...for public internet access.
Couldn't help but notice on my recent trip the Japan that most of the touted 'internet cafes' were closed, and replaced by Wi-Fi instalments. The guide book - the latest one - was out of date in most cases. but only by a month or so.
Now, I know Wi-Fi is all bells and whistles etc. But frankly, its a royal pain in the ass. It has this air of increasing internet access, but it doesn't really. It increases private internet use in public - not public internet access. It's actually killing that stone dead.
Indeed, I'd say the internet hasn't been this inaccessible since about 1996. Welcome to the great leap backwards. That's the last time I remember a medium sized, cosmopolitan city like Kyoto having, say, one or two public internet places. So unless you're dragging your own terminal around with you (and let's face it laptops are not cheap), you're increasingly screwed.
I actually own one myself, but who wants to drag it around on a holiday? Not me. But am I still and email junkie? Of course I am.
But more broadly, wasn't there once some idea of public access to the www? The info superhighway? Global connectedness etc? Paying a modest buck and getting some tube-time as global citizen, on the cheap? Forget it. That idea's dead. And unlike telephones, the state never did have a stake in the technology, so there's not even a residual welfare-style system - as there is with public phones.
I doubt the global gulf between the wired and unwired has ever been greater.
8 comments:
Definitely agree: travelling around England, I've been having ths same experience. Have seen 2 internet cafes in over a week, but wifi everywhere...
yes, its shocking isn't it... Like the Dark Ages out there!
Incidentally, I really love your blog. Its the old Labour Historian in me (my PhD field).
I dont actually work in my field; bit hard to pay the rent etc! Moved on. But still love the 1890s.
Last time I travelled abroad I had the iBook with me and it was tops. Cracked it open just about anywhere and there were free, unprotected networks galore.
As a result, I didn't check to see if there were still internet cafés about, but I do recall using one or two in airports (including a Burger King at Kuala Lumpur airport that sported terminals... you had to buy a card at the counter. Embarrassing.)
So, yeah, you've got to haul the hardware around. But hell, newer model backpacks have a special padded pouch for laptops, and these days I reckon there'd be some folks who have a traveller -- probably an older model they don't mind getting stolen so they can claim on travel insurance.
All true, world of Yentl. But my laptop has (effectively) turned into the family desktop - so if it take with on a work trip, they go without. So, that means getting a 2nd. Which I will probably have to do, given recent experiences abroad. Im serious - you cannot get access otherwise.
The broader point remians of course - what about all the unwired. Only recently, they could maintain a hotmail account etc, without even owning a puter. I fear these days are gone.
So much for wi-fi being "progress", I guess
True enough. But consider the tangible benefits of taking your laptop on tour:
With a digital camera (standard these days, I'd venture) you can quickly download pics to your computer and e-mail them to friends, all from the comfort of a café or even hotel room. I did this many times, and it's great to have a dialogue with your mates while you're travelling. From an internet café it would be time-consuming and cumbersome at best, if possible at all.
Most internet cafés only have Gates-Machines with their poxy, virus-ridden, intelligence-insulting operating system fit only for dribbling poosers. By taking my Mac with me, I have a stout, logical, virus-proof OS on hand at all times.
Install 'Avernum 5' or similar and you've got hours of entertainment on hand while you wait for flights. Plus with iTunes you've got all your music, too.
As laptops get smaller and lighter, I personally look forward to taking one everywhere. Not much different to a mobile phone, I'd wager... and I don't have one of those.
If you're a mobile phone user, does it trouble you that phonebooths are disappearing also?
Well, as I said in the original post - the state once provided phones, and thus, continue to do so in a welfare-net style way (ie a bare minimum).
There's not even a bare minimum of terminals now for the laptop-less traveler's seeking internet. I only wish the public phone things was a genuine parallel - I would have had no trouble.
But again - that's not the point. There are plenty of people who will never afford one, who could, and did use internet when it was one buck for twenty minutes on someone else's terminal.
I see the end of those days (and they *are* over) as a regression to about 1996. Wi-fi has created a wired globalist, laptop-totin elite, and left the rest to rot.
"Wi-fi has created a wired globalist, laptop-totin elite, and left the rest to rot."
Agreed, but we shouldn't just focus on the upside. ;)
Meanwhile, check this out: a lightweight laptop specifically aimed at travellers and others "on the go".
http://eeepc.asus.com/global/product.htm
Waddiditellye?
Sadly, yes, Ill guess I will have to waste $500-$100 on getting a 2nd notebook - a mini. Extremely dull.
Been looking into it earlier this week: some HP and Dell options too. Mini-notebooks seem to be a burgeoning trade, no doubt a result of the wi-fi regression!
Post a Comment