Admissions of an electronic hoarder

According to yesterday's news, UNESCO designates 2019 as the International Year of the Periodic Table of Elements. It's 150 years since Russian scientist Dimitri Mendeleev discovered the  essential relationship between the natural elements, and mapped this systematically. On the back of this, there was a feature about the need to re-cycle redundant electronic goods to recover their rare earth component elements, as all digital devices make use of some of these. As earth's supply of the essentials is finite, there's a risk of industry running out of them. Scarcity ensures price rises, and competition to control remaining un-mined resources. Indeed, the persistent chronic state of war in the Congo is due to the territory being rich in strategic minerals.

This prodded me into discovering a company in Newport Road called SFX Tech which re-purposes usable computers and recycles the components in the rest, and arranged to deliver all this kit there tomorrow. The next thing was to find and sort kit I no longer use, which I've kept over the years 'just in case'. Thanks to Linux, much of my old kit works when fired up, even if it's too slow and outdated to be of use for the majority of today's purposes. I retrieved three laptops, one from 1998, one to 2004 and one to 2009, also three old Nokia phones, two modems, and a couple of personal digital organisers,  and a Nexus tablet, with broken USB port, now unchargeable, plus a variet of chargers and cables, British and European. Prior to the 1998 laptop, I had two others. A luggable PC I sold in 1991, to part fund the purchase of my first real laptop in 1992. This I finally got rid of in 2010.

I bought my first Amstrad computer in 1984, the first of four. Then there were four Windows desktop PCs as well, all disposed over the years as more capable kit became affordable. I wasn't an early tech adopter, waiting until newish kit was available at a discount, watching the retail market regularly. I guess I was never as attached to these devices as I was to the portable ones, having held on to the latter so long. I enjoyed having kit I could take with me on my travels, and the selection of wireless network plug-in cards and dongles added into the throwaway bag bears witness to this. 

All this changed when affordable smartphones came on the market. It's amazing to think how much more powerful and capable these are than all previous mobile devices. I think I've passed on a couple of smartphones after upgrading, but there are two spares in the house 'just in case'. I still have my work Blackberry and my personal Samsung Galaxy. Once CBS is wound up, I'll be down to one phone for the first time in seven years.

Well, there's less electronic junk taking up space in the house now, and more to go eventually, as the process of simplifying life advances with age. Having seen what trouble was caused after his demise due to my brother in law Geoff's accumulation of 'interesting stuff' acquired from decades of car boot sales, I'd feel better if I could minimise what remains of my acquisitions to 'really useful up to date stuff' once I'm headed for the Pearly Gates. 

  

  

Recollection in Bristol

Another visit to St German's this morning to sing the Solemn Mass. Nice to have a late relaxed start to my Sunday. I was asked if I'd be willing to cover more regular duties during Fr Dean's absence, and said yes for three of the four Sundays of the coming month. October Sundays are already fully booked, though nothing beyond that so far.

We drove over to Bristol to see Amanda and James after lunch, and Owain came and joined us, which was delighful. He told us all about his visit to Bristolian artist Banksy's Dismaland Bemusement Park in Weston super Mare, and showed us photos he'd taken on his 'phone. He said how much he'd laughed, how much it made him think, with its hard-hitting satirical social critique of modern consumer society, ruthlessly mocking the fantasy escapist ethos of Disneyworld, and reminding the audience of the many horrors of injustice and violence which mar the contemporary world. 

We also reminisced about life in St Agnes Vicarage when Amanda came to live with us, Owain was a toddler, thirty five years ago and there were aspects of life in the St Paul's area that had some of the bemusing characteristics of Banksy's Dismaland. We drove him back to his place in Redfield on our way home, passing through the edge of St Paul's, down Ashley Hill. Superficially, it all looks less run down now than it did in those days, but looks can deceive, Owain suggested. 

It's thirty three years since we left the St Paul's area, for me to do the career break R.E. teacher training course, which made an adult educator of me, rather than a schoolmaster. Two years later, I bought my first home computer, and a decade before the internet became public property, slowly found my way into understanding the coming digital era and what it meant for society as well as science. 

Sixteen years earlier, as an undergraduate researching data to back my final year Chemistry project in Bristol University, I awakened to the important potential of the development of Information Science, then in its infancy, and the use of computers as its tools. The data processing mainframe computers of those days filled a large room, yet my Amstrad CPC 464 in 1984 was just as powerful, if not more so. How much further have computers and information technology come in the thirty years since then, and the world is such a different place due to what can now be achieved for better or worse through data processing of every kind.