So Many Passwords, So Little Brain in which to Store Them

It has come to my attention that we are using more passwords than ever, but the space in our brains isn't growing to accommodate them all.

I have passwords for my computer at home, my computer at work, and voice mail systems at each place. I use a password for online banking, to select Netflix movies, and to access a range of accounts from the power company to my credit card. I even have a password for making insurance premium payments online, something I do twice a year.

Why do I need a password to make insurance payments? If someone else wanted to pay my insurance premium, I wouldn't have a problem with that.

I don't think I should need a password to look up information about my gym membership, benefits at work, or the cat's microchip.

The only institution that hasn't made me use a password is my church, but I'm sure we're getting closer to collection plates with keypads on them, a safeguard from tithing hackers.

And how are we supposed to remember them all? If I don't use a password very often, I forget what it is. When I need it I have to click on the "forgot password" link and have yet another one emailed to me. Of course, to get the email, I need, you guessed it, a password.

Passwords are also getting harder to remember because they come with so many requirements. In some cases, you must use a combination of capital letters and small letters, a mixture of letters and numbers, and/or symbols that aren't letters or numbers. God forbid they make any sense so you can remember them. To ensure security, don't use the name of a family member, a city, a pet's name, or your birthday. And for God's sake, don't write them down because a crook might steal them.

It's worse when the password is assigned to you. Our new wifi came with a password that has approximately 27 random letters and numbers. I guess the neighbors won't be piggybacking for free on our internet.

Meanwhile, the worst finally happened. I walked up to an ATM machine and inserted my card. The screen prompted me for a PIN number. I reached for the key pad and my hand froze. I drew a complete blank. To save my life, I couldn't remember that number, one I've been using for years. Nothing.

Like the hard drive on an old, overloaded computer, my brain had crashed.

I didn't get any cash that day. I didn't even get my ATM card back because the machine wouldn't release it without a password. But my account was safe, gosh darn it.

Keeping Up with Communications Technology

My current cell phone was purchased in 2010 under protest. I didn't think I needed it. My previous cell phone was just fine. It allowed me to call someone and receive calls.

It was an improvement over the one before which took two hands to hold and only worked if you stood in a certain place outside, holding your elbow exactly the right way. That one was so primitive it practically required a crank to use, and was worthless in the isolated parts of Wyoming where I sometimes go.

I'm old enough to remember when having a phone in the car was something of a novelty, reserved for the very rich and possibly mobsters.

Anyway, the cell phone company refused to fix the newer phone that I liked, and insisted that I procure yet a newer model, which I did.

My new phone could make and receive calls, but also had texting which I wasn't sure I would ever use. Turned out that while certain female relatives rarely returned phone calls, they did respond to texts. A convert, I now text more than I talk.

But at three years old, my texting cell is a dinosaur in phone time. When the protective case broke a while back, I went to the special mobile device store to get a new one. The young, technically gifted employee sadly shook her head and said they didn't make that model anymore. It looks like it may be time to upgrade again.

Because of brilliant marketing and planned obsolescence, I am now probably going to have to buy one of those things that are way more than just a phone.

I don't want to surf the net. I wouldn't know what to do with an "app" if it hit me in the head. I suppose I might take a picture, but not a video. I just want to make phone calls and send texts. Yes, I work with technology every day at my job. But at home I want my computer to be my computer and my phone to be my phone. I suppose it's possible that, like texting, once I have "apps" I'll enjoy them and wonder how I ever lived without them.

I must admit I'm still impressed when I'm in the car with someone, and a question no one can answer comes up, and within seconds Google has given us the answer - in the car! Truly these aren't phones anymore. They're portable computing and communication devices.

Machines Replacing People in Everyday Interactions

Every couple of months, I use this blog to spout off about technology. The occasion for this particular spout is that I just got a new GPS for my car. The Global Positioning System is a little gadget that plugs into the car's electric outlet (you know - the thing that used to be the cigarette lighter but isn't any more). A little screen shows me where I am and a voice tells me where I should be going.

It's one of those things we couldn't have imagined a few years ago and makes me think, as I often do, that we are living in the future.

The GPS speaks to me in a casual business-like female voice. I've started to call her Blanche. She really helps me out. Gone are the days when I have to mess around with a paper map and its complicated folds.

Of course, Blanche isn't perfect. In Vail with my sister recently, I decided to have Blanche direct us to a particular Mexican restaurant we were interested in. Blanch guided us to some empty lot on the frontage road which was clearly not a restaurant. My sister was not impressed with my gadget.

Blanche isn't the only new interaction I've been having with machines.

