Introduction
“Never doubt that a small group of thoughtful, committed people can change the world. Indeed, it’s the only thing that ever has.” – Margaret Mead
Technology has brought many advances to civilization. Automobiles, telephones, television and computers have made our lives easier, not to mention renewable energy and medical advances. It wasn’t that long ago that the ordinary citizen couldn’t have a book published unless he spent $4,000 or more. That changed with time as I had my cookbook published in the fall of 2002, thanks to a self-publishing company in Pennsylvania. This was a print on demand venture so I had to pay, but I didn’t need to take out a mortgage. Improvements in the book business have reduced costs even further. My knowledge of cover design, working with various other types of software made the amount spent even less, but I had to do more work.
I added to my education because of all the technology. As a result, many of my books have come into print. The others are ebooks. All my books are free downloads at my web site, which is listed at the bottom of the introduction. I began writing while I was teaching in Binghamton. That book was finally published in early 2012 because of all the revisions. Altogether I taught high school mathematics for eight years before joining the business world as a software programmer. I retired and then became involved with the self-publishing option.
Without the tech of the book business I probably wouldn’t have a web site. My math and computer background played a huge part in organizing and writing books. Besides the culinary treatise, other topics include technology, addictions, the environment, missing intelligence, music, genealogy, my journey as a writer and a novel about the national lottery. I’ve always read a great deal – mostly non-fiction since truth is more entertaining than fiction – and this made my research easier. I’ve never stopped learning or teaching. All good writers need to do both.
I mentioned veracity and I strive for that in every book I’ve written. My aim is to have a minimal number of errors when I publish a book – it’s virtually impossible to catch every mistake. An individual found my site and felt that the topics I covered were eclectic. There are a few threads there: humor, hope, education, helping others and social justice. My goal from my writing is to have more people read. No one can make excuses since my books are usually short, not epics. Naturally they’re political since no true artist can be anything but. I haven’t mentioned any of my titles in this book, but you can go to my web site and see what they’re all about. The cover and title should give you a clue. Clicking on information under the cover of each book will tell you even more.
As in a few of my books, some of the names have been changed to protect the author. These include individual as well as corporate and software names. You should be able to recognize the real appellations from the bogus ones. Actually, when you see a name that’s not authentic, feel free to replace it with the name of your favorite software or company.
When I was almost finished writing The ABCs Of Technology, I read another related book by Bill Bryson, I’m A Stranger Here Myself: Notes On Returning To America After 20 Years Away. Besides this 1999 book, I’ve read quite a few of his offerings and I recommend them for his research, insight and sense of humor. I’ve included a few more books in the reference section following the last chapter.
This book is about hope, change, progress, advances, challenges and solutions. Each chapter begins with a quote with the title being either that of a song or words from a song. The last few books of mine also used song titles for each chapter. Here I’ve tried to make a connection in each of the twenty-six chapters between the topic and chapter title. The considerations are mostly for television, cars, phones and computers. Just as in technology there are so many connections and some topics embrace many aspects, I have more than one chapter to cover the same aspect of tech, even saying a few things about health care.
Many people feel that tech is a big failure. Some individual might say that it has so many bugs that he opened up an exterminating business. Don’t tell the IRS about him. Another mentioned that she avoids the stuff since she breaks out in a rash whenever she is near a computer. They seem to be forgetting about all the good. Technology has been around for centuries. Nonetheless, while solving problems, tech has also created others. I’ve heard so many complaints about computers, telephones, cars and television that it’s obvious that we have to fix what’s broken as soon and as much as possible.
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