A scene I love from The Hunt for Red October was the communication through sonat pings. Later, when I worked in IT, the use of SNMP pings became a core part of my troubleshooting an issue. I thought of this scene every time.

These days, another form is most of my work with humans. These are all a form of a ping:

• Asking for an update.
• Following up on that issue.
• Is this still a problem?
• Are we good now?

I haven’t heard from you, and I am unsure of the current status. Really… I want to move this along and need you to remember my thing exists and do something to move it.

I feel for project managers. Having to ping manage means no one recognizes the thing as very important. It’s behind other priorities. Ping management is the only way to get some traction and move it along by centering it in the consciousness of the forgetters.

Also, when I called it this to an IT manager at work, this guy got offended. He didn’t like being called a target.