[Rod_Cloutier]

I just bought my daughter a new cell phone today. As a Millennial, she was born near the turn of the Millennium (1998) and she has an unholy obsession with her cell phone. As far as I can see there was nothing wrong with her old cell phone which I bought her three years ago in 2012. It still works, you can call and text people, you can take pictures, play silly 'Flappy bird' games on it, it has a functioning camera and video player in it. Her new phone is an Iphone S6, which is about the same from what I can see, it does all the same things. The mall we were at had an astonishing 8 large stores devoted only to cell phones and cell service plans.

All of the Millennial's seem to be so narrowly focused on social media and their phones; the why of it is really baffling to me? What is the fuss about? Really, silly children's toys for the most part, that distract them away from real living, interacting with real things, and developing real relationships.

My boss recently told me that he tried to punish his 14 year old daughter by taking her phone away. She panicked, cried, even threatened suicide until he gave it back. I had a similar experience with my daughter when she was 15 two years ago.

With the arrival of peak oil, climate change, economic and financial collapse, ect, I think that with a certainty; that the millennial's will most certainly riot if the cell service or internet is off for more than a few days. To some extent it is a comfort, knowing that no matter how bad things may get, that the millennial generation will demand, to the point of utter psychotic riot, to have their cell phone and internet service kept up no matter what.


All of the internet censorship, the big brother is watching you meme, with NSA spying on everybody stuff is really just bunk. There is likely a million years of new content on social media with each passing week, even with the NSA computers scanning through all of the narcissistic selfies and snapchat updates, et al, what will they really find?

In my mid forties now, I feel fairly confident that they'll have some type of internet access for the balance of my life span, given the Millennial's position for this sort of thing. I'd feel sorry for the people who will be decorating lampposts if they try to pull the plug and censor or shut down the internet/ social media.

http://weknowmemes.com/2012/11/the-day- ... y-arrived/

[SeaGypsy]

My daughters are almost 5 & 6. Their mother is the opposite of a technophobe to the extent each is on their second tablet computer already & they are both up on the gizmos way more than I am. My 4 yo takes photos & stores them to show me mum doing stuff she's not supposed to. My 6 year old reads at grade 5-6 level with no special tutoring, a lot of which comes from self directed apps & games she finds & downloads I know nothing about.

Meanwhile, these two will put the screens away all day if there is anything else to do. Visitors, helping daddy carving, mum cooking etc, going out & about anywhere.

I'm seeing these younger millenials taking this stuff for granted, finding it very easy & not the big deal it was/is for those 10 years or so older.

[KaiserJeep]

I'm 64, a retired engineer that had a lot to do with many of the computers that sit quietly in the background of the Internet and count money. The phones and tablets and PCs that the consumer handles, and the web servers they talk to, are really just front ends for the database-of-record NonStop computer hidden somewhere, quietly counting money, never unavailable. I had a cell phone, in the '90's when they were analog and subject to fading and abrupt disconnects.

The problem was, my boss kept calling me and having me make decisions that he should have been making. So I gave the company back their cell phone, and did not ever replace it. I do carry around a 10" android tablet to read books on, and just about every place I go has wifi, so I check my E-mail if I'm in the mood, at least every couple of days.

I find that I am as connected as I wish to be. Having people with headsets clipped to their ear, talking and gesturing in public, is very rude is my belief. I do keep a burner phone in the Jeep for emergencies - but nobody knows the number, and it is turned off anyway, because I don't want people calling me, I don't want to call them, or tweet or twitter or anything else.

My daughter's former high school had to crack down, if you got caught talking or texting you got one warning. The second offense and you were forced to drop your phone into a machine that shredded it. Reportedly the other kids see it happen once, and believe in the penalty, and there is no more trouble. I imagine the shredder is traumatic for the kid who has to drop their phone in it, however.

[jedrider]

Millenials will DIE before they give up their cell phones. Problem solved.

[Outcast_Searcher]

I just bought my daughter a new cell phone today. As a Millennial, she was born near the turn of the Millennium (1998) and she has an unholy obsession with her cell phone. As far as I can see there was nothing wrong with her old cell phone which I bought her three years ago in 2012. It still works, you can call and text people, you can take pictures, play silly 'Flappy bird' games on it, it has a functioning camera and video player in it. Her new phone is an Iphone S6, which is about the same from what I can see, it does all the same things.

So, with respect, why are you enabling her? She's 17 years old -- about the age to go to college or get a job, or both.

Why don't you tell her if she wants a new, fancier, more expensive phone to replace her perfectly good phone, that she is free to buy one? With money SHE earns herself.

Parents not teaching kids values like hard work and the value of a dollar aren't doing them any favors.

[Rod_Cloutier]

Parents not teaching kids values like hard work and the value of a dollar aren't doing them any favors.

It was her X-mas gift of course.

