From: sac@apple.com (Steve Cisler)
Newsgroups: comp.society.futures
Subject: Day of the Gizmoid
Date: 15 Dec 92 00:07:01 GMT
Organization: Apple Computer Library

The Day of the Gizmoid, by Stanley Bing 
American Way. Nov. 15, 1992
Reprinted with permission of the author 
OCR'ed by Steve Cisler<sac@apple.com> 

Hello from the twenty-first cerntury!

It's terrific here! Wherever you turn, there's technology. Chips and
wafers -- and dripping gobs of them -- hanging off the walls,cluttering up
our desktops, making life so much faster, easier, and more negligible in
every way! In business, of course, the rise of the technosociety has paid
off big time. We work smarter. We play harder. We get more done and
more fun than you do. Don't you wish you were here?

Of course, high technology is something you have to get used to. I admit
it was hard at first when, back in 1996, I had my first track ball surgically
implanted in my elbow. But now i couldn't be happier! Take today. It
was a success from morning until right this very second, as I sit on the
turboliner to my surburban ecosystem inputting this into my 886-66
laptop that is so light that if you didn't anchor it with this handy cable, it
would actually float up to the ceiling! Incredible!

Want to hear about it? Sure you do!

It was a solar time-unit much like any other here in downtown Gates
City (formerly Seattle, I think). As always, I hit the ground running. On
the way up in the elevator, I popped a Magic Muffin, the creation of a
genetic mutagen firm I own some stock in. This tiny, slightly bitter
white pill (which, by the way, is derived from all-natural substances
before it is synthesized) creates--after some five minutes, perhaps ten in
fatter people--the unshakable conviction that you've just eaten a large
bran muffin with plenty of juicy raisins, with zero downtime elapsed. I
find the little rascal has literally increased my normal corporate workday
by four percent, while not robbing me one bit of the very nice perception
that I've gorged on something sweet and tempting first thing in the
morning. Take it with a scalding cup of soy coffee. It's the best!

I got to my office before Betty, as always. For an android, she sure takes
her time getting started in the morning, but I'm not complaining. Those
early hours before the whistle blows are the true quality time of my day.
It takes me a minute or two t hook up to The Gizmoid--the electronic
pod that holds all my working appliances. First I plug my pocket fax into
my desktop communications pod and download its memory buffer.
which was filled through cellular communications while I was on my
way in. Then I turn on the videophone and audio hookup, access my
databases and get them running in the background, tie into my personal
satellite dish, trash shredder, and compactor, flip on the white-noise
switch that creates the illusion that I am outside.

Then I accessed my voice mail. It was a slow day--I had only 127
messages, forty of which were unsolicited recorded voices exhorting me
to buy time-share subscriptions in a vacation complex down in Cuba,
our proud new fifty-second state. The rest I replied to with a digitized
message that promised a more individual reply by end of day. I love my
voice mail. I remember when we first got the thing back in the middle
1990s. I didn't get the point then. I kind of resented the need to press the
pound sign all the time whether I really felt like doing it or not. But I got
over that. Today, I checked my mailbox sixteen times and there was lots
of neat stuff in it. Next week my password expires, though. Can't let that
happen. Then I'd have to answer the phone when Betty couldn't get it,
like I used to. That would be a big step backward into your stupid
century.

Then my computer calendar beeped at me, and then, in a very
comforting voice programmed by me to sound both businesslike and
slightly sensual, informed me that it was time once again for my
monthly memo on the production of synthetic tofu at our orbital colony
up there 22,500 miles above the earth. Downing the last of my digital
grapefruit juice, I slammed into action and sent an electronic message to
the bulletin board on Stern-Buffett Space Pod, which is owned by a
consortium of our company, Hathaway Shirts, and Hartz Mountain. We
can go there any time we like for vacation. The food is great and the
views are terrific! Anyhow, we have a very big satellite office there, and
it's my job, once a moon unit, to find out what they need and convey
those needs to senior management. My department gets involved in
this effort. Since my whole departrnent (which used to consist of
eighteen humans and a motorized dog) is now made up of me and one
rather elderly android, this is no big deal. I just put a requisition for
inforrnation up on the bird and hang out for a while, which, by the way,
is still a popular pastime for people in business.

Before I wrote my memo, however, I took a little stroll around my
virtual personal space (VPS). In the last years of the twentieth century,
many companies cut down on their square footage, which, in spite of
head-count reductions, still left folks feeling somewhat cramped. This
invention solved that problem, although there were a few kinks to
work out along the way. Several early guinea pigs were injured when
they went to take a walk around their spacious "office" and tripped over
computer cables or, in one tragic case, a human test subject stepped right
on the face of a fellow worker stretched out on the virtual deck of a
yacht owned by somebody by the name of Robert Maxwell. Do you know
who that was? It doesn't matter. Here's what you do: Simply clamp the
VPS goggles on your eyeballs, hook up the personal sound
environment, and you can literally imagine your work space. It seems
so real, even if it is virtual. These days, I'm opting for a hut on the beach
at the edge of one of the very small Aleutian Islands during the brief
summer those northern outposts enjoy. I've got a pitcher of something
strong and straight, and my pet walru$ Randy, by my side. It's llberating!

