Compute this!

I am going to complete these blogs, even though there not as important as my many other things to do... how did things ever get accomplished without computers? Without my computer I would fail, thats a no-brainer. Everything that is required of me, requires me to have access to a computer. This machine has transformed everything, and its hard to believe that in my short life time, they have evolved from nothing! Wikipedia describes computers as "a machine that manipulates data according to a list of instructions"... In my previous blog I discussed the programing language that allows us to do the things we do. Getting back to the main point, computers are everywhere. They are in grocery stores, in our cars, airplanes, calculators, digital cameras and even in some children's toys. Its strange to think that the very computer that I am working on to write about computers is capable of computing millions of instructions for anything from word processors to websites. Wikipedia also states that a typical modern computer can execute billions of instructions every second and nearly never make a mistake over years of operation. So why are we all so surprised when our computer freezes or the hard drive crashes. It seems that as dogs have dog years, computers have computer years, and a life span of one computer is at most 8-10 years! In government offices, they incorporate into the budget new computers every 4-5 years. So it seems every human year means 15 computer years...sad really, but how worn would you be with so much use?
The dependence on computers has done nothing but increase over the years since they have been implemented. Computers are where we rent and watch movies, where we stream television shows, were we download (and sometimes buy) our music. We complete homework assignments, and every business is now run by the computer. Our files are now stored electronically, instead of alphabetically in the filing cabinet, mail is almost extinct with the invention of electron mail (e-mail). Pictures are stored within the computer, no one uses real film anymore, and then we post all of our best photos online for the world to see and save until deleted. We used to have to write things by hand! Now, my hand is sore after a long exam. So much has changed, but we are still busy busy. I cant compare really, because I was never in college before computers, but I do see previous posters on display in some spots in the college, obviously people didn't have access to Illustrator, images are literally cut and pasted. The questions then exist, what will we make easier next? and what happens when there is no energy to feed computers, and what happens when Y2K hits?

The future seems promising, but who knows what giant bug lurks on the next hyper link, ready to destroy your life in a fancy 1000 dollar box of wires and microprocessors. Because, thats what it is, your life, your taxes, music, movies, assignments, data...Where would you be without it?