In digital minimalism I’m always like “could people in 1978 do this?” Could they send letters and place calls? Then it’s okay that I use the digital equivalent of that. Were they always reachable? Nope. So then it’s okay that I walk away from internet sometimes. Could they listen to headphones? Maybe not audio books on tape then outside of the home (no walkman yet), but certainly pocket radios. Could they read on the train? Yes, but, slow media like books and comics. No reco algos. Were there discussion forums? Yes, in magazines, you could write in, but a lot of it was hobby clubs or study circles in real life.
I chose 1978 not because it was a good time or people were happy. They weren’t. It was hard times but people were taking that seriously in a way that I appreciate. I chose it because while I was born two years later, in 1980, my mom’s magazine collection (which I have read and reread many times) start in 1978 so it’s the oldest history that I am thoroughly familiar with.
It’s not that bad of a date to choose because it’s before personal computers, before Internet, before the right-wing hegemony, and the death of democratic socialism and of collectivism, enduring the second (1979) oil crisis. The family had one TV (not that anything good was on) and one phone and it was meant to last you for years and years and years.
But I don’t always use that date; I sometimes daydream of how something would be done in the 1800s or in medieval times or late sixties or in the twenties (or even in fantasy books or retro science fiction like Earthsea or Way Station). With less info to go on outside of pop culture or historical depictions.
I’m only talking tech level here, not political values. Respect for human dignity has come a long way since then (and has a long way left to go).
Now, I don’t wanna overstate this “retro” rule of thumb. It’s not my only or even main approach to thinking about this stuff. It’s just one more tool in the minimalist’s mental toolbox. (Like how Francine Jay has her “Lightly” principle which I also try to keep in mind.) And I certainly don’t live up to the principle very well or thoroughly. I’m better at daydreaming about luddite stuff than actually living it out.
It’s just a thought that really appeals to me.
It gets a little complicated because I grew up rurally and then lived in a tiny fully walkable city during the modem era (I got my first modem when I moved) and then moved to a huge city coinciding with buying my first smartphone. So it’s not always just possible to just go back to how I used to do it.
As a child rurally I’d cut class and sit under a tree and sing or draw or read or wander the woods and backlots on bike or on foot.
In the small town I’d just visit my friends spontaneously, doorbell sans phone bell. (They didn’t live that close to me but pretty close to each other so if one wasn’t home another probably would be.) But also sometimes have day long phone convos. I got a huge extension cord for my land line (local calls had recently became unmetered in the early 00s; I wish they had been during the IRC era because that would’ve saved me a lot of money) and sometimes spend twelve hours on the phone hanging out with one person in our separate places. Modems and unmetered phone calls weren’t around in the seventies. In hindsight it probably would’ve just been better to actually meet up and spend the day together but I wasn’t doing this anti tech thing back then. I was late in getting cell phone but I had Walkman and Game Boy. I hated real life and did everything I could to dial up, dial out, zone out.
And then the big city I never got to experience how it was pre tech. It probably would have been an unbearably lonely existance for me (although I remember before getting my own place I’d often spend the entire day in the library). So it’s not just a simple matter of turning back the clock exactly. I guess that’s the difference between retro (which means “looking back from the present”) and the actual past as it was experienced then without hindsight.
I guess that’s why minimalism (as little as possible but no less) rather than digital nothingness which is more appealing but is something I’m nowhere near yet.
And why do this instead of adapting to using tech in a more healthy way? Rewinds don’t work and you can’t uninvent things. Yeah, this isn’t gonna work long-term but it’s a way to clear my mind and thoughts and try to gather inspiration to figure out a new way to tackle the problem. “When you’re in a bigger room, you might not know what to do. You might have to think of how you got started working in a little room.”