Betty came in shortly thereafter. "I have a dental appointment just after
lunch, so Ill be out until about 3 o'clock," she said, placing the
space-station inventory data on my invislble blotter and trundling out
without further comment. She's still in a huff about something, I can't
remember what. Boy, the imaginary personal history they program into
those androids is really something! Talk about realistic! After digesting
everything for a few minutes, I took myself in hand and crafted this
crucial communication:

To: Senior Management, Worldwide

Following impactful and necessary reductions in incoming outflow in
our orbital tofu harvesting facility, regional exigencies have produced
significant declines in outstanding materials throughout. December
production is expected to once again abate until acceptable levels are
reached and maintained throughout the frst quarter of the
coming-calendar year. Please emend your calculations downward to
reflect these trends and fax the appropriate revisions to me by close of
business Tuesday. Thanks!

Memo done, I reached for immediate clearance with my senior vice
president, Ned, who at that moment, I knew, was on his own virtual
golf course somewhere on the other side of the electric fence that
separates my wing from the executive suite.

"Ned! Greetings from the planet earth!" I screamed into my squawk-box.

"I can't hear you. I'm going into a tunnel on the fifteenth green!"
screamed Ned from the other end of his cellular line. This cracked me
up. The experience is so real it screws up cellular communications!

I read Ned the memo.

"Next time call me after I take my  ?&$&$! shower!" he said. Of course
he cleared the memo, but not without asking me to verify any facts
contained therein. Okay, I thought. Some things never change. The guy
wants me to clear it up and down the executive food chain. I decided to
go through the entire drill. I immediately e-mailed a request for
verification to my counterpart at corporate headquarters in Osaka. At
first, when I dialed my internal faxlmodem/toaster, the screen told me
there was NO ACCESS, but after only thirty-seven automatic redials, I
got through and punched out my message. While I waited for an
on-line reply in the foreground, I took the opportunity to check the
weather in all 6,000 cities in the Western Hemisphere, just in case. You
can't know too much about the weather, especially if you're in sales and
always in need of a good conversation starter.

At this point, I had to sit back and wait for Osaka to kick in. Sometimes
even the future gets boring, so I faxed my wife a photocopy of my rear
end. Ha! She loves it when I kid her like that. Right afterward, in fact,
she called me up and said, "It's incredlble to me that in the middle of a
busy day you find time to do this kind of thing. Honestly!" You can't
spend too much time shoring up your personal relationships, that's
what I always say.

And still I had to wait. Naturally, there was nobody human to talk to.
What with personnel reductions and the influx of excellent android
labor, a guy can get lonely. It's especially tough for guys like me in
middle management. I mean, we've got no one to order around or even
delegate to. We have to do a lot of the work ourselves!

Gosh! What's the point of being a manager?

Thank God for the new Holographic Staff Emulator that we just
installed. It's an incredible invention now being marketed by a former
special-effects producer from the West Coast, where fictional people are
often more important than real ones. Six three-dimensional projection
pods are set up in key locations throughout our work space. As I pass by
an invisible "trip wire," a palpable, 3-D "employee" will appear,
drinking a cup of coffee and complaining about lack of advancement in
the current business environment. If given an order or direction of any
kind, the projection is pre-programmed to give an appropriate response,
from "that's not my job," to "I'll get on that right after I meet with Mr.
Forbisher on the upcoming business plan." So this morning, at loose
ends and kind of bummed out in general, I lifted my spirits by ''firing''
Arnie Weiner, a holographic employee who was really getting on my
nerves.

"Don't I get a couple of months to get myself together?" he whined.

"No! Pack up your stuff and get out, you lazy worm!" I thundered. It was
fun!

Then I had lunch. This is one of my favorite times of day. Usually, I just
scarf down some expandable food paste (which absorbs forty-seven times
its weight in stomach acid and inflates accordingly) at my desk. The
penne al pesto mash is my favorite. It's quite tastyQand takes me only
six seconds to eat! That's productivity! And it leaves me at least an hour
to play D Tetris on my workstation.

