Questions, questions…
15 Jun 2022
Dear LPG,
Did you know that the word ‘google’ officially became a verb on June 15th 2006? I think that so many more of us turn to google or other corners of the internet for answers these days; either when there is no one else around to ask or when we decide that the answers we get from the people around us are not right.
I often find myself looking to the internet for an answer to the most basic of questions and usually after I have asked one of my friends or family members, and they offer me an answer that I don’t agree with I sometimes end up asking Google or Alexa. Questions are an age old part of communication I suppose. There are those subjective ones which are neither right or wrong such as, ‘Is it cold today?’, but I am talking about those times when you are watching a game show or the news and an item comes up about a celebrity or politician which leaves you wondering just how old that person is or if they were ever a contestant on a particular reality television programme.
I even find that I ask myself the answer if there is no one else to ask and, back in the day, I would find myself using the ‘who wants to be a millionaire’ option of phoning a friend even if the answer is really not important.
Until the 1980s no respectable home would be without their encyclopaedia and, if I thought the original answer I got was wrong, I would ask a couple of other friends and go with the most popular answer. But then came the computer and now we have the internet, and many of us older people are also becoming a bit more intimately acquainted with the electronic personal assistant, so we often don’t even have to turn anything on or wait for it to boot up before we can bring the endless knowledge of the world into our conversations.
During the past year, we have had more time than ever to see those adverts where the person just asks Alexa what the time is or what the weather is going to be like on the day.
This got me thinking about the most common questions asked on the internet and, as usual, she did not disappoint…
I wonder if you agree…
BF, Lewisham.
BF offers us the answers to his question….
