RSSNot your usual Microsoft keynote: Tom Brokaw
By Scott M. Fulton, III | Published March 3, 2008, 7:09 PM
Last Wednesday in Los Angeles, developers and admins expecting Bill Gates or Steve Ballmer were treated to Tom Brokaw, a developer of a different kind with a message that changed the tone of the day, and maybe of Microsoft as well.
LOS ANGELES (BetaNews) - The message this time wasn't about how great things are, or how empowering the acceleration of agility can motivate the enterprise to harness the power of workflow. It was a mangled metaphor-free message, and it came from a source no one expected to hear from that day: former NBC News managing editor and NBC Nightly News anchor Tom Brokaw.
We present Brokaw's words in their entirety.
But I do think that we are at a very important time in our lives collectively, not just in this business or in this country but around the world. From the very beginning, I was astute enough to recognize the power of the personal computer and the many facets of software programs that drive it, and the explosive reach and power through the Internet world to fundamentally alter our times and our world. And so it has.
Here and now, however, still at the dawn of this new age, I like to believe we are in the seminal stages of what I call the "Second Big Bang." The first Big Bang, of course, formed the physical universe [that houses] the world today in which we live. This Big Bang means that there are planets out there still trying to find their place in this universe. Some of them have already drifted too close to the sun and burned up. Others have merged. Still others of them seemed to be not very significant on the horizon a few years ago, and they have now become a very powerful force.
But as I say, we're still at the seminal stages of the formation of this new universe, the possibilities seem endless and utterly exciting.
The expansion of this new technology has been advanced not by a small collection of monkish wonks working in secret laboratories, but instead by a vast and ever larger population of teenagers, lab scientists, physicians, academics, business executives, merchants, farmers, military analysts at the Pentagon, grunts in the field, environmentalists and geologists, journalists, and librarians, NPOs and multi-national corporations. All of them with the same foundation and ability to move this technology and change our world, limited only by their imagination.
Historians will look back on this time in our lives as a truly transformational age in the long history of the world, a time when the planet got much smaller, much more intimate, and the possibilities of every aspect of our lives got much larger.
However, the test of our place in this world is not yet complete. After all, we don't want to become Easter Island or the Mayan civilization. Life -- you have to remember every day, as you use this technology -- is not just a virtual experience. If we develop capacity, however unlimited it may be, and leave out compassion or common sense, what is the reward to us, either individually or collectively?
If speed overruns reason, what else gets cancelled?
When I talk to young people...I like to remind them that global poverty will not be resolved by hitting the Delete button. We'll not solve climate change by hitting Backspace. What I believe in my heart and my mind is that it will do us little good to wire the world if we short-circuit our consciousness, our souls, and we short-change our potential to use this technology to advance mankind.
Next: Brokaw's heroes...
Apple won't be outdone by M$. They will find their own retired TV news anchor to give their next keynote. It's probably going to be Dan Rather. LOL
Score: 0
|Yeah, the GG had all those GREAT advantage of growing up in the Depression, having to drop out of school to support their families, going hungry, living in a very frightening world being swallowed up, then spending 5-10 more years fighting and sacrifing to make the world safer. What a deal, too bad so many did not live the great times they were having!
"Dad, its your ****ing fault the world is a mess! By the way can I borrow the BMW?"
Score: 0
|Yea, but recognize the book marketing for what it is: it was Tom's generation that labeled his own "the greatest."
I forgot to mention they didn't have to compete with Wal-Mart, a republican-trashed USDollar, crippling debt to the Chinese, endless war (Iraq has last far longer than WWII ever did), nor did their labor have to compete globally with India and China.
Give any generation those advantages, and it's pretty easy to claim your own greatness. If they're so great, why don't they get off their walkers and fix the problems conservative created this century?
Score: 0
|Hmm...did we suffer gas shortages? Lines at the pumps? Are we recycling all of our tires? Donating our used metal to the war in Iraq?
Ever heard of Vietnam? The Cold War? I'll give you credit for mentioning WWII, but I have 100% confidence you have zero clue what kind of sacrifices the Nation took for that one.
Do you even have a *clue* what you are talking about?
Christ, we've got it easy now comparatively. Our problems now are *nothing* in comparison to what we had to deal with in the 50's, 60's and 70's. Hell, and that's just the Caucasian population. Expand it to other ethnic groups and the gap widens even more.
If they're so great, why don't they get off their walkers and fix the problems conservative created this century?
You deal with *half* of the crap that went on in those three decades and then we'll talk.
Score: 0
|While I like Tom, Tom's Greatest Generation had advantages that today's working people would kill to have: cheap energy, low taxes, cheap housing, affordable college tuition, liveable wages, manufacturing jobs, low social security taxes (1%!), and I won't even go into the negative positives, such as no RIAA suing everyone, georgie bush was a coke-snorting war dodging drunk collecting multiple DWIs, and they didn't have endless regulation that repubs have saddled us with over the past 40 years.
Today, Tom's Greatest Generation is killing our economy with their medicare costs, medicaid costs, how they don't pay the same taxes the rest of us do, didn't have jackasses like rupert murdoch owning all media, social security payments that exceed anything they put into the system after less then 9 years, and this may sound cruel, the fact that they're living longer than ever in $5k/mo. nursing homes.
I'm sure the Microsofties enjoyed listening to Tom's travel diary.
Score: 0
|how they don't pay the same taxes the rest of us do
This is *really* amusing when you realize the poster, on his "PC-Tool fansite" states that he is, in fact, unemployed and living in the basement.
Don't flatter yourself, Zaine.
Score: 0
|Once again, your lack of knowledge shows up on my computer screen. Son, I've paid more taxes than you'll ever make in your lifetime, and my basement is bigger than your house (2500 sq.ft.). I'm unemployed because I don't have to work. It's called investing, toolie, something your generation doesn't do. Go back to your Hannah Montana mp3s, we're staying on topic.
Score: 0
|...and I quote:
-is not a programmer (I wish, but I don't have the brain for it);
— is a lazy, fat **** — I make no excuses there;
— is unemployed (see previous point);
— is poor and lives in a basement (see previous two points);
Either way, you're lying SOB, aren't ya?
Son, I've paid more taxes than you'll ever make in your lifetime,
So sorry to disappoint... Son. I'm not the one posting about being a poor, uneducated, shut-in, while crying about taxes and wasted money on welfare and medicaid.
Score: 0
|talkprice: From your post, it appears you have quite a bit of brain capacity you aren't using. Do yourself a favor. Step away from the keyboard and pick up a book. You are on your way to a lifetime of minimum wage. Seriously, the guys wearing nametags at 30 are funny in the movies, but you really, really don't want to be one of them.
Ummm, unless you were trying to be funny. If so, well played, sir!
Score: 0
|as I said earlier, I think talkprice is a spammer. Typical 1 or 2 lines after a discussion, very neutral followed by a URL. Nice.
Score: 0
|Looks like!
Score: 0
|