El Exigente

Years ago, there was a commercial for Savarin coffee featuring a character known only as El Exigente ... the demanding one. The premise was that if El Exigente approved, the whole town went nuts in a riotous orgy of ... well, coffee drinking, we assume.

Nowadays, El Exigente is the machine ... all machines. We've let these things into our lives, naively assuming they were somehow making things easier. But all they've done is whittle away at our freedom, little by little, until we became servants to the machines.

It started with the humble VCR. Oh, sure, it was great to be able to record TV shows to watch at our convenience. But remember the first time the power failed? When it came back, the VCR just kept flashing "12:00" at us, day or night, relentlessly. It was the machine's way of saying "What time is it? What time is it? What time is it?"

We have a coffee maker in our office that can whip up espresso, cappuccino, and other savory caffeinated drinks. But its electronic display, ostensibly to show hints about how to use the device, keeps making demands. "Decalcifying needed." "Empty grounds bin." In fact, this mischievous machine withholds caffeine until its demands are met.

All our desktop computers take time from their busy schedules to inform us that software updates are available. Some of these are even critical updates! Woe betide he who ignores those insistent prompts.

And mobile devices? My tablet has a whole repertoire of pings, boops, beeps, twiddly-doos and other assorted "alert" sounds intended to notify me of ... what? It gives no clue as to what these auditory attention getters signify. At least my smoke detector has the decency to tell me, in a clear, LOUD voice, that I must change its batteries or face incineration. I must say it's a compelling argument.

But by far the worst, most demanding, unyielding device is the GPS. Not only is it constantly intoning its directions with smug superiority and supreme condescension, as if I were an idiot ("Please proceed to highlighted route." Of course, dammit! It's my driveway!), but if I dare deviate from its intended course, it sighs with exasperation as it utters "Recalculating." It's appalled that I have the effrontery to challenge its all-knowing prescription, and to disobey a direct command. No wonder GPSes have been known to lead their drivers miles off course into the wilderness. They simply don't have the patience for  our meddling.

And this is only the beginning.

Speaking of GPSes ...

As technology advances, the life span of a species, from invention to obsolescence, gets shorter. The species known as GPS is already facing extinction, since most smartphones can now perform the same functions, and are cheaper. In fact, the smartphone is a kind of Swiss Army Knife of techno-toys. I'm in the process of switching to phone-based navigation, as my once beloved GPS is showing distinct signs of dementia.

I jumped on the GPS bandwagon whole-heartedly. One of my completely irrational fears is of being lost while driving in a strange city (and I consider my hometown pretty strange.) I think the clinical name is wherethehellamiphobia. I have a severe case. I loved the idea of a gentle guiding voice giving me step-by-step, turn-by-turn directions, each one just as I need it. Even on familiar roads, I thought, the infallible companion would be soothing and reassuring.

Of course, the reality was somewhat different. For one thing, the American English voice was actually Dominatrix. "You will turn right in 500 feet, and you will like it." And then there's the surly way Dominatrix would respond if I dared to disobey her instructions. She'd hiss "Recalculating..." through clenched silicon chips, with scarcely concealed contempt.

I got used to Dominatrix's quirks, but I don't think she ever adjusted to mine. She started to show signs of mental breakdown. Once, right in the middle of the Verrazano-Narrows Bridge, I heard her venomous "Recalculating..." How could we change routes in the middle of a bridge? I glanced at the screen, and saw just the car icon, surrounded by blue as if hovering in the air somewhere over New York Harbor. I think it was the first sign of her latent homicidal tendencies.

Later, she stopped speaking to me altogether. I could still follow the maps, but got only scornful silence from her. Finally, even the maps stopped displaying.

I didn't want it to end this way. I thought perhaps we could remain friends. But I think Dominatrix sensed that the smartphone was getting more of my attention. I suppose it's natural for each generation of technology to be jealous of the next. Already my iPod Touch is deleting my unread email messages from Apple.

Next Generation GPS

What I Want

Technology is close to solving some of the pesky problems of daily life. The big issues? No way! But a number of minor annoyances could certainly be eliminated in the next year or so. So here's what I want:

More cell phone bar code apps

SnapTell is a mobile app that uses the device's camera to read bar codes on products, and then tell you where else to buy them, on- or offline. Very cool! But I'd also like to automatically look up the product in Consumer Reports or epinions.com and see if it's even worth buying.

Better caller ID

When someone calls, I can see who it is and decide whether I want to answer. But if my wife's on the phone, I can't see who she's talking to.  Fix that. Yeah, yeah ... privacy. I'll bet Facebook knows who she's talking to.

Smarter remote controls

I have to go through about 47 levels of on-screen menus to browse through the video-on-demand movies or TV shows on my system. By the time I've found something tolerable, it's too late to watch it. I know the cable companies keep these ungodly search paths out of obligation to the content providers, but someone should make a touch-screen remote where I can add buttons that will just jump right to the set of choices I want. Click .. HBO HD movies; click again ... Showtime HD movies, etc. That simple.

For extra credit, just put all the movies in one freakin' list, and let me choose.  I really don't care which channel is so graciously agreeing to take my money.

And speaking of TV how about ...

Baysian commercial blocking

The most effective email spam blockers work by learning to recognize certain types of content as spam.  Why can't we do that for TV commercials? I could click the CRAP button on the remote when a commercial starts, and the system would learn what signals are just noise, and would blank the screen and mute the sound. Then I wouldn't have to sit through the animated boogers and the animated road kill and the animated whatever else six times in every half hour.

Better software upgrading

I have two PCs and a MacBook Pro, and I'm convinced they all spend most of their time upgrading their own software. I think they've got a little keeping-up-with-the-Joneses thing going amongst themselves.  "Oh, have you seen my new Thunderbird?" How about if they only upgrade when I'm not using the computer? How about if they learn how to upgrade without having to restart the whole machine? Better yet, how about if software companies TEST their products before delivering them?

Smarter GPS

Do I even have to explain this?

What else do I want? Well, I'd like a share of anyone's implementation of any of these ideas. After all ...