How new is your phone? Do you use it for everything?
Do you use Alexa or other similar device?
Do you have smart home appliances and gadgets?
Do you have a late model automobile?
Do all your files live on the cloud?
How extensive is your online networking? Do you restrict what you say?
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And other such questions. I assume that we here are relatively advanced in our use.
Or are we? Maybe we know so much we don’t want to use all these devices. Take Alexa. We can know how many people use them, more or less. But how do we know how many could use them but choose not to? That would be me, for instance.
Since I brought it up, I will give an honest rendition of my own tech footprint.
I use an iPhone 5. That’s pretty old, but it still does the things I need it for and I like the smaller size. Next year Apple will stop supporting it so I will have to upgrade.
I use a 2013 MacBook Pro 15 inch. It has 16G RAM, 256G SSD and the ports I like: USB, HDMI and a card reader plus audio output. Works great still, best laptop I’ve had, and I have had a lot of laptops. But most of my software won’t run on a 64 bit operating system, so I have a reckoning coming up with this rig too. Too bad because it is such a great machine, even if the battery has that stupid glued-in to the keyboard design.
I do not have an Alexa or other smart listening device. The spyware aspect just puts me off. Plus I hardly ever ask people for help so don’t really have a need to tell a device to do things for me.
And I don’t have a smart doorbell or any cameras, or smart appliances. my step-daughter, who also works in high-tech, loves those devices that auto-set the room temp from your phone, adjusts the curtains and window blinds and all that other servant-style stuff.
I have a car. A couple of them actually. I live in California and we have to travel distances that don’t have good public transportation. We’re way behind Europe on such things and always have been I think. My wife drives a hybrid, but I have a 2000 Toyota that was low miles and cheap. When it wears out I will re-think my vehicle situation.
On airplanes I use noise-canceling headphones.
I like good audio and I love the cinema. My house has a cable-modem Internet connection, but not a TV subscription. I only do streaming or watch DVDs, which I sometimes buy at thrift stores. I play it all through a stereo system I have had for years that is mostly stuff I got on eBay and thrift stores. Great audio is easy to get for not much money if you know what to look for, don’t mind if units are bulkier and use wires. I still use CDs sometimes but have been phasing them out in favor of burned files on a hard drive. When I play them back I send them through a special DAC that bypasses the cheap soundcard on a laptop. When I ran a radio station I liked to hear things at the higher end of quality. So what I have sounds great.
I do some work in the cloud such as Google Docs for work, though would rather not have to, since I don’t trust Google. And I back up my own files on hard drives, with redundancy. MIl spec hard drives.
I admit that I use Facebook. Too many friends that I would not otherwise keep up with. But I wish there were better competitors. I have never liked the winner-take-all aspect of the Net.
I have a website, but it is kind of primitive. If that puts off corporate headhunters, then…good. Not interested. I do like using Zoom for meetings. I do a lot of audio editing and I often get them translated via a machine learning site. That is sophisticated stuff that works amazingly well.
I do not restrict what I say, but I try not to say untrue things or pick fights.
Hello John - here my comments.
- How new is your phone? - end 2019 (Android), replacing a four year old one (Windows) because support to App-based social media is phase out;
- Do you use it for everything? - no, screen & keyboards are far to small; the phone is too intrusive
- Do you use Alexa or other similar device? - no
- Do you have smart home appliances and gadgets? - nearly none, depending on what counts
- Do you have a late model automobile? - 3 years old, ready to purchase a E-car that reach local market this year
- Do all your files live on the cloud? - no, purposefully only partial synchronising across different machines; use of different clouds & local storage
- How extensive is your online networking? - hmmm; just pulling an 18-person co-authors group together for a book; I know ‘in vivo’ three co-authors and met two other once.
- Do you restrict what you say? - hmmm; I tune wording to media and expected (less-known) audience; my guide rule: What ever I would say to a friend being in a crowed bus I would say ‘online’.
Curious what you make up of the above.
best regards & happy 2020 
Martin
Looks like we have a similar approach. On an as-needed basis, more or less. Plus I don’t like to throw stuff away of it still works…I have a 2004 mac laptop that still works very well. I just use it as a music player pretty much now. Too bad; it has tremendous build quality. A real workhorse. But unsupported.
Anyone else? Don’t be shy…
How new is your phone? Do you use it for everything?
-2016- the only phone I bought for myself actually…all other phones were received from friends who upgraded 
Bought first I-phone ages ago, used it 4 days and returned it. As I later realised they made absolutely everything INCOMPATIBLE with anything else, I was very happy with that decision and never bought their products again.
I know they have good products, just didn’t like their philosophy and didn’t really feel any need for them.
Do you use Alexa or other similar device?
-nope and I am not planning to, too easy to spy on us already
Do you have smart home appliances and gadgets?
-none
Do you have a late model automobile?
-2009, quite economic for my needs (often on the road), it’s a cabriolet convertible but i might be changing soon to a utility car though (company needs)
Do all your files live on the cloud?
-only those I have to use often both on my home computer and laptop, I travel at least once per month so I need cloud
How extensive is your online networking? Do you restrict what you say?
-too big, i am on many online networks but it is a professional need…I would prefer reducing it greatly
-i never restrict what i say, the passive aggressive censorship these days drives me nuts…and it especially freaks me out that people just accept that they cannot speak of many subjects in countries like USA and UK and those were considered democratic countries with a lot of freedom. Nowadays if you go against narratives your video on youtube will directly be demonetised or your ability to generate income will be compromised in various other ways (in a hard capitalist society that is a threat to anyone’s physical integrity as well, you don’t always have to murder people).
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