The Techno-Optimist Assertion: A Message to Generation X

  • William Laraque, Managing Director at US-International Trade Services

  • 14.03.2016 06:15 am
  • undisclosed
Transition
 
You will instantly recognize the "techno-optimist." He or she throws around the words "blockchain, "artificial intelligence (AI) and VR (Virtual Reality)  at every opportunity. He and she, they, are the standard-bearers of a new world and their religion, their idolatry is technology and wealth. As this idolatry grows, after it is initially funded, it turns into enterprise; it has its day. Its day is short and the enterprise battlefield is littered with the bodies and debris of those who launched their frontal assault against the bulwarks of things as they are. As is the case in battle, victory favors the well-prepared, the well-informed. Like battlefields, those of enterprise must be surveyed, reconnoitered. The battle must be gone-over in our minds until we can visualize every step, every evolution. Battle is a crescendo of events which involves bringing appropriate weapons to the hinge point at the appropriate time. Its climax is what Napoleon called "l'attaque debordante," the discombobulating  attack. You call it the "killer app."
 
The Past
 
The past is history to you and history is so past. Faulkner reminds us that history is never dead, it is not even past. But what do you care? You're busy "living the moment."
 
Jobs and Jobs
 
You may not listen to what I have to say. There is scant chance that you will read what I write since it's not on Twitter or Instagram. I'll therefore paraphrase Steve Jobs, one of your technogods. You must start with the customer experience and work your way back to the technology, not the other way around.
 
Heed
 
I pray that you will heed this advice. I'm elderly,  am the inadvertent litter-bearer and am tired from picking up the dead bodies of those who would not listen and from sweeping up the debris of enterprises which failed.

Other Blogs