Jeffrey C. Long

A week ago, the family took my daughter to the airport in Boise so she could fly back to our hometown. When we arrived at the airport and got of the car, I heard a tell-tale hissing sound. Unfortunately, I had to get my daughter inside, so I didn’t have any time to deal with it. Sure enough, when we came back out, we had a flat tire. 45 minutes later, my son and I had jacked up a very heavy Suburban and put the spare tire on. But we discovered that it wasn’t the healthiest in the world either, which meant it was time to find a tire store.

While inside the airport, I had been using my laptop on their free wifi. Knowing I needed to find a tire store, I opened my laptop to see if I could still access the internet out in the parking lot. Sure enough I was and before you could say “flat” I had found a Costco tire store and a map.

Once we got to Costco, we went inside to get some hotdogs for the family while I went to the tire department. Lo and behold, it was going to take over an hour to fix the tire. I knew that there was a Les Schwaub nearby, but this time I didn’t have wifi to find the number. Out comes the cell phone which has access to the internet to access the yellow pages. Within moments, I was on the phone with Les Schwaub and learned that they would be able to fix the tire in less time.

Now, I probably would have found a tire store regardless. But I wouldn’t have found Costco without the laptop and wifi. And while Les Schwaub was down the street from Costco, I saved a trip there to find out if they had the time for us. Otherwise, I would have packed up the family, and driven over there, potentially to discover that they were booked up.

The future belongs to the technologists. The people who have and learn how to use the information and communications technologies available to us.

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