h a l f b a k e r yExpensive, difficult, slightly dangerous, not particularly effective... I'm on a roll.
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I had a new digital camera arrive in the post on Wednesday morning. My busy schedule means I haven't got time to play with it until Friday night. This is plain wrong.
Many technologically oriented businesses have their fair share of gadget lovers [sic]. An employment perk that ought to attract them
over other employers would be "Gadget Leave". Allow 2.5 days gadget leave a year, allowing people to take the odd half day off to play with their newest toy. This will also improve productivity as they won't spend an entire day browsing the web for pdf instructions or forum tips while they impatiently wait to get home and rip open the packaging.
Curta (as mentioned by zen_tom)
http://www.vcalc.net/cu.htm
It's like something out of "Brazil", but you can actually get it. [jutta, Mar 10 2007]
[link]
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My brand-spanking new iMac arrives on Monday and I shall be at work all day twiddling my thumbs thinking up obscure but believable short-term illnesses to find myself afflicted with before making my excuses and heading home panged with guilt but ultimately flooded with joyous anticipation. |
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If you're going to leave it in the box to savour the anticipation for a while I suggest you at least take it out and test it before the warrantee runs out. My boss failed to do that with a new piece of equipment, and only found out it was faulty long after the warantee expired. . .
He's the opposite of a gadget freak, he hids things away in the cupboard til he can work up the courage to try to figure them out! |
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But if you're rediscovering your F4 it's like a new gadget isn't it? Shouldn't you quash your urge to rediscover your F4 and hide it away in a box for a few weeks until the desire to play with it passes? (maybe I'll get my F3HP out this weekend...) |
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Excellent - glad to hear you have a consistent policy towards new and old gadgets.
This idea has made me realise I used to get excited about new gadgets but now I become irritated about having to learn a new interface or whatever and just want the gadget to get on with whatever it's supposed to do. |
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//Today, for example, I'm rediscovering my Nikon F4 again//a euphemism if I ever heard one. |
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Having now spent the last 4 hours researching the features of the Nikon F4, I can now announce quite categorically, that I really want one of those. |
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In the future, to avoid unnecessary eBay browsage, can we pre-empt any gadgetary proselytising with some kind of warning? |
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The last time this happened I nearly spunked a fortune on a mechanical Curta calculator. |
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You get days off? I'm lucky if they offer me a toothbrush as their "dental plan." |
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Gadgets are not for days off, they are for messing around with while one is *supposed* to be working. |
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Don't do it [zen_tom]! - you should be saving up for a Nikon D200. |
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//Don't do it [zen_tom]!// |
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I see, [Ian], that you like to play hard-to-get with your technology. You like to have a dominating relationship with your gadgets, where they never know if they might be put in the cupboard for 6 months, a year, or forever. |
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I prefer to begin my relationship with my gadgets on an open and honest basis, on the understanding that it is expected in return. |
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You suggest that someone with impatience to open their new-found gadgets is afraid of commitment, but quite the opposite can be the case. I conduct many weeks or months of research before I buy a new gadget, very often buying time-tested products rather than the "latest and greatest". This is the source of my impatience and excitement when I finally choose to commit. |
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I actually get paid to play with gadgets!
