It feels like all the joy I used to feel from being an enthusiast has been completely voided as computing has become the modern vector for fascism and surveillance. I find myself recoiling from all online spaces, even independent and open source ones that I’d loved and supported in the past.

It’s been an exceptionally strange impulse to go from having an elaborate online presence to now feeling like the only acceptable way to engage with the network is to have as minimal of an online footprint as possible.

This especially hurts when it feels like an issue of skilling, where I know how to do certain tasks with computers, but have to teach myself for the first time the analogue alternatives that my parents and their parents likely already knew well.

How have you chosen to deal with it? Do you find yourself moving away from computing and the internet, despite formerly loving it as a hobby? Have you replaced things that computers used to do for you with analogue replacements?

I’m curious how other people are experiencing this.

  • Libb@piefed.socialEnglish
    21·
    9 hours ago

    How have you chosen to deal with it?

    Moving back to analog wherever I could, re-learn and re-use the old ways as much as possible. And also taking back control, and ownership, over my tech.

    I’ve been using a computer since the early 80s and have been online regularly probably somewhere around the late 80s, first through BBS. Luckily for me, while I was self-learning that new computer and digital stuff, I was also taught the classic ‘analog’ ways of doing things. Things like writing longhand, or using snail mail. So, the moment I realized I could not trust nor agree with techs, I started:

    • Using physical and/or low-tech objects wherever and whenever I can.
    • I got rid of all streaming and subs, an always growing, always less privacy friendly (and more expensive) list of services and apps.
    • After years mostly reading ebooks, I moved back to reading actual print books, and using physical media for music and movies (discs).
    • Relying less on a computer on my everyday life. Doing math in my head instead of needing that high-tech crutch that is a calculator. Using an actual dictionary to lookup for a definition (a paper dictionary does not track what word I’m checking, like no print book is reporting back what I’m actually reading), Stopped relying on a spellchecker (aka, improve my writing skills and also learn to be fine with doing as few mistakes as I can even more so in foreign languages like English). Small things like that.
    • Use older tech (more repairable, sustainable, less connected) wherever I can. See, I recently purchased a 90s digital voice recorder that uses good old AA batteries (that last for months, plural), that requires no Internet connection to operate and no subscription either (so there is no tracking going on, no constant updates or security threats, and there is no ads). Sure, it doesn’t have the latest and greatest AI summarizing tool but… I don’t care. And I certainly don’t want AI to feast on my own voice, nor on my most personal notes, doing god knows what with them.
    • Use Free Libre software instead of the most widely known proprietary ones. Apps and tools that respect my privacy and my rights as a user.
      After 40+ years being an Apple user, a few years ago I fully switched to GNU/LInux and to Libre software. My only regret? I should have switched years earlier.
    • Last but certainly not least, I barely use my phone at all. On mine, there is only a handful of apps I need to have access to (finance/security/pro stuff). There is nothing personal, not even ebooks or music, and certainly no social or games. The phone is the least trustworthy of all the ‘digital’ device I own, so it’s the one I use the less.