Most of that's great until the power goes out. Or DNS/Cloudflare has issues. Or someone fat-fingered a router config. Or a construction crew/cargo ship breaks a major optical cable. Or an attack happens and everyone overloads the networks. Or bad people steal the databases. Or a government decides to track you.
Well, it depends how you want to define those problems. Paper records got wet, or burned away. Gas wasn't always available for street lights. Forged coinage was a problem - as was bribery and corruption.
So we're trading problems - but I know which world I prefer.
I loved the feeling of going somewhere, and nobody knew who I was or where I came from. Now, it's almost impossible to travel across town without a modestly-motivated person being able to find out about it. Does nobody else recognize the sacrifice of anonymity as a loss?
The one question I had reading this was... why then travel to the foreign country? You're enmeshed in the same basic experience you had in your domestic country, except you had to sit in a plane or on a train for hours to get there.
I would recommend, every once in a while, a complete disconnect. Tell people you'll be out of touch for a week, entirely. Get a topological map of an area, get a compass, get an altimeter, and get a GPS satellite reciever (no, not a cell phone, a device that GPS-triangulates your latitude/longitude from GPS satellite signals) so you can see where you are on your topo map. Carry cash only. The location could be a wilderness area that you backpack into, a small town on the seaside with a hotel reservation set aside for you, something like that. Walk around, read a book, take photos on a camera with no internet connectivity to look at later, write in your journal, eat a meal.
Terrifying thought, isn't it? Separation anxiety is a thing, in the digitally connected world.
Right! The world is so accessible nowadays. You can travel light and far without much money. You don't have to rely on hotels and travel agencies to find a place to live and get information about the area.
Is finding this "terrifying" a young people thing? I'm mostly confused by this, because it's both very ordinary and rather nonsensical.
First, backpacking in the wilderness with a topographical map is a vastly, vastly different experience than staying a random town, where you have access to anything. Also, why use GPS and stare at a screen instead of you know, locating yourself using the trail markers, ridges, etc? Is eating a meal and reading a book something people don't do all the time? Also, what camera is this? A phone with airplane mode on? Are you not allowed to store the pictures online, is a physical media transfer required, what's going on? What role does cash play here? I'm really confused.
> You're enmeshed in the same basic experience you had in your domestic country, except you had to sit in a plane or on a train for hours to get there.
That's the point. You can travel to the other side of the earth and all you'll get is the same experience as you would at home, but there's other brands of beer and different stuff in the museums. This isn't a diverse world, this is just reskins of the same template.
I handed over my passport to the border guard.
my various devices happily slurped up the bits
My phone immediately latched on to a dozen satellites
I have an IP address, therefore I am.
An army of volunteers had already mapped the city
the next bus was snagged in traffic
I didn't fancy walking through an unfamiliar city.
useless to a thief - unless they force me to unlock it
pickpockets operated in that area
The conversation with the taxi driver was a little stilted.
noting which standard allergens were present in each dish
verified that I was vaccinated against you-know-what
knew to wake me at 07:30 local time. The next morning, as I entered the office where I'd be working
Though all of this basically existed in the past in other forms.
27 comments
[ 0.28 ms ] story [ 64.5 ms ] threadThe old world never had those problems.
Seems like a reasonable trade off to me.
So we're trading problems - but I know which world I prefer.
This modern world isn't without its flaws, but the old world wasn't that rubbish either.
You only think it is good because you are the one of the winners chosen by the technologies.
[0]: https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2019-05-29/the-rich-...
[1]: https://www.smithsonianmag.com/science-nature/burning-truth-...
Not saying everything is fine. But seriously, that's not the fault of the technology.
I would recommend, every once in a while, a complete disconnect. Tell people you'll be out of touch for a week, entirely. Get a topological map of an area, get a compass, get an altimeter, and get a GPS satellite reciever (no, not a cell phone, a device that GPS-triangulates your latitude/longitude from GPS satellite signals) so you can see where you are on your topo map. Carry cash only. The location could be a wilderness area that you backpack into, a small town on the seaside with a hotel reservation set aside for you, something like that. Walk around, read a book, take photos on a camera with no internet connectivity to look at later, write in your journal, eat a meal.
Terrifying thought, isn't it? Separation anxiety is a thing, in the digitally connected world.
First, backpacking in the wilderness with a topographical map is a vastly, vastly different experience than staying a random town, where you have access to anything. Also, why use GPS and stare at a screen instead of you know, locating yourself using the trail markers, ridges, etc? Is eating a meal and reading a book something people don't do all the time? Also, what camera is this? A phone with airplane mode on? Are you not allowed to store the pictures online, is a physical media transfer required, what's going on? What role does cash play here? I'm really confused.
http://www.threepanelsoul.com/comic/getting-away
I went to cool museums. Drank beers I'd never heard of. Ate weird new foods. And wandered down cool side streets.
Most of the places were card only - and carrying cash is expensive. I read books in a park, chatted with locals. Wrote a blog post.
I used to do all that too, before GPS and smartphones. This way is much better for me.
The picture presented is very convenient living, but is it life?
But he doesn’t. He only has a NAT:ed address.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=PdFB7q89_3U
This thing smacks of:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_o7qjN3KF8U