How lucky can you get ? |
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[xenzag] If we continue [TheLights]'s 'relationship' analogy in which he is a romantic lover, courting and wooing his gadgets for months before committing himself wholly and unconditionally and devoting all his attention and love towards the object of his affections, then you, being paid to play with a wide variety of the hottest gadgets around are a sort of gadget porn star. |
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How can I get a job as a Go-Go Gadget porn star? |
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if you tested yo yos you could be a yo yo
go go |
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of if you tested airbeds and yo yos you
could be a go go lilo yo yo gigolo |
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.....and if you limbo danced while doing
this testing you could be a go low, yo
yo, go go, lilo gigilo. |
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An ode to increased inefficiency due to the frivolousness of civilization within our civilization of capitalistic efficiency which breeds frivolousness and/is consumerism hence inefficiency. |
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...and if these items were painted in very
bright colours, you'd be a go low, day-glo
yo yo, go go, lilo gigilo |
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...and if these items were painted in very
bright colours, and you were wearing your
Father Christmas outfit, AND your yo yo
doubled up as a type of amulet
charm...AND you had to do your testing in
a certain area of London, you'd be a Soho,
ho ho, go low, day-glo,
mojo, yo yo, go go, lilo gigilo. |
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...if you were all those things, AND the homeless lead singer of an Irish pop band, navigating your way around town on a uni-legged bouncing implement, only to find a place to rest in the local karate school, you'd be |
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Bono, the hobo, pogo, dojo, Soho, ho ho, go low, day-glo, mojo, yo yo, go go, lilo gigilo. |
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P.S. Re F4s, I couldn't resist - the new camera should arrive on Wednesday! |
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with or without the "now make me a nice
cup of tea" option button? |
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It doesn't have one of those, but, if you dip it in some tea, and press the 'depth of tea preview' button, it will tell you how hot the tea will be halfway down the cup (but only if you've put the batteries in first) |
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I sense that I can't change your mind on this, binkly. I will not therefore try to persuade you that this is a good idea for you. I would, however, like to persuade you that it is a good idea for me, and others who like gadgets. |
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// if you need that much time to play with a gagdet |
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I don't need that much time to play with a gadget, it's just that once I have one I WANT to spend that much time. I only proposed 2.5 days a year. I was worried some would argue that that was far too little. Xenzag, Our resident go-go gadget porn star, of whom I am fairly jealous, seems to need about 9000 hours a year playing with gadgets, and still enjoys it enough to brag about it on the HB. |
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// then you are buying the wrong gadgets |
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Sure, I can (and did as a first thing) pick up my new camera, set it to point and click, and take a picture within 5 minutes of unpacking it. However, if I want to really get the best out of it, I need to invest some time to learn how to use it better. This is the same for nearly anything of a technological nature. I'm aware of the dangers of "feature bloat", and generally avoid products that have it (MS products excepted) |
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//or you need to use that time to get out more. |
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I seem to get out too much already, that's why I had to wait two days to find two hours to read the instructions. To quote Terry Pratchett, I don't want to get a life because I seem to be leading three already |
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Seeing as I've mentioned Terry Pratchett, I'll suggest that those who find the idea of gadget leave irrelevant can have the option of having 2.5 grandmother's funerals a year instead. |
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From the perspective of a management-type person, I understand the value of Gadget Leave, and I support the concept. I've seen significant reductions in productivity from employees who are distracted, whether by a new gadget waiting at home, a pregnant wife due to pop at any second (could also be considered arrival of a new gadget, I guess), or some such. What I question is the 2.5 figure. Allowing a half-day off per gadget as you suggest, means each employee would be getting as many as 5 new gadgets per year. Obviously, employees such as these are grossly overpaid since I can only afford 1 or 2 new gadgets each year, and that's just not fair! |
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Aside from that, I work where new gadgets are arriving weekly
and I encourage my employees to try them out, so I guess you could call me a gadget pimp. |
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//employees such as these are grossly overpaid//
Not necessarily. My latest gadget is a Van De Graaf generator. I made it myself for free from old shite I had laying around (two bits of wood, a pencil, a pen, two cotton reels, a soda can, some brass mesh, wire, drawing pins, aluminium tape, self amalgamating tape and a small aubergine). Granted, it sucks (I was proud to squeeze 130mV out of it before the pen broke) but I find it immensely rewarding to see that such a junky piece of crap can generate anything other than noise. I have been bothering my colleagues about it and thinking about it at work way too much. |
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However I think it would appeal a lot more to the techies than to the more commercially oriented, "people people" types. So if I ran a company I'd be tempted to generalise it a bit further, and just say that every employee gets an allowance of 5 half-days a year on which they can just do what they like, regardless of any relationship to gadgets. |
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//5 half-days a year on which they can just do what they like// very generous, but isn't that just called "holiday"? |
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Latest gadget report: A second-hand OSX server, which I had initially planned to access from work using a nifty ssh port forwarding scheme to tunnel through the corporate firewall and thence fiddle about on personal stuff whilst looking as though I'm working beaverishly away. The day I switched it on, I got more than 20 break-in attempts from people trying to log on as root, admin, and other default accounts - scary stuff - so I reconfigured it to block all the normal ports and listen on a different one - but of course this one is blocked from work, so it's back to the drawing board... |
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I was thinking the opposite, like the gadget itself was on a vaction away from you, where other people made use of it for a few days. |
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