(My main point here was that TPTB are unlikely to be able to shut down free speech and internet without a fight that they can't win)

[Sixstrings]

(My main point here was that TPTB are unlikely to be able to shut down free speech and internet without a fight that they can't win)

Yep, that's a good point.

I think.. it's more like. TBTB will *USE* social media as a tool to manage the population, more than ever shut it off. You're right, people would go bananas without their social media / cells / texting.

So why "shut it off?"

They can just censor it, instead. And control it, and use it to shape opinion and behavior. Like the "social credit report" idea in China.

And data collection -- a full citizen profile, down to their family photo album, their political views, and psychological profile gleaned by AI software in a supercomputer that looks at facebook profiles all day.

[SeaGypsy]

Did Orwell ever predict big brother knowing us at least as well as we know ourselves, better than we know our own family? I can't recall that prediction among specific projections by anyone, but that is where we are or almost are. Why would they switch off the most awesome tool at their disposal? Even with all the radical stuff going on, when you own the internet you employ or snuff whoever you will.

[Ibon]

Did Orwell ever predict big brother knowing us at least as well as we know ourselves, better than we know our own family? I can't recall that prediction among specific projections by anyone, but that is where we are or almost are. Why would they switch off the most awesome tool at their disposal? Even with all the radical stuff going on, when you own the internet you employ or snuff whoever you will.

I hire indigenous staff here. Some are permanent and some are temporary. A young man Jose was here awhile back. All smiles. We really liked him. After a couple months I offered him a permanent position. He had zero documentation, never had registered his existence here with the authorities. I went with him to the municipality and they explained the steps he had to take to become a known entity of the state. I paid him a small severance for his time with us and told him to take his time to get all his documentation.

He never came back.

[SeaGypsy]

Yeah its like that where our wives are from too, very close to Manila are Aeta & Igorot aboriginals pure Melanesian & zero papers or literacy. Us westies are the odd man out there. Also very easy to get internet capable devices without ID as a matter of course.

[KaiserJeep]

Speaking again as an engineer, I wonder how many of you understand what a cell phone has onboard nowadays.

First of all, it has an associated SIM (Subscriber Identification Module). This module is in a small card that many of you own and have probably swapped between phones. It is a unique SIN (subscriber identification number) and it associates you with your online user profile, something all internet users have, used to market stuff to you in personalized advertising. Burner phones also contain SIMs, and you would probably be shocked at how quickly and surely a new burner is associated with YOU the individual. This is a mobile technology extension of the combination of online user names and MAC addresses that have been tracking your online activities for 20+ years. Understand that our web habits and the devices that we use to connect to the web create a unique digital fingerprint (or footprint) that can be tracked. Logon to your usual haunts like PO.com and whatever, and the odds are about 50/50 that you have been identified by your 3rd online session (or go to 3 or more web pages, and you get ID'd in one session), and that new device added to the long list of computers, tablets, and phones that you have used since you first used the internet - and every userid and every word you ever typed in every web page and every E-mail system since your first message/text.

Secondly, modern phones all have onboard GPS modules, and these are all on and working all the time. Modern GPS "chips" are sophisticated hybrid circuits containing radio receivers and both analog and digital circuits, and they are both dirt cheap and incredibly effective - offering at least 20 db more receiver sensitivity than the old handheld GPS devices that used to lose lock when you entered a building. Nowadays I have seen modern GPS phones retain positions even in the L3 sub-basement of a steel-framed high-rise building. Most phones nowadays also contain SINS (inertial navigation platform) navigation functions (perhaps on the GPS module itself) which can continue to track your position and report your itinerary the next time you connect to a cell tower. "Turning off" the GPS feature on your phone does not disable the tracking function, it simply disables the public use of the location data with any app that you can buy. It does not mean that the phone company or any government agency with the proper subpoena cannot track your phone. Note that (this is a matter of public record in thousands of court cases) most private investigators "know somebody" who can track a phone with the GPS function turned off - or can do so themselves. Even if you spend a small fortune on a phone with the GPS module disabled (a violation of law in most places) they can still track you pretty darned well using the relative strength of your phone signal on 3 or more cell towers. (One of my former engineer colleagues and a personal friend developed these tracking algorithms, nominally for the use of "911" emergency services on older non-GPS phones, but in retrospect "not really".) Nor does removing the battery on your phone help - most have small onboard batteries on the printed circuit boards, allowing you to swap phone batteries and not drop the call. (AFAIK, removing BOTH the battery and SIM for 30+ minutes will disable the tracking, forcing your phone to take up to 7 minutes to recalculate your position next time powered on.)

The smartphones - and any "dumb" phone without full data capabilities but with texting functions - also have a range of unique MAC addresses that identify that particular phone. ("Oh, on this date/time, so-and-so swapped his SIM into her phone and made a call....")

It doesn't matter whether you are in your house or a cave in Afghanistan, make a call, logon to the web, or just move around inside the range of a cell tower, and they can track you and listen to your "encrypted" calls.

