<h1>The Hidden Cost of Convenience: What We Lose When Technology Becomes Our Servant</h1>

VANITY | December 9, 2025 | CIB-173RDABN

[GingisK]

Between the two of us, we have both power and internet.

Useless when the Internet itself isn't powered.

[Tell It Right]

Useless when the Internet itself isn't powered.

I put that in the post. My Spectrum service (land internet) has gone down when the grid is down (I assume there are various relays needing power to get the service across miles of wire to my house). That's why my son-in-law brings his Starlink to my house. For that service to not be powered, Musk's ground source transmission to the satellites would have to lose power. I imagine he's got that backed up ten ways to Sunday.

It doesn't matter if it's the Spectrum modem or the Starlink modem that feeds into the parent node of my wifi mesh's parent node. Once that's supplied, the internet service seamlessly moves from there to my bridge, then from there down ethernet cables to the child nodes (the rest of my wifi mesh) throughout the house. All of our devices still connect to the same wi-fi name and use the internet as before. (Similar to an office network having a backup ISP and switching to it with none of the office workers knowing.)

The grid power was down long enough only one time for us to set up his Starlink here. So we've done it successfully. The other times we were happy with hotspotting from our phones (because the grid power came back up and restored my Spectrum service).

[GingisK]

Civilization collapse will render all of it null and void. That IS coming.

[GingisK]

I’ve been reading about “water mills”, tips and tricks for selecting a site and building them. My guess is that we’ll be needing them.

[Carry_Okie]

They wanted to charge me to reset the battery monitor module after I changed the 12 v battery after having "neglected" to put a backup battery on the board. Somebody saved money at the expense of the customer.

It's become a racket.

[Tell It Right]

I, too, looked into pico water turbines as well as pico wind turbines. The idea is to help during the four coldest months out of the year (cold for Alabama) that I can produce only about half of the power we need (less sunshine overall, power consumption shifted to night to run the electric furnace). That is, without curbing our lifestyle (i.e. getting in the hot tub as much as we want, charging the EV and driving it as much as we want, and keeping the house temp what we want in our 2,600 sq ft home). But we don't get enough rain to have enough flow in our ravine at the back of our property to power a water turbine. Same for not having enough wind to power a wind turbine.

I'll just be happy with $65/month avg power bill (no natural gas bill, almost no gasoline expense). You seem to be preparing for an apocalypse. I don't blame you. I'm more concerned with a slow-burning frog type of control from the left. Instead of blatantly violent persecution of Christians, I'd put more money on something like jizya taxing (i.e. higher rates for power and gas, with power not working all day in areas like the Bible belt that doesn't vote Dim, much like other tyrannical leaders do in their countries by punishing some areas with power that works only a few hours per day).

In the past 12 months we had to pull from the grid only 20% of the power we consume. If the left tries to make power too expensive to use a lot of, their warmageddon cult energy polices will impact us only 1/5th as much. That includes not just the energy for our house, but also the energy to run our EV (1,500 miles/month of home charged miles for local driving). And if the left makes power unavailable at all (in the 4 winter months I need the grid), we have our gas pickup. If the left makes gasoline too expensive or hard to come by, we have the EV.

[GingisK]

Oh, I see. You are looking into your personnel needs following The Crash. I more into the restoration of the entire industrial economy. ;-D

Here is where I'd start:

Or maybe:

[Carry_Okie]

Civilizations do not collapse because they become weak. They collapse because they become complex

That's not what the history says. Joseph Daniel Unwin published that data in 1934. His findings were that empires collapse within three generations after they blow off female prenuptial chastity.

Every one. Aldous Huxley called it the most important research of the 20th Century. If families cannot raise children to build upon their forebears, it's done.

[GingisK]

I'm not sure why you posted that to me since the text in italics isn't anything I've said or repeated. But, I am very fond of discussing this topic.

A fall in birthrate below 2 children per couple does indeed mark the beginning of the end. This reduction seems to be the result of divergent causes. Universal mistrust in the government is a symptom of collapse, caused by incompetence withing the government, poor regard for the judiciary, and so on. It also stems from lack of an appropriate education.

Mass immigration occurs to fill the vacuum of declining birth rates, usually accompanied by replacement of the society. Those who swell into our Nation are not really capable of sustaining a technological society. Worse yet, this is happening all about Western Civilization and even the Orient.

We're in a dying civilization.

Check THIS out. The link goes to one of many scholarly articles regarding civilization collapse.

[GingisK]

DEI is central to the collapse of civilization. Ensuring rule by the mentally ill is not a plan for long term survival.

[Carry_Okie]

DEI is central to the collapse of civilization. Ensuring rule by the mentally ill is not a plan for long term survival.

DEI is nothing new. It was brought to this country in 1933 as funded by the richest people in the world. Stop treating symptoms as causes.

[GingisK]

Stop treating symptoms as causes.

You are mistaken. DEI is a cause, but not the only cause.

[Carry_Okie]

You are mistaken. DEI is a cause, but not the only cause.

Symptoms can act as causes without being at root. Pain is a symptom, but your musculoskeletal system will react to it, then acting as a cause of secondary problems with their own symptoms. DEI is a symptom. Hell, I was familiar with its tenets back in Berkeley 40 years ago as extensions of Critical Theory. Yet the latter was not in this country until it was imported wholesale in the Institute for Social Research (aka Frankfurt School) and then implanted largely at Teachers College at Columbia in 1933.

[GingisK]

In any case, we’re screwed! ;-D

[Theo]

Thanks.

I work with AI every day, all day. I use it as an assistant when I code, and for other things. I use it more than Google, for all kinds of things. It’s part of my daily routine.

That said, AI sucks at: making images, making videos, making articles. It gets “good enough,” but people who use AI every day know that it’s soul-less, and that often those who use it to create content are lazy. Oh, and the “uncanny valley” is just creepy.

Of course you’re free to continue relying on AI to create content.

[grey_whiskers]

Thunderous applause.

[grey_whiskers]

Every one. Aldous Huxley called it the most important research of the 20th Century.

Aldous Huxley??!! Wow.