Getting To Know The Committee for 2021/22

At the November 2021 annual general meeting of Melbourne PC User Group the committee of management was up for reelection. Due to the fact that only existing committee members nominated for election, the existing committee was returned unopposed. As PC Update editor, I posed them some questions to get to know them better as people, as well as what they see as the most important thing they want to achieve for Melbourne PC User Group in the coming year. I received responses from David Stonier-Gibson, Harry Lewis and Stewart Grunkelee.

David Stonier-Gibson

If you could invite any influential person from the technology industry to dinner, who would it be and why?

Elon Musk. He has achieved more than anyone else in the tech space.

If you were sent away to a remote desert island and could only take one piece of technology with you, what would it be and why?

A Kindle loaded up with books and a solar charger.

What’s the more significant invention – USB or WiFi?

WiFi. It can do most of what USB can.

What is your favourite book?

Time enough for Love (Robert Heinlein). Challenges all our assumptions about just about everything.

What is your favourite TV show or movie?

I dream of Jeanie.

If you could change just one thing about MelbPC this committee term, what would it be?

Make Moorabbin and what we offer into a new member magnet.

Harry Lewis

If you could invite any influential person from the technology industry to dinner, who would it be and why?

Douglas Engelbart.  Any of the pioneers who imagined what is now the most familiar interface to computing devices.  How did they conjure up something so different from what was around before and at the time?

If you were sent away to a remote desert island and could only take one piece of technology with you, what would it be and why?

A box of matches.  (Once I got the fire started I should be able to keep it going, but I never had much luck rubbing two sticks together.)

What’s the more significant invention – USB or WiFi?

A loaded question! two different generations of connectivity and standards.  USB because it got there first.

What is your favourite book?

Whatever I happen to be reading at the time, if I have the time.  ‘Stalin’s Wine Cellar’ by John Baker and Nick Place, a fascinating insight into the strange world of expensive and historic wine collections.

What is your favourite TV show or movie?

Hard Quiz

If you could change just one thing about MelbPC this committee term, what would it be?

Recruiting more volunteers to the iHelp team.

Stewart Gruneklee

If you could invite any influential person from the technology industry to dinner, who would it be and why?

Rob McGinnis, the founder of Prometheus Fuels. His company is an American energy ‘startup’ developing tools to filter atmospheric CO2 using water, electricity, and nanotube membranes to produce commercially viable fuels. If this enterprise is economically successful, it will greatly assist in replacing the current usage of fossil fuels and dramatically change the way in which the world ‘s nations approach the climate change challenge. He would be an interesting guest who could explain the details of how his process works.

If you were sent away to a remote desert island and could only take one piece of technology with you, what would it be and why?

A membrane pump style water purifier. Without clean water one cannot survive for long on a desert island.

What’s the more significant invention – USB or WiFi?

WiFi. This invention frees us from cables, clutter and mostly, just works magnificently.

What is your favourite book?

The Day of the Triffids by John Wyndham. I first read this book in my teens and it has all the ingredients of a classic Sci-Fi novel. It is easy to read, engaging, exciting, imaginative and thoroughly plausible.

What is your favourite TV show or movie?

Walt Disney’s Pinocchio (movie). A moral tale well told.

If you could change just one thing about MelbPC this committee term, what would it be?

Promote and engage in computer literacy training for the general public using Melb PC volunteer members as mentors. The Good Things Foundation oversees the disbursement of Federal Government grants to organisations that engage in the Be Connected program. Melb PC is a Be Connected Network member and as soon as all Covid restrictions are lifted and we can gain unfettered access to the Moorabbin building in 2022, I plan to commence one day per week open to the public (and members) to attend and learn how to use their smart phones, computers and other devices.