wireless and fast
As a kind of Christmas treat I now have fast internet delivered wirelessly to all parts of the house.
At present I’m sitting here blogging; simultaneously enjoying a glass of wine while we watch our videoed copy of the last episode of Angels in America. And the moment seems very civilised. There’s something quite transforming in the way you use the internet when you can wander over to the iBook, lift the lid, and start surfing.
And there is one other benefit. Before I had to sit in the other room tethered to the phone socket for dialup internet, totally ignoring Becky for hours on end in the evenings. Now, I can sit in the lounge with her, totally ignoring her for hours on end. That must count for an improvement of sorts.
Patrick Quinn-Graham
18 December 2004, 19:19 #
The move to wireless for me was a great one – it too was with my (then G3) iBook. I’d already had always on internet (first adsl, then cable) for quite some time (delivered with a cat5 cable that went to places I wanted to be), but the move to wireless means I walk in the door (or not, perhaps sitting outside) and just pull open the lid and it’s there. In a way it transformed the way I use the internet.
Alan
18 December 2004, 20:16 #
Exactly. What it does is make the internet into just another utility like water and electricity – ubiquitous throughout our living space and always on.
What it doesn’t do is make me less of a geek introvert. But the time of such miracles is past.
Gryfon
20 December 2004, 15:53 #
In a few years we’ll look back on this conversation as fondly as we now look back on the times when we three were among the early adopters of 56K dialup.
Ubiquity and platform independence are two pivotal strategies that have the potential to dramatically change [developed] society. And we’re just as much in the dark now as we were then over what exactly those changes will be and what impact they’ll have.
Who could have predicted the uses to which cellphone are now put, with cameras and now even movies and sound capability?
Patrick Quinn-Graham
20 December 2004, 16:26 #
That’s the one problem with the internet – it’s not yet ubiquitous enough. I have this wonderful connection here, but then I go to Auckland and it’s (back to dialup | horrible).
Being able to pick up my phone and do quick lookups is quite an enticing one – with it and bluetooth the internet (albeit at a snails pace) is always there.
I’ve always been a tad of a geek, not to mention introverted (who’d have guessed?), Wireless didn’t really change that, except now I intovertedly geek around other people, instead of in another room :)