Re: Gemini Digest, Vol 25, Issue 5

Dear jsreed5,

Thanks for the the great justifications.

Just to say, that the expectations inherent within a fully functioning 
government and its range* of monopolies/monosopolies COULD permit 
government services to be exclusively provided by Gemini.

For example, take Tally Sticks - Need to pay tax? Give me a piece of wood 
or go to the effin' dungeons boyo
=> https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tally_stick#Split_tally 
(https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tally_stick#Split_tally)

Your concern regarding government services are political, it CAN be 
possible for Gemini to service eGovernment services for reasons such as 
the digital divide, privacy et al. We just need our respective populations 
to work on the feasibility.

====================
Jonathan McHugh
indieterminacy@libre.brussels (mailto:indieterminacy@libre.brussels)

August 8, 2021 5:04 PM, "jsreed5" <jsreed5@protonmail.com 
(mailto:jsreed5@protonmail.com?to=%22jsreed5%22%20<jsreed5@protonmail.com>)> wrote:
On 06/08/2021 21:23, Pete D. wrote:
>
> I'm struggling to understand how a gemini client would help the girl on
> the 2nd hand PSP. There is literally no usecase there for gemini to have
> helped.? We could donate money to her local library to have a public PC
> or something. And if you are talking about infrastructure issues with
> that, well, the 2nd hand PSP connected, so that problem was solved a
> different way.

I agree that Gemini clients probably won't *need* to be created on old 
hardware anytime soon, if ever. Instead, I see such a pursuit as 
worthwhile for purposes of leisure and enjoyment, especially for people 
who can't afford newer hardware.

Today's Internet is dominated by Javascript, WebRTC, and many other 
frameworks that make sites too heavy to use on old hardware. On top of 
that are streaming services like Netflix and digital gaming services like 
Steam, who can arbitrarily decide that your particular system is no longer 
compatible with them even though it's physically powerful enough. The end 
result is that much of the part of the Internet people use "for fun" is no 
longer accessible.

In my experience, especially among people in my generation, that's why 
people throw out old technology--not because their smartphone can't still 
make calls or access their banking needs, but because Reddit or their 
favorite mobile game doesn't work on it anymore.

Gemini provides tons of interesting content that can't be found anywhere 
else, at least in aggregate, and I thoroughly enjoy simply browsing 
Geminispace to find interesting articles and services. As a low-power, 
low-bandwidth protocol, Gemini can easily run om old hardware. And since 
it already has a lot of users, there's already a lot of content to 
explore. Heck, there are already aggregators and services that pull 
content from the regular Web and serve it over Gemini.

This situation is one way I see users reducing e-waste. Much of the 
spending on extravagant, high-end computers in the first world is for 
gaming PCs and HTPCs: systems that are meant to entertain us. If we find 
enjoyment from simple, lightweight protocols like Gemini, and if those 
protocols run perfectly on the hardware we already own, we might not be so 
quick to buy the latest graphics cards and RAM sticks.

I think as far as entertaining content goes, Gemini could well serve as 
essentially a replacement for the Web on old hardware. No-one's going to 
be filling out an application for temporary housing on it, but if it 
allows people to still enjoy their old computers and smartphones, that's a 
good enough reaspn for me.

---

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