The Internet and other stories

It appears that unless we take up the position of resident hermit on a desert island we cannot escape the grasp of technology. Of course it’s not guaranteed that you’d escape it on the island. But it’s not all bad. Honestly!

Going back in my dim and distant past I remember the entrance of the computer age into my life. We head back to 1981 and Sir Clive Sinclar’s ZX81. A leap in home computing, that little black wedge with its one kilobyte of memory and black and white output through the television. I would get the magazines with programs in that you could enter line by line. It was all so exciting to make a square bounce around the screen or some other useful utility.

1982 came around and Sir Clive released the ZX Spectrum. What a machine! Soft foamy keys, more memory, colour output and games. We would plug in the cassette player to the machine and load the games. A ten to fifteen minute wait whilst the cassette player squealed away sending the program to the machine. The hours of fun playing Jet Set Willy, Manic Miner and Sabre Wulf – that my parents had. Yes, the discovered the joy of platform gaming. Waiting for your turn suddenly was taking much longer as there were more of us wanting to play. Still there were some upsides to this. We played a lot more music and escaped into the kitchen to watch the black and white portable television and drink coffee.

As the eighties trudged on, and thanks to a great couple of teachers, I was introduced to the RM380Z. Along came the BBC Model B, the first one at school I opened as I was terribly impatient. At the time my friend (and the person I still call my best friend after 35 years) was also interested in computers. From this we spent many, many hours working together writing programs, trying things out. Lunch times and after school we worked on the computers. It was a great time.

At home we had Ataris next (the 600 and 800XL) which we were still loading games slowly but at least they were starting to get a little better. Then I left home. After that it was a few more years before I purchased my first PC. There was plenty of working on them in the office but actually having one at home was great. Then came the first modem and dial up internet. I remember how slow it was, waiting for web pages to download as they appeared a little at a time.

Since then I’ve been through numerous desktops and laptops. Cobbled a few together out of old pieces and added upgrades, argued with technical support services, and reinstalled software more times than I can remember. I’m now sat at home surrounded by computers. My laptop, my work laptop, my desktop, the eldest’s desktop and even the television has its own computer for streaming video and playing music (and the odd game on the big screen).

Anyway, this is a long way of getting around to my point, if there is one. The internet. Over the last few years I’ve done more and more online. Through this I’ve met many, many new people. Some are total jerks and others are the best people you could wish to meet.

I have had forays into Second Life, spent a good few years in there. There I’ve heard musicians streaming across the ether, I’ve DJ’ed in virtual clubs, sharing music I enjoy and hope that others do too and generally spent many hours wandering about looking at creations limited only by the imagination. Here is where I also met a few fantastic people that I’m proud to call my friends (you know who you are). Without the internet we’d have gone along without ever realising we existed.

When we needed some advice about Captain Chaos we turned to the internet and I found the Downsyn forum. Here there are a lot of parents of children with Down Syndrome sharing their fears, thoughts and advice. We’ve seen a few heated discussions on there over the last few years but all in all it was a great place. Again I have new friends there that understand what we are going through because they have been there and done that. I’m pretty sure I’d be insane by now without the support they provided.

Recently I’ve played World of Warcraft as well. I know, I can hear the nerd jokes from here. But again I’ve made some friends I never would have. I currently play in a small group with a few locals, some Danes, Norwegians and Italians. But again, these are people that I’d never have met without the internet.

And there are blogs. I follow a few regularly and these let me into their lives. One of these is Jessica – better known as Black Belt Mama. I started following her because she was on the same path I was, training in Karate to gain a Black Belt. The path of course is never easy and Jessica has had her share of obstacles (I was knocked off my path due to a motorcycle vs truck incident and fibromyalgia syndrome). Just recently she has had a rough time and shared this on her blog. It’s at this point that the internet becomes frustrating as most of the time you can only share a few words by email when really you want to be able to call round on them and see what you can do to help out.

But, in general, this is what is good about the internet. The ability to meet people you would have never known. To see what others get up to in their life, the differences and the similarities, to share ideas and advice and maybe let people see that creative side. I don’t fancy living on that desert island playing the hermit. I’d much rather meet the new people, make the new friends and expand my own views and ideas.