COVID-19 Paradigm Shift: An Oxymoron Comes to Life

Hmmm, can I afford to be a skeptic?

My brain hurts. But no
need to worry. I am not having a brain aneurysm. Not in the literal sense at
least, although the case could be made that a virtual aneurysm is occurring.

My brain hurts because
it is working overtime trying to reprogram itself to keep pace with the new
logic and language of digital technology. If you will pardon the pun, it does
not compute and causes my brain to spin its wheels.

Most recently I have
been grappling with the new concept of virtual trade shows and virtual exhibits.
They are product of COVID-19 protocols which puts limits on gatherings of
people. Conference and trade show organizers are frantically reconfiguring
their events into virtual formats to survive.

My 62 year old, Baby
Boomer brain is having difficulty wrapping itself around the concept. The raison
d’etre of trade shows has always been face-to-face contact. Now I have to come
to terms with the idea of virtual face-to-face contact which is the very
definition of an oxymoron.

Will they work? I am
pessimistic, but for the sake of my job I have to consider the possibility
which means accepting the twist in the language associated with it. My brain is
disgruntled and holding out against the transition.

It occurs to me that
this has happened before in the history of mankind. Let’s start a few hundred
years ago with the Industrial Revolution. Imagine a skeptic’s first encounter
with a manufacturing machine.

“It runs by itself? How
does you start it?”

“You just push this
button.”

“Button? This thing on my
shirt is a button.”

“This is a new kind of
button that you push.”

“It’s just silly. You’re
wasting your time. It will never catch on.”

Jump forward a couple of
hundred years when the Information Age arrives. Imagine a skeptic’s first
encounter with a computer.

“It’s a thinking machine?
How does it work?”

“You just click this
button.”

“You push a button. Not click.”

“This is a new kind of
button that you click.”

“It’s just silly. You’re
wasting your time. It will never catch on.”

Those leaps forward, and
the changes forced on us by COVID-19 protocols, are what is known as a paradigm shift – a fundamental shift in
approach or underlying assumptions. My brain is not taking kindly to the shift.
In fact, it is staging a revolt. Drawing a line in the metaphorical sand, while
being dragged kicking and screaming in the Trade Show 2.0 world.

A virtual exhibit? It’s
just silly. You’re wasting my time. It will never catch on…

~ Now
Available Online from Amazon, Chapters Indigo or Barnes & Noble: Hunting
Muskie, Rites of Passage – Stories by Michael Robert Dyet

~ Michael Robert Dyet is also
the author of Until the Deep Water Stills – An Internet-enhanced Novel which
was a double winner in the Reader Views Literary Awards 2009. Visit Michael’s
website at www.mdyetmetaphor.com .

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