The Charge of the Tech Brigade

Assumptions & Horrors Navigating A Modern World

In June 2024 I replaced my six year old mobile phone, having nursed it through about nine months having major charging issues. The battery though still charging very quickly, lost its power far quicker than before. Charging it became more problematic, frayed cables, new ones still not working; throwing up the questions, is the new cable a transfer only type OR is the issue with the C port? Yet, the C port still charged the unit and transferred data from it! In the end I had to put it down to simply old age. It got me thinking on how much I loathe the way things are today, and how stressful I find navigating the ever growing demands made by a never-ending changing high tech world. Technology can be wonderful when it works, but oh-boy, you are in trouble when it fails, ESPECIALLY if you can’t work your way through to a solution.

Just Going Out

Going out in general, and even more so going away from home for some time, brings a unique nightmare to mind. Before packing any of the usual stuff for a trip, I had to have my mobile, the original mobile charger AND a travel charger AND a charger for the travel one! Cables for each often did not have the same port to port configuration; USB mini or micro, port A or C? This scenario inspired the title for this blog.

I love going to the theatre, and long for the days when I trotted up to the local theatre booking office. Having studied the season’s shows, I had made my choices and had seat numbers in mind, as I know the theatre well. I would buy a job lot of tickets, they were printed off there and then, tickets went in a security box, dates went into a paper diary and the event was made sacrosanct. Now I have to physically and mentally psyche myself up to go online to consider booking anything.

Tickets for Entertainment/Travel

Online ordering is often a necessity, as theatre booking offices tend to only be open on show days for the hour before a performance (many open all day pre-Covid). If phone lines are available to help booking, they can come with a nasty costly sting in the tail, because they are never a short call, with the waiting in line and the protracted explanations of what you want. Assumption: Everyone has the means to book online, the computer and/or smart phone with appropriate apps, and a secure stable internet service. Result: Many of the older generation (and younger people) who are maybe less tech savvy and on limited income are frozen out.

Then what type of ticket do you have? Sent in the post, sent by email 24hours before the event, instant e-ticket attached to your booking confirmation to print at home? But some of us (me included) will have travelled at least 24 hours in advance of the event, so are not at home to print ticket off. I’ve seen the advice “oh get your hotel to print it off for you”, no way that will happen in a less pricey hotel. And even when I was at home, I had three tickets with different ways of accessing the bloody things, before I could even try to print anything. Feeling tearful and literally on the edge trying to achieve this feat of technological wizardry, is NOT FUN! Gives the whole process a nightmarish quality I’d prefer not to have. If you can’t manage to have a physical copy of your ticket, you rely on a mobile phone that is smart enough with its tech hardware and app software, to display the QR code for any ticket you have. Trying to ensure your phone has enough charge for the display to be readable is very stressful.

Theatre Membership

I had a major issue with my membership for over a year, which gave “no fee tickets” as one of the benefits. Although I was getting all the information of events by email, trying to book online ALWAYS added fees, regardless of what I tried to remedy the situation. I booked a couple of tickets for “must see” shows and choked down the injustice of the fees. Afterwards, I vowed not to buy any more until I had resolution. I went to my local theatre on an afternoon matinee day and made enquiries. The problem seemed to be my two email addresses, and only my lesser used one recognised my membership. The ticket desk changed the email information and put my new address in as well, and I managed to book several tickets (without fees) AND got paper tickets too (they were using up their stock). I was delighted, but when I tried a few days later, the “paying fees” problem had returned. I found a FAQ section online and began a laborious process of trying to find out what was going on. Eventually my membership account information was reset once more to my Gmail account (I couldn’t do this myself online). All was not well however, as I discovered at the paying end trying to purchase tickets for a London show.  My address had reverted back to the old one, which didn’t correlate to my payment card, so the process was denied. Cursing I had to navigate my way through the membership website, change my address (thankfully something I could do online) and restart the buying attempt again. And each individual show has a separate process, and after a few times it became grating on the nerves.

Public Transport

I don’t drive, so am reliant on using public transport. My bank cards don’t “bing” though I activated both of them correctly. My bank has no idea why this has happened, and I know of others who have had the same problem/bank reply. So it’s not just me. My fit-bit watch has a payment wallet option, which I’ve never used thank goodness. Since around October 23 my model suddenly and inexplicably started losing charge within a couple of hours rather than days, black screen, freezing etc. These issues have been reported worldwide, and many believe it’s a software glitch from an update. But the company refuse to say that’s the issue or offer any fix to the problem. Any advice I’ve seen, I’ve tried but the problem persists. Some people were given a free replacement as their watches were within the 2 year warranty (the expected lifetime of a Fit-bit watch apparently). Mine went wrong a couple of months before its second birthday, but I thought I’d just messed up the settings somehow and persevered. It was only around March this year I started searching online to see if others had the same problems. They did, and it seems the replacements went the same way too. I’m thoroughly fed up with my watch now, but it is obvious to me a similar model (I don’t think the one I have is being sold by Fit-bit anymore-telling!!!) or a more expensive type is worth it.

So between my elderly mobile phone, and my temperamental Fit-bit watch, I couldn’t rely on either to pay for bus tickets from a virtual wallet, or my phone to have enough charge at the end of the day to display the ticket for scanning. So it is a must for me to depend on having hard cash in coins (no change beyond a £5 note). But there are far fewer cash machines around to get hard cash, to buy something to have the change. The whole saga is enough to put you off going out at all, unless you know you can walk to your destination.

In conclusion to my rant (sorry folks this has built up over a LONG time), it feels like the global technology giants are deliberately engineering things, to ensure the general masses become totally reliant on their technology. For us all to be umbilically tethered   to our tech gadgets, because that’s the only way we can get a lot of things done these days. I also think it is a way the global technology machine and the powers behind them can monitor us, as an act of keeping the people under permanent surveillance. Otherwise, a dystopian nightmare!