I always talk to telemarketers when they call. Sometimes it turns into a good chat. When I tell them I've been 'on the phones' they usually drop the script, and I hear some great war stories. "One time this crazy guy said he was going to track me down and shoot me in the head," Kim Lee tells me. "He was in Texas and I'm out here in BC, so I didn't worry."

Yep, I was one of those pesky guys who call during your after supper nap and ask if you or your wife need new pantyhose. I know what you're thinking, if I want panty hose I'll go down to store and buy some, not order 6 dozen from some stranger on the phone.

After my experience at the Call Centre I have a lot more sympathy when some guy phones up and offers me a free Engelbert Humperdinck CD, if I'll commit myself to purchasing only one more a week, for the rest of my natural life. It's a tough way to scrape up the alimony.

Don't get me wrong. I liked my job. I put myself through college doing factory work, which is basically what your average call centre is-a clean factory.

Picture this, there are maybe 100 people crammed into a room the size of a chicken coop. Each phone rep has a little workspace, like one of those study cubicles in a high school library, with a partition so you can't lean over and crib the other guy's homework. Each cubicle has a phone, head set, and a computer.

Remember when Billie Gates and all those other geeks flogging computers told us the machines would make life so much easier for all of us. The implication was that once your office got wired up, you'd push a few buttons, sit back and watch that little rascal finish your work, while you did your nails or called your mom.

Sounded like a good idea when we saw the teck guys hauling in all that equipment. And such a soothing colour they chose to paint it-the same off white as your dentist's waiting room.

Don't get me wrong I love my machine. Spell check, e-mail, games that let me commit mass murder without fear of legal repercussion. No I'm not a Luddite ("English artisans 1811-16 who smashed new machinery they thought would put them out of work." Webster's Online Dictionary). See I can't even write a simple sentence without consulting the All Present One for a definition.

In lots of ways computers have simplified the office. In the old days your average two-finger typist used up a small tree trying to get his final copy ready for the editor. A single typo and it was back to square one. Now it's file/print/OK and you've got yourself a copy as error free as the one on your screen.

That was the sizzle. The reality of the steak is that in the call centre, the computer has created the perfect assembly line. Even Henry Ford would have approved.

Your average telemarketer's shift starts with a pep talk. "Are we going to make some money today?" the floor manager shrieks in her Amway Convention voice. "Billy Bumpkin over there in the corner made enough in commissions last week to buy a new house and send his kids to college." Then she swivels her gaze to take in the rest of the room. "And you other losers get selling or I'll personally show you the door!"

The shift starts when the bell rings, and everyone has one minute to log in and be ready when the computer starts feeding out calls. If you're 10 seconds late logging into the computer it knows. From then on, through out the shift, every time you finish up with a customer, the computer automatically connects you with the next one.

The managers can monitor every second of an employee's workday. When you log off to take your minimum legislated break the computer knows if you're even one second late logging back in. The next day, when you sit down, you find a nasty message on your screen.

In all fairness to mangers, while they are watching the reps, their performance is being monitored by the general manager, and she's being observed by head office, who's constantly scrutinized by the company president, who's being scanned by the manufacturer of the product they're hyping.

Somewhere in the world there is this one guy at the top of the heap who can zoom in and watch anyone in the pyramid, anywhere in the world. Think 1984. It's enough to make us all paranoid.