Originally published in East & West Magazine
June, 2010
Nothing is free. I get that. "Free" gift with purchase, "free” welcome cocktail at check in, "free" health care, "free" love, “free” wifi. It’s not free; it's built into the price. If it were really free they’d be losing money. When it comes to being wired I don’t care. Charge me for it. Just don’t talk to me about it.
Just as those kitschy American roadside motels touting “Free Cable TV” belie decades of signage neglect, so the ubiquitous “Free Wifi” signs, too, are starting to look quaint ... relics of an old and dying paradigm.
The digital divide is not just an economic gap between the technological haves and the have nots, but a divergence of thinking. Or, more accurately, a failure of divergent thinking. Many people are not getting on board with new technology and, by extension, the new ways of looking at and interacting with the world that are the inevitable consequence of so much change so quickly. They have chosen to ignore or even reject technology outright, oblivious to the fact that their failure to embrace the digital age can (and likely will) create some degree of adversity in their lives … and, more importantly, in mine.
Recently while checking in to hotel in Bali I asked the receptionist for their wifi password, as I always do. He informed me that they had (what I imagine they considered to be) a very high-tech, customized wifi system, complete with a branded sign-in page and scratch-off access cards available for sale for $1 per hour in 30 minute increments. I know what it costs to set up a small wireless network. It isn’t free, but it’s pretty close. In any case, it’s certainly not enough to bother me about on my vacation. Nickel-and-diming me over internet access when you already got a 5000% markup on those Peanut M&Ms is just tacky.
That was annoying enough, but I bit my tongue, paid for the card, scratched it off, logged on for 10 minutes, logged off and went to dinner. When I tried to log in again later the system rejected my code. I went again to the front desk to inquire. After a solid seven minutes we discovered that the problem was that I had logged off. Once you log off, you see, your code expires, no matter how much time is left on that card. For a split second I think I might have actually believed that Ashton Kutcher was about to jump out of a plant, pointing and laughing at me.
Needless to say I voiced my displeasure with their system in some detail.
The result? During my entire stay the hotel gave me as many access cards as I asked for - wait for it – free of charge. In the end the obstacle course they constructed ended up costing them, not me. I tried to explain to the manager that if he simply added an extra dollar to every room for every night’s stay that he could offset his internet access costs and possibly even make a little extra, and not a single guest would ever notice the difference, nor would they even care if they did. In addition, he would save all of the costs of printing cards, the hassle of collecting the money and IT management fees. Not to mention the added benefit of your guests not rolling their eyes at you in disgust as you make them jump hurdles for something they consider as ordinary and routine as flushing the toilet.
To this Balinese hotelier and his staff wifi is a western luxury item and another potential revenue channel to be exploited, but to his guests it is merely one of many expected amenities, like shampoo, or a door. It’s a part of their daily, and sometimes hourly, lives. Last month US News & World Report released a list of things that Americans say they cannot live without. The top three? Portable computers, high-speed internet access and smart phones. Education was fourth. Notice they didn’t just say “computers” or “internet access” or “phones”. We’re way past that. We not only expect these things, but we expect them to be light, fast and powerful. These are not aspirations anymore … these are the basics, the bare acceptable minimum. In a related story the same publication released a list of the top 21 things that Americans say they are willing to give up. The disposables, according to Americans, ranged from cable tv to a home phone (do people still have those?) to privacy to newspapers and magazines, health care and even comfort itself! What is absent from the list? Anything to do with getting and/or being online. We take being wired for granted, but for a large part of the world’s population it’s an exotic and unattainable oddity … just another foreign land that they will never have the opportunity to explore.
This digital disconnect does of course have bigger implications than my ability to access Facebook poolside. Information technology has the capacity to literally improve and save lives. Imagine the laborer in a developing country who toils in intense heat twelve hours a day for a few dollars. Now imagine him with even the most basic computer skills and he has suddenly moved into a much more comfortable life, with a bigger paycheck where he is surrounded by colleagues from whom he can learn new skills and share information. Learning builds on learning, success breeds success. In many parts of the developing world even a little knowledge can open doors to opportunities which may seem small to us, but to that man those few extra dollars a month represent a significant improvement in his quality of life.
