posted Tuesday, April 21, 2009 - 04:34 AM (#47540)
Yup, one of Heinlein's character's says much the same thing in To Sail Beyond The Sunset
Anyway, John was saying that the recent tech-support strips (especially the one where you had to bring *your* computer to the source of help): 1, 2, and this one 3 had reminded him of the death of doctor's house calls:
Supposedly the act of doctors making housecalls was killed by the rising popularity of telephones. The system was self-balancing when the patient (or their family) had to put in a little effort - namely, getting out of bed in the middle of the night and traveling to the doctor's residence in whatever weather they expected the doctor to travel in. But as soon as the investment became unbalanced - the doctor was expected to travel in any weather, but the family only had to pick up the phone - the writing was on the wall for house calls.
