How does one teach resilient tech to a generation where tech has just worked, even as that generation sees that nothing about the social contract that they’ve inherited works?
Tech which can just fall over at the slightest push because it works on assumptions about underlying layers which each require more energy than the layer beneath them.
The thing is, layering in more complexity and resource dependency to do a thing that could be done with much less is just stupid, but it’s exactly what an energy blind culture does.
It cannot see the cost and so to all intents and purposes there isn’t one. But there really is, in non-obvious ways…
…For example, imagine a distraught parent trying to get an appointment for their sick child on a GP website which is heavily and needlessly JavaScript dependent. (I know of such GP websites.)
They’ve had their electricity cut, and their phone is low on battery, and now every interaction on the website is draining their battery.
Until it’s gone, and now their child doesn’t see the GP.
Obviously, this is just illustrative, but it could happen right?
It’s not really a surprise that Google, a company which famously had a culture that obsesses about every byte served, now chooses to serve 9 MB of JavaScript to power a page with a search input box on it https://tonsky.me/blog/js-bloat/
Sure, its servers have to deliver the payload, but you pay the price. Maybe directly on your mobile tariff. Or maybe indirectly by loading your region’s electricity grid closer to the point of failure.
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