Since I consider myself a member of today's society, I felt that I should accept this blame, and try to correct our errant members in their ill-informed ways.,”
Recently – last week, in fact – every person in U.S. society, and perhaps the world society, was blamed for the loss of a jump drive and three months' worth of work contained therein.
Since I consider myself a member of today's society, I feel that I should accept this blame, and try to correct our errant members in their ill-informed ways. As I am also an engineer, one of the many vocations that helps research, design and build new technologies, I hope my insight into the technological world will help those who lack said insight.
There are two points in particular that I feel need addressing. First, let us look at the idea of backups. In any situation where you have an electronically stored project that has taken you more than a few days to build or write, I suggest multiple backups. The old adage "Don't place all your eggs in one basket" is no less applicable to today's world.
Jump drives are lost and computers crash; therefore, it is an important habit to make sure to keep your work in at least three different places, more if it's important. In fact, most of my research projects are stored in no less than five places.
If you need some ideas of where to store your backups, I can suggest: compact discs, DVDs, home computers, friends' computers, e-mail accounts, an extra "backup" hard drive, an additional flash drive or even an old 3.5-inch floppy disk. Also, if you own your own computer, there are plenty of freeware automatic flash drive backup programs easily found in a Google search.
The second point I wish to touch on is the idea that technology should be smarter than humans. I must apologize to anyone who has this misconception. In a sense, yes, technology is smarter than humans. It can do things that the average human mind can't even comprehend, let alone accomplish in its head.
However, the basic idea of 'human error' is that no matter the sophistication of the technological device, it can be no brighter than the person operating it. A good example of this is the age-old story of the CD drive used as a cup holder. True, technology can do lots of rather impressive things. However, this does not remove the culpability of the user when he or she makes a mistake or misjudgment.
The understanding of the technology one uses, as well as the capabilities of that technology, is the responsibility of the user. It is all well and good to rail at the misinformation of society when you make a mistake, but it wasn't society that forgot to double-check its lab station before it left for home. To blame society is to relegate the importance of the responsibility that being a free-thinking, rational being requires of you.
I hope this will enlighten those who misunderstand the relationship between the user and technology, and help society get back on the right track. Further, now that you all have been informed, I think society is off the hook if any of you fail to heed this advice.
Millar is a third-year master's student in the College of Engineering.
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