Saturday, January 14, 2012

Line of the Day (2): 2012-01-14

It is said that anything invented before you are three years old is a normal part of life; anything invented before you are thirty-three is new and exciting, and you can probably make a career in it. Subsequent inventions are just new-fangled fripperies that you can well do without.
    -- Philip Hazel

The above is from the Preface of From Punched Cards To Flat Screens: A Technical Autobiography (PDF), which I look forward to reading in full.

(via, via, via)

2 comments:

Jack said...

Jeez, that's a fascinating observation -- about the three stages of relating to stuff. But gosh, it makes sense.

I've often marveled at how everything that happened prior to our consciousness seems like part of history. When I was born, World War II was just 22 years distant. I've now lived twice that long, and yet World War II still feels like it happened in some old dusty history book.

Never thought about it in terms of technology, though, but I certainly see the point.

Facebook: New-fangled frippery.

And that's being polite about it!

bjkeefe said...

I know what you mean about WWII. And yet, I still have to work very hard to remind myself why someone from Gen X or Y should feel the same way about the Vietnam War.

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