Reflecting this morning on the work in front of me, as I often do I am looking back over my life. And wondering what the future holds. For what? Dealing with the overwhelming amount of "information at our fingertips" ...
An information "tsunami" of sorts, which is beyond dispute to me. Given what I have experienced in my lifetime.
Image Source: Pixabay"Information at our fingertips" is an expression I have used for a long time. Before there ever was an Internet.
At least before I was aware of it. As an engineer, I experienced a relatively early "deep dive" into the topic, when I bought one of the first available IBM PCs. In the early 1980s ...
While it is easy to "skip over" the implications of what I have experienced since, I have decided to put together these thoughts in my latest Steem post, where they will be "immutably enshrined" for future reference.
Entering the Information Age
Without spending too much time on it, in my quiet moments in thinking about this topic, I am reminded of some fun conversations I have had with my children over the years (they are all out on their own now ...).
The "common theme" of these has been that I have lovingly and gently (but still seriously in my intent ...) chided them about their father being a "dinosaur" and, as a result, knows what it takes to accomplish certain tasks, before there ever was any thought of a computer doing it for me.
What about them? A lot could be written about the implications ...
We could all probably write a number of posts on what follows. The impact of entering the Information Age and its effect on all of us. Especially our children ...
The "tsunami" of information "rolling over" us in the Information Age is indisputable. Whatever we may have experienced, or think about it, very few of us would spend any time arguing about whether or not the Information Age is here to stay.
Whether we like it or not. Whether we spend any time even thinking about whether we like it or not. Like I am this morning ...
Accelerating into the Information Age
Heading into the future, the impact on the lives of us all is growing. I personally believe it is accelerating. That is to say, borrowing some verbiage from my engineering background, the growth is not linear. It is asymptotic:
"An asymptotic line is a line that gets closer and closer to a curve as the distance gets closer to infinity."
[emphasis mine]
Infinity ... How does a man respond to such a concept? Whatever the answer, dear reader, we have reached the point some time ago, where it is not even a thought any more that we can do it unaided.
Unaided by what?
Computers! That can process minding-numbing amounts of information. At speeds approaching the speed of light. With ever increasing amounts of processing power ...
In splendid isolation from each other? No! The advent of the Internet has made it possible for information systems across the entire planet to be networked together. And this is at the heart of what am writing about this morning.
In the midst of the "explosion" of technological innovation we have seen in our lifetimes, we are all now at the very beginning of experiencing what the introduction of blockchain technology introduces to the "equation" ...
Current Focus: Taxes and the "Digital Asset" Class
So ... What has set all these thoughts "in motion?" Beyond the "caffeine rush" of a couple of cups of coffee this morning? 😉 ...
As much as I might like to pretend, currently retired, that I am "free" of deadlines, yeah, well ... Think again! I am currently faced with the well-known federal deadline of April 15th to file my taxes for 2018. And ... With it, a challenge unlike any I have faced before now.
Historically, I have always done my own taxes. I am an engineer and a supposed "numbers guy," so how tough could it be to do that? Circumstances have varied from year to year, of course, but overall the answer has been - "Not too bad" ... Particularly with nice "tools" like the well-known TurboTax ...
Well, I didn't get very far into prep for this year, when "Houston, we have a problem" ... ... cropped up. How was I going to report on a whole new investment area. My portfolio of "digital assets?" Where every single exchange is a taxable event? ...
In the midst of beginning to even think about the challenges I would face, after reading up on it a bit, I was hit with a different, but related, challenge. Related to a MS Excel spreadsheet I built over a year ago, to handle all of the details of tracking my various "digital asset" transactions.
On the worksheet built to send and receive API calls to and from CoinMarketCap (CMC) for the latest pricing, as needed, I was suddenly looking at the following:
Illustration: CoinMarketCap API Call "Deprecated" ... 😧
Good grief! So ... All my hard work a while back was soon to be "deprecated," i.e. replaced. 😞 Back to the "drawing board" ...
The following is a brief outline of what I have been through, over the last two weeks or so, to get to the main point of my writing this morning:
- Long avoided prior, due to the time involved, I decided to "go right down through the middle" of the problem and create a new database. Rather than tackle it any further with a spreadsheet. An order of magnitude more difficult to work with in crafting a solution, but also and very importantly, an order of magnitude more powerful for addressing the challenge ...
- For most any request for data today, on the Web, if you want to "automate" the capturing of it anyway, then you need to understand sending and receiving API calls for it ...
- To continue getting all-important "crypto" pricing, I needed a new route to the API data on CMC. The old one was being "deprecated" ...
- First, I had to get my own "personal" (so, of course, you can be "tracked" ...) API key, to cross the barrier now erected to get any more info from CMC via an API call.
- Second, I had to understand the finer points of receiving the API response as a JSON string vs. an XML string.
- Microsoft has built in "native" support for handling XML data. Relatively easy. But, JSON data? Nope! You are "on your own" ...
What about the "customer service" minded approach of supporting multiple API response options? Yeah, right ...
The technical details warrant (maybe I'll write more on them some day) a separate post to be understood at any depth, beyond what I have written above.
At the heart of the philosophical state of mind I am in this morning is the last bullet item. Getting one "information system" to simply and easily "talk" to another. You know, like one American talking to another. Not even a thought needed to be given to the potential for interpretation problems. How about it? Again. Yeah, right ...
Image Source: PixabayWith the relentless advance of technological innovation and growing size of the "tsunami" of information we are attempting to handle as it is "rolling over" us, this is a common issue. We all are very familiar with the challenges faced when attempting to communicate effectively and efficiently with someone who speaks a different language from us. Particularly, if neither of us have any idea about the language of the other!
