Joel on Elevator Technology

Infinitors (the term we call ourselves, those who once worked for InfiniteInfo) would laughingly remember the "hospital building" where we had our offices. It's called the "hospital building" because it can easily be mistaken for one as it's painted all white. While we can joke about the building, we will always scoff at the elevator system they had in place.

What Joel describes as "New Elevator Technology" has been around in the Philippines, in fact, as early as the year 2000 when I joined InfiniteInfo in their then new offices at the Page I building (aka "the hospital") over at Alabang.

It must be great and efficient for a high rise like 7 over at the World Trade Center but it's a nightmare on a building that is less than 20 storeys.

Here are our common complaints and quirks which may or may not be related to the technology itself :

• The elevator is always broken.
• There are only 2 elevators.
• It takes forever for one to be available during rush hour.
  
• If you forget to key in your floor and you step in the elevator, you have to step out on the next stop to press your floor number at which time you may already have passed your floor.
• Pressing *(insert floor number here)* is suppose to prioritize your floor. It doesn't work :-)