Am I the only who feels sad or frustrated about technology?

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Hollywood_Guy
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18 Jul 2018, 7:57 pm

A local-owned business that's been open in my area for 150 years announced today that they were closing because of more people shopping online today and super-mega stores. I am a millennial, and I sometimes feel like I'm the only one who starts getting a painful or upset feeling when I hear these types of stories today.

I don't want to sound condescending to people or like I hate all technology (being a killjoy), but at least my parents and grandparents growing up in the old days didn't miss out on any of it at all. I hate that I only became an adult after the world changed so much from that. I don't feel suicidal either or want to physically harm myself, but I feel like questioning why I want to live in this universe anymore. Unfortunately, it seems like my only two options are this existing universe itself, and the afterlife (which I don't believe we get to choose what it's like). I had these feelings and questions since I was in high school. I sometimes do get the urge to just say "I hope I end up dying earlier" (not in the near 5 or 10 years, I mean "earlier" as in 40s or 50s).

So, I have these feelings because I feel that this is pretty much it, and everything is going to change, nobody will socialize or interact the old-fashioned way and everything will pretty much be online-only. Nobody can do anything to stop or slow it down at all. If there's a God himself, he also wouldn't do it.

There was even a video on YouTube published by a video game/rant vlogger that had pretty much all hate comments in the comments section.



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18 Jul 2018, 8:47 pm

Hollywood_Guy wrote:
Am I the only who feels sad or frustrated about technology?
Not so much with the technology itself, but with people's dependence upon it.

For example, there is a co-worker who seems to believe that email carries as much urgency as a phone call, so that when he sends a message, he expects an immediate answer from everyone on his "To:" list.

Another example is two people sitting at opposite ends of a couch texting each other in complete silence.

Yet another example is a crowd of people watching their smartphone for the video feed of a celebrity walking along with them.

I make my living by designing, installing, operating, and servicing technology; so I can't very well demonize technology, as it has been very, very good to me. Then again, when I want to speak with people, I will speak with them, preferably in the same room, if not face-to-face.

People are way too dependent on technology; but that genie is already out of the bottle.


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SabbraCadabra
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18 Jul 2018, 9:13 pm

I think this is why so many people are waiting for some kind of apocalypse.

Of course, most of said people would be completely helpless without their phone for 24 hours...


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Hollywood_Guy
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18 Jul 2018, 9:29 pm

SabbraCadabra wrote:
I think this is why so many people are waiting for some kind of apocalypse.

Of course, most of said people would be completely helpless without their phone for 24 hours...


Are you talking about one specific apocalypse scenario when an entire electric grid and all modern electronic gadgets die? Never mind the disaster that would be for certain countries alone like the US, but it won't necessarily stop new tech from moving unless it literally occurred globally. And even then, there won't be much society left at all anyway.



SabbraCadabra
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19 Jul 2018, 5:11 am

Most people want a zombie apocalypse (or is that fad over by now?).

It wouldn't have to be one specific apocalypse, and it wouldn't have to shut down "the grid" completely. But if enough servers went down, even if people kept their mobile devices running, there wouldn't be a lot of Internet left to surf.

And internal batteries only really last about 10-15 years.


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Hollywood_Guy
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21 Jul 2018, 5:02 pm

Am I the only one who gets a dim view about it?



Hollywood_Guy
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23 Jul 2018, 7:16 pm

And everyone is effectively forced to upgrade. It's even getting harder to enjoy an older or simpler form of technology personally, like 80s and 90s home electronics because the niche is extremely small and some things aren't being produced anymore, left to go extinct.