"800 Channels, and nothing on..."
It's an old quote, and I'm not entirely sure where it came from but sometimes it seems remarkably on point.
I'm having one of those days where my motivation is seriously lagging. There are dozens — if not hundreds — of things I could be writing about; there are lots and lots of things I could be doing... and yet my mind feels pretty much like a slug swimming through honey.
”Sometimes you just need to take a day off!”
And so, as I tried to find at least some kind of motivation, my mind drifted off towards speculating on "The Future of Work" and this thing called the ”Attention Economy” which a good number of so-called experts believe might become the backbone this thing we call "work" in years or maybe decades ahead.
Suddenly I found myself thinking about a lecture I went to while I was at University in Austin, TX — this was maybe in 1983 or 1984 — where the speaker was this rather idealistic professor and researcher from my native Denmark, and he spoke about a future of humanity in which what people did for ”work” was pretty much what they wanted because there were ”robots” to take care of all the ”dirty work” and the manufacturing.
Of course I was in Business School at the time, so this guy's perspective was not a very popular one! What was particularly not popular was his suggestion that in such a world every person would at least be paid was he called a ”Citizen’s Wage,” representing the amount of money it would take to have the very most basic housing, services and food.
In some ways, what I found most interesting about this lecture was the question and answer session that followed the presentation.
It seemed like most people present kept trying to press the same point, over and over: absent ”having to” work for money to make a living people would just sit in front of the TV and eat donuts and stagnate and do nothing.
But how many of us actually stagnate and choose to do nothing when we're out of work or we don't have to do anything? Based on the people I've asked, it's a pretty small minority.
Sure, I expect that there is a segment of the population this would affect. I expect that segment has a lot in common with a very different segment who are convinced they wouldn't be decent people without having ”fear of God.”
I think the thing that makes me sad about it is this root assumption that absent the threat of destitution or some kind of punishment we're pretty much all lazy assholes!
I don't buy it. And we need look no further than our children. Children sit in their sandboxes and build castles not because they will be rewarded, but because it is fun and stirs their imagination!
We adults aren't so different.
Which circles me back around to the beginning of this post: Even if my bills were paid and I didn't have to worry about food, I'd still be sitting here, casting about for a good idea for something to write about... and I'd have "on" days, and "off" days, just like I do now!
Thanks for reading, and have a great week ahead!
How about YOU? Any thoughts on the future of working? Will we end up in a place where most people are part of the "attention economy?" Or do you think those suppositions are overstated? Comments, feedback and other interaction is invited and welcomed! Because — after all — SOCIAL content is about interacting, right? Leave a comment — share your experiences — be part of the conversation!
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Created at 20220110 00:43 PST
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