Since the classes I took earlier this year didn't work out, I'm attempting to learn Spanish from a computer program. If you pass by my place at just the right time, you'll hear me talking to simulated virtual people who only exist in software. They are Norman, Claudia, and Isabel. They always understand me in spite of my accent, and they are endlessly patient, allowing me to repeat each lesson as many times as I want.

Blanche and Isabel are not real people, of course, but sometimes I forget that. When Blanche reminds me just one too many times that I will need to turn right in a quarter mile, I sometimes call her a bad name. If I miss the turn, Blanche sounds just the slightest bit annoyed when she says, "Recalculating..." and attempts to get me back on track.

Technology pervades. Who goes anywhere without a cell phone? We use ATMs to interact with our bank and we check out our own groceries at the supermarket without even thinking about it. I can go all day without speaking to another human. And then there are the many times when my co-worker and I instant message each other though we sit only 10 feet apart.

I see where the Japanese are developing robots to take care of elderly people. Is this the companionship we have to look forward to in our old age? Yeah yeah, it's easy to complain about technology, but it really can help us. The Japanese robots, for example, will enable people to live more independently for a longer period of time.

In the interest of full disclosure, I have to admit that I contribute to technological depersonalization. In my day job as an Instructional Designer, I write curriculum that can be accessed from any computer in the company. Web based training at your own desk at your own speed is more efficient and requires much less interaction with other people. Whether that's a good thing is debatable. Hey, I didn't start  the depersonalization of technology, I'm just making money off of it.

Entertechnology: A BillsWeek Rant

I've said it before and I'll say it again: we are living in the future.

For example, thanks to ever increasing technological advances, there are TOO many entertainment options.

What we can view, listen to, communicate on, and even read, are constantly expanding. Now we even carry our books around in thin little electronic conveyors of copy. No more lugging that tiresome thick paper volume around. All of this has no effect on quality. You can just as easily electronically access trash as classic literature.

 We are so spoiled. My sister has a subscription to the New York Times and doesn't even have to step out on the front porch to get it, let alone drive into town to buy it at the local bookstore like she used to. All she has to do is start the coffee and turn on her Kindle; no need to even don her slippers.

My Dad has a satellite dish with millions of channels plus Netflix, Xfinity, and I don't know what else. He has so much to watch, he barely has time to be a productive member of society. If he doesn't want to watch anything (say his eyes get tired), he can always listen to Pandora over his satellite system.

At the gym I can listen to my iPod or watch one of a dozen TV monitors tuned to the 24 hour news channels or ESPN. Some of the workout machines are affixed with their own private TV so I can watch the channel of my choice while working out.

Bars and restaurants all have multiple TVs playing around the joint.

I have almost as much entertechnology (new word I just coined for entertainment-technology) at my house. Now that I can watch favorite old TV shows on Hulu, I don't need to leave home for any reason. When I do go out, I have around 200 podcasts to listen to on my iPod (yes, I only have an iPod - it's soooo last decade). If I run out of those, I have hours and hours of music on the same little device. I am considering a long road trip just to listen to it all.

In the olden days, people sometimes left their homes to be entertained. You might actually go to a public place to be in the same room as the performers. Sometimes they played music. Sometimes they wore costumes and talked to each other, pretending to be someone else. The people watching would rapidly tap their hands together multiple times. It was called clapping. How quaint. Imagine having to leave your home to hear music or be otherwise entertained.

Now multiple individuals can be in the same room at home engaged in separate entertainments. During a quality visit with my dad recently, we both in the same room, simultaneously, headphones in ears, watched different movies on our separate computers.

Kids watch movies in the back of their minivans. Not poor kids though. They have to look out the window at the boring real world.

When I was a kid, a movie in the car was unthinkable. My sibs and I took turns choosing the radio station on long road trips. On late night family drives in the 70s, it was a treat to find an awesome AM rock radio station from Oklahoma City. That's right. KOMA out of OKC. I haven't checked but I'm sure that station is now a right wing sports talk mouthpiece.

Anyway, now each kid has their own iPod or whatever. Do they have some other way of practicing negotiation skills when they don't have to disagree over the radio station?

All this entertechnology is not perfect. I still have to get off the couch to switch my television from DVR to Roku. I can't use my wireless surround sound and my internet router at the same time because I guess they are on the same frequency and cancel each other out.

And on the subject of technology, my microwave is slower than the stovetop. My cell phone is not an i-anything and if it has applications, I sure don't know it and probably wouldn’t know what to do with it. My printer leaves inky blotches on what it prints, and does not double as a fax or a scanner. I have a digital camera, but no charger for it. And I HATE it when my phone beeps while I'm standing at the urinal.

