN!!!!!!!" on my screen. Washington beat Chicago in a wild game 45-41! It was the second-highest scoring game in the NFL this year.

I know I wrote a few weeks ago about professional sports and some of the things I believe are wrong with them. I still believe that, and feel strongly about all the injuries in sports at all levels, but I still like to watch football. I especially like exciting games like this one.

At one point, I asked her if she wanted to switch over to FaceTime and watch the game while we were able to see each other. She said she could not do that because she was talking to a mutual friend on her smart phone! It was just another example of new technology and multitasking at its finest.

I want to show you a picture I found recently I find rather humorous:

Click on the image to make it larger:

I think you will agree with me when I say, "Technology is changing all of our lives in one way or another, sometimes on a dramatic basis."

I remember as each one of these new devices came out thinking to myself, "What will they think of next?" Little did I know just what was coming down the line.

It is often said, "If you think what has happened in the last ten years is dramatic, just wait until you see what happens in the next ten years!"

There is a classic example going on right now with the new iPhones. We are already at iPhone 5, and now we have the iPhone 5C and 5S. How long will it take Apple to come out with the iPhone 6? I am guessing it will be available for holiday gift giving. Call me cynical, but Christmas is only a little more than two months away. That is a long time in our new world of constant change.

I look forward to your comments.

Later,

Mike

Technology And Autusm

I know this is a few days late, but if you saw the 60 Minutes homage to Steve Jobs Sunday night, you saw this piece on how the iPad is changing the way, as they put it "autistic people" are communicating with the new toy. I have two things I want to point out about it before I show you Lesley Stahl's piece.

First of all, most people in the people with disabilities community prefer "person first" language. Another words, Instead of referring to "autistic people," why not refer to them as "people with autism"? It may seem like a small thing to many of you, but a movement has been growing for many years to try and change the culture and that begins with language.

The other thing I had a problem with was the way they chose to jump from a laminated piece of paper with letters and phrases right to the wonderful new iPad. There have been many devices that have helped to bridge that gap for many years. Ms. Stahl failed to mention them.

That being said, please look at this piece and see what you think:



She starts out using person-first language, but quickly changes to using "autistic people." I find that interesting. When you finish watching the segment, read some of the comments. I found many of them fascinating.

The other two segments on Steve Jobs were enlightening to those of us who did not know much about his personality and life story. I know I could not have worked for him, but I certainly like using his computers!

I look forward to your comments.

Later,

Mike

Kindle is Here

The latest, greatest technological device is here and from what I've read and seen, it will eventually change reading books, newspapers, magazines and blogs just like cell phones have changed the way we communicate with telephones.

Granted, amazonkindle is in it's first generation, and carries a $399 price tag, but like all technology, we'll see that price drop and maybe even disappear.

Imagine students not having to carry heavy backpacks full of textbooks, schools not needing to buy those textbooks because they can just download the books on to their students' Kindles, walking through a park on a nice day and watching people reading their Kindles instead of books, newspapers or magazines, or riding the train or bus to work while reading your morning newspaper on your Kindle.

Amazon.com says about Kindle: "We wanted Kindle to be completely mobile and simple to use for everyone, so we made it wireless. No PC and no syncing needed. Using the same 3G network as advanced cell phones, we deliver your content using our own wireless delivery system, Amazon Whispernet. Unlike WiFi, you’ll never need to locate a hotspot. There are no confusing service plans, yearly contracts, or monthly wireless bills — we take care of the hassles so you can just read."

Check out the extended video demonstration by going to the amazonkindle link in the second paragraph and scroll down to the video.

The paradigm keeps shifting as change is happening faster and faster. For example, my 30 gigabyte iPod which is less than a year old has already been replaced by the 80 and 160 gig models!