computing power

40 years ago, no housewife could figure out what to do with the Honeywell computers sitting on their kitchen counters.

Today, we don’t have enough computing power to satisfy our ever-increasing demand for streaming media and other new apps.

Over the past few days, I found out that McNamara brought more computing power to the Pentagon back then to “quantify” the war results. Apparently, he would have done the same thing had he stayed at Ford as one of the “whiz kids”.

Maybe due to having more computers at Defense, we ended up having the INTERNET as we know today.

So, let’s say by planning for the war , he ended up promoting peace (besides his later work at the World Bank).

We need the machine to be in service of mankind (energy exchange market, bio and nano tech invention, DNA studies and of course YouTube with some medical app’s and not the other way around (as in Prey).

Talking about machine. I remember distinctly that my colleague at Children’s TV International was driving a Civic back in 1979.  30 years later, I saw mostly Hyundai on route 95 as I was passing through North and South Carolina.

Who would have thought that one day the US would adopt automobiles from Korea (Remember the Greatest Generation?).

Technology, supply chain management, and globalization are doing their jobs well.

Even during the LA riot, the black customers and the Korean liquor store owners hardly came to an agreement causing Rodney King to utter “can we all get along”. Today, I notice the pride of black drivers of Korean-made cars.

Take history further down the road, I would venture to propose that the US should learn from each of the geographies

it got involved in e.g. Korea, Japan, Vietnam, Iraq and now Afghanistan. That way, we can collect all the competitive advantages of other nations (besides being a magnet to attract reverse brain drain as it has done up until the 9/11 immigration policy reversal). The lessons of those nations are now evident : Korea and Japan

illustrated the merits of  thrift, hard work and quality. Vietnam taught us that numbers (as in the case of Mc Namara) and reality don’t jibe. Iraq was about “look before you leap”. And now Afghanistan (on-going), maybe about unlearning the Russian lesson.

I just want to focus on computing power in this blog. But I always apply my observation to the real global situation we are facing. I am glad the White House appointed its new Asian community liaison, actor Kal Penn (something to do with “Penn” as in Sean Penn, also an activist).  Finally, we have a “suspicious looking” face walking in and out of the place of power.

I wish him luck and enough computing power to do his job. Because with enough computing power, you can get a lot done even if your computer is in the kitchen of rich housewives, or the basement of the White House. The age of  machine serving man is here. Take advantage of it, before we end up with the age of man serving machine.

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