But you can’t play the game if you don’t speak the language. And you’ll never learn the language if you don’t embrace the culture and begin to think in new ways.
King Chulalongkorn (Rama V), arguably Thailand’s most revered monarch (publically Thais will tell you that the current king is their favorite because they have to, and because he is a pretty great guy), was an insatiable and deliberate student of foreign cultures and traveled extensively to Europe and the British colonies in Asia to observe the habits, customs and methods of the west. He saw that big changes were happening and knew that Thailand had better change too if they were going to have any meaningful role in this new world. His relentless pursuit of political, social and educational reforms is largely credited for the modernization of Thailand in the nineteenth century, and for the fact that Thailand was never colonized by a western power (although Thais do now use a fork and spoon in lieu of chopsticks, thanks to him). He understood the inherent power of knowledge and of adopting new ideas and different ways of doing things. He was what we call an “early adopter”. He embraced the new and different. He immersed himself in learning. He understood that keeping up with the times was not just a fun hobby, but an existential imperative.
Unfortunately Rama V’s zeal for the culture of technology is not as pervasive today as some of us would like. From the taxi driver who instinctively turns on the car light to read my (illuminated) Blackberry screen, to the waitress hovering a precariously-overloaded tray of drinks over a customer’s laptop, to my sister’s boss asking her to “please forward that to my home email address", to my mother turning off her cell phone when she’s not talking on it, some people still interact with the new in old ways. Just a few short years ago a good friend of mine was trying to figure out the best way to get me some photos she had taken with a digital camera for a piece she was writing. Her proposed solution was to go to the local drug store and have them printed and mailed to me in New York, where I could then scan them for the website. Fortunately she’s pretty.
But I reserve my most intense scorn for those who understand and use technology but still, for whatever reasons, revert to old habits. Just flipping through the channels last night I caught a scene in some B movie in which someone was taking pictures with a digital camera which, of course, uses no film. But they dubbed in the sound of a motor drive to (I can only assume) get the point across that this was a professional photographer with a modern camera. And a modern professional camera (we are accustomed to believe) makes that iconic, sexy whirring noise. (No it doesn’t).
One of my favorite targets for ridicule in this category is the Backpacker iPod DJ. You know the guy: a scrawny, pierced European with dreadlocks and a tattoo in Sanskrit wearing $3 fisherman’s pants and a Red Bull tank top, standing smugly on stage behind a shiny new Macbook with the prerequisite oversize headphones pushed purposefully up against one ear. In the absence of actual turntables he tweaks dials, moves levers, pokes at flashing buttons and adjusts knobs with one hand while fist-pumping the sky with the other. Dude, we all know that song … we bought it from the same bootleg shop up the road that you did and it sounds exactly the same. Your little dog-and-pony show is a fraud. You’re not a DJ … you’re a Trustafarian with a laptop and a Peter Pan complex. Now press play and get off the stage.
I understand that some people are averse to change, especially radical change. Some people like to jump and some like to tiptoe to the edge and think about things a while. It’s all good. Anyway, watching people fumble and trip over technology can be very entertaining when it’s not hurting anyone or messing up my vacation. But when it comes to my attitude on being wired I defer to the King …
You can burn my house, steal my car, drink my liquor from an old fruit jar. Do anything that you want to do, but uh-uh, honey, lay off of my … internet.
It’s true that incorporating new technologies into our daily lives can sometimes be a challenge and a struggle. Not so with wifi. Not anymore. We’ve mastered it. It’s everywhere. Wifi is technological sausage. It’s easy to make, inexpensive and very satisfying … and I want it. But I don’t need to watch it being made. Just bring it to me hot and put it on my bill. And please don’t yap at me about “taking a vacation from the internet” and “relaxing”. This is relaxing, dammit! I don't want to be less wired. I want to be more wired ... but wirelessly.
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