The Desire for a Road Trip

The Desire for a Road Trip

Byrichard

Almost every time I get into the car I wish I was going on a road trip. I wish I was driving from point A to point B and that the drive would take hours, rather than minutes. As much as I hate “commuting” between point A and point B on a daily basis I love travelling from A to B as a journey. I love sitting for many hours in a car, thinking, looking at the landscape, remembering things, thinking of the future and more.

Not the Usual

It’s interesting, because I use the car twice a week, on normal weeks. To go shopping, and no other reason. I used to drive an hour or two to go for walks. Now I never do. I should, because the roads into and out of my village are very dangerous for pedestrians. The paradox is that if I get into the car to drive ten minutes to go for a walk, I become part of the problem, rather than the solution.

The Absurd commute

Most people drive to and from work, every single day, rather than taking the train, cycling, or other. I used to drive to work too, when I had a parking space. As soon as parking cost 30-40 CHF per day I got a half fare and took the train. The train journey saw me walking twenty minutes at full speed, rather than catching the bus, and then walking from the train station on the other end to the office. I hate waiting for buses, and being in crowded spaces. The walk is more pleasant.

If we made parkings cost 30-40 CHF per day for everyone, most people would leave their cars at homes and motorway traffic would be a fifth or less of what it is now. They want to expand the motorway from 2030 onwards, but that’s absurd. Reduce commuting by car and you don’t need bigger motorways.

The Road Trip

The drive is thirteen hours long. I set off at 0300 and hope to be at my destination by about 1600. For the first three or four hours I drive in the dark. I head towards Grenoble, and eventually I go towards Porte De Valence. That’s when the sun starts to ride. I then drive west towards the Franco-Spanish border. I cross it and refuel. My first stop in over 800 kilometres. I then drive towards Barcelona, hit that traffic, and then towards Valencia, and beyond, before arriving at my destination.

During the last three or four hours I find myself needing the toilet more often. I think it’s fatigue.

I snack along the way, especially when I feel that I am losing focus. It usually brings my focus back. I also found that when I’m in France I find it comfortable to drive at 120 kilometres per hour, rather than 130. I’m used to this speed. It is the speed limit in Switzerland and Spain, so it makes sense to drive at a speed that causes less fatigue.

That’s also why I set off at 3am. It’s early, but I find that it’s easier to drive towards Spain during daylight. I find that as soon as the sun sets I begin to feel more tired.

Paradoxically on the way back I often drive through the night, from Grenoble towards Geneva. When I’m heading home it matters less.

A Mental Break

In a normal year I might do this drive two to three times. I flee southwards to avoid Christmas fuss, but I might also drive again in April or so, to get “spring” or summer sooner.

Podcasts and Books

During the drive I listen to hours of podcasts and books. To some extent the drive is an opportunity to listen to books and podcasts while watching the landscape change. I listened to Harry Potter books, Louis L’amour books and more. It’s nice to have an opportunity to listen to books for hours in a row, without worrying about doing something more productive with one’s time.

It’s like my daily walks, but for longer, and sitting down. I managed to finish entire books in a single sitting.

And Finally

The most I’ve driven in Four days is 3600 kilometres. I drove to Tarbes and then Barcelona, and from Barcelona back to Tarbes and then to Geneva. By the end of the trip I was exhausted. This is much smaller, it’s 2600 kilometres with a few weeks in the middle to recover.

I could fly but a big part of the experience is the drive. There was a time when I was flying between England and Switzerland and it became boring. It felt like commuting, rather than fun. It’s more tiring to drive but the experience is more pleasant.

Almost every time I get into the car I wish I was going for a road trip. I finally have the opportunity to go for that road trip next week. It will give me new things to write about, and it will recharge me before coming back.

According to TomTom Go if I set off now the trip should take just 11 hours. In practice, because I drive at 120 in France it will take about twelve to thirteen hours. Part of me is impatient to set off but another part of me wants to finish what I’m working on. Within the next day or two I will have PhotoPrism and Audiobookshelf running off of a 4 TB hard drive, rather than an SD card and a 2TB drive and that setup will be a serious iteration, rather than experimental.

