umbilical cut

UMBILICAL CUT
Friday morning I couldn’t get online for about twenty minutes. Being a creature of habit, liking my routine, this was very disturbing. Once I got on I had to rush through everything. And never caught up. Okay, I breathed deeply a few times and was okay. But then, the Gods themselves knew it was Monday and they felt they needed to remind me. I’m so glad when they take a personal interest. As of noon, we still haven’t gotten online. The router is busted. So I’m writing this and will save it and either wait for a connection or go to the library after work and hope I can upload this. If not you are reading it sometime after Monday afternoon.
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I know not everyone can be like me, no matter how hard you aspire. But I like my rut once I wear it in. In a rut you can spastically jerk the steering wheel back and forth but you always stay on track. I’m not worried about setting a routine where I can be set up for mischief, I’m so far off everyone’s radar. But this wasn’t just about me being rudely interrupted in my routine. This is more like being too dependant on one channel for information and communication. I know my micro-business model is almost totally dependant on the Internet. It’s bad enough I’m dependant on computers for writing, being a bit more expensive than a pencil and pad of paper, but I can’t get any readers without getting on the Internet. But that is just to earn secondary income. It’s a lot worse than that, we’re becoming too dependant on a thin wire.
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More than likely, 90% of your correspondence is e-mail. 99% of your news is through the Net. I’m sure far too many of your documents are electronic. And that’s not likely to change. Most people don’t like to write anymore. E-mail is quicker, doesn’t give you writers cramp and although it really isn’t cheaper it feels that way. Plus, it’s fitting revenge for all the poor service from the Post Office. Not that your connection to the net is trouble free…The news you can’t do anything about. For a good part of a decade newspapers have been turning to crap. The big corporations moved in and bought up the small fry. To do that they assumed massive debt. To pay for that debt they moved from investigative reporting to soft news and entertainment. Print news is no longer news, not compared to what you used to get. And TV is worse. So you don’t have a lot of choice. Shortwave is politically motivated. All Rush Limbaugh type of news. Or NPR which is just as bad. Yeh, I want my news filtered through an indigenous minority filter. Yes, the internet is as bad sometimes. Everyone with an ax to grind. But at least there is plenty of choices to minimize that kind of thing. And as far as e-books, I’m as guilty as anyone. Not only savings documents electronically but also offering my own information that way. It was a great way to be able to get in print, but it is nothing permanent.
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Besides sour grapes, yes, I do have a point. When we first flocked to the internet for all these new and improved features, we were happier than pigs in a puddle of slop. We’re so special! We have choices now. The consumer has spoken, we are empowered. Now that choice which once spelled freedom is constricting us. We are more vulnerable than before. The other choices we snubbed to embrace the web are no longer viable choices. I don’t think the Post Office can be saved. The first class mail is almost dead, that that paid for all the magazine subscriptions and catalogs and possibly even subsidized Netflix videos. Now there are no more cash cows but cash vacuums. Nothing can save the newspapers without bankruptcy and a return to a monopoly on classified ads. Without free spending corporations and high ad rates, the magazines will fail. I don’t think broadcast TV will be with us forever. They seem to also be facing an ad shortfall. Not that there will be much to miss there with the glut of So You Wish You Could Dance On A Tropical Island BS. One expects TV to be crap, but it has gotten to the point where it is worse than bad.
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So, what happens to all those services? They go to the Internet. Paid access to a magazine’s site. U-Tube shows. Etc. And it is never a great idea to be dependant on one avenue for your access to the world. Too many chances that evil will subvert it, either corporate or government. And no, I’m not just overreacting to being without my connection one weekday. Yes, I’m out of touch on the weekend and by Monday I’m eager to see how much closer to Armageddon we’ve gotten. But being out of the loop isn’t the only problem. I’m afraid that pretty soon it will just as bad being in the loop.
END
Please be patient with my answering my e-mail, new postings for Dirt Cheap Dirt, and the next installment of Bisonia. We’ll be back to normal soon enough. Back in the loop.