That last panel hit me like a truck because… yeah, that’s what people think happens when they do their little personal choice things to pretend they matter.
They really buy like a paper book once and go “ah, yes, Bezos is fuming right now” while he makes another billion.
We have lost all sense of how to influence society and all ability to gauge scale. For all the folksy traditionalism in this (which includes driving a gas guzzler from the 70s, apparently?) the Internet has created this entirely disproportionate sense of our footprint on the world and this strip is as much a result of the hyperconnected dystopia as everything it’s complaining about.
In my experience this is extra bad for Americans who, frankly, didn’t need that much of a push to go from their individualist, self-centered perception of society to this vision of sitting on a couch listening to a walkman as activism.
That’s exactly what is so nice about FOSS based systems. You can use technology but without the tech bros and the corporate enshittification.
We’re techy enough nerds to know there’s another way to be free of billionaire influence while still keeping some resemblance of modern communication: self-hosting.
We don’t need to go back to handwritten mail, FOSS is the way to go.
Writing someone a letter is a very personal thing and you’re creating a memory. Something tangible, concrete, also weighs in on reality. Looking at a piece of paper with your handwrite makes you understand you’re commiting to something.
I’m a FOSS loon but the craze of making everything digital is absurd. I’ve listened to people criticizing others for using paper and a pencil to take down a memo, note or even journaling, when they can do it on their phone.
Is existing so dreadful nowadays? Does the notion of leaving proof of existence scares?
Its nothing to do with contempt for the media, or not wanting to leave evidence of my existence or anything like that, its just that I got shit to do.
Yeah, handwriting sucks. I used to type my homework in a mechanical typewriter, holy cow even that sucked. Going from that to an electrical typewriter that could hold a line in memory was amazing, but still nothing compared to a proper word processor. Wordstar in MS-DOS anyone?
I still like to sketch my ideas from time to time, but all my permanent notes are stored in Joplin, encrypted, in local backup, and synced to the cloud. I can’t afford to lose them, and I can’t afford to lug around with me a heavy suitcase of papers.
I’ve seen young people wishing for simpler times, kids using Polaroid cameras, hunting retro consoles that were already ancient when they were born, longing for music that was way before their time, etc. I get they’re disillusioned with the current state of things, but romanticizing the past is not a healthy way to cope with the horrible today.
I don’t doubt you have a busy life. And that is not the subject at hand here.
What should concern us, collectively, is that we are constantly being pushed the notion that we do not have enough time and that tech is always the solution, when it is not.
I’m going to take a risk and say you write faster than you type and reaching for a pencil is quicker than launching a program.
I’m going to take a risk and say you write faster than you type and reaching for a pencil is quicker than launching a program.
Maybe for you, but opening KWrite takes only 5-6 key presses and I type much faster than I write
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“Telling people to use an LLM to figure out how to X is like telling a 16yo to play GTA to learn how to drive” is my new catchphrase, thanks internet person (I presume person, could be mistaken…)
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