Technology
We have been working here in primitive, primitive conditions. There is no connectivity in the conference rooms. There is wired access in the hotel rooms, as long you don’t have a Linux computer, despite it specifying that Linux computers, along with Windows and Macs, are acceptable. I travelled with my new Linux based Asus eee, which I had just tried out to make sure that it worked. Which it did. Except in this hotel. I spoke to some very nice technicians, and two different ones came to my room but they couldn’t get the hotel system to make itself known to my Asus. The technicians all said it was well known that Linux did’nt work here, they’d reported it to their bosses but nothing had been done. They did get me fixed up so that I could use the wireless connection in the bar, so the bar became my office for the duration of the conference. (And the wireless signal doesn’t limp along as far as the conference rooms.) Furthermore there are only two power points in the bar. I have been making permanent use of one of them so the rest of the hotel’s guests have had to use the one other between them.
And then in some of the conference rooms the air conditioning is loud enough to make it difficult to hear the speakers, and there appear to be no sound enhancement systems anywhere except in the largest rooms, where the speakers have to use hand held microphones. And this is a technology conference.
On the other hand the afternoon coffee break consists of any selection of coffee, tea, herb tea, water of various kinds, energy drinks of various kinds (energy drinks are big here, must be because they’re all so fat), various different cokes, and ice creams and lollipops. All free. Maybe that’s why they’re all fat.
Some things here work on sensors, especially in the loos. In the gents there’s a sensor at the urinal which reacts when you move away, and flushes the urinal. On the other side of the room you don’t turn on the tap over the washbasin, you hold your hands under it and it turns itself on. (The same technology doesn’t seem to work for the soap though; nothing works for the soap.) It’s an interesting game to see if you can get across the room quickly enough to turn the tap on before the urinal flushes.
July 19th, 2009 at 12:56 pm
There is of course much to be said on the positive side of the American way of life. Whilst I agree there are obvious obesity problems in the US, it is a growing problem here too. More to the point there are lots of things the Americans are obviously doing much better than us.
What about the delegates to the American Council of the Blind conference that we shared the hotel with for the first few days? How fantastic were these blind and partially sighted people at coping with the unfamiliar hotel environment? and by return how organised and helpful were all the hotel staff at escorting the delegates when necessary? I find it hard to imagine any similar hotel in the UK taking on such a commitment.
Everywhere I went in Florida the facilities for the disabled were better than I have seen anywhere else in the world. Acres of disabled parking spaces beside the entrance to everything from shopping malls to theme parks to airports; wheelchairs, suitable for every terrain, available to use and no shortage of staff to help with any problems.
I also noticed that, even in the most crowded areas, everywhere was spotlessly clean and in good working condition. The ‘restrooms’, with or without self-flushing loos, were universally pristine.
I agree that the technology setup at the conference was rather limited but all the other hotel facilities were fantastic including large well-appointed rooms at a very reasonable rate, large choice of eateries, fantastic pool, efficient service and so on.
Finally, notwithstanding the tech limitations, the conference itself was super. I particularly enjoyed the keynotes which had an interesting cybernetics thread throughout. What were your thoughts on the keynotes, Rob?
July 23rd, 2009 at 12:18 am
See my final post from Orlando – http://www.open.ac.uk/blogs/CCChat/?p=66