http://www.guardian.co.uk/technology/2012/sep/09/jake-davis-anonymous-charged-bail
By Jake Davis
The Observer
8 September 2012
The last time I was allowed to access the internet was several moments
before the police came through my door in the Shetland Isles, over a
year ago. During the past 12 months I have pleaded guilty to computer
misuse under the banners of "Internet Feds", "Anonymous" and "LulzSec".
One of my co-defendants and I have also been indicted with the same
charge in the United States, where we may possibly be extradited, and if
found guilty I could face several decades in an American prison. Now I
am on conditional bail and have to wear an electronic tag around my
ankle. I'm forbidden from accessing the internet.
I'm often asked: what is life like without the net? It seems strange
that humans have evolved and adapted for thousands of years without this
simple connectivity, and now we in modern society struggle to comprehend
existence without it. In a word, life is serene. I now find myself
reading newspapers as though they weren't ancient scrolls; entering real
shops with real money in order to buy real products, and not wishing to
Photoshop a cosmic being of unspeakable horror into every possible
social situation. Nothing needs to be captioned or made into an
elaborate joke to impress a citizenry whose every emotion is represented
by a sequence of keystrokes.
Things are calmer, slower and at times, I'll admit, more dull. I do very
much miss the instant companionship of online life, the innocent
chatroom palaver, and the ease with which circles with similar interests
can be found. Of course, there are no search terms in real life -- one
actually has to search. However, there is something oddly endearing
about being disconnected from the digital horde.
It is not so much the sudden simplicity of daily life -- as you can
imagine, trivial tasks have been made much more difficult -- but the
feeling of being able to close my eyes without being bombarded with
flashing shapes or constant buzzing sounds, which had occurred
frequently since my early teens and could only be attributed to
perpetual computer marathons. Sleep is now tranquil and uninterrupted
and books seem far more interesting. The paranoia has certainly
vanished. I can only describe this sensation as the long-awaited renewal
of a previously diminished attention span.
[...]
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