wispfox

I suppose that it had to happen sometime.  

For years now I have been wearing a hair shirt in protest about the way the internet/computer manufacturer consortium have “ruined the internet”.  The hair shirt consisted of used laptops from the local computer recycling organization and buzzed along just fine, but lately the poor old things have been breaking down.  My 2012 rebuilt MacBook Air and a 2014 Lenovo are both crippled by hardware issues so I had to go out looking for something new.

When I went to the shop to look for a “quality used car” what I saw was that prices for the newer Macs (they do seem to make good hardware) were not that great.  Since my 11 and 13 year old computers were gassing out (I have had them 4+ years) so buying another cheap computer (working 10 year olds run in the $80.00 to $120.00 range)  I didn’t want to mess around with hair shirts anymore.  I am too old and my decades long protest went unnoticed.  

So I went to the least evil of the big retail places (wally world) and they were selling new M1 MacBook Airs for $600.00.  Now I suppose that this is Apples gesture to poor folk since a new M4 is more expensive by quite a bit.  So I put a crowbar on my wallet and I am pecking away at it now.

I had to make a choice about the “ecosystem” that I wanted to work in.  Apple or Google or Microsoft.  Essentially, my opinion ended up being Apple as the least scummy of these three.  Microsoft is now and has always been “la creme de la scum”.  I despise everything that they are.  Google is way above MS on the scumometer, but their Chromebook system really isn’t all that useful and is pretty closed and marginal.  That left Apple.

It isn’t a super great choice but I suppose that it is something that I can live with.  They are a manufacturer of pretty and well built hardware that is on the spendy side but seems to last forever.  Their software is pretty much the same as what I have been using except for the annoying decision to keep the window control buttons on the right side rather than the left side, but truthfully, that isn’t that big a deal.

What I am hoping is that this is my last computer.  I am hoping that it outlasts me.  Apple will try to sell me shit I am not interested in buying, and I think that their intrusive overwatch to get ideas concerning my spending habits will lead them to the logical conclusion that I am not really a part of their market.

So all of this verbiage is my admission that I have been hanging on to a dead idea that the internet isn’t primarily controlled by corporate interests.  It is time to look at it as a utility that I spend money on.  It has replaced my television for news, it has replaced the post office for mail, it has replaced my newspaper and magazine subscriptions, the connection provided by the funny looking black cube is part of my telephone service.

Nope, this is another aspect of things that I am not particularly thrilled about.  The world has changed from my salad days when my opinions and worldview were installed in the meat puppet that carries me around.  Most of the promises that were made in the days back then when my e-mail was a PDP-11 on the DARPAnet and I hooked in from home on a 1200 baud modem didn’t pan out.  As usual, the world that was promised wasn’t available for delivery.

So my excessive expenditure is the best compromise that I can come up with.  It ain’t perfect, the choice limits some choices, but the choice is the best that I can come up with taking into consideration lifespans of both the hardware and the user.

I still don’t like it much.   But there is much that I don’t like.