Thoughts On Decentralised Social Media
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Thoughts On Decentralised Social Media

Byrichard

The web was decentralised for a long time. The internet and social networks were designed around different niches. We had niches for people that did sports in the same area of Switzerland, that wanted to discuss a variety of topics, for music lovers and more. The change brought on by MySpace, Twitter, ICQ, Facebook and other projects is that it centralised all those communities so that everyone was in different communities, on three or four social networks.


That centralisation internationalised certain networks, like Twitter and Facebook, although with a heavy US bias. With the decline of Facebook, Instagram and Twitter the implosion of social networks that happened before is moving in the opposite direction. We are going from a centralised to a decentralised social network landscape.


The more I use Mastodon, the more I take long breaks from the “federation”. People are arguing, disagreeing, and in general trying to impose a vision, onto people, rather than seducing them, and encouraging them to think the same way.


I watched an episode of Northern Exposure that deals with racism, bias and prejudice that I appreciate. In the 90s cultural differences and other differences were a source of discussion, and existential questions. People would explore what they felt, and try to find a new way of seeing things, to make them more open minded. People would aknowledge how they felt, and see about changing their views and attitudes, through discussion.


Twitter is swinging to the Right, and there are adverts every fourth post so it has become less welcoming. Mastodon has another related problem. People are saying “if you don’t think this way then you can leave” and “everyone has to behave this way, rather than that way”. I go to social media to have pleasant conversations and interactions, not to be told what, and how to think.


What I want is not a Twitter, Facebook or Instagram replacement. I want to find a new social network, in person, that uses Signal, or another IM platform, to converse with a small network of friends. I am tired of the big social networks that lack social warmth. I want to find a new community of like-minded people. Not easy, when COVID denialism makes being social a risk.

Apple Reading Goals
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Apple Reading Goals

Byrichard

I am confused by Apple reading goals because they measure how many days you have reached your goal, as well as how much you read for the current day, but once today is yesterday it loses all of that information. It tells you that you have a. streak but you have no way of knowing anything else.


It would be nice to know how many hours you read per week, as well as how this has varied from one week to the next, from one month to the next, and from one season to the next. With this information you could see whether seasons and other factors affect how much you read. None of this matters, except that because it is tracked it is a shame not to keep that information available for users.


Apple Books has the same flaw as plenty of other Apple Apps. If you live in Switzerland it is assumed that you speak German, and because of this assumption it is hard to browse for English, and even French content. You are obliged to know what you want to find, instead of having the freedom to browse. Apple must lose a lot of business by forcing German language version of content, rather than looking at system settings and using the system default. We’re decades into regionalisation, and yet tech giants don’t cater to people who do not speak the majority language.


And Finally


I thought I was going to go for a walk today but didn’t. I walked to breakfast and back and then spent time standing, so when I saw that it was 1400 I thought that I should go for a walk but didn’t. This is unusual for me. Today has been a crap day. I didn’t get to focus on my goals as I wish I could have. Days like today frustrate me.

Bird Watching
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Bird Watching

Byrichard

Sometimes when you go for a walk you spend time watching birds. In the video below you see a flock of gulls flocking around a tractor as it prepares the field for a crop. You see hundred of gulls wait for the tractor to open up the ground and then they rush in to find some snacks. I think they’re happy with worms, insects and small rodents. Anyone that thinks that vegetarianism doesn’t result in hundreds of animal deaths is wrong. These birds love to explore behind tractors.


https://youtu.be/ILcwVNE0UCc
A tractor and Gulls


Rewriting Books For Political Correctness


As a child I read Roald Dahl and I enjoyed the books. These were some of the first books I read. Recently the English decided to re-write books. According to sources they replaced “boys and girls” with children, “mothers and fathers” with parents and more. They replaced words like “fat” and more. Someone thinks that fat is worse than enormous.


In the age of Brexit and more we should not be rewriting old books. We should have fought against ideas like Brexit, against ideas that are xenophobic in nature. We should also work to de-stigmatise topics and identities, rather than make them neutral, or neuter the conversation. Every one of us goes through life being teased or attacked for what we are.


