Well, you know what I mean

They say that an engineer will spend 100 hours trying to figure out a technological way to save an hour. I think that there are lots of "time-saving-devices" out there that take more of your time than when you didn't have them. They say that people spend inordinate amounts of time reading and responding to e-mails they never would have received had they not had email - where have you saved time? Sure there are plenty of justifications, but hey, when you do the math...

But I don't know how people live(d) without e-mail. I can ask the fellas at work if they want to go to lunch without having to speak to them - despite that they are all within cooee of my desk. Now there is an advantage. Anyway, who said that reading and replying to e-mails is not productive? How else am I supposed to get my daily dose of Dilbert, or notification that a Ford Focus, number plate XXXXX has left its lights on in car-park 1-D? By fax? Don't be ridiculous.

All that aside, I have to admit that I really love gadgets. I can't walk past an electronic doo-dad without sizing it up and determining whether or not it is worth drooling over. And if it does warrant further attention, I will then spend time determining what justifications there are for having such a thing. It will save me time. I will be more organised. It is faster. It is smaller. It is bluer, or greener or it just looks really cool and I want it.

Alas, the most gadgety thing I have is my mobile phone. PDAs, iPods and tooth-implanted-ID-systems do not grace the shelves of my tech-toy-chest, yet.

I used to have a PDA. It was a Palm Pilot m-100, one of the really low-end ones.

I liked it because I could do stuff on it. Like, write e-mails on the run and sync my calendar and teach the thing to recognise my handwriting. It broke under the stress of all those fantastic plug-ins and third-party programs I downloaded onto it. I was once in the supermarket when I bumped into a friend. I wanted to show off my cool toy so I asked him for his email address so I could whip out the PDA while he was there and have him look over my shoulder and go, "Cool". Well, the blasted thing crashed, so I said, "Oh, it sometimes does that". I did a soft-reboot and the stubborn thing just crashed again. Great. I really showed him.

I call that the "Well, you know what I mean" factor. - which is the whole point of this blog. The "Well, you know what I mean" factor comes in to play when you want to show someone something and it doesn't work. Your can then only save yourself by saying, "Well, you know what I mean".

I'll give you another, more exciting, example. Let's say you are showcasing an amazing new product in front of hundreds of people. The press is there, your family is there and, more importantly, your boss is there. You have tested everything before. The computer works, the projector works, the laser pointer works, the mic works. The time has arrived and you stand up on the stage in front of all those people, the spotlight shining down on you. You make your grand opening remarks. The crowd is waiting with baited breath. Click! Your PowerPoint presentation fires up! Click! You jump from slide to slide! Click! Click! Click! Now, for the product itself. And you get the sinking feeling. You tested the product, right? You made sure the batteries were charged, right? Click! Um. Click! Ehr...Click! Click! Click! Click! Click! "Ladies and Gentlemen. There seems to be some technical hitch with the SPX2001 right now. Ahhh. Why don't we take another look at slide 6, shall we. Here you see a picture of the SPX2001 in action. It's really cool, right? Well, you know what I mean".

See this November 2004 article in Business Week for a great example (you may have to click on the "skip this ad" link on the top right of the screen) - Microsoft's MSN Search Beta Blunder. The tag line: Oops -- Microsoft's debut of the first public version of its $100 million search engine didn't quite go according to plan

Oops, indeed.

I once built a database system for our group. I showed it to the boss before it went live, "And it has this really cool feature where you can do XYZ. Look...I don't get it. It worked before. Well, you know what I mean".

Or when someone was showing me this really great technology at work the other day, but he couldn't get the memory card out of his PDA, "Ehr, you just slide this out and then put it in there and then it works - but I can't get the card out right now. It really works. It's really really cool. Really. Well, you know what I mean".

Have you had a "Well, you know what I mean" moment?