more from notes from ref

Slow computers make fast software, 'High tech' solutions only make more problems

You don't need the superfluous computing to do simple tasks.

Devine goes on to share the story of how they spent a summer

- I think that even though the modern stack doesn't really work for us, it doesn't apply

22:36
- in the limitations that we have on the boat. We have 180 watts of solar, and we just spent the whole summer with 2 6-volt batteries,

22:45
- which is very small. And everyone, all the time, when you're going down that route–you know,

22:52
- like obviously, this two year sort of adventure into computing history–

22:59
- every turn, people are like, well, you should just put more solar panels, or, buy more batteries.

23:04
- That is such a modern way of solving your problem. But in reality,

23:10
- technology like this, especially like high tech stuff, rarely solves problems.

23:16
- It creates a lot of other problems. And on a sailboat it is very immediate. Putting more solar would mean more windage,

23:23
- more chance of things flying off and cutting our limbs off. More batteries would mean the boat would be heavier.

23:28
- It would stop us from being able to run away from storms. And the limited space of the boat gives us a space for creativity.

23:38
- Its limitation became a sort of playground for us.

23:44
- I am not a sort of programmer who could build Plan 9, or Oberon, or Lisp machines, ...

23:51
- But I know that I could write simple NES games, and port them around. Now my thinking was that, well–

23:59
- I can't write an NES game inside an NES game, and this is such a shame.
1

ref

100 Rabbits the talk

3:18
- you become a Photoshop illustrator. And suddenly, that skill that you thought you had was actually entirely owned by someone. And even though we've been paying for the software for years,

3:21
- the moment that you can't have access to validate, authenticate yourself, well, that skill is taken away, and this

3:27
- we didn't expect, and it really scared us.

···