Sometimes, though, I have to go out. Fortunately, this doesn't impact
my schedule one bit. I sirnply have a cellular satellite earth-station
uplink brought right to my table and pow! There isn't a person I can't
reach, no matter where they are. By 2008, as you might not know, each
and every person in the fonnerly Free World was issued a pocket pager,
which they were required to wear by a new law titled The Mandatory
Reachability Act. So as I chowed dom my arugula with three kinds of
genetically altered goat-cheese, I cajoled, badgered, and oerse wheedled
my way rough er tender defen  nding em lollygaggng over
cheeseburgers, out shopping, even, in
 case, taking a walk in the park! Can you imagine? This is the futur--and
there's no time for thatl

Back at the office, I took a minute to have my daughter beeped- at
afterschool soccer practice to make sure she went right home afterward
and did her homework. "Send me a fax or an on-line modem message
when you get home, sweetiel" I said.  "Dad, you're such an awesome
wonk" she replied. What a kidderl Just like her moml Then things
finally got cracking. The foUowing e-mail came in from Osaka:
"Estimates vague but definite," it read. "Move forward if forward
movement seems advisable. Thank you and have a nice day." Isn't that
superb? In the old days,

I might have had to wait an entire day for positive clearance like that.
Now I can have it within hours, thanks to modern technology and the
Japanese respect for all things relating to Tom Peters!

Search for excellence! You just might find it!

Confirmation all lined up, I accessed Ned's digitized signature (which I
have on file in my drawing soware package) and applied it to the memo;
e-mailed the memo to those

who read e-mail; faxed the data to those who Iove faxes; and even
walked some hard copy around to our very senior guys, who are mostly
extremely old dudes who persist in being proud that they don't know
how to operate machines. Given new advances in aging, however, it
looks like they'll be around for three or four hundred more years or so,
and it pays to be nice in any century, right? Look at it this way When
they finally retire, I'll only be 210 and ready to boogie!

Almost done for the day now, I strolled down the hall for a
twenty-minute session in one of our new Cultural Acclimatizing
Chambers. These days, even more than in your ancient time, the
ambitious and greedy business person needs to have the world's
customers right at his or her fingertips. Step into one of these boxes,
turn the dial on the Multi-Acculturator, and zoom, you emerge
thoroughly Japanized, Germanized, or Com monwealthed, speaking the
necessary language, in love with aU the appropriate foods, ready to do
business without danger of making a gross cultual gaffe. True, the effects
last a couple of hours, but repeated use hlally alters the brain stem and
makes improvements permanent.



All in all, it was a most productive day. I connected with innumerable
people who know I'm here, know I'm working, know how on top of the
case no matter how far , how disengaged, how not involved in ersonal
scenario they may be. Across ation, across the world, I touched the
executive infrastructure of my corporation and made it take notice! I
couldn't have it all, by the way, without the introduction  last year of
that great new concept Business Saving Time (BST). What a fabulous
development that was! Invented by consultants fired from top Fortune
50 companies, the idea is simple: At 3 p.m. every day, the clock in every
subscribing business organization is turned back one  hour. Although
this does create synergy problems with the "outside world," the
productivity gains and ultimate sense of bewilderment and resulting
"culture bonding" are hard to ignore. In short, while it was midnight
out in the real world, I was just bright and perky, getting ready to hit the
road for home.

Waiting for the turboliner, I zipped out my personal tie fax-modem and
tried to get in touch with my wife to give her some thoughts on what I'd
like for dinner, but for some reason our home machine was out of
service. our voice line was "experiencing difficulties." I know this must
have been frustrating for her --she loves to keep in touch.

I the train, I met Ralph Barfinger, whom I had a deal pending. Thank
goodness I was carrying my Ultrasonic Deal Closer. This tiny gadget,
when beamed at a customer, will create in its target a massive sense of
unease (centering in the small bowel) that can be eradicated only prompt
signature on the pertinent papers. Let me tell you--it works. By the he
got off at his transfer point, I had punched into my laptop with a
brandnew order for 50,000 units. "Bye, Ralph!" I hollered as I headed
home at top speed.

Yes, it's a great business world, and things are rapidly getting even
better! Next we take delivery of our first Total Benefits Compactor, a
computerized compartment that can reduce the number of covered
ailments (and associated company expenditures) to the size of a bread
pellet without the full understanding of anybody affected until it's too
late. Coming soon, too, is the promotion disintegrator, a high-speed
laser beam that effectively eradicates all raises in title except those that
do not result in higher wages and bonuses. That should leave us just
enough financial resources to pop for the new Corporate Executive
Compensator, a sleek, black box the size of a common stack of $1,000 bills
that protects the remuneration structure of anyone earning more than
$350,000 per year no matter how his or her company is doing.

Now the day is done. I"ll go home, plug my brain stem into the back of
my Nintendo, ingest the news in the background of my consciousness,
and have my virtual dinner. After that, I'll do something digital with
my kids and accomplish an infrared interface with my wife before
falling off to a vast and dreamless slumber. Just a normal day for me.
Nothing special. Just terrific. And it's waiting for you, just around the
bend. When you get here, by the way, be sure to look us up. We're the
fourteenth housing nodule on the thirtyfirst level of the nineteenth
grid. The one with the flowers in the window.

We'll leave the light on for you! |

--
American Way, Box 619640, DFW Airport, Texas 75261
Subscriptions are $72/ year for 21 issues.