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What If The Internet Disappears?


tothemuseum

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Example:  The day after Christmas last week, power went out in a neighborhood that, among much else of importance, houses a large medical complex.  Power out.  Computers down.  Medical office shut down and could not see patients because "the computers are down".    As was patiently explained to this pre-internet numbskull:  "If we can't make an appointment for you, we can't see you."   Solution:  Whole office takes a week's vacation.  

 

So what is wrong with our medical personnel having a nice Christmas vacation?  You have a problem?  All right.  That's solvable in a next-door neighborhood with power.  But the topic involves the www (world wide web).  Now what?

 

It may all sound funny at first but it isn't.  Are we relying too much on something that is not as steady as we think/hope it is? What about the air planes and space ships that are flying around on computerized power?  Send astronauts to Mars?   Never say never.  Where is our backup?  Maybe my thoughts are too dark? 

 

May the power stay with us.

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I guess that suggests the people in charge need a good kick up the XMAS :)

 

A Plan involving people talking to each other, getting of their backsides to take messages might work a little slower, but could have kept the hospital working. 

 

Some folk seem to have forgotten how to talk to each other using old fashioned slower methods. Its sad to see families, and young couples out for a meal together glued to their mobile phones not speaking to each other. It might do them the world of good if the internet did go down, and they got to know each other. 

Or they just never learned how to use pencil/paper to keep records.  It's like they don't know how we did it and we don't know how they do it today.  I seldom see a medical office.  So, I am also learning a lot new.  Like doctors no longer stand in for each other.  Your doctor goes on vacation.  You wait until he gets back.   Computers go down, you wait until they come back up.  But, as you said, we no longer communicate.  We don't tell each other what we each need to know.   There really are a lot of things today's office employees cannot do without those computers. 

 

Which keeps getting me back to my question.  Are we relying too much on a system that can fail us at any moment?   Do we have any kind of stable backup if the whole internet goes down? 

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The problem is access to data, important databases are normally backed up. If the internet goes down, access to those databases from remote locations is interrupted. If the internet stays down then people need to get the data manually.

Too much centralization of data away from remote locations like filing cabinets, or local PC's with data bases leaves one open to interruptions in access to data. 

 

Control freaks or IT professionals like to centralize data so that they can be in control, when they are unable to communicate they will fail.  :shocked:

And if those people whose job it is to get to that data do not know how because those in control do not want them to know how?  Or, because those who should know do not really want to know how.  The more they know, the more required of them.   Too much education is being narrowed down to a tiny portion of a career field now.  No one gets a broad education any more.  They just zero in on a specific job skill and call it success.  Then they wonder why they eventually get bored with their jobs.  But, if they show an interest in learning more, those a step above them on the ladder feel threatened and start making life miserable for them.

 

None of which protects the www.  We are still stuck with the fact - do we have enough power to back up the internet and keep it operating?

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I think it will be a complete disaster)

 

My life will definitely be boring without it. 

Spoken like true young people!  As in, "young people these days..."

 

How long did humanity survive without electricity or indoor plumbing?  Life before the internet was a lot of fun, and we got along just fine.  We actually paid attention to the people around us and watched where we were going when walking or driving, and we could read maps and plot routes to where we wanted to go, and we got there by paying attention to landmarks and street signs.  People knew how to work with their hands and were pretty crafty at arriving at low tech solutions to problems.

 

I like to look at our old barn and admire the adze marks in the hand hewn beams and posts.  A lot of people don't even know how to use an adze any more, or even know what one is.

Edited by Farming guy
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