As a digital media guru / evangelist or whatever I may be tagged as, I immerse myself in the benefits, convenience, lifestyle and immediacy that digital media can bring. The ease that I can access information, change what I want to watch, listen to or interact with in the touch of a button. So I am always interested in that age old tradition of "people watching" and observing their behaviours and what they do.
This little muse of "non-digital man (or NDM as we will refer to him from now on) " started when I noticed, as all commuters do, a regular pattern on my daily journey into work... so without further a-do lets sit back from a far and observe our subject in his natural habitat as he begins his daily commute...
It's 7.00am - NDM arrives at the car park and struggles out his car door not with one, but two bags ready for his daily work life. My immediate reaction is that he is either off to play sports after work, or perhaps a lunch time gym session? Either way NDM is uncomfortable and laden down with bags that are full of stuff! In comparison I arrive with no bags and have my muti-media wi-fi device and 2 USB keys - all of which contain all the work that I need contained in two small and compact keys. I also have the data that is on my keys stored within a virtual cloud - should I lose my keys or become corrupt - I can still access all my data from anywhere...
We move towards the station entrance and our NDM now struggles as he needs to purchase a ticket. The queue is long and there are other "suits" in the line that believe that they should be first and will huff and puff with their copy of The Times or FT tucked neatly into the top of their briefcase. Our NDM joins the queue and looks at his watch as the train is due in 10mins and the queue is not moving fast. The clock is ticking and his blood pressure is rising... Again in contrast the night before I logged on and renewed / topped up my Oyster to allow me speedy and hassle free access to the platform - on the way through I pick up a free copy of Metro.
With only minutes left I see NDM rush through the barrier and grapple a copy of Metro and runs up and over the bridge to get to the platform and in the tradition of the consummate commuter tries to get to his favoured position on the platform where he knows "his" seat is waiting for him! He doesn't. He is now hot and sweaty, annoyed that he cant have "his" seat and gives the lady that has now encroached on his personal space a stare - then trudges through the carriages trying to squeeze through with his heavy load of two bags. I follow him through and we find a selection of seats where he collapses in a sweaty heap, relived to down his bags.
We both scan the Metro - NDM looking at the "latest" news - for me I have already seen the breaking news and latest headlines from my device - and as such the Metro news is old news and enjoy reading the articles and doing the odd sudoku.
Now as we are into our journey - NDM opens his rucksack. The other bag contains his laptop and so much paper that I assume that he must have been responsible for some kind of de-forestation in South America. To carry that amount of paper is almost obscene - and he feels it with the sheer weight of his bag. The rucksack - alas did not contain any sports clothing or trainers - but instead contains his "journey material"!
Inside is a hardback book, a paperback book, a set of chunky headphones, an A4 notepad, more papers and a big shiny silver thing. The big shiny silver thing is a portable DVD player - that seems to be almost as thick as a regular DVD player. The sequence goes something like this...
- takes out DVD player
- Drops paperback book that squeezes out along with DVD player
- Stuffs book back into bag
- finds top half of chunky headphones
- can't find other end of head phones - previous book stuffing has ensured that plug end has now molded itself to other items in the bag
- struggles and eventually produces plug end of headphones and about 10 sheets of A4 go flying...
- gathers A4 paper - hides as if MI5 secrets (is that not in folders or laptops?)
- looks at rest of carriage as if our fault
- zips up bag
- untangles knotted headphone cable
- plugs into dvd player
- unzips bag again and begins new rummage
- 2 mins has passed and the rucksack is now on his lap, on top of his DVD player - much tutting and huffing ensues
- locates Love Film envelope (carriage feel like standing up and applauding this miraculous find)
- opens envelope to reveal Independence Day DVD
- DVD looks quite scuffed - but clicked into place and envelope stuffed back into bag
- rucksack zipped up again
At last a sense of calm washes over NDM as he presses play and starts to watch the opening credits of his long awaited and highly anticipated viewing moment. Meanwhile as this is going on I selected movies from my device - has a choice of 3 that I had downloaded a few days earlier and was watching in crystal clear picture and sound as all this was going on!
Hold on though, we trundle through Wimbledon, which has a rather bumpy through fare and the screen sticks and shudders as the internal laser is jolted around and NDM's enjoyment is short lived. He looks to the roof of the carriage as if perhaps the picture is now being shown up there, or perhaps if he looks up there by the time he looks back it will all be over like a bad dream. Alas no - his journey and timing means that the Clapham Junction station is his queue to start the shutting down of this little operation - and repacking of all the materials that he has just taken so long to get out, set up, and play! He was lucky if he watched 10mins of his movie - and now it was time to begin his descent into Waterloo.
By the time that we reach the waiting area before we get to Waterloo - I notice that another pair of tangles headphones have arrived - much smaller and more compact and more convenient - but now a new device immerges from his bag. This time it looks like a Samsung MP3 player. He starts to panic as he needs to get his MP3 player working and on the track he wants to hear, realises that he has not zipped his rucksack up correctly and the zip has jammed. Blood pressure rising again - as he knows that if he doesn't get down onto the underground in time he will not get his favourite spot on the platform there, and he has already missed his first seat...
While I stand up, push a button on my device that stops the movie, select a playlist of my favourite tracks, press play, and slips into my inside pocket of my jacket. As I wonder off to work feeling light and agile I notice up ahead that the underground has been closed due to platform over crowding. I turn round and see our NDM running towards the underground - oblivious that his world is about to take another turn in the stress factory - I can't help but feel a little sorry for him, but then it hit me!
My role as I said at the start is to evangelise the benefits, convenience, lifestyle and immediacy that digital media can bring - I can't control trains or delays, but I can help in easing the burden and lightening the load using technology and digital media to streamline what you need into byte size chunks. Giving you more time to do the stuff that really matters - LIFE!
Final note to our intrepid NDM: It's the 21st Century - digitise and enjoy your life!