Opus 2024-366: The Deception of Upgrades

Did you get the recent digital upgrade of the book 1984?  Neither did I.  In fact, I have suspicions that somehow it was removed from my iPad and my Kindle.  I can’t find it anymore anyway.

Have you noticed that probably never happened if you had a paper copy of the book?  Digital devices are really wonderful.  I enjoy reading on my Kindle.  I enjoy using my iPad.  The problem is they make it impossible for us to be serious about long-term learning and retention of information.

I have books that I will pass on to my children.  I have other books that will either go into the dumpster, yard sales, or to a local charity.  Ultimately, it will be up to the children what they keep and what they don’t keep.  It will not be up to the government or some high-tech monopoly to decide what they want to keep or throw away.  Books can be handed down for hundreds of years if they’re carefully taken care of.  Digital devices can be wiped clean in seconds.

While the publishing industry has developed papers that last longer and longer by being acid free the digital industry has made it easier and easier to deny us information.  Have you noticed that if you want music you have to download it.  Physical discs are becoming harder to find.  That way if they want to remove the music from your world it’s not a problem.  Don’t even think about owning your software.  We do not understand how powerful and devious digital masters can be.  They do have the power to go into your computer without your knowledge and change things, remove things and add things.  You may not know what they added until the Gestapo (biggest apple) shows up to arrest you forbidden knowledge.

Digital information in the long run will probably be as useful as the virtual arsenal you have in one of your computer games.  Start building a library of hard assets that will be able to be read in the future.  Aquire the kind of things that can be read in firelight.  Build a pantry of information that will not change while you sleep.

Wouldn’t it be nice if I was totally wrong.  Feel free to label this a conspiracy theory.  Keep in mind that most of them prove out in the end.  One example of what computers can do in their infinite wisdom you see above.  I told the voice recognition software “Gestapo” and it wrote “biggest apple”.  Don’t trust the cyber world.

homo unius libri