With trepidation and a complete sense of foreboding. I knew now just how the richest man in the world, Bill Gates must have felt at the launch of Windows 98, when before an audience of over 5.000 analysts, pressmen and customers, the software had refused to boot. Actually, he must have felt much worse. When you re the head honcho of the world s largest software company, and you re surrounded by detractors, a failed software launch is enough to get competitors really energized and the press guffawing over quippy newspaper headlines. Soon I was up on stage, looking at a sea of slightly amused faces.
People just love it when things go wrong.
My voice, accustomed to rising only during either a pow-wow with the spouse or when the offspring gets a C grade, wasn t quite up to the mammoth task at hand. Speak up, can t hear you from down here. If the MC, the gracious Geetanjali Aiyar hadn t announced tea and snacks, I felt we would have been done in altogether. So am I even more skeptical about technology today. For no matter what they tell me about how hi-tech is going to take over our lives, I ll never be a buyer of this spiel.