The Bank of Finland is looking at ways of how to maintain the ability to pay in times of extreme crisis, for instance, when there is no electricity or internet. they aren't the only central bank looking to do the same in the area, as there is near total reliance on Mastercard and Visa for payments now, and the geopolitical situation is worsening. The irony is of course, is that while they have consistently reduced the amount people use cash through all kinds of ways, they are telling people to keep cash on hand in case of an emergency.
In many areas of daily life now, it is impossible to operate with cash and often, impossible to operate without an application. For instance, a lot of the carparks in Finland have numberplate readers and require an app to pay in order to get out of the lot. If for some reason the application or the phone isn't working, too bad. There are also a lot of businesses that will not accept cash, because it costs them more to do so now. Back in the day, it cost them to accept cards, but this has been reversed.
Pretty much all of our daily life is reliant on the communication infrastructure that makes it possible, with very little analogue remaining in the system at all. Most people don't fully appreciate how much this has changed in a very short time I think, because when everything works, it is far, far easier and more convenient. But when it doesn't work, society collapses. For instance, my daughter's bus card wasn't working the other day and I have told her to always keep cash on her, just in case this happens. However, the bus driver couldn't take cash - so he let her on for free. Now, extrapolate that out to a million people a day on buses, trains, and trams, and it creates quite the headache.
I remember back in the day working in retail in Australia, occasionally the EFTPOS system would go down, and we would have to get the card "clacker" out from under the desk and manually process credit cards. We couldn't take debit cards. This happened once during one of the busiest sale periods of the year, and it was absolute chaos, and many people left the store without their goods in frustration. But also understanding that it wasn't our fault either.
Our reliance on technology is pretty extreme these days, isn't it? For many of us (at least in developed and developing nations), our very livelihoods rely on having internet access, not to mention our hobbies and entertainment. If there was a hypothetical EMP that knocked out the internet for a few days, the world would very quickly descend into chaos, as people take advantage of the system being down, and perhaps just out of boredom. We would end up at each other's throats, because we had nothing else to do with our time.
These days, we have to encourage people to "switch off" from technology and have "technology detox" periods in their life to try and bring back some analogue living again, but it is a pretty small amount of people who regularly do this. I know that I am not one of them, because I will at least once a day write an article for Hive like this one, meaning I need digital equipment and internet access. And then, a lot of the other things I do in life like go to the gym, still require internet access and applications.
What is also interesting to note as a risk, is that while the technology brings us all of the information we could possibly need to us immediately, it is also probably the biggest source of risk for the information we receive. The propaganda machines of the 1930s would have killed to have this kind of gradation and access to people in their own homes, pushing whatever they want right into the brains of people who consume it as constant entertainment, not even caring as to the accuracy of what they are absorbing.
We might now have generations of "digital natives", but the thing with being culturally immersed is that it also comes with the blindness of the culture itself. Every culture is largely blind to itself and it is only when people from outside, "foreigners" who meet the differences from their own culture and highlight it. It is only when we step outside of the normal, that we see how strange the normal actually is.
Have you ever thought what your life might look like to a stranger who gets to silently observe your daily life? Would they be impressed, shocked, disappointed, disgusted? Would they want to copy you, be like you, or want to have nothing to do with you? Would you be their role model in the positive or the negative?
If we could all just take a step back from what we normally do, I think we would very quickly discover a lot of opportunities for us to make our lives better. Much of it would be low-hanging fruit, like scrolling mindlessly less, and spending a little more time with people we care about. I also think that we would discover things like being a little more analogue, a little more manual in our actions, makes us feel better about ourselves and the world around us. We would start to build ownership collateral in what we do, rather than be a constant renter reliant on the services of corporations.
It is not like the internet and the apps are going away, but as humans, we also have to work out what helps us be the best version of ourselves right now, and in the future now. We have to think about what actually has value in our lives, and not outsource our competitive advantages out of convenience.
Once a competitive advantage is outsourced, it becomes a liability.
What is yours?
Taraz
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Interestingly in United States cash is much preferable to cards or apps. There are two different prices for cash and cards for gas. Cash price being lower...
In terms of my competitive advantage, I think that's my wife. She helped me get a very difficult promotion to the architect, she helped me with a few hundred thousand dollars from her savings when I was short on the deal, she payed off our house that we live in by herself, she is running an impeccable household while starting a successful new business. And that is without mentioning all the other things she does...
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This is the way it used to be a long time ago in Australia, but not sure if it still is at all. In Finland, not sure if it has ever been!
That is awesome! I reckon this is the way relationships should work, where we help each other when needed, but most importantly, to be better than we are alone.
I remember working in retail when the system would go down and we had to use the old card copier as well. It was kind of a cool feeling sliding the bar across the copy paper even though it was such old school technology. I was talking to my friend the other day and I mentioned that I had been starting to grow my silver collection, partly because I think it is cool and partly because you just never know. He pointed out that if something like an EMP were to happen, lead would likely be far more valuable than silver. It was an interesting thought I had never considered before.
