Before Google.....
While at a workshop yesterday I saw an interesting statistic. The number of searches that were performed on Google in single day was estimated at 3 billion in Feb 2010, and then the question was asked what did we do before Google? Now while some of you may be thinking, "What! There was a time when Google did not exist?", well I have some news for you, yes there was a time when Google did not exist, in fact there was a time when the internet, as we know it did not exist.
Remember the time when we had to do research using encyclopaedias? What I remember most was the time the encyclopaedia salesman came to try and sell a set of encyclopaedias to my family. In his grey suit, white shirt and dark tie wielding a set of beautifully bound Encyclopaedia Britannica, all 30+ volumes and the students companion World Books. He proceeded to explain what an encyclopaedia is, the quality of the pages and the binding. And then to prove how useful they are he asked me a question.
Now this is where the catch is, the reason he asked me the question, something I only figured out in recent times, was firstly it was a question that my parents could not answer or were too embarrassed to answer, for fear of being wrong, and secondly to demonstrate how "easily" it is to glean the information from the encyclopaedia. And then viola he picked up one of the volumes and flipped open the book to the exact spot where the question was answered, a feat I must admit I had never ever been able to duplicate even now.
My parents obviously saw this as a way out to deal with all those questions child could potentially throw at them, whether embarrassing or not, by referring them to the encyclopaedia. And more often then not, at this point the salesman would score a sale, as he assumed he did when my dad allowed him to leave the set behind.
Now considering that the price tag for these books of knowledge was significant and would result in taking up the payment plan over a number of years, my dad took a route, which completely surprised the salesman and in fact me as well. My dad went out and sourced two sets of encyclopaedias for less than a tenth of the price of the Encyclopaedia Britannica.
The reason for the encyclopaedias being cheaper became quite obvious when I attempted to use them for a school project. Whereas there were literally reams of information in the more expensive set, there was more often than not just a paragraph or two in the cheaper set that I had access too.
The upside is I had to start my creative writing career quite early in life :-)
Remember the time when we had to do research using encyclopaedias? What I remember most was the time the encyclopaedia salesman came to try and sell a set of encyclopaedias to my family. In his grey suit, white shirt and dark tie wielding a set of beautifully bound Encyclopaedia Britannica, all 30+ volumes and the students companion World Books. He proceeded to explain what an encyclopaedia is, the quality of the pages and the binding. And then to prove how useful they are he asked me a question.
Now this is where the catch is, the reason he asked me the question, something I only figured out in recent times, was firstly it was a question that my parents could not answer or were too embarrassed to answer, for fear of being wrong, and secondly to demonstrate how "easily" it is to glean the information from the encyclopaedia. And then viola he picked up one of the volumes and flipped open the book to the exact spot where the question was answered, a feat I must admit I had never ever been able to duplicate even now.
My parents obviously saw this as a way out to deal with all those questions child could potentially throw at them, whether embarrassing or not, by referring them to the encyclopaedia. And more often then not, at this point the salesman would score a sale, as he assumed he did when my dad allowed him to leave the set behind.
Now considering that the price tag for these books of knowledge was significant and would result in taking up the payment plan over a number of years, my dad took a route, which completely surprised the salesman and in fact me as well. My dad went out and sourced two sets of encyclopaedias for less than a tenth of the price of the Encyclopaedia Britannica.
The reason for the encyclopaedias being cheaper became quite obvious when I attempted to use them for a school project. Whereas there were literally reams of information in the more expensive set, there was more often than not just a paragraph or two in the cheaper set that I had access too.
The upside is I had to start my creative writing career quite early in life :-)
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