There must some truth to the converse of the phrase the devil is the details because on almost daily basis I encounter a fustrating situation resulting from a lack of understanding the necessary details.
Whether it is drudging through an unreadable ALL CAPS E-MAIL (TO SIGNIFY IMPORTANCE), or following drivers that forget to turn off turn signals, I can't help but to think there must be some good in the details.
We are becoming a society with much greater accessibility to tools. There almost nothing that you can think of that isn't available on E-Bay. Yet ownership by itself doesn't imply proficiency.
Regardless how you slice it, proficiency is necessary. A lack of proficiency is undesirable whether it takes the form of creating a PowerPoint presentation; or building a treehouse.
A musician friend of mine recently move to the US from Uruguay. After settling in he starting jamming with local musicians he found through Craiglist. After a few jam sessions he became a little perplexed because he'd go over to houses with state of the art music studios but whose owners could barely anything beyond the basic chords of a Santana riff -- that they played over and over.
My friend said (mostly because of monetary restraints) the only people who would own such equipment in Uruguay are professional musicians who knew how to use the tools and who could earn a living with them. He could not understand why someone would spend so much money on equiptment they were incapable of properly using.
Why would anyone spend thousands on ProTools if the only things they are proficient at can be done with software costing far less?
I really didn't have an answer for him. Maybe it's the idea that ownership will makes us better, or inspire us. Either way some more attention to the details would probably do somebody some good.
edited: 21JUN2012
