Back in the day, someone who rode into the stretch of river where you had been panning gold for months and started digging rock for themselves was called a ‘claim-jumper’. Second only to horse thieves and bank robbers all of which deserved to be shot by the legal standards of the day. Fast forward a hundred years or so and it’s happening again in the digital world. To prevent my YouTube ‘name’ from being hijacked I’ve had to wade through the process of first understanding then enrolling into a service I have no plans to use. Loathe though I am to have any involvement whatsoever with a company owned by personal-data-sucking Facebook, I’m talking about Instagram.
It’s all the rage amongst the phone-typing zombies these days. Tiny screens and even smaller keyboards but it satisfies the digital generation’s ever shrinking attention span. Words? Who needs them these days when every hipster has a camera phone inextricably bonded to their hand it seems. I reluctantly own a mobile phone but have no subscription, ‘minutes’, or even a sim card and can count on one hand the number of times it’s left the dusty corner of the desk on which it resides most days. Or months. I only took it from my long-abandoned cell provider because they offered it free and I wanted a way to play audiobooks in the truck on long drives.
Here’s the catch with Instagram. You can’t actually add any new photos without first sending it through a mobile. Ridiculous considering the percentage of the population that isn’t slightly pre- or post-teen and addicted to social media. You can log on via a trusty computer to fiddle with things a bit but you’re in for a brick wall if you want to participate outside of an i-gizmo. I suspect it’s because both Apple and Android have torqued the data collection tools native to either operating system to their maximums thus making them increasingly profitable for the digital masters. There are genuinely interesting people on there (Alton Brown, Robert Llewellyn, et. al.) I wouldn’t mind “following” but damned if I’m going to carry a corporate tracker in my pocket 24×7 to do so. At least there won’t be any Spork imposters wandering the digital halls now that I’ve sorted out how to post my first (and likely last) photo on the blasted thing. I’ll likely tackle Twitter next for the same dysfunctional “one post and forget it” reasons to protect the Mr. Spork brand. Do I even have a brand? Closer to one of those hand-written sticky name tags they slap on you at conferences more likely.
In other digital hassles this week, my reliable corded Skype phone that has given me solid performance for more than a decade stopped working mysteriously. Did the logic circuits fry? Did a cord break? Nope. Skype (now Microsoft) simply decided they weren’t collecting enough data from customers like me using similar VoIP handsets and forced their paying customers to stop using perfectly good technology by turning off support for the devices. Worked fine one day then dead as a proverbial door nail the next. Certainly they blamed ‘improved customer service’ and ‘evolving technology’ but the fact of the matter is that they made thousands of completely functional devices into paperweights and landfill fodder with the flick of a corporate switch. Not enough back door advertising money coming in though that channel I suspect.
I was able to load the dreaded ‘app’ for Skype onto my disused mobile so I could place calls again – I use wi-fi signal from my own router when in the house – to serve out the remaining time on my pre-paid annual subscription. Needless to say, they won’t get any more cash from me after that runs out. Time to shop for another VoIP alternative I suppose.
At least my new internet service provider is working as intended. And for a fraction of the cost of the last guys. Literally a few pennies short of half price. With their reliability now confirmed I can perhaps make some headway on doing the live kitchen streaming sessions I’ve mentioned elsewhere. I wonder how many people would watch me make a gratin or fix a tea kettle? Can’t be much worse than the other garbage they pump out as reality television, eh?
Finally, it seems this site might be in for a visual change soon. The ‘theme’ I use (the collection of fonts, layout, etc.) has developed a few quirks and it appears the developer hasn’t been supporting it with answers for a while. I can’t blame him since he generously gives away this work but broken is still broken so don’t panic if in the near future everything looks a little different. It’s still me, still the same ramblings, just in a new electronic suit. Links to all my social media shortcomings can always be found behind the pretty little icons at the very bottom of any of these pages.
It’s been a technically frustrating week. I might go back to parchment, inkwells, and wax seals at this rate.
