Revenge Of The Nerds: Tech Support
Every computer tech support person in the world is warped. These profoundly damaged individuals are in their jobs purely to get back at the people at school who tormented them, and even those that didn't. The computer nerds suffered, but now the tables have turned.
After spending considerable time in an office observing their behaviour at close range, my theory goes a long way to explaining the tech support person's precious, patronising and supercilious attitude towards the people they're employed to look after.
But you have to cut these mixed-up techno-scholars some slack, for they can hardly be blamed for suffering so cruelly at the hands of other children. Many were largely ostracized from society during their formative years, and have not yet got the hang of functioning outside the cyber world into which they were forced, desperately trying to evade merciless hands grasping at lunch money and underpant elastic.
For an example of how twisted these motherboard monarchs are, witness this garden-variety exchange between an employee, struggling hopelessly with a temperamental computer, and the tech support guy, whose job it is to ensure the company's machines are working properly.
"Hi Derek. Sorry to bother you, but my computer keeps freezing every time I open up a program. Barry in accounts had a look..."
[Tightly] "Barry! You asked Barry? Three weeks at TAFE and he thinks he can rebuild a server with his eyes blindfolded. I'll be right down."
After whiling away 57 useless minutes jabbing ALT+CTRL+DEL, suffering panic attacks about the report that must be presented to the manager and toying with the idea of removing the machine's cover to tinker with the circuitry, the support man arrives.
He wears a Homer Simpson tie and a pissed-off expression, makes a swift comparison between his gigantic workload and this time-waster's apparent lack of it, readjusts his expression to convey exactly what he thinks of this incompetence and begins stabbing complex codes into the keyboard.
"Er ... don't you want to hear what's wrong with it before you start...?"
"The hyperdrive is under-subscribed," interrupts tech support. "Obviously a breach of wallspace protocol and severe stress on the deliminators."
Threatening hieroglyphs flash across the screen as the support man beats savagely on the keys, cutting deeper into the computer's files like a butcher hacking off a haunch. The machine's operator is reminded of Steve Erwin crashing through dense undergrowth in pursuit of a fleeing animal, except this Steve Erwin wears Target Country patterned shirts and cartoon ties.
After five minutes crouched on the floor like a soldier pinned down by heavy gunfire, the computer wizard presses re-start. The computer turns over but a rheumy wheeze comes from deep inside and gears knash.
"It's your machine," says tech man to the employee, just stopping short of flipping him a five-cent piece and tousling his hair. "I never liked this one."
The crestfallen worker suddenly notices the techie is holding a Mr Bean coffee cup and gapes incredulously. But no, this situation requires subtle handling, not ridicule, for technology man considers his work here done and is preparing to scuttle back to his barricaded office to save Princess Leia on his Pentium Quad Phase III. The short-changed employee has seconds to act.
"So you fixed it, then?"
Tech king freezes mid-stride, then spins on a garish running shoe. "Pardon?"
"It's just that I have to finish a report this morning or I'm dead meat."
A number of expressions flicker across Techie's face. Grovelling before him is a soul in the grips of a black panic. Repressed recollections of "throw the hat" and the shrill, bloodthirsty cries of small children float up from his subconscious. He favours the prole with a wintry smile.
"I'm not sure what you mean by 'fixed'." [It was never broken. If it was, you broke it. I was never here.] "But give it a sec to warm up and call me if it happens again. It's probably just your multiflexors."
IT man sets up an intricate voicemail system that would put a bank to shame, the report languishes and the employee is left to prosecute a doomed case in the manager's office.
In a nutshell, the tech support man thinks anybody that cannot defeat him in an epic three-day death match of Quake III is a complete technological dunce unworthy of attention. Those that cannot weave a wry anecdote about the vagaries of programming in DOS are relegated to the "attend to when I'm bored of twisting paperclips into futuristic art" pile. The computer enthusiasts recognise their own, and it's a difficult clique to fake your way into — just as it was hard to be accepted when your mother dressed you in spinal corrective caliper shoes minus the caliper part.
Being a tech support person is a sweet refuge for those whose outlook at age 13 was decidedly bleak. How the tables have turned.
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