Sorry, @Alex. The only humor I see in this picture is the folly of our current situation. This picture reminds me that there was a time when innovation and hard work was king. The wood-fired boiler turned the flywheel that distributed energy to each of the machines. Humans were smart enough not to stick their arms between the belts and the pulleys, so there were no gates surrounding them. There are 12-year-old apprentices working to learn a trade and on their way to become master craftsmen. Each employee was dressed in their work clothes and ready to put in an honest 12-hour day.
No Blackberrys, no carpal-tunnel syndrome, no fluorescent lighting, no smoking breaks, no HR training seminars, no PowerPoint, no Farmville, no ergonomic office chairs...
How about the caption, "Smile. Remember that Work used to mean Work."
Wow, William, I expect the occasional "in my day.." comment on this blog, but seriously, nostalgia for the 19th century? Dangerous working conditions and child labor contribute to a satisfying albeit considerably shorter lifespan? :)
Perhaps your caption should have been "The workers at the Acme Buggy Whip factory were stunned to learn that their jobs had been off-shored to Foxconn..."
William L Weaver; So, the 'folly' of our current situation is that 12-year-olds are in school instead of on-the-job ? No OSHA doesn't sound like paradise to me = or do you agree with the mine owners that the 29 miners were 'expendable' or ' disposable' ? How about the caption: Remember, Work used to mean Dis-memberment and Death.
Zippy, speakig of Foxconn, this is probably what it is like there.
You are right, though, there were lots of industrial accidents. A friend of mine lost his father when one of the shafts broke in a setup like this. There wasn't a lot of stress analysis or testing that went into design back then.
On the other hand William's next to last paragraph has some merit.
"And in today's news, the Director of the United States Patent Office has recommended that the Patent Office be closed, stating, every useful invention that is possible has already been invented."
GlennA, I think you are correct. Actually, around the turn of the 20th century, it was Ernst Mach, I think, who was encouraging students not to go into physics. His reasoning was that everything usefull had been discovered. There were just a few details to be worked out. Then Einstein published his paper on black body radiation.
For 3D printing to make the jump from rapid prototyping to manufacturing, engineers will need to find easier ways to move products from their CAD screens to their printers.
Gigabit and PoE are two networking technologies moving ahead in tandem as industrial users power remote Ethernet devices such as IP security cameras at 1,000 Mbps over existing CAT5 cable.
New versions of BASF's Ecovio line are both compostable and designed for either injection molding or thermoforming. These combinations are becoming more common for the single-use bioplastics used in food service and food packaging applications, but are still not widely available.
From Dell / Intel® New Paradigms in Design Work Scott Hamilton, vertical market strategist for Dell Precision workstations, 5/2/2013 5
Early in my career, I worked as a draftsman and remember the days of drawing on vellum with numbered pencils and Mylar with plastic lead. This was a fun experience in the sense that I ...
I've been using workstations for more than 10 years and love finding ways to get more performance from my system. With demanding professional applications that require more power each ...
A lasting memory from my first job as an engineer in an auto assembly plant is standing on hard concrete at six in the morning, vending-machine coffee clutched in hand, listening to ...
For industrial control applications, or even a simple assembly line, that machine can go almost 24/7 without a break. But what happens when the task is a little more complex? That’s where the “smart” machine would come in. The smart machine is one that has some simple (or complex in some cases) processing capability to be able to adapt to changing conditions. Such machines are suited for a host of applications, including automotive, aerospace, defense, medical, computers and electronics, telecommunications, consumer goods, and so on. This radio show will show what’s possible with smart machines, and what tradeoffs need to be made to implement such a solution.
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