Explaining Things Simply — The Lone Sysadmin.

I read this article and started to really think about why it is that I find myself saying over and over again that Hell is Other People. I’ve faced this pressure in my professional life, the clamor to “write simpler” ends up being a 22 caliber bullet that ends up ricocheting around inside my head. The requirements for communication are straightforward, you need a common language with a common syntax, grammar and vocabulary. In my experience with IT the biggest tripping point is that vocabulary trap at the end.

When you are in IT, sometimes you have no choice but to write in a complicated fashion because the core issue is a complicated one. Usually there is fiscal risk, sometimes legal risk, sometimes even personal risk. The messages are often times important and the combined issue of complicated subject matter and limited shared vocabulary really makes communication impossible. This is where I think a lot of my particular cassandras tears originate from. I can’t hope to communicate with others about technology as the spiraling reduction of complexity required to reach a successful instance of real communication ends up making the entire statement devolve into “That is bad. We should not do it. It is not safe.” which ends up being thrown in the bin because your reasons aren’t good enough – those reasons you left on the chopping room floor because they were too complicated and there was no shared vocabulary.

After reading this article, which I can appreciate, I can’t help but get the image of Morlocks and Eloi out of my head. I’ve frequently made reference to these characters in HG Wells’ ‘The Time Machine’ story, but I think the comparison is apt and getting more so as time goes on. There are people who understand, there are people who do not, and it could lead to a fundamental separation between people – maybe even enough to be something that could cause speciation. There is another aspect of this that rankles me deeply, and that is that there is a deficit in vocabulary to start with! What ever happened to self-improvement, learning, or being curious with your average person? Years ago we all could have said that understanding technology wasn’t a necessity, but in the 21st century? Can we really say that still? Everyone needs to understand technology. Even a dog-catcher needs to understand some technology to do his work! So, if there is nothing to do that doesn’t involve some sort of technology then why do people avoid it so? Why do they remain so ignorant and incurious and so unwilling to learn?

I’ve said it many times and it’s likely going to be either a part of my memoirs or my epitaph even, that when someone ceases to learn, they begin to die. If you don’t want to know, perhaps living isn’t for you. Let a machine do it, what’s the difference?