Comment by throwaway94275
9 hours ago
1991 was the vibrant, exciting, crazy "adolescence" of the PC age and well into the period where it was cool to have a desktop PC and really learn about it.
Phones are dominant now and have passed the PC generation by - in number, not capability. The concept of copy/paste/save for arbitrary data lives on for the non-tech masses only in the form of screenshots and screen recording features.
The thing that stands out to me looking back over a few decades is how much of consumer/public computing is exploring the latest novel thing and companies trying to cash in on it. Multimedia was the buzzword aeons ago, but was a gradual thing with increasing color depth and resolution, video, 3D rendering, storage capabilities for local playback, sound going from basic built in speaker beeps to surround and spatial processing. Similar with the internet from modems to broadband to being almost ubiquitously available on mobile. Or stereoscopic 3D, or VR, or touchscreens, or various input devices.
Adolescence is a very good word to encompass it, lots of awkward experiments trying to make the latest thing stick along with some of them getting discarded along the way when we grow out of them, they turn out not to be (broadly) useful or fashion moves on. What I wonder about is if the personal computer has hit maturity now and we're past that experimental phase, for most people it's an appliance. Obviously you can still get PCs and treat them as a workstation to dive into whatever you're enthusiastic about but you need to specifically go out and pursue that, where the ecosystem might be lacking is a bridge between the device most have as their personal computer (phone/tablet) and something that'll introduce them to other areas.
> The concept of copy/paste/save for arbitrary data lives on for the non-tech masses only in the form of screenshots and screen recording features.
When it's not impeded by DRM, that is
Depending on where personal/portable AI devices go, phones might be significantly different or not exist in 10 years as they do today.
There might be a resurgence of some kind of device like a PC.
Seeing iPadOS gain desktop features, and MacOS starting to adopt more and more iPadOS type features clearly shows the desktop, laptop and tablet experiences will be merged at some point by Apple at least.
I think it'd be biased more in the direction of the Ipad. If anything there's one feature apple's trying to avoid and that's Macos' waning ability to run third party binaries
"Fitting into my pocket so I can use it in line at the post office" is a capability that desktop PCs have yet to manage to achieve.
> use it in line at the post office
If it were a powerful, useful device that I could load my own software onto and make programmable without jumping through a bunch of hoops, instead of the ad-laden crapware that resulted from primarily two megacorps duking it out over how to best extort billions from app developers and users for their own benefit, then sure, I'd agree.
But phones aren't awesome little PCs, they're zombifying the majority of the public. They also, incidentally, are insidious little snitches busy at work trying to monetize every single thing about our daily lives.
> ut phones aren't awesome little PCs, they're zombifying the majority of the public. They also, incidentally, are insidious little snitches busy at work trying to monetize every single thing about our daily lives.
Yes, and corporations are doing all the same stuff to our PCs as well.
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If you think having a developer mode switch on your smartphone that would enable shell access and a build env is what's stopping "the majority of the public" from "zombifying", either you need to talk with more "majority of the public", or I've been talking to the wrong "majority of the public".
The general public doesn't know how to program. They don't know what variables are, that they have types, they think functions are what rich people call a dinner party or corporate event. On computers, where there are no such restrictions, the majority of the public haven't suddenly become hobbyist programmers in their spare time.
If you're so blinded by hate because there are hoops (which there absolutely are), and you refuse to jump at all, not even a little bit, simply on principle, I mean, you do you. Meanwhile, there are people who aren't the majority of the public, but that want to do things that able to get into tech learning to code despite the epic of Apple vs Google vs Gilgamesh flattening towns. It would be great if it were easier because the phones were more open, but at some point you gotta go with the serenity prayer.
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But are DRM and poor user experiences hard requirements for something to fit in your pocket?
Otherwise, I don’t think I get your point - maybe you could clarify?
throwaway94275 wrote:
> Phones are dominant now and have passed the PC generation by - in number, not capability.
And I'm saying phones have passed PCs in capabilities. Don't put words in my mouth, not all of them, obviously. I'm just pointing out that a desktop with a 5090 and 42" widescreen monitor doesn't fit in my pocket, and that fitting into my pocket is a capability that some people value.
My GPD pocket 4 fits into really large cargo pants if that counts lol, and there is the micropc2 too that’s even smaller :p
Oh fuck you, I didn't have the $1,500 I just spent on Amazon for one of those! I've been waiting forever for them to make one with a finger print sensor, and I thought you were responding to a different comment so I looked it up and thank you :)
Well… https://www.zotac.com/page/zotac-vr-go-4
There are also various handheld PCs.
"Fitting into my carry-bag so I can use it in line at the post office" is already possible for a PC and many people do it all the time.
That's not remotely true. The only person I've ever seen in public using something like https://www.newegg.com/p/3C6-018V-01637 to STAND in line while using a laptop is me.
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Handhelds like the Steam Deck are PCs and can fit in some pockets :P
I’m also waiting for the gallon sized water bottle I can fit in my <1l pocket.
long press -> save image/video is perfectly supported on a phone, it's just content diffusion platform that arbitrarily restrict it.
No, it's also iOS that's arbitrarily restricting it. I opened a bare .webm directly in Safari and got nothing on long press and nothing in any of the control widgets to save it.
Long pressing on https://www.learningcontainer.com/wp-content/uploads/2024/07...
gets me
https://imgur.com/a/bseFwX3 on iOS 18, and https://imgur.com/a/Ksbz3zW on iOS 26
Maybe you're holding it wrong?
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You can't even make a screenshot if the app doesn't allow it. Phones are broken. (well, the OS on them is).