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A Reminder That Broken Things Can Be Fixed
Technology is malleable. Though made of metal, glass, and plastic, the gadgets we enjoy today can take on second lives years into the future, long after the unending march of product release cycles have rendered them junk in the eyes of most consumers. Old, broken things can be fixed, their innards rearranged, software hacked, whatever. Maybe today you can take some comfort in this thought: The state of things isn’t always as permanent as it appears.
Writer Melanie Ehrenkranz has often reminded us of this in her work on OneZero. Take for example her story on the iPod hackers who have resurrected the classic “clickwheel” devices. Many of these devices are broken — you might have one or two in a storage bin somewhere — and enthusiasts buy them in batches and refurbish them. One enthusiast told Ehrenkranz that he’s reconstructed hundreds of these small music players.
There are also Kindle hackers who have forged a divergent path from Amazon’s tracking and ads, refashioning the popular e-readers into something they have fuller ownership over.
And, of course, there are the Tamagotchi hackers who cheat death itself for their “little friends.”
“You put a lot of time into growing them, they grow from babies to adults over a week, and you gather them money and toys, so I grow attached to them,” one of these hackers said.
These are some of my favorite stories to revisit. They’re a testament to where true power ultimately lies: not so much in the machinery itself or the corporations who put up walled gardens, but in the hands of the people who can imagine a better future… or a more interesting one, at least. Today, I’m reflecting on that.
