In the past year we moved for work (my wife got opportunities that were not available in our previous location) and ended up in a fairly affluent, yet still diverse region; we’re lucky in that there is a good mix of accepting technological changes but not excluding stable, traditional methods of, well, most aspects of life.
Given that, I’ve noticed that without the distortion field of an immediately nearby major urban centre people are much less inclined to be constantly driven by whatever latest shiny waste of time appears, whether from startups or desperate monopolists. Rather, people observe the wider world at a slower pace than heart-attack-inducing and most often continue to rely on well-established lines of communication; specifically, speak to your neighbours as first priority, care about your local politicians above all else, and so on.
This has helped me to understand certain trends and opinions that I’ve observed of people from outside of the tech/web/news bubble that so often dominates and defines online communities. It seems that people have got lives to live, and real changes to make rather than taking up their time screeching at a website.
Overall, this makes me happy. If we’re going to make important changes, and generally improve our world as much as possible we need people who are capable of maintaining perspective whilst doing the best they possibly can.
(this post was inspired by this conversation on Micro.blog)
