…but they wouldn’t give it to me!
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Guernica:
You do realise, I hope, that this isn’t actually a picture of the bombing of Guernica in 1937? Nevertheless it has the ability to speak to us about that event.
Whoever created the jpg for that fridge is certainly no Picasso, but as a piece of art (performance art?) it still speaks to our current condition.
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I’d call that a fairly low bar, to be honest. Yet it’s still one that a lot of manufacturers fail to surmount.
Folks, as @codinghorror would likely implore you to do, use the flag feature. Flag the top post and ask for a moderator’s attention. I’ve used this in the past when corrections were needed for posts either because of a change to a developing story or more mundane things like typos successfully.
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I agree, yet I also believe facts are important. So, if Cory wants to provide a picture that is merely a metaphor and not actually a true example he needs to say that’s what it is. There is no such warning in the post. Note the headline “Watercooler won’t dispense until it finishes updating windows” is a (false) statement of fact, not a indication of a metaphor.
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Has that ever worked on a Cory post?
That’s not so bad. Just wait until you see it when you’re on the highway. (Take the train on Patch Tuesdays.)
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Can’t say I have on a Cory post. I think calling this out as a hoax is a reasonable thing to do though.
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In that case, I believe 2018 will be summarized by a self-driving car getting a blue screen while in the middle of a freeway.
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And she wouldn’t give it to you?
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I agree with you about the machine thing. Why the heck does a refrigerator need a digital display, or wifi? What tiny trace amount of good can that do me, compared with the risks involved?
Not sure about US water quality in 1917, though. They used a LOT of lead pipes and lead solder in supply lines back then, and the federal government only started regulating drinking water quality 3 years before that. On the other hand, more than half of Americans probably drank well water back then anyway.
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My new computer holds over 3 tetra-gallons. I’m unlikely to get thirsty for a bit.
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Yeah, I was just heartened to see an IoT device updating itself.
Too bad it’s fake and this fridge will probably soon join the ranks of shitty hardware being used against us.
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This is real. In fact, last week I was sitting in my train when the announcement came that they couldn’t leave Penn Station because it was downloading software. We had to move to another train to leave.
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Fair enough, but the point the image makes stands. I’ve seen electronic billboards displaying what looked like a specialised version of Windows 98 (with some sort of error message dialogue displayed), and last weekend I spent some time in a slow-moving checkout line playing with a wall-mounted price code scanner that was showing a Windows for Widgets (or whatever it’s called) desktop instead of the price scanning app.
I also noticed the subway news screens run Debian Linux when one of them kept rebooting itself.
Now, all of those things must needs be electronic, unlike a water cooler. But “Operating systems – they’re everywhere” wouldn’t be a wholly inaccurate slogan for 2017.
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I know it’s possible to customize the menu images on the Keurig in my office. I wouldn’t dare, because my bosses hate fun.
Yeah, I don’t think there’s a Windows Update for Embedded. Or, at least there wasn’t the last time I was on that team.
Why does it need any electronics at all? Surely a couple of relays would do, or if extra sophistication is needed then something like an old electromechanical washing machine controller would be massive overkill and would run for decades without any maintenance.
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Embedded windows might be different.
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If you want to look like the people on the screen, think twice before opening the fridge.
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