In the same week:
- A meeting at Google Campus London – a superb space, a hive of activity, buzzing with energy and ideas, casual, and a wonderful vibe.
- An invitation to a reception at the British Computer Society (BCS): jacket and tie compulsory for all.
Here we are, one-sixth of our way into the 21st century, and the BCS is still insisting on formal dress? Do they also require that only unmarried women be allowed to program these new-fangled machines, too? That social, religious, and intellectual radical, Charles Babbage, would be appalled at such deference to established tradition.
You know that one of the people sitting beside you at Google Campus is the next Zuckerberg or Brin. Maybe it is even you yourself. Not a single person at Google was wearing a tie or a suit, though. I doubt anyone intent on changing the future – or even the present! – is attending events requiring formal dress, but I guess the past is not evenly distributed either.
NOTE: An early review of the Google London Campus is here.