A few years ago I read plenty of James Bond books and I found some passages and ideas questionable, but rather than request for changes to be made I thought, “plenty of people would hate to read these books today. I am certain that people would like to re-write James Bond books, but I see the language as historic artefact. I see it as a step back in time, a time capsule.


The aim shouldn’t be to change what was written decades or generations ago. We should ensure that modern values are instilled in human beings, rather than books. Remember, Brexit and related spreading of hate are the real issue. I don’t want to go further down this thread.


I think that society, rather than editing old books, should remember to teach people about history and context. I was disgusted to find that people I went to university with did not study 20th Century history. People who have not studied 20th century are vulnerable to make the same mistakes in the 21st Century. Look at Brexit, Trump, and the rise of the Far Right. Historical context would do a lot more to advance society, than rewriting old books, in the current social context. Brexit England does not represent 21st Century values. Brexit normalised xenophobia.


And Finally


A book is a book. If the ideas within are old fashioned or redundant we do not need to finish it. We can dump it and read something else. We can get through school without reading books in full. When I liked books I read them in their entirety, but when I tried to read Jane Austen I gave up. I struggled with Willian Faulkner. I enjoyed all Roald Dahl books as a child.

My Lack Of Interest In the Apple Watch Ultra

My Lack Of Interest In the Apple Watch Ultra

Byrichard

I see people are training for ultrarunning events, scuba diving and more with the Apple Watch Ulta, but I feel no interest in such a watch. The first reason for my lack of interest is that the watch is stupidly expensive for something that lasts just 30 hours on a single charge. I would expect a watch to last at least three or four weeks between charges, and at least a week with daily use. The Ultra does neither.


The second reason for my lack of interest is that Apple watches are fragile. They are not protected from being bashed or knocked when climbing or doing other things. I broke one screen. indoor climbing. With Suunto watches I climbed for years with barely a scratch.


The Third reason is that when you’re diving in cold waters you want a big, clear, easy to read display that is reliable. I trust Suunto to make reliable dive computers, but as a secondary device. My primary device was a Mares Icon HD. This is a large, clear, easy to read dive computer. This is from a few years ago. The point is that for cold water diving I want specialist gear by specialist device makers. It has to be trustworthy.


The fourth reason is that there are perfectly suitable devices for between 100-350 CHF. You don’t need to spend more on a watch than on a fragile device. I want something that tracks my daily walks, hikes, runs and bike rides, without worrying about it breaking. Cheap devices have plenty of functionality. I’d even toy with the idea of getting an Apple watch SE, because cheap watches last as long as expensive watches and some devices are bought for three or four years of use, not a lifetime.


The fifth reason is that a touch screen is often not useful when hiking, diving and more. You need buttons because you can navigate by memory, rather than by looking intently, and because with buttons you don’t need to take your gloves off to use the device.


The Final reason is that Apple watches are designed to make you want to swap them out every second or third year. If you buy the top of the range watch this year then next year or the year after you will want to swap it out, and then again after that. It’s better to buy a watch at a reasonable price, that does what you want, that will least three to four years. The Series four lasted four years. The Suunto Spartan lasted until the strap started to break and the battery started to decline. The Ambit three lasted for many many happy years of use.


If we were not in a pandemic, and if life was normal I’d be focused on doing a variety of sports, and I wouldn’t be so distracted by devices. I’d get the gear I need for the sports I want to do, and I’d do them. My desire to experiment with a variety of devices is due to the pandemic. In better times I would be focused on driving hundreds of kilometres a month, to do things. Not at the moment.


And Finally


I get pleasure from looking at the breadth and diversity of options. If I choose the cheaper options then if I play with them for a year or two, before moving on, then I do not feel wasteful. Three or four years ago I was tempted to get a cycling computer but resisted that urge because I don’t have the use case for it. I do love to cycle but sports watches do the same, and more. They are not dedicated to a single use.


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Twitter is Dead, Long Live Social Media

Byrichard

Le Roi est Mort, longue vie au Roi (article) is a popular phrase in French. It signifies that if the king died royalty would continue and he would quickly be succeeded. Social media has just entered a new age, I believe. Twitter, Facebook and other giants have grown too big, and algorithms have destroyed the sense of community. That an individual could buy Twitter, and affect it’s political leaning has affected people’s perception of Twitter.


