I wonder how many of you could actually carry on without a smart phone right now. I mean, not like a week, or on vacation. I mean like forever. You can only call, text, maybe GPS, and listen to MP3. You need a computer to access the internet.
Discussion
Can I buy a backpack to carry my laptop in and a mobile hotspot to connect it with?
If so, then yes π
MmmKay. How bout only when you get to a destination, sort of like public wifi. Only available when stationary, or at a dwelling.
Nah, I need live Sat Nav cos I'm useless at finding stuff.
I didn't go out for the first twenty years of my life.
lmfao. I keep maps in my glove box and often print directions because my GPS can be super flakey. Thats why I allowed GPS because technically you don't need internet access for that, and we still have standalone gps devices.
Some dumb phones allowed you to use the phones internet connection, that has been doable since dialup.
def! ,, so over the brainwash
But my phone IS a computer with access to the internet. Built in. On a platform that is fairly easy to use nearly anywhere.
I grew up before internet connected phones. I know HOW to do things without, but... It's a hard sell to not have many of the things that I currently have that are, quite frankly, amazingly useful. That convenience is certainly being used to nefarious ends, but... That happens with any new tech.
100% accurate. When I started paying attention to all of the things I was addicted to and started cutting them out, the phone was high up there due to my privacy paranoia. I believe so long as your putting information onto an electronic device, it has the possibility of leaking private information. The only solution IMO is to stop using it. Now you don't even need to use it, as long as it travels with you they can know exactly what position you were standing in when it sent the sample back to the mothership. Plenty of these things not even a privacy OS can protect you against.
First, I started logging DNS, then I saw all the connections my device was making even when all apps were closed. Freaked out, then I started stripping apps down to only what I could tolerate. And over the years dropping more and more. I recently stripped down completely, removing google services and switching to obtainium and manually installing apps. Finally I turned off mobile data.
I currently have
- Obtainium
- Wireguard
- Organic Maps (for trails)
- Firefox
- Keyboard
- Contacts
- Phone
- QUIC (qksms clone)
- File manager
- Signal
Everything else I use firefox and pin pages.
I have all notifications turned off except for phone calls (most don't work without google anyway). I regularly lose it. I forget to charge it. It maybe sees 30 mins of screen time/day.
I'm still behind you but also on a similar path.
I could do without a "smart" phone, but, that would compromise me further in that communicating with my family would be unencrypted, and that's a much worse situation.
Also, suddenly going dark with any electronic device is a sure sign that your behavior has changed and that's a big tell to anyone paying attention. I live too far from family and care about them too much to just stop communicating unless it's a really big thing. I still have many things to do that are similar to your list but struggle since I'm not where near as savvy as you.
Totally get it. Family should be a big deal, I wouldn't cut them loose for the extreme privacy, but I probably would prioritize only chatting when I'm not working or driving or something, like most do anyway.
Tell me about it, I just probably had more time on my hands man, it was brutal just getting this far with the 6y/o junker device I have now.
I remember growing up playing the answering machine back to see who called and making a list to call them back. The only time you could talk was when you were at home or work. Anything else wasn't possible. You'd change the message if you were going somewhere, change it when you got back. And if you didn't answer people weren't upset. Miss those days.
Not much of a Blake Shelton listener but Austin comes to mind every time I think of this stuff :)
I do think that I'm moving more in that direction.
My vision is for my phone to only be connected to a home server, so that all the data is going to hardware I control through I tunnel that I also control. That has some vulnerabilities and some tradeoffs, especially since I do want to live in the mountains and I might not be able to do that due to connection speeds alone. (I refuse to use starlink.)
I'm honestly not sure what my tech future looks like. Some of my more ambitious ideas are clearly out of my ability.
The future of tech is going to happen with or without me. At least if I can put some effort in I can maybe change some things.
Sometimes I think not all problems need to be solved with more technology you know. Like maybe we had it figured out as best we needed.
Yeah and I think more self hosting movements like umbrel and start 9 self hosting may be the future. We tried once in the late 2000s early 2010s but the software just wasn't there imo. It's cool to see VC funding investing into self hosting. Hopefully I won't look like a fool for being hopeful!
I don't think you'll end up the fool in this case. I'm just a fool since I try too much, too soon and can't get anything to work. π
I actually lived this way later than most, right up to 2021 with about a 1 year exception when I lived in China, 2018-2019.
Living in China, itβs less possible to do without a smartphone (specifically WeChat) than it is in the U.S. where I live. I still went back to my βdumb phoneβ no problem when I returned home, and still see internet-in-my-pocket as a luxury.
The one thing that would really hurt me is having to go back to paper maps getting to new places. I still could, though.
For sure! Paper maps are a last resort. I often have to travel near DC. There are way too many highways and traffic to get around with a paper map alone. Even with someone reading it, its sketchy. The Atlas' I used to have are quite outdated now, I should probably try to find some new ones
I will usually print out a direction list if it's somewhere new until I learn the route. I like to think I have a pretty good sense of direction.
I just went somewhere in Seven Corners π let me tell you, I LOVED having a realtime map and driving directions showing up right on a screen in my car then
I've actually thought about going back to a dash mounted GPS device so I don't need GPS on my phone.
All of the "free" nav apps that aren't GSM (Google Street maps) are very flawed, and it still pisses me off that OSM won't just rip off Google's location database. That's NOT proprietary, IMO. It's also exceedingly invasive though I can't figure out a correct way to tell them to stop other than asking politely and then if they refuse, incineration of all their servers all over the world simultaneously, which is seriously difficult to pull off as a civilian.
Going back to a Garmin isn't a terrible idea, IMO, tough it's obviously not as portable as a phone.
Also traveling though rural areas, I rarely have signal and lose GPS lock often, so a paper backup is required.