How I long for the good old days when there were just three TV stations and an AM radio. Of course those days weren’t as simple as we remember: you had to get off the couch to change the station. How did we ever put up with that?

Old Technology in Fiction Can be Distracting

While mopping through ketchup during my lunch break, I’ll often have one of Sue Grafton's alphabet mystery series in front of me. Detective Kinsey Malone has a gun but hates to use it. She drives an old VW Beatle. She likes men but has trouble loving them. She's also not above breaking and entering if it will help the case.

And as far as I know (I'm only up to Q), she's stuck in the 1980s.

Picture it: a rainy night. The car won't start. The shadows close in. The angry suspect doesn't want Kinsey on his tail. As the danger increases, Kinsey makes a mad dash for the phone booth across the street. As the bad guy's footsteps come nearer, she closes the folding glass door behind her, puts down the gun, and rifles through her bag looking for change so she can use the pay phone.

I don't like picturing Kinsey in the 80s. I want to picture her now. It really annoys me when she types her final report on a manual typewriter.

Kinsey should have a cell phone and a laptop. But Grafton has made a conscious decision to set these novels in the 80s so the storylines flow together better. I suppose it could be distracting if at the end of one book it is 1986 and at the beginning of the next, it's two weeks later and 2007 (I’m reading another book about relativity and space time, but that’s not the subject here).

I suppose it's just my quirk to deal with, but I'm really distracted by old technology in books, movies, and TV.

In the movie Broadcast News, the workaholic network newspeople run through the hallways carrying huge video cassettes. If Holly Hunter is such hot stuff, why doesn't she just download the video digitally? I know, I know, the movie was made in 1987 when high tech meant having video in cassettes instead of on those giant reel-to-reels.

I think part of the problem is that technology changes so quickly. Our gadgets come and go out of date before our popular fiction does. Case in point, video cassettes or no, William Hurt is hot in this movie.

Quick poll: who still uses a fax machine? I don't think Kinsey even has that option. She is always mailing something (you know, with an envelope and stamp) and waiting several days for a response.

If the book or movie is old enough, it’s less distracting and more amusing. For example, in the 1957 film, Desk Set, with Katherine Hepburn and Spencer Tracy, a computer occupying several rooms threatens to take over the company. When the giant machine malfunctions, it spits thousands of paper cards all over the place. The lesson, of course, is that computers can't replace people.

At least in the 1950s they couldn't. Now I'm not so sure.

Before my very eyes, technology is changing. When just, like, five years ago, I heard a prediction that the internet and television would morph together, I thought, "What do I give up? My computer or my TV? Well, it won't happen for a while yet."

But it's happening. I just installed a little contraption which picks up the signal from my wireless router (or at least it's supposed to - there are some kinks to work out) and plays content from the internet through the TV/surround sound/home entertainment system.

It doesn't stop there. It's now common to carry your phone, web browser, global positioning system, office assistant application, games, TV, and tons more stuff on one gadget - that can fit in your pocket.

I've said it before and I'll say it again: we are living in the future. Think about it. The new stuff we have is more advanced than what we were expecting just a short time ago.

I want to call Kinsey Malone and tell her that it won't be long before she can type her reports and keep her billing records, and instantly gather and send information from all over the world, on one little machine that she keeps in the back seat of her car.

Spence and Kate would never believe it.

A BillsWeek Guest Entry: You had me at LOL

Turns out this old Boomer is not alone in adjusting to technology. Apparently changes affect Gen Y as well. This is Joey Halligan's second contribution to BillsWeek and I think there may be more. Stay tuned! - editor

I just received a text message from my father. It read: “Joey, I need tech support. Pls call me when you can. Love, Dad.” My father is 63 and texting.

As recent as three months ago, my cell phone plan included 300 text messages for an additional $5. That included incoming and outgoing texts. However, picture messages were a la carte - a whopping 25 cents each. In the last four years with that plan, I may have gone over in text messages once, and it wasn’t by much. Then I got swept in by the overwhelming text craze. Now my phone buzzes constantly throughout the day. Fortunately, I’ve switched to an unlimited text and data plan since then.

I never considered myself someone who couldn’t live without their phone, until the last few months I suppose. Yet I can’t say that I don’t enjoy the interactions, which often seem more like interruptions. At what point, however, does technology cross the line of keeping us connected into creating an addiction to stay connected? Seriously, do I need to know every time you use the bathroom or stop at a red light? By the way, I hope you’re not texting and driving in Colorado - that’s illegal now.

