Look around you. Take your eyes away from the screen and look up, look outside. What do you see?
I see people glued to phone screens. Unable to carry out basic functions without being distracted.
Do you feel that the world is subtly changing? Not just in the normal "progress is a good thing" type of change. You know, better health, clean water, living standards improving. No I'm not meaning that.
The change that I am talking about has crept up on us. We pay for bills via electronic messages. We talk to our co-workers on screens. We look at images of our most cherished friends and loved ones on small pocket sized slabs of glass and metal.
We order unhealthy, manufactured, sugar and chemical laden 'food' whilst sat alone, locked away against the world, to be delivered to our door by a poorly paid cycle courier.
those without a smartphone, are charged a poverty or "disconnected" tax
If we go to a shop to buy groceries, unless we agree to sign up for a 'loyalty' app on our phone, we are penalised with higher prices. The poor, the homeless, the refugees who cannot afford to be plugged in this way, those without a smartphone, are charged a poverty or "disconnected" tax on their life.
Entertainment is now rented. You may choose from hundreds of movies, books, or songs, but only to borrow. No ownership. Those e-books that you rent, that are easier to acquire and not read than paper copies, are available for free from a physical underfunded public library, where you may just have to meet another human and have a conversation with them. How convenient.
We're scared to engage with the outdoors. It looks so dangerous, so wild. What if something happens? What if we get lost? What if we get dirty? What if we go out and forget to take our phone? How will we manage?
Banks are closing, some shops are refusing to accept cash. Someone does not want you or me to make a transaction or exchange value anonymously. And why would you? Only those with something to hide could possible object.
If you do go outside, your phone will be telling tales. Sending your movements to a huge, multi-billion dollar tracking organisation, for them to squeeze every last bit of data into their money making apparatus. But at least you can trust them.
I’d like to introduce myself to you
I'd like to introduce myself to you. To look you in the eye, smile, offer my hand and give you a warm, face to face greeting. I can't do that yet, (who knows what may happen in the future) but for now consider this a letter arriving in your mailbox (remember post?), a letter of introduction and an offer of friendship, starting with "Hello".
I'm Alastair, a middle aged, British chap who is lucky enough to have grown up in a time before personal computers, the internet, mobile phones. As I've gone through life, I've embraced technology, wondered and marveled at the opportunities it offered, bought the computer, mobile phone, Apple Newton, Palm PDA, GPS... you name it. I've dived in to this new world head first and swum deeply.
But recently things have felt a bit off. Whilst I acknowledge what much of this technology can do, I've begun to question the assumption that all progress is inevitable and better. Post lockdown, with a need to be outside and in nature, I started to step back and look at what some technology was doing to myself and others. I began to question assumptions. I became interested in living a good life and started to notice many of the ways that this new normal was actually hindering that.
I couldn't quite put a label on the feeling. Couldn't quite distill it down until I realised what I was reacting against.
The machine. The accumulation of a number of changes in society, technology, behaviour, that were moving people from independent, wild, natural beings, into a kind of human facsimile that cannot operate without the assistance of external applications, technology and imposed behaviours.
And this troubles me.
So I've decided to push back. To look at what is going on, to try to understand it, to develop ways to fight back, to reclaim what living a good life actually means. And that is what you will find me writing about here.
I don't quite know where we are going on this journey, but then again, most journeys or adventures have a high degree of uncertainty, that's what makes them exciting! But I am going to venture out, to really get an understanding of the machine, to look for the cracks in it's body, prise them open and see what I discover. My journey is to help myself be unmachined and to share what I discover with you. To find ways to live and love and thrive in the real world. To find tools to break free from the machine's worst effects. To live a sovereign life. To treat any tech as a tool, to solve a specific problem if needed, but to be under my control and direction.
If you'd like to join me on this little adventure, I'd love to have your company, to invite you to be part of this band of traveling misfits. We'll learn from each other, and what's more it could be quite fun.
So that's it. Welcome friend, we're going on a journey, I'm not sure for how long, or to what final destination. But let's just head off and see…
…oh and if you’d like to join me, do consider subscribing and stopping by to say hello in the comments. Thank you!
Take two… 😉
As I commented before, I look forward to joining you on the journey. Like you, my formative years were devoid of 'devices' and also like you I feel that they (the devices) are taking over. It's time to push back...
You’re not alone in thinking the way that you do Alastair, there are many of us that are fed up with, as James Cameron put it, “The Rise of the Machines”.