Digital Capitalism

     Advances to the Rear

Digital technology

certainly improved

a few aspects of my life

during the first decade

of this century,

but since then

the trend has definitely been

the other way around.

It seems as if every new

amazing development,

whether in social media or operating systems,

has made trying to use these things

more frustrating and difficult

and less enjoyable and rewarding

to me –

although undoubtedly more profitable

and ego-fluffing

(‘Look at what WE can do!’)

for those producing them.

   Not Exactly A Fine Point

Always remember

that the very latest

in consumer digital technology,

no matter how oh-wow-gee-whizz

and fun to play with it is,

always serves the purposes

of those who produce and sell it

far more than those

of the consumers who buy it.

                        New Telephone

My clunky old phone and fax machine,

the fax capability of which I’d discontinued years ago,

was using up too much electricity

with its flashing LED display telling me 24 hours a day

either that it had no paper in the feed or that it was ready to print,

so I unplugged it and went to buy another phone.

I was pleasantly surprised –

for pessimists all surprises are pleasant –

to discover that it was indeed still possible to buy

a plain landline telephone

with no amazing electronic shit designed to astound the inner child.

It cost me $22.96.

Imagine my dismay when I discovered

that it didn’t work – anywhere in the house – when I was online.

The fax machine and my other phone did.

So I took it back.

The nice man patiently explained to me

that because all landline telephones are digital now

I had to plug it into an ADSL line filter

if I wanted to use it when I’m online.

One of those suckers cost me $17.98.

That’s called a technological advance.

A year or so later I got rid of my landline account altogether.

That new, digital phone makes a dandy garden ornament.

                Technological Advance

The oldest object of computer hardware that I’ve owned,

which I bought in 2001, was my scanner.

It’s also the only one

that worked the way it’s supposed to work

every time, with no glitches.

Unlike other programmes,

its software worked as it should every time, too.

Windows 8 was incompatible with it though,

making it intentionally obsolete.

Oh, the wonders of technological advance!

                 High Tech Toys

I’m tired of hearing about

things that people have designed

to make other people say gee-whizz,

wow, or anything like that,

as I have no desire

to pay money for technology

that does astounding things

for which I have no real use.

           Any Time Of Day

Walking early in the morning

to avoid the summer heat,

watching the dawn spread over the sky

whilst enjoying the singing of countless birds,

I saw a short, square-shouldered woman

of indeterminate age

who had a slouching face

walk by with wires leading to her ears,

her eyes on the ground

and some overpriced digital gizmo

in her hands.

       Sartre & Me & Windows 8

I remember that long ago,

when I was an undergraduate,

I read an essay by Jean-Paul Sartre

that, as I understood it then,

reasoned that whenever anybody makes a decision

(or maybe it was a certain type of decision)

that person is making that decision

for all of humanity.

I couldn’t buy into this then

and I can do so even less now.

I can’t stand the thought

of deciding anything for anybody,

let alone everything for everybody,

and it pisses me off whenever people

– and especially Microshit programmers –

take it upon themselves to decide things for me.

Unless, of course, if I don’t give a shit

one way or the other.

                  Functional

I wonder if it’s because I’m old

that the latest high-tech

gee-whiz oh-wow

always tends to make me

more irritated than enthusiastic.

I doubt it.

I’ve been this way –

only adopting and using

digital stuff

after it’s been around for a while,

if possible,

and only when I’ve had a real use for it –

since the 1970s.

               A Crime of the Future

Imagine a trim 47-year-old man

in a silver-and-green track warm-up get-up

and matching trainers,

pale-brown hair with a touch of silver at the temples

just starting to recede around a widow’s peak,

walking a grey French bulldog

along the footpath of a street lined with giant oak trees,

humming Annie Lennox’s ‘Something So Right’,

a song from his youth.

Walking the other way,

a lean, smooth-looking 31-year-old man

in matching pale-grey leather trilby and jacket,

sleekly taut high cheekbones,

laugh lines crinkling the corners of his twinkling eyes

sidesteps to stay in front of the older man,

blocking his way.

‘Hey man,’ he says smilingly

in a soft, smooth, reassuringly friendly voice,

‘got any money on yuh?’

Silver-temples chuckles indulgently.

‘Of course not. Nobody carries cash anymore.

All I have is plastic.’

He chuckles a bit more,

reaches into his silver-nylon bum bag, and shows him his cards.

‘You wouldn’t happen to have a mobile eftpos terminal on you,

would you?’

Cheekbones reaches into an inside jacket pocket

and pulls out a wireless terminal.

‘Now,’ he says, his eyes glinting and his voice hard with menace,

‘let’s have your card, mate.

You’re about to make a voluntary donation.’