But when my phone vibrates and my best friend in Florida sends me the latest picture of her 2 year old son, I stop everything. Then another friend will send me a picture of an outfit at the store and asks for my opinion before buying. Then Facebook sends me my nephew’s status update letting me know he’s bored at home with nothing to do. Of course, I’ve only subscribed to five of my closest friends and family members’ Facebook status messages, anything more than that would be text suicide.

So when did personal conversations evolve into hours of text exchanges? I used to be the first to say, "Just call!" You can say everything you’re texting in a fraction of the time! Yet here I am, averaging 1215 outgoing texts in a month. Drop your calculator, I’ll do the math for you: that’s about 40 texts a day, not including the more-than-likely accompanying inbound text. Yes - that brings me to a total of nearly 2500 texts a month. And that’s now. Who knows what I’ll be averaging in 3-6 months. For all this, I blame three things: my curiosity, the curiosity of my closest friends, and a QWERTY keyboard on my phone.

So is texting really all that bad? If it causes a vehicular accident - yes. If it isolates you from all other forms of interactions with people around you - yes. If you answer a text in the middle of a meeting at work - yes. If used wisely, texts can be a quick way to stay connected and exchange quick thoughts. But when you slowly start to forget what your friend’s voice sounds like because you only associate them with the acronyms they send, you may want to snap out of it, and ask them out to enjoy a cup of coffee or a meal.

“Can u pass the salt? lol jk :-)”

Joey Halligan loves technology. Need tech support? You can reach him at JoeyHalligan@me.com.

Social Media and Technology: When Will the Madness Stop?

This week I joined LinkedIn, the networking site for professional people seeking connection with other professionals. I think it’s the 21st century version of the cocktail party where you used to drink martinis and hand out business cards. It’s like Facebook, only you don’t put personal stuff on it like what your cat threw up that morning. Instead, you record your professional news and accomplishments. Rather than collecting “friends,” you cast your network for as many “connections” as possible. The more connections you have, the more successful you must be. Or something.

I only linked in when a respected adviser basically told me I had to. She said that many corporate recruiters won’t consider anyone who is not part of this version of the social networking craze. Don’t get me wrong – I’m not looking for a job right now, but in this age of shifting corporate landscapes, layoffs, reorgs, and whacked-out bosses, one can’t be too prepared.

What troubles me is the growing necessity to either be a part of these social networks or be left out of society all together.

Facebook is fun, but I was shocked to discover a whole world of electronic communicating, even among people I see every day, that I didn’t know about. I’d evidently missed volumes of important electronic conversation. And pictures.

So far, LinkedIn is not fun. I have absolutely no idea what I’m supposed to do. I filled in some of the basics of my profile but other than connecting with people I already know, it’s a pretty sad compilation of dull information.

I’m starting to feel kind of whiney and oppositional about technology. I just don’t want to incorporate any more into my life.

I was the last person in the entire world to get a cell phone, and that was only because my mother insisted that I wouldn’t be safe without it. This is the same woman who let me and my sister drive across Nebraska to school in a car with no heater in the middle of winter, but that’s neither here nor there. That first cell phone didn’t work anywhere except in the 303 area code, and subsequent improved phones and plans didn’t work in such places as the inside of my condo, and anywhere I visited in Nebraska or Wyoming.

I was also the last person (in about 2002) to get cable TV, and at first I only got the old fashioned analog kind. I joked at the time that I was being dragged kicking and screaming into the 1980s.

I got a nice CD player only after everyone else started getting ipods, and I only got my first ipod this year when a coworker upgraded to a fancy new one, giving me his old one. Now I have all these CDs gathering dust where my vinyl LPs and cassette tapes used to be.

I have VHS tapes in my bookcase but nothing to play them on. I have these holes in my walls where my old landline phones used to be. I can’t figure out how to change the password on my wireless router. I only know how to utilize about 10 percent of the buttons on the four remote controls I use for watching television.

I haven’t even mentioned the many other virtual worlds I belong to. Netflix not only allows me to select the movies I want to view, it enables me to see what my friends and family are viewing. I’m not sure I want them to see everything I’m watching. And then there are the dating web sites. ‘Nuf said about that.

Is this all too much, too fast, or am I only getting old? No need to answer. Just let me shuffle through my dotage in peaceful ignorance.

Except I still have to figure out how to link to enough connections so I don’t look like a professional failure.



(If you want to leave a comment and are having trouble, try entering your name and leaving the URL portion blank. If that doesn’t work, I don’t know what to tell you. It’s technology, after all.)