My table at Biblocafe in Glasgow, ScotlandI'm in the U.K. and eager to post related to my adventures here. I have a video for Manchester which I will post ASAP.
I have promised posts on Northern Colorado and Arizona also, so I will be folding those in as I journey North and East in Scotland.
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One challenge I have had in the U.K. is that laptop culture, specifically ubiquitous free Wi-Fi, is a hard sell.
Most people do not want people with computers hanging around their business all day! Don't they have jobs!?
Never mind that simply owning a computer winks to business owners your disposable income level and your education: loiterin' is loiterin'...
Alternatively, desiring Wi-Fi indicates you have deep pockets. So the Bed and Breakfast would like 1/2 the price of a room in exchange for 24 hours of internet access, thank you.
Also, once a Wi-Fi network is "down" do not expect it to be back up any time soon.
An inquiry for when service will be reestablished is met with many people asking other people for guidance and all ultimately returning blank stares.
No one seems to know anyone who dares to turn a modem on and off, is handy with a server, nor do they intend to call a service.
I was listening to the television the other day and heard an ad I thought directed toward an unusually technophobic market, about how "technology gets in the way" of actual living. Surprisingly, it was the Apple advertisement for iPad 2.
Since the iPad will sell briskly here as elsewhere, it struck me that Apple wasn't advertising to technophobes, they are attempting to normalize the product for non-users.
Will handheld electronic owners be emboldened to use their tools in public if non-owners feel they can't still approach their friend in a cafe or on a park bench? If non-owners see a tool for communication and efficiency or a dangerous toy for private advantage?
This issue is resolved by sustained public activity in the United States. Everyone in the coffee shop has a laptop, everyone is online, and everyone is interacting.
Your Mom has a laptop and an e-reader and a smartphone. So does your nephew or niece. Parents go through their children's text messages at the end of the day. Sometimes you sleep with your e-tools or at least keep them by the bed. A couples sits at the same table IMing one another about a distruptive patron or a mutually attractive one.
Blogs, vlogs and social networks don't constitute a new public space so much as they extend the old space (with some growing pains.)
I've been grilled by a few people, starting at customs, about what it means to be identified in part by my internet use.
- What does it mean that I am a "travel blogger."
- Delta Magnet is "a very unusual name" to go by online.
- I will be meeting people I have never met except for on social networks!? (alarm sounds)
"How do you know this man is the right sort of people?" I was challenged by a friend. Just because a man works for the Scottish Tourism Bureau and wants to be my Facebook friend doesn't mean anything, especially if one's true friends you know don't have any connection to him or know the pub you both plan on patronizing!
Fortunately, there have been great partings in the clouds.
I am seated presently in the wonderful Biblocafe across the street from Glasgow's Burbank Bowling lawn. To the east is a pocket park where a quartet of woolly picnicers are lounging in second-hand clothes. The barrista is carrying espressos to their encampment in ceramic mugs.
The Wi-Fi signal here is as strong as the brew. The venue doubles as a used-book store and creative gathering place if you need further inspiration.
At the hostels, the sheer volume of young people visiting from elsewhere make Wi-Fi, for calls and posting photos, an essential.
Elsewhere, I met a wonderful fellow traveler from Brighton who is keen to put me up for a night or two should I choose to cover the South! And I have been assured of e-continuity by my hosts in Strathyre and Edinburgh.
I am breathing a contented sigh of e-relief!
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