Step back 100 years ago. The year is 1911. It is the dawn of the Age of Flight. The automobile is a novelty for the wealthy. Industrialism has driven many off the farms and into the factories. Social conscience is growing, with clamors for better labor conditions, equality, and human rights. The edges of the known world have been explored and mapped with successful expeditions to the North Pole and South Pole. The Scientific Revolution and the Industrial Age are in full swing in the cities with all of the associated good and evil that accompanies progress.
Yet on the farms and in the countryside, much is unchanged. The sun rises and sets. Babies are born and grandparents die. Seedtime and harvest, summer and winter proceed unchanged. This is the mainstream. Substantially unaffected by the whirling world, thorns and weeds are still subdued by the sweat of man and beast. The tractor has not yet replaced the draft horse. In this world, there is a close partnership between man and beast in the work of the day.
In this world, the veterinarian is seen as a part of the world of new-fangled inventions. Trained both scientifically and practically, applying expert knowledge to the care and service of the beasts that enable the farmers to operate, these men are viewed with a mixture of affection and suspicion. Miracle workers when they defeat a common illness with new antibiotics, buffoons when they overlook a basic part of life on the farm, they must earn their place in the world and win the trust of the farmers who have gotten on just fine without them so far.
Many of us have enjoyed taking a glimpse into the life of the country veterinarian through the wonderful pen of James Herriot, a country vet who worked among the Yorkshire farmers from 1940 to 1995. His books chronicle the impact of science and technology on the farm community, both its blessings and its tragedies.
Step forward 100 years. The year is 2011. It is the dawn of the Information Age. In a few short years, the Internet has changed the way that we communicate. Once relegated to a few universities and laboratories, the computer and, by extension, the information system has become a ubiquitous part of our culture. Concerns about privacy, confidentiality, freedom result in major headlines about the unauthorized disclosure of state secrets (WikiLeaks). Information systems provide us with global awareness, bringing Haiti, Chile, the Gulf of Mexico, Japan, and the rest of the world into our living rooms and raising our appreciation of our common bonds with others around the world. Information systems give us models that let us think globally, while acting locally. Many of us have given up on paper maps and rely upon the Global Positioning System (GPS) to get from one place to another. All of this is fantastically useful!
In this world, the veterinarian is seen as a part of the world of new-fangled inventions. Trained both scientifically and practically, applying expert knowledge to the care and service of the beasts that enable the farmers to operate, these men are viewed with a mixture of affection and suspicion. Miracle workers when they defeat a common illness with new antibiotics, buffoons when they overlook a basic part of life on the farm, they must earn their place in the world and win the trust of the farmers who have gotten on just fine without them so far.
Many of us have enjoyed taking a glimpse into the life of the country veterinarian through the wonderful pen of James Herriot, a country vet who worked among the Yorkshire farmers from 1940 to 1995. His books chronicle the impact of science and technology on the farm community, both its blessings and its tragedies.
Step forward 100 years. The year is 2011. It is the dawn of the Information Age. In a few short years, the Internet has changed the way that we communicate. Once relegated to a few universities and laboratories, the computer and, by extension, the information system has become a ubiquitous part of our culture. Concerns about privacy, confidentiality, freedom result in major headlines about the unauthorized disclosure of state secrets (WikiLeaks). Information systems provide us with global awareness, bringing Haiti, Chile, the Gulf of Mexico, Japan, and the rest of the world into our living rooms and raising our appreciation of our common bonds with others around the world. Information systems give us models that let us think globally, while acting locally. Many of us have given up on paper maps and rely upon the Global Positioning System (GPS) to get from one place to another. All of this is fantastically useful!
In our world, the information systems expert is seen as a part of the world of new-fangled inventions. Trained both scientifically and practically, applying expert knowledge to the utility of the system as a whole and the business functions it supports, the geek, the techie, the guy who knows how this stuff works is viewed with a mixture of affection and suspicion. Miracle workers when they recover a seemingly-lost file after a critical system failure or clean the system of a virus, buffoons when they are ignorant of a basic part of life in the world of business, they must earn their place and win the trust of the business owners and organization who have gotten on just fine without them.