I don't know much about lead lining, but if you hit someone over the head with a lead pipe or a silver pipe, perhaps it doesn't matter which :D
That's true, but I think he was thinking more in terms of bullets. Having the lead to reload your own rounds would ensure you can continue hunting to provide protein and also protection when necessary. Which makes sense unless the EMP unleashes a horde of Werewolves.
We are in desperate need of alternatives for the digital systems that power our lives. This should be a priority, because things can happen that can knock out these systems for months. I can only imagine the staggering amount of losses in life and property if this happens. Actually those in positions of power night have a backup for this kind of situation, but won't make it available to the masses. Just as I'm sure they've got bunkers to hide out in, in the event of a nuclear apocalypse. To make sure we are perpetually dependent and they perpetually in control.
It would definitely thin out the herd quite a bit. Just imagine all the military failures.
Well, in my country we are in the age of stone. We just want accept cash, y we still doing resistance to use cards. But, al least we can pay by apps without Internet or electricity. So, age stone with advantage. 😂
I think in a global apocalypse with no electricity, most people just give up and die in the developed countries!
Here people says this is the only place machines will not reveal
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Oh, it might be quite a bit longer than that. At least in theory, an EMP could do significant damage to transformers. The big ones at power plants and substations would be particularly difficult to replace.
Oh yeah I know. Poorly phrased. I meant that within a couple days, we would resemble a post-apocalyptic wasteland, where Mad Max warlords rule.
It is kinda cazy to imagine that a small tech problem could cause a lot of trouble in our everyday lives. Perhaps, we should all think about having some cash available and looking into more old fashioned choices in our lives.
The problem with cash here is, many places don't take it and banks don't hold it.
Everything is digital these days. Our age demands this. Old, young, and even babies have been introduced to this world, and they must be. What would happen if the internet suddenly crashed globally? I think it would be beyond catastrophic. Sometimes, even when we can't use Google products, things don't go as planned. If the internet crashed suddenly, we'd be back in the Middle Ages. :) From a broader perspective, we'd experience a major crisis in every aspect of life. The internet is critical. We must develop alternatives to the internet or reduce its impact on our lives.
I don't think babies should have any digital contact until they are three or four at least. The brain is still developing cores skills and they aren't developed in front of a screen.
The trouble is, nothing else is as convenient.
Banks should be turned into cooperatives and all asset management corporations into collectives. Instead of vertical heirachies we need more horizontal stuff
Collectives are pretty popular in Finland, but they are still corporate entities at the crux.
It has to begin somewhere. Slowly we scale.
Collectives also ensure that folks getting paid get some darn rights instead of just low wage work.
With all that I have presented, if you also noticed that time is accelerating with the acceleration of technology, you will find the day passing quickly while you are immersed in technology and you will find that you have not done your goals and postponed tasks in a normal healthy life, and this continues day after day, unfortunately.
This is the issue - the internet as many use it, is just a way to suck time from the things that matter. It is an avoidance tool, not a development tool.
We have now entered the digital age. Where we are now completely online-based or application-dependent. Similarly, the banking sectors or financial sectors are becoming online-based, as a result of which they often accept online payments or payments instead of cash, as a result of which they get some additional benefits. However, the sad thing is that many financial institutions cannot work their applications properly and sometimes suspend their activities for various reasons. Although currently, moving with cash or always using cash has become risky. Especially in our country, it is very risky to go out on the streets with more cash. Another sad thing is that our country is not as online-based as the developed countries of the world. Although there are some mobile banking or financial institutions through which virtual payments are possible. But there are limitations in that case too. However, if all financial sectors provided this facility and other institutions accepted it, then people like us would have a lot of benefits.
It is a big problem there? I think it is changing everywhere, but in some places, even a small amount of money or anything of value carries a risk. We have created a pretty pathetic world.
In today's developed and developing in many developing countries, money has reduced the risk of keeping money. Payment facilities through online apps is comfortable with everything but the people who are embarrassed due to internet. It is a timely requirement to implement a manual transaction system in such cases.
I never imagined there would be such problems with electricity and internet over there. I thought it was just a problem in my country... You can't imagine how many of these difficulties occur here!
Your right, that bus example nails it. When cash and and manual backups vanish, one glitch turns into a city wide audit trail of favors and losses. In my day job I see it as control risk, once you hand the rails to a couple processors, you dont control failure paths, they do. My edge is boring consistency with reconciliations plus tiny offline habits like a small cash float and printed notes, it isnt sexy but it keeps me calm when stuff breaks :)
So very me x_x
only on the hobbies/entertainment part now after I accidentally career switched
Think more likely because the withdrawals would make at least some people very aggressive.
Well you know if you reeeeeeeeaaaalllllyyyyyyyyyy wanted to there's always C/Hand Written ;D