Guess what? Information systems have their version of the identical problem. Again, a lot could be said here on this point, e.g. there is a business "strategy" involved in having a proprietary solution that locks your customers up into only dealing with you. "Open source" is a commonly used expression these days for avoiding some of those pitfalls.
Separately, we have a number of different programming languages available, when writing code to get these &$%&$#*)%@#%#@&(%& computers to do what we want. And how well do they all "play together in the sandbox?"
You get the general idea ...
Closing on I suppose a bit of a high note here, challenges of this type have been at the center of my work to support my family over the last 15 years. One of my favorite sayings, working through the midst of these types of challenges?
"If it was easy, it would've been done by now!"
To keep morale up and humor light, often followed with - "lifetime job security" ... 👍
No End in Sight ...
From the outset of my time "in here," once electing to "jump in" to engaging on the Steem blockchain, I have never made any secret of being a disciple of Jesus Christ. In short, a Christian ... Like any of the rest of my fellow Steemians, our philosophy on life is going to be heavily, if not solely, based upon our system(s) of belief.
I am no exception. So, please permit me dear reader to close out this post with some perspective you may find of some interest, whether you fully (or even partially ...) agree or not.
In the Bible, the Book of Genesis is commonly referred to as the story of the beginning of the ages - the history of man. Many of the details are fairly well known, e.g. Noah and the Flood. In amongst these stories is one I would like to draw to your attention this morning.
Soon after the Flood (did man learn anything? Uhhh ... Well, let's see ...), we are presented with the story of the Tower of Babel:
Image Source: Jonathan Park - "What Happened at the Tower of Babel?"In this remarkable story, captured for us briefly in Genesis 11:1-9, we read these closing words of judgment:
"That is why it was called Babel—because there the Lord confused the language of the whole world. From there the Lord scattered them over the face of the whole earth."
Genesis 11:1-9 [emphasis above mine]
Any person with a Judeo Christian worldview would trace at least some of their understanding of the historical challenges man has faced with language and distance barriers to this story. Specifically, that a sovereign God ordained that it be so. To discourage man from what he was attempting at that point in time ...
So ... Where do we find ourselves today?
I've already briefly touched on the Internet providing some solutions to the historic distance problem. As a result, the world seems much "smaller" these days. Right?
How about language barriers? Well, we can throw our new "tools" at it, e.g. Google translator! Certainly far from perfect, but we can make ourselves reasonably well understood. With relatively little effort. I have used this tool myself, while "engaging" here on the Steem blockchain with newly "met" friends, e.g. @insight-out (Bulgarian), @blessed-girl (Venezuelan), and @marya77 (Iranian).
So, we are becoming progressively more and more familiar with all that is going in to overcome the historic difficulties of language and distance. With perhaps the "low hanging fruit" already "picked," then the increasingly more challenging "difficulty factors" are being met with ever greater amounts of processing power brought to bear on overcoming them.
In recent history, man has been at the center of creating and focusing these efforts. In the future? In response, I wrote briefly on what I have personally experienced in a post about attending a conference with the "best and brightest" from all over the world last Fall in San Antonio, Texas.
AI (Artificial Intelligence) and all that this implies, is now playing an increasingly more central role moving forward. Man will not be actively involved as much as "supervising" systems doing the work for him ...
To wrap up, overall are we making "progress?" Are all of these technological advances ultimately "good" or "bad?" While not professing to have the wisdom to know for certain, my own thoughts are that, for the most part at least, in and of themselves, probably neither.
It is the overall intent and focus of man's hopes and aspirations, in applying them, as we read in the story of the Tower of Babel that I believe is key. Are we ushering in some sort of "utopian" future for us all? The creation of or restoration of (depending on your system of belief) "Paradise on Earth?" "We got this!" Right? Hmmm ...
To be crystal clear, I am not making any declarations. Nor passing any judgments ... I am absolutely suggesting, however, we not lightly pass over the implications of all we are living through. And what they might mean for our future.
Image Source: PixabayIt is tempting and, with the passage of time ever more so for me and my family, to try and "escape" all of this somehow. To live simpler lives. Close to the earth. I am resigned to this not being realistically possible.
Nope. For whatever I may think of it, this is the time in man's history I was destined to live. "For such a time as this" was a common thought in my recently completed "road to recovery" trip.
Perhaps someday I will get around to writing more about that ...
Closing
So ... There you have some "food for thought" from the perspective of one of your fellow Steemians. Who has experienced a lot in life. And who has lived long enough to enjoy (at least somewhat ... 😉) reflecting back on "what it all means" from time to time ...
With that, on into my day dear reader. Back to work on my "taxing" problem ... 😉 I’d love to hear any feedback you may be inspired to provide.
Until "next time," all the best to you for an even better tomorrow, as we all work together to build our Steem Community! 👍 😊
Respectfully,
Steemian @roleerob
Posted using SteemPeak and “immutably enshrined in the blockchain” on Friday, 29 March 2019!
Interested to read more of my “reflection” series of posts? Great!
- Reflections: Adding "Value" to the Steem Blockchain - Chapter 1
- Reflections: Curation and Pollination
- Reflections: My Life as a Hay Farmer
- Reflections: Adding "Value" to our Steem Blockchain - Chapter 2
- Reflections: Innocent until Proven Guilty!
- Reflections on the Future: BBC 2018 Conference in San Antonio, Texas
- Reflections: My "Road to Recovery" Trip
- Reflections: Officially retired ... Or am I?