People have reverted back to Facebook, moved on to Mastodon and more. People have reopened their eyes and are ready to try new social networks once again. This is a good situation to be in. According to one calculation Musk has valued each Twitter at 167 dollars. (If we assume 44 billion divided by 250 million).


The problem with social networks is that their value comes from two places. The first of these is the user community. Social networks have value because they have people coming back day after day for months of years, and conversing with each other. Instagram lost its value when it was bought by Facebook, ads were added, and influencers. rather than friends of friends appeared in timelines. A social network is about friendships. Instagram became a glossy magazine so I stopped using it.


Social networks are dependent on their users but they are also dependent on the programmers that are working on them. To set up a twitter clone on a small scale takes about two hours if you use the Laravel framework. I know, because that’s what I did twice this weekend. The challenge is in scaling up, and that’s why Twitter had teams of engineers working on various aspects of the platform. By scuttling the engineering teams Musk has removed the people with the skills and experience to prevent the website from collapsing under its own weight. When React or some other framework updates their code Twitter will struggle to keep up, and that’s when I expect it to collapse.


While Twitter fights for its survival other networks are grabbing the opportunity to grow. Mastadon is growing, Post.news is growing, Facebook might see some people reverting to their network.


The discussion has shifted from the Open Graph as Zuckerberg called it to ActivityPub. The current area of focus for many is to create a syndicated/federated network of networks where people communicate with each other across platforms and websites.


We used to transfer our contacts and other information from one platform to another when we joined a new network. Now the idea is to share that data between websites in real time. I look forward to a more diverse social media landscape. I look forward to a more resilient network of social networks, where one individual cannot buy an entire social network on a whim, and destroy it.


Those that agreed to sell Twitter now have billions in their pockets, but in the process they have allowed Twitter to be destroyed. Websites such as twitter should be turned into organisations, for encouraging thought and discussion on an international scale.


I don’t want to be part of Twitter now. I’m tired of social media. That’s why I am blogging again. I want to invest my “social” time into something constructive. The development of thoughts and ideas, through the writing of blog posts.

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The Year-Old Pandemic

Byrichard

Thanks to the incompetence of leadership during this pandemic Switzerland went from a low of 21 cases per day in June 2021 to a high of 3600 or more over Christmas. This is really a shame. For a short period up to the 21st of June Switzerland really looked as if it would end the pandemic.


On the 21st of June the government made a mistake. It reopened society. The rational was that the pandemic would soon end and that slowly we could return to life as normal. Within a week or two the number of new cases started to go up again, but rather than go a step back until the number went back down the government went ahead with the next diminishing of sanctions.


Over time, we could see the number of new cases climb and climb and I really expected to see a peak within two weeks from the 1st of August. It came about three to four weeks later and that’s close to when the second wave was declared. Bad decisions continued to be taken until it was decided that people should have their Christmas and new Year. Two weeks after all the Christmas shenanigans were over tightening came back, and instantly the number of new cases went down.


We’re now a year into the pandemic with little chance of the pandemic ending anytime soon.


As I see it the government has two possible avenues. The first is to vaccinate everyone, but the drawback is that you need vaccines to vaccinate people, so for now this idea is on hold. The second idea, and this was definitely possible in June, and is still being proved by New Zealand, is that you can end the pandemic with proper government directives.


Last week Switzerland finally got down to just 1000 cases per day, which is excellent news, and with a little effort it looks as if the pandemic could end sooner, rather than later. Unfortunately the government decided to reopen society yesterday, so we are now condemned to go through another wave of infections and the end has been blown away by bad policy.


One weakness during this pandemic is that lockdowns and restrictions have been pictures as political rather than scientific. As a result of this people are guided by their emotions rather than their rationality. This irrationality means that people fail to see that the sooner the pandemic ends, the sooner normal life returns.


The more often society reopens, the longer the pandemic will last, and the longer the pandemic lasts, the more businesses will go bankrupt. It makes sense to have a lockdown like we had this time last year, for the pandemic to end, so that life can resume.


There is another cost to the pandemic. Teenagers are unable to have a normal university experience. Add to this that around 36 percent of homes in Switzerland are one person and this is a theoretical 36 percent (I don’t know the actual number of people) who might have gone without a hug, a kiss or a handshake for almost a year by now.


