The Machine

Look at it run.
Isn't it marvelous?
Made with state-of-the art technology.
The best computers money can buy,
Always online and checking for updates to improve
Quality and Quantity.

Gleaming.
Perfect.
Sterile.

Product is still below that of competitors,
But we're always trying to improve.
More tests.
Harder tests.

The best fix is to narrow tolerance margins.
See that bin there?
That's the first set of defectives.
Damaged materials lower the quality of the rest,
So we weed them out before even starting the
Elementary stages of assembly.

We'd lose too much, though, by just
Throwing these out.
Many of them would work in
Food service and other low-tech industries.
They go through an alternate line,
Which you can see to your left.
There the bottom threshold of acceptability is
Lowered.

Here we get more serious problems
Dealing with chemical imbalance and
Contamination,
Starting at the sixth and seventh levels of
Production.
Leaving them with the rest would again
Have a negative influence on overall
Quality.
They're now too far along
To fit in our alternate assembly line.

Throwing this many out would still be
Wasteful.
We send them to a specialized
Facility in another building.

We sometimes wonder if the outcome of that
Procedure might not be worse than just
Correcting the imbalance here,
But that's not our problem.

After this point, you'll see more and more
Defects
Which just drop out of the machine.
With the ever narrowing
Tolerance
In these upper levels of production,
We find more examples that simply
Can't be dealt with here.

Some isn't defective because it's below
Optimum levels, but because it's far
Above them.
Uniformity
Is more important than
Quality at this stage of development.
If our customers saw how much
Better we sometimes do, they'll have
Higher expectations of the rest.
This way, everything is
Interchangeable and therefore more
Useful to the customer.

Here, at this end, is what we take pride in.
This is where the finished product comes out.
It is a long process of
Assembly,
But I'm sure you'll agree that the final
Product is well worth the wait.

Oh, good, you're just in time to see our
Latest batch of
Product coming through now.
So far, they've been
Assembled and
Tested
In groups of about 25 pieces each.
But now each one gets its final
Stamp of approval.

Here comes one,
From among the rows of
Wonderful, gleaming
Uniformity.
Across the front, to be symbolically
Inspected by people far too
Important to actually take part in the rest of the
Process
Before receiving the certificate of
Authenticity.

Congratulations, Class of 2001:
The first class of the New Millennium.

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