Re: [Off-topic] Re: [Pan-users] Re: Advice on other lists

[Rob]

On Tuesday 25 August 2009 08:30 pm, Steven D'Aprano wrote:
> Technology enables people to mistake "nice to have" for "essential to
> have". Nobody worried about having to leave their music collection at
> home when they went out when music was on CDs, or albums, because it

People also went for days or weeks at a time with no phone service when I 
was a kid, and when my parents were kids, most people didn't have phones at 
all.  Now most people I know feel the need to have their phones with 
them at all times.  Those people who don't are referred to as, at best, 
"seniors", or more likely, "filthy hippies".  Sometimes both.

None of us *needs* to use a newsreader that can group and download multi-
gigabyte binaries, either.  None of us *needs* to be spending our time 
posting to its support group with navelgazing about how spoiled kids today 
are and why can't everyone just be satisfied with a PC and an mp3 player 
with 75% less storage than my 75-year-old stepdad carries on his keychain.  
Come to think of it, none of us *needs* Internet access or even 
electricity; we could all move to one of the less populated areas of the 
world and live out the rest of our lives doing subsistence farming.  

But, much like not having your music collection with you wherever you go, 
that would suck.  So you and I -- like most people -- do things we don't 
*need* to do, because they scratch some itch or satisfy some urge we have.  

Rob