In the 21st century plenty of people live alone, and when you live alone during a pandemic it implies that you do not see many people. In fact the only person you see during the day is the cashier, if you buy food.


Switzerland decided to close petrol stations on Sunday, and my habit of seeing one person in the physical world per day was lost. I sometimes go three to four days at a time without speaking to another human being.


This pandemic is teaching us to live in absolute solitude, for days at a time with no contact, and weeks, months or even seasons without even a handshake or hug.


I don’t watch normal television anymore. If a podcast has someone speaking about relationships I pause or stop listening. I avoid films. I avoid certain topics in podcasts. I listen to very little music.


We’re in a pandemic, and we live in solitude. Normal people think “the pandemic will take two years to resolve, and it isn’t that bad”, but to people in solitude it is that bad. Solitude is fine, as long as it is not made to feel like isolation, and that’s why I changed my media consumption habits. I went to be comfortable in solitude, not distressed in solitude.


With how people behave, and how the government behaves, we are in for a few more months at best. Maybe the summer of 2022 will be less lonely.

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Great Britain and the Fourth Estate

Byrichard

When I think of Great Britain I think of the BBC and I think of the Natural History Units. I also think of radio programs like In Our Time, From Our Own Correspondent and Hard Talk. I also think of BBC World and the quality of their news coverage. I mention these current affairs programs because I believe that the British provide quality content. They also inform, educate and entertain us. That is their purpose.

In a healthy media environment the media should inform and educate their audiences. They should provide us with the facts and context for everything they write about. They should provide us with neutral and unbiased information. Radio and Television broadcasters were held to this standard until recently. With Video on demand services increasing in number and with the number of channels made available through satellite broadcasting and digital audio broadcasting opinion has found its way on air. This made it easier for satellite and television broadcasting to share opinions rather than facts.

“I think people in this country,” declared Vote Leave’s Michael Gove, “have had enough of experts.” His fellow Brexiteers were quick to back him up. “There is only one expert that matters,” said Labour MP Gisela Stuart, also of Vote Leave, “and that’s you, the voter.” Nigel Farage, the leader of Ukip, suggested that many independent experts were actually in the pay of the Government or the EU. All three reminded voters of occasions when “the so-called experts” had made mistakes.

source: Michael Gove’s guide to Britain’s greatest enemy… the experts

The role of journalists and the Fourth Estate is to understand the questions that people are asking and to understand what information people need. In the case of BREXIT for example if the campaign focuses on Migration then the fourth estate should provide facts and information about migration. It should look at the push and pull factors. It should also look at the goals that the European Union has set itself and how those goals can either help reduce or encourage migration.

Newspapers and politicians should never say “I think that people in this country have had enough of experts”. The raison d’être of the Fourth estate, of newspapers, current affairs broadcasts and expert opinions is to provide people with facts so that when they go to vote they have all the facts.

BREXIT on one side of the Atlantic, and the rise of Trump on the other, show that the fourth estate has failed. It has failed to keep people informed and grounded in reality and it has failed to keep emotion out of the debate. The politics of emotion are being exploited and this is having a negative impact on how countries are run. Alastair Campbell spoke of this when live on ABC news Australia.

To illustrate the challenge faced by modern politicians watch how Obama has to pause and think as he responds to the question.

Newspapers such as The Sun, The Daily Mail and other newspapers can publish anything they want and people will believe it. The Sun said twice that the Queen endorsed Brexit and twice they were shown to be lying. In a post-fact media landscape the lies are easy to spread but very difficult to negate.

London, Ireland and Scotland were not subjected to the same propaganda machine and their vote reflects this. They voted Remain because they understood the implications of BREXIT and the benefits of Remain. Their familiarity with the topic made Remain so easy to justify that certain people said of my generation that we “should not take what we have for granted”. I would encourage the opposite, that a dismantling of the EU should be unthinkable.

The Fourth estate has failed to do its job and the British people will now suffer the consequences for months and years to come. The rest of Europe and the United States should do everything they can to encourage people to keep up to current affairs so that facts guide their decisions rather than rumours and emotions.