Keeping Up With The Times Seems Impossible Now That I'm In The Real World

I was sitting in my window office... err... cubicle this morning and Microsoft Outlook (ewww) informed me that the book I had ordered for the research department at work was in! Grown Up Digital, the latest book from Dan Tapscott is a followup to one of my favourite books ever, Growing Up Digital: The Rise of The Net Generation. OK, enough plugs... the point is, Dan Tapscott is one of the few people in the Baby Boom generation who recognize the massive wave of change that my generation has been unleashing (and will continue to unleash) on the world... and he predicted it all before YouTube, Facebook, or Twitter even existed!

So, as I'm beginning to read this book, waiting for my corporate issue computer to chug through some mandatory upgrade which I know for a fact won't make it faster, I can't help but wonder what I'm missing out on in the digital world. I'm reading this book and it's talking about N-Geners who have multiple RSS feeds, speak to their whole family around the world on Skype, and read about 50 blogs per week. I've used an RSS feed, I'll read a blog here or there, but I've never talked to anyone on Skype (especially not family... I'll pass). Am I somehow falling behind in technology already? I've only been out of school for about a year, how can this happen?

I blame closed mindedness. I love my job, and I love my company, but honestly, it pains me to use my work computer. When I log onto Facebook, it tells me that support for my browser is being phased out and I need to upgrade... can I upgrade? Of course not! When I want to look up where I'm going FOR A WORK TRIP on Google maps... does my computer lock up? Of course it does! Even more painful, when I first started I had the option of downloading firefox (albeit an outdated version)... that ended about 2 days after I installed it and my computer became useless.

Don't get me wrong, I completely understand why we have the systems we do. If everyone has the same computer running the same software, blah blah blah then everything runs smoother. Here's the problem... companies who are moving forward with technology have realized that the future of the workplace is web based. Google Docs, YouTube, Facebook, Twitter, Google Wave..... there are all the tools of the future and you can run them off of any computer, even the crappy one at your local library.

POINT: I'm not here to complain about my technology at work... I'm here to make a point using my situation as an example that companies need to be thinking about web based options for their systems if they plan on impressing the workers of the Net Generation. If I want to blow the coin and get myself a mac to use at my cube, why the heck not!? Sure, there's always going to be some type of mandatory security software that needs to be installed, but technology openness is what I demand!

PS: A 17 inch screen is NOT suitable as a second monitor. 26 inch or go home IMO.