Mobile Offices: Never Go To Work Again

[jmiller]

Meet John Q. Deskjockey. He spends the best part of gorgeous Spring days tethered to a desk in a white-walled box with fluorescent lighting and a picture of his favorite mountain lake hemmed in by a decorative frame on the corner of his work station.

And while the breeze of the air conditioner provides an altogether metallic comfort, John still drifts away to far away places he can’t get to until Saturday. Or worse, August.

If he could only…

John’s daydream expands until finds himself on a pontoon boat, sitting cross legged in Bermuda shorts, fishing pole balancing delicately on the side, a laptop in front of him. While the worm dances beneath the surface of the water charming the small mouths, John is e-mailing a spreadsheet and chatting with his boss on his Bluetooth headset and printing a photo lab quality picture of the girls he just past sunning themselves on the beach.

Ah, the world of wireless technology. If it could only…

But it can. Yes, I do think it could.

The 21st century may prove to be a quality endeavor—a borderless, networked, boundary blurring, work and leisure fusing juggernaut of hands free cyber bike riding. And really, if you could, you should.

With the advent of certain technologies the fantasy I’ve described will step fearlessly from the ether into the Ethernet.

Take, for example, one of the latest tech world zeitgeists, WiMax, the son of WiFi, which, once all proper transmitters are in place, will allow broadband Internet in the most remote places.

Place WiMax in bed with ever expanding cellular networks, and hands free Bluetooth technology and your mobile office is on its way.

A couple of backup battery packs later, your laptop (and this is assuming we one day won’t have batteries that have longer charges) can provide a fully unplugged workday.

But wait, there’s more. Prop up a nifty little Lexmark P315, complete with a nifty little handle for toting, atop your beer cooler, and jump drive your photos to print on the fly.

Or pick up a half-pound Fujifilm MP-70 portable printer and shoot, infrared style, from your camera phone.

Feeling a little froggier? Pick up a new smartphone from Nokia with a 4 gigabyte hard drive, download Skype to cut out your roaming charges, and have a conference call while repelling head first down Ayer’s Rock.

Man, the possibilities are endless. Give John Q. Deskjockey a little time and a little rope, and you’ll not see him hang himself in office wires again.