- The typical story of technology is one of progress; your floppies get old and decrepit and you can’t see your old data, that’s basically your fault, and who wants to live in the past? But human networks often stick around for decades, half-centuries. People have been working on Smalltalk for more than 40 years, for as long as I have been alive. Just continually thinking about it, how to improve it, how to make it popular, how to get the world to acknowledge it. It binds them together. I respect that.
- A tremendous part of daily life regards the exchange of technologies. We are good at it. It’s so simple as to be invisible. Can I borrow your scissors? Do you want tickets? I know guacamole is extra. The world of technology isn’t separate from regular life. It’s made to seem that way because of, well…capitalism. Tribal dynamics. Territoriality. Because there is a need to sell technology, to package it, to recoup the terrible investment. So it becomes this thing that is separate from culture. A product.
I completely agree with this - nascent technology (both in terms of our childhood, and the adolescence of home computing) evokes powerful feelings for those who were there, and is as "comforting" as an old book, a favourite sweater, a photo album full of 1980s polaroids. I went through some alienating times recently, and watching old video games that I used to play growing up was an easy and pleasant form of escapism that both brought back good memories and allowed a return to simpler times, forgetting the present issues for a little while. I say "watching" them because I found some longplays of them on youtube - I am not nearly as good or as practiced as I was when I was 14 or so - those games were damn hard! Ghosts and Goblins, Pool of Radiance, The Immortal (on the amiga), Barbarian (Psygnosis), Super Hang On, Lemmings, Choplifter, Green Beret, Xevious, Terra Cresta... some great memories and fun to relive again.