You not being able to read 1984 because of DRM isn’t ironic.
But you not able to read the book, because of DRM, and then invoking some preconceived notion about 1984, to claim irony. About a book you can’t read. That is ironic. And you won’t know just how ironic until you read the book.
Having read it a long time ago I was having a hard time figuring out what’s ironic about it, thanks for confirming I’m not forgetting something from the book.
I think OP was saying that a book that basically tells you to deny Big Brother, fuck the system, and think for yourself is being protected behind the system, in this case DRM
That’s just my guess, though. Haven’t honestly read 1984 since college
I might be wrong but isn’t a concern about DRM that it locks you into a specific ecosystem, which can spy on you? Sure, it’s not government surveillance, but I think that it’s still ironic.
Government surveillance is only what the zeitgeist has turned 1984 into. It isn’t really the focus of the book. Sure, it’s there, but it isn’t the largest thing. The thing is, it’s much better for the media to tell you that it’s just about government surveillance rather than you actually learning what it’s about, which is really also more what it’s about. Now that’s irony.
Employers do have the ability to tell that you are logging in from another location outside of your home. People who take extended vacations while working run the risk of tax issues and being fired. It’s happened where I work.
Look at Mr. Moneybags over here able to afford McDonalds. I stopped by for a McChicken the other day for the first time in a few years and it was over $3. It was $1 last time I was there.
I know I’m getting old, because I remember when $9 would buy an absolute feast at fast food. It feels like the price has skyrocketed far beyond inflation.
I’m not trying to rain on your parade tho. If you’re willing to pay that much and it makes you happy, then all the more power to you. We all deserve to treat ourselves from time to time.
It’s a good story in my opinion. It’s not exciting and it doesn’t follow common story structure >!the main character just reverts to where he started, for example!<, but it’s worth a read. It’s not particularly long, and it’s still culturally relevant.
Like a lot of older books, it doesn’t quite give you that dopamine hit you get from today’s media. It’s a product of its time in that way.
But in other ways, it’s a timeless classic. I was rewatching the vice documentaries where they visit North Korea and I was absolutely blown away by the parallels between the DPRK and 1984.
When Kim Jong Un attends Vice’s basketball game with the Harlem Globe Trotters and talks about friendship with the Americans, the journalist points out how bizarre it is considering the fact that their entire trip has been nonstop “fuck the American Bastards” propaganda up until that point.
All I could think was “We’ve always been at war with Eurasia.”
Similarly, the way the North Koreans in the stands scream, “Live 10,000 years!” over and over and over when Kim Jong Un enters the room reminded me of the two minutes hate from the novel, just inverted.
I mean, whether it’s a riveting tale or not (I happen to think it is), it definitely serves as a warning. The novel seems absolutely absurd to us in modern America because we can’t believe that their society could really exist. We might know it logically but I don’t think it hits home for us emotionally that 1984 is a perfectly realistic outcome for a society gone wrong.
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