I've been thinking about this more and more as I consider the idea of friction<\/i> — of resistance<\/i> — in my life, and how to eliminate it.<\/p>\n
To paraphrase and subvert the standard definition, technology<\/i><\/b> is the collective term for techniques, methods, and\/or processes that make an activity easier. Cooking has tech. Hunting has tech. Manufacturing, from machinery to millinery, has tech. Scientific investigation has tech.<\/p>\n
Basically, if it's something humans do, we've come up with tech that makes it easier<\/i> to do.<\/p>\n
Sometimes, we iterate on that tech endlessly (see: ways to kill each other), sometimes, we figure out the best option right away and leave it (see: the wheel and\/or lever).<\/p>\n
Sometimes – the majority of the time, probably – an attempted improvement to existing tech fails to make The Thing easier (whatever The Thing is). In those instances, the iteration is discarded or is itself iterated on until is does<\/b> improve The Thing.<\/p>\n
This is so obvious it seems silly to say; if you do a thing that makes the existing tech worse, that is failed tech. (Maybe not a failed attempt, if it teaches us something, but it is failed tech.)<\/p>\n
In short, good technology – functional technology – reduces friction: it makes the effort required for A Thing, less. If it doesn't do that, it is not technology.<\/p>\n
By this definition, DRM – Digital Rights Management – as it is implemented today by various media industries, is not<\/i><\/b> technology.<\/p>\n
It's not a failed iteration of technology; if DRM were completely successful in its purpose (it isn't), it still fails to meet the one criterion for technology: it does not reduce friction for whatever Thing it affects. In a perfect world (which, again, this isn't) it might theoretically achieve a state of adding no additional<\/i> friction, but it will never make friction less<\/i>.<\/p>\n
It is, in short, doing nothing but making things worse.<\/p>\n
Today, it makes it harder to get to your stuff. Tomorrow, that difficulty increases, and as time goes on, so does that difficulty, until we reach a point where The Thing no longer works<\/i> because of this anti-technology.<\/p>\n
Until we reach a point where we've lost years or decades of our culture because we let our<\/i><\/b> Things be locked in vaults we didn't control, to benefit people who only exist to sell keys.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
I've been thinking about this more and more as I consider the idea of friction — of resistance — in my life, and how to eliminate it. To paraphrase and subvert the standard definition, technology is the collective term for techniques, methods, and\/or processes that make an activity easier. Cooking has tech. Hunting has tech. … <\/p>\n