Alarming technology

This is an alarm clock. Those of a certain vintage will be familiar with the red glow that heralds a new dawn every 24 hours. Others will recognize it as the relic on the parents’ bedside table. I see it as a foreboding harbinger of automation.

This weekend, British Columbians – like most Canadians – saw clocks spring ahead. But nowadays, there is not much work to be done. Once upon a time, usually just before bed, it was required to go room to room and manually set time forward. Present day, not so much. Other than the alarm clock, only the microwave/oven combo needed to be adjusted in the apartment this weekend.

(Watches don’t count. A nice timepiece is worth the occasional adjustment. If you don’t have a watch to adjust, consider getting one. They are worth it. Digression complete.)

The alarm clock serves limited purpose. It’s not smart. It can’t tell the good folks at BC Hydro how much power is being used. Retailers can’t gauge spending habits and flood with internet ads. No one is going to decipher internet history from it and judge. It tells time. It will wake you up. And it will play music, if you pick the radio station option. It performs simple tasks; it is not a multi-tasker.

After smacking the snooze one morning recently, a realization dawned – this one piece of electronics (aside from baby pics) has travelled across the country several times, hit hot spots like Kapuskasing, Timmins, Regina, Quesnel, Prince George and Victoria.

It is the one constant in life. It’s been bedside for almost 35 years. It represents a different time.

Life for this benign object began in Barrie, Ontario. Not just the purchase, but all the components were put together in a General Electric plant that was situated right beside Barrie Central Collegiate. It employed men and women, provided good-paying jobs and didn’t require a university degree. It was possible to finish school, jump the fence and start a new job the next day.

GE provided dinner on our table for many years. Then work started to shift. Overtime slowed. Then one morning, the plant was closing – after 40 years of operation.

When this clock finally comes to an end, the replacement will be very different – if there is even a new one. The smart phone, steadfastly always at the ready, can do the job even while its owner is asleep. Or fancy new alarm clocks – with Bluetooth and music downloaded from satellites. Whatever it is, it won’t be as quaintly unsophisticated.

And therein lies the tech terror – with each new edition it morphs into taking over more of everyday life. We acquiesce, not silently; rather with full-throttled enthusiasm, spending thousands on devices all designed to make life easier.

As a matter of individualism, it is brilliant. This is being written on a Surface, a Gear S5 Frontier is attached to the wrist tabulating steps in the day, heart rate, providing immediate weather updates (like what is wrong with using the window) and the Galaxy S7 sits plugged in beside. PVR streaming up last week’s Coronation Street episodes. And runs are conducted with aforementioned smartwatch and Bluetooth headphones.

Technology is good.

Technology is bad.

That plant employed in Barrie employed up to 600 people. When irons, kettles and alarm clocks stopped being completed, families were thrown into disarray. It’s now a mall. And the high school is closed.

Resource towns also face challenges due to technology.

In Kapuskasing, for years they were the proud producer of all the newsprint for the New York Times. Demand for newsprint has since dropped, slightly.

In towns across British Columbia, new mills are welcome investments but they also usually mean – ultimately – fewer people needed. Back in 1992, at the Canoe mill in Salmon Arm, the woodlands manager shared they produced more wood than ever and did it with a smaller workforce. That practice has grown, not shrunk.
Being a bag boy at the local grocery was a good weekend job. Cashiers made fair wages to get you through the lineup as painlessly as possible. Presently, those jobs are being replaced by scanners. Convenient? Yes. Cheaper for the shopkeeper? Definitely. The only loser is those who no longer have those jobs.

Amazon is piloting a store that needs no checkout at all, all cameras and all connected. Walk-in, pick up your goods and walk out. Then check to make sure you got the special, as the money will already have flowed from your account.

Technology is not evil. It does though have repercussions.

President Donald Trump’s foray into tariffs as a way to rebuild American jobs is doomed.

Those steel towns will never boom that way again; they can thrive and mix in new enterprises with the old stalwarts. First though is conceding progress morphs into something unexpected.

Way back when, that little alarm clock – which now acts as a symbol of caution – was a pretty fancy piece of tech. Now the smart watch – if the owner was smarter – could probably launch a nuclear attack. Robots are seemingly being prepped to take over every job imaginable. Luddites need not rise up and SkyNet has not darkened at the door.

Spare some thought about the impact technology is having, as it could impact your life in an alarming way.