BRAIN MACHINES.

Waipawa Mail, Volume XXXVII, Issue 8178, 3 May 1919, Page 1 (Supplement)

BRAIN MACHINES.

By HERBERT C. RIDOUT. While human genius will always be the decisive factor in the successful conduct of bu si lie sis the growing adoption of appliances that lessen the falLbilty c-i the c’eiical worker, eliminate mistakes, or improve the working conditions suggests that the business office of the near future will be a palace staffed with men and women trained 1o a high point of efficiency and equipped with -brjiin machines to relieve them of tlie drudgery part of their work. A visit to a modern business office bud out on these principles is like a trip to soino Wellsian realm of fantasy. We step into the doorway and the pressure of our feet causes the doors to swing open. Tlie lift faces us; we press, say, a button marked “2” and fly upwards, and as the elevator comes to a standsti'l on the second 'landing, the doors open and then close -bellind us. We pass through an open, well-light-ed apartment. At some desks sit stenographers. with head-pieces and eartubes, typing as hard as they can go. At other desks sit clerks tapping away at. adding machines; others still are typing entries into large loose-leaf ledgers. Dull steel filing cabinets line the wa'ls: the office furniture is a light oak, tlie walls a restful green, with white partitions to reflect the light from diffusing electric bowls overhead. The departmental heads sit in comfortable padded chairs before desks with a pJa-te-glass surface. Plate-glass can be wiped clean daily . Woven-wire let-ter-travs take the place of the o',i wicker baskets that harboured dust. Bos;cle each man’s desk stands a dictaphone. Instead of a stenographer being called in. letters aro dictated on to this commercial phonograph and the letters repeated into t-lie ears of the stenographer.

In the counting house is a little do-' vice for printing the amount's on cheques. This prevents mistakes or forgery. In tho postal room are brainmachines that will stamp envelopes, moisten and seal them, and address them at the rate of .about a thousand* - an hour. * On the walls hang charts and din'rams that tell „+ « ~i--

grams that tel 1 at a glance the existcondition of stock, the daily production, and its comparison with otlier periods. The telephone mouthpiece is fitted with a little appliance that enables the instrument to bo used when the room is full of people without the spoken words being overheard.

Tliis is no fancy picture or dream. In hundreds of British offices to-dav these brain-machines and devices are in use. C onservative folk sometimes denounce them as tending to kill initiative, but their users declare that not only do they simplify business 'hut they n'so result in a higher standard of intelligence m clerical staffs.

But. most important rf oil. they arc aii indication of the business of the fi*,™ will wfentifical. Iv arir)!ied principles +W. pnp<rarai<v orisina'aty and ideas, while leaving little to change or speculation.