(no subject)

[avevale_intelligencer]

Apparently Bill Gates has made a speech somewhere in which he confidently stated that CDs and DVDs are obsolete, and furthermore, that there will be no new physical storage medium to supplant them. He is of the opinion that from now on all music and video will be made available on the net and downloaded straight to people's hard drives via high speed broadband or DSL or whatever. He sees a future in which all our entertainment needs will be provided through the house computer. It seems that his audience thought this was wonderful news.

I admit that I used to think along those lines, back in the days when I thought that, say, being a gypsy was kind of a neat way to live, or that houseboats were a fun idea. I've grown up since. I'm sure Mr Gates is licking his chops at the thought of the future he describes, with everyone absolutely dependent for their entertainment on his software; and I'm also sure that the new version due to be unveiled any year now will provide Microsoft with even more of a stranglehold on our computers, and thus our lives. Let me conjure up an extreme scenario. Mr A, five or ten years from now, has a PC running Windows Second Week In August 2009, or whatever, and gets all his radio, TV, music and video recordings, games and so on online. He doesn't own a single CD, DVD, videotape or cassette, and boy is his house tidy. He's gradually converting all his books to ebooks and clearing the shelves. Then, one night in a fit of frustration at having had to reinstall Windows Just After Lunchtime On Saturday yet again, he mentions in an email to a friend the noticeable resemblance between Microsoft's products and a large pile of poo. Next morning his PC won't boot, Microsoft Technical Support have barred his number, and he has NOTHING. Some text-scanning robot has noted his opprobrious comment and applied an automatic procedure hidden in the software somewhere.

I said it was an extreme scenario. I don't think Gates would be allowed to get away with that kind of stunt (thougb I'm hard put to it to think who would stop him). But the old adage about eggs and baskets applies here. Diversity is good. Redundancy is better. Why have a dog and bark yourself, you might say? What happens when the dog gets laryngitis? So I am hoping that Mr Gates' golden future will keep its distance for a while longer, and while I shall continue to download things off the net, I don't consider I actually have them till I've got the shiny beermat in its pretty box on my shelf. If I can't see it and touch it, it could disappear at any moment. Besides, I'm a magpie. I like collecting things.

Thoughts?

Comments

[folkmew.livejournal.com]

Yeah, when we went on the road we got rid of a HELL of a lot of stuff. (and STILL had a large storage cube). I loved being on the road. I loved how easy it was to clean house (in a 35 foot RV worst case scenario I had the place spotless in 2 hours max). I loved feeling like "I owned my stuff, my stuff didn't own me" but still, I don't know that I could happily live my WHOLE life JUST in a trailer with no storage cube or docking house. I like too many stuff intensive hobbies like music, quilting (someday), painting, books books books...