May I Bring this to your attention

There are many things these days that want to tell me something; advise me of something they think will be of interest to me.

• Service providers letting me know they’ll be in the area
• E-mails telling me my monthly statement is ready
• E-mail programs telling me I have new e-mail
• My calendar system tells me when I have to go to a meeting
• My Telephone flashes when there is a message waiting
• My washer and drier tell me when they have completed their cycle
• My microwave tells me when food is ready
• My PC tells me all sorts of things
• My car tells me when it needs to be serviced
• My TV tells me when it’s going to record something

And of course there is one of the original home-technologies, the telephone, that tells me when someone is calling. But something has changed with this device; may be in an effort to stay relevant there are now ring tones.

Ring tones are a funny beast. On the one hand they can inform you of who is calling, by assigning different tones to different people. But on the other hand it can be very confusing when mixed in with the cacophony of sounds produced by the other devices in one’s local wilderness.

It is this cacophony of tones, rings, chimes, arpeggios, bells and whistles that is becoming the issue. How is one to remember which is for what? How does one manage “tone clashes?” It can all become very confusing and oddly frustrating. Too much noise, not enough information.