The New Machine
“I was fascinated by the computer, it was science, and so I took a course in it, and failed. I would always remember, for it was the only course I ever failed in my life … but a journalist cannot do without computers.”
The striking thing about them in the valleys where they sprout in California and Massachusetts in the United States like lettuce in seasons is that they hate to occupy buildings that are higher than four storeys. They don’t like the inner city which, perhaps, suggests to them the old ways with which they are unfamiliar. For them, the lower the building and the newer the environment, the better. They like to the near their type and stay away from the generality of mankind. You have to speak their tongue to understand them. Their creators are eccentric, young and irreverent. They are made to think and behave like their creators. They are changing the world and they are daring manking to ignore them. You ignore them at your own peril. They are computers. What will mankind to without them? Computers and I have a relationship that will certainly endure the rest of my life. Once they touch you, computer, you stay touched. Here is the story of how science and I parted ways, and then came back together again whereof I landed on the laps of a computer in Brokklyn, New York. First, the parting.
In secondary schools, Nigerian kids are not told they are forced to offer art and science course. At least, we were not told in those days at Oduduwa College, Ile-Ife. If they had explained to us that the reason we were required to pass English and Mathematics, and a course here nd there in both arts and science, was to give us a broad beginning in something called liberal education, we would have perhaps worked harder. All we were told that we should pass Mathematics and English ans six other subjects which couldn’t without taking course in the arts and the sciences. I wanted to be a chemical engineer and, if not that, then a shipwright, a ship builder. That was my attitude until my English teacher, a fellow named Mr. Sutton, told me that he thought that I would make a better career in an English-related endeavour, hence what I am today, a journalist.
I was lucky way back in 1964 to have made a connection between English and journalism, and not for the confusion about the choice of a creer which carried over into some people’s middle age. It was shortly after Sutton told me to love English that my colleagues and I at Oduduwa College decided to publish a fortnightly magazine called The Torch, for the school. Whatever is the pursuit of one’s choice, the American university education set-up requires every student to meet certain conditions. In addition to every student passing certain course in English, he is also required to take course in the sciences, even if he only wants to get a degree in the arts. And a science student, be he a medical candidate or an engineering aspirant, is also required to pass a number of courses in the arts. That’s how I returned to science and I landed in a computer programming course at the Brooklyn College of the City University of New York. As a candidate for a degree in English, I was required to take a number of credits in the sciences. I was fascinated by the computer, it was science, and so I took a course in it, and failed. I would always remember, for it was the only course I ever failed in my life. I still love computers. Nobody can go through life without them, or life will not be worth living. That the computer has not made the impression that it should in Nigeria best speaks of Nigeria as a developing country.
To fit into the fast lane of progress, every kid should grow up with the computer. In the future that has already started, computer is the trendsetter. Even a journalist, in the brand new world, cannot do without computers. Word processor and typewriters with memories have killed the once irreplaceable manual typewriter. At Newswatch, we obtained some photo-composing equipment made by Compugraphy of the US. The brand we ordered was called the 7500. They sent us the Editwriter 750011. When they arrived in our offices, we jumped for joy. They were installed, but they refused to work. Why? Nobody could say. After some hours of trying and trying, the technicians who installed the machines, Nigerian technicians, said the manufacturers had sent the wrong memories for the computer based equipment. The wrong brains, they said, had put in wrong bodies. What to do? I took off for Massachusetts to return the “wrong” brains for the “right” brains. When I got there, a small town called Willington outside Boston populated by computer companies, another silicon valley, I was put in a room for three hours to talk to the whizz kids – and they are indeed kids – to learn the secrets of the brain which I wanted to return.
They explained carefully that I had the correct brains. The ones I was asked to replace them with, they explained, were old and limited brains. They went on to say that the machines that we bought were better than the 7500s which the Nigerian technicians were familiar with, and were not as versatile as the 7500 11s we had purchased. If we took the ROM brains, being the ones I was asked to collect, we would be cheating ourselves. The RAM brains, which came with our machines, were more up-to-date. Even those, they carefully explained were already bein phased out. Then they painstakingly taught me how to programme the RAM brains. And then I returned home with the RAM brains and explained the programming to our technicians. We set about work, and hurrah! The machines flashed. And finally I passed my programming course, establishing a new relationship with the computer. But the experience depressed me. Why are we always stuck with antiquated technology? Even the 7500 11s are being phased out. The new 8400 series are five years old, yet no one in Nigeria can maintain them, hence they are not marketed there. When are we starting our computer journey? That is the question.
©Newswatch, May 6, 1985
(Pp.261-263)
