Defining the Digital Lifestyle

My lifestyle has always been somewhat different than what you would call "normal". I think I've been living the Digital Lifestyle for quite a bit longer than most people. My first computer was a Commodore VIC-20 and I was playing MUD on the internet before it was called "The Internet"... so I've been "digital" for a while. But what does that really mean?

Granted the definition probably changes over time but right now, to me, it means a lifestyle that uses technology to remove the bounds set by someone other than yourself.

So for example, the way I watch television is very different than the way most people think of watching TV. I don't actually own a TV anymore and I don't have a living room to put a TV in anyway. What I do have is a few computers, one that downloads stuff, one that I do work on and play games on and another one that I use for consuming media. I call it "The TV Computer".

This computer is currently a laptop and it was previously a real computer with a video capture card in it that never got used. I actually have plans to build a new "TV Computer" (one that is capable of playing GTA3) and I'm probably not going to be putting a capture card in that new version either.

Anyway the point is, if I want to watch a TV show, I don't tell my Tivo to record the next episode, I tell my P2P client to go download all of the episodes. That is what I mean by the Digital Lifestyle. No commercials. No cable company. No satellite company. Just an internet connection and a P2P cloud. I'm using technology in a way that breaks the bounds set up by the media company. That's the Digital Lifestyle. Sure, listening to a music file you paid $.99 for on the iTunes store is "digital" but you're using the technology in that way isn't freeing yourself from a boundry set up by someone else. Yeah the file is digital and the iPod is digital, but you're still only doing what "they" tell you to do with the file.

Look at it this way, if you're not using technology to change the way people think about... everything, then you might as well just listen to records or casette tapes. There's no benefit to having your media in digital format. Living the Digital Lifestyle breaks down borders and lets you decide what to do with your data instead of someone else deciding for you.