Comment by blueflow
4 years ago
You still have the choice to not use any of their services. You can get pretty far in life despite not using the internet at all.
4 years ago
You still have the choice to not use any of their services. You can get pretty far in life despite not using the internet at all.
Well not in all countries. In my country you are required to receive electronic messages from the government as well as to have a government issued ID and authentication system that forces you to have a fairly recent smartphone. For now, it is theoretically possible to use the authentication system without a smartphone but you will have to jump through an awful amount of (artificially imposed) hoops.
Not having an internet connection is NOT an option. There is a legal process to get a special permit to avoid having to use these state mandated electronic systems but it is almost only theoretically in that you will need to have a doctor's note saying that you are unable to use such systems. E.g., by suffering by severe dementia or similar.
But there's nothing that says you have to use that smartphone and services for anything other than government communications.
Which country are you speaking of?
I'm not sure about OP, but here in Iceland having a smartphone with electronic ID built into it is not TECHNICALLY a requirement but life can be very difficult without it. It is the de-facto identification system used by every government service and banking institution.
Afaik mandatory government-provided mailbox is in Czech republic ("datovka") and Slovakia, at least for some parts of population (like enterpreneurs, lawyers, other professions that communicate with state institutions), with general mandatory use coming soon.
They serve the fiction of confirmed mail delivery. If you don't pick it up from this mailbox, it is considered delivered anyway and your problem, if you miss something here.
I find this incredibly hard to believe.
Governments have accessibility obligations and so their key services should absolutely be usable with something like Chromium/Linux. And it definitely shouldn't be more onerous than using a smartphone.
For example, see https://www.slovensko.sk/sk/na-stiahnutie
It is the portal for Slovak republic. You are supposed to have your national ID card, which is a smart card. To use it, you need a smartcard reader and an application, which basically listens on localhost and is kind of a intermediate between your browser, the pages than need authentication and the department of state, which handles IAM.
That application runs on Windows, Mac and Debian (9,10)/Ubuntu (18.04,20.04)/Mint (19.20) (it is not open source). Other distributions are not supported, forget ChromeOS.
It is quite onerous. You have to enter your PIN for smartcard about four times, before you see the content of the inbox.
In some cases Google can only be avoided at a potentially life altering personal cost. Consider how many government services use reCAPTCHA, and what it means to have no access or delayed access to these services.
I don't buy this. This would mean that elderly people are also excluded from these services.
Elderly and marginalized people do suffer because of restricted access to online services. People who cannot access the web and its services are at an obvious disadvantage in life, and that sometimes can have severe consequences.
https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=32304320
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> This would mean that elderly people are also excluded from these services.
Having helped my 92 years old grandmother sorting out her tax returns on the government’s website, I can confirm that this is exactly what it means. And it’s the only practical way of communicating with the administration. Most local branches have been closed to the public, and the phone lines are congested all day (and cut you off after one hour waiting, which is always fun).
How would you (for example) apply for a job without the Internet?
Speak with recruiters.
Most of the jobs I've worked for have come via old school phone calls.
Factory workers usually aren't snagged by headhunters, and many jobs around the world require online application.
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Postal? Or deliver the envelope in-person to their box when they are nearby.
I learned it like this, its since recently that applying by email more commonly an option.
As someone who's in college and looking/lookedfor internships to do over the summer, postal is literally not an option anymore. Companies will not offer a mailing address to their hiring team at all, and if you send something via mail they will simply not look at it. Also, post-pandemic, most interviews are done via Zoom, so how are you going to do that then? Even if you're in the same area as the company you're applying in, they just will not let you into the building.
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It is funny how some consider the internet synonymous with Google and the other big players. You don't need to use Google and the others at all these days. So many alternatives abound. The problem seems to be awareness of them. Ask me anything.
The sentiment is noble, but that's not really true.