If it makes you feel any better, my tech company employer used to track all the employees using our transponder ID cards - and when Human Resources was looking for an excuse to fire somebody, his/her manager had access to the tracking data - included how many trips to the bathroom, the length of your stay, how many trips to the coffee machine and how long you gossipped, which meeting rooms you used and when, how many online minutes were private vs. company use, whether you were actually working while at home, etc.

Nor does it help much to run your browser in "incognito" mode - which adds a randomization of MAC addresses and other tracking functions, forcing the tracking algorithms to re-acquire you via your "footprint", often within minutes. Even the tablet I use, which has no GPS module or SIM, and is in fact "wifi only" can be tracked when I leave the wifi turned on, as I enter and leave various wifi zones (mostly, I leave wifi off so that the battery lasts longer for my main e-reader app). Privacy is an illusion today.

[PeakOiler]

I still don't own a smart phone or tablet. Just the PC and a laptop. That's enough for me. And then they complain about their cell phone/internet bills in the hundreds of dollars per month! Go figure...

I complain about my internet cost being over $60/month! LOL

Everyone in my family has a smartphone and they all consider me to be "unsociable" these days. I rarely get emails anymore from anyone either, including friends. I'm now an outcast...

I don't use Facebook or Twitter either. What am I missing?

Excuse me for not becoming one of the sheeple.

[onlooker]

(My main point here was that TPTB are unlikely to be able to shut down free speech and internet without a fight that they can't win)

Yep, that's a good point.

I think.. it's more like. TBTB will *USE* social media as a tool to manage the population, more than ever shut it off. You're right, people would go bananas without their social media / cells / texting.

So why "shut it off?"

They can just censor it, instead. And control it, and use it to shape opinion and behavior. Like the "social credit report" idea in China.

And data collection -- a full citizen profile, down to their family photo album, their political views, and psychological profile gleaned by AI software in a supercomputer that looks at facebook profiles all day.

Some great thoughts here. Yes the TPTB seem not intent on shutting down the Internet and are using it in the manner Six describes. However, in the end the Net is allowing the dissemination of information that I am sure the TPTB do not wish widely known and believed. It is raising consciousness to the common plight of all on this planet while shedding light to the common attributes of all governments that they are corrupt and are aligned with Big Business and the wealthy to maintain this dysfunctional system as long as possible. Besides most people nowdays know that they are being "monitored"

[Newfie]

"Resistance is futile."

Borg manifesto.

[Newfie]

I saw the Star Trek Borg episodes as a way of thinking about the conflicting desires we have to be a part of the Borg, always connected, vs. the Marlboro Man, lone tough individual.

Really quite a prescient bit of writing.

[PeakOiler]

"Resistance is futile."

Borg manifesto.

LOL!

I’ve been resisting buying each and every new electronic toy for years now but I suspect I will be FORCED to buy one eventually. For example, if my landline phone service is ever discontinued, I’ll be forced to buy a new device and be absorbed (even further) into the collective.

[Pops]

Socialise is what normal kids do. Texting about the latest news in their world is far better in my mind than holding up in the basement googling this and that and making plans for retribution.

Seems to me it is exactly the same as the desire of teens when I was a kid in the '70 to have a phone extension in their very own bedroom so they could do exactly the same thing.

But yeah, pretty sure it won't be just kids that object to "turning off parts of the internet" as some have suggested.

[Rod_Cloutier]

But yeah, pretty sure it won't be just kids that object to "turning off parts of the internet" as some have suggested

The thing is though, that the 'kids' are adults now, or nearly adults. They are the next generation beginning out on their own, with their own agenda.

Chris Martensen in his 'Crash course' series identified 10 major trends for the future, where the next 20 years will be completely unlike the last 20 years. Out of all of these trends which he has forecasted, which of course include peak oil and catastrophic climate change, he also has listed a demographic shift as the baby boomer generation retires.

https://youtu.be/gutQJMuDlBo

I see the 'Baby boomer retirement' demographic issue as the #1 driving force of world and daily events right now, it is simply a massive event unfolding. The Millennial generation is coming in as young adults, and I think things, and the social narrative are going to shift rapidly from this point forward, in new and in unexpected ways.

Hold onto your hats, rapid social change is just ahead!

[Newfie]

Gary,

Thanks for that summary. I sorta "know" all that you said, but could not have described it so concisely. Well done.

For all that these devices are incredibly useful. I've been using my iPad for navigation, I can buy a tablet with the nav software and charts (US) for well under $1,000. A dedicated chart plotter will cost me several thousand. There are other differences so it's not a direct comparison. But now my iPhone, which I'm honing to buy anyway, becomes a backup chart plotter, for under $100 additional investment. Backups are good.

[Pops]

I thought the post was about kids on phones and internet access, lol

Boomers quitting work, quitting buying, taking their money out of investments, selling the big house, expecting Soc Sec and medicare, etc, is a big deal.

Phones not so much I think.