Working and Living Offline

Last updated Jun 20, 2023 Edit Source

• Writing
• Productivity

I prefer to live and work offline as much as possible. The internet is a life-enhancing utility, much like hot and cold running water, but I like to turn the tap off when I’m not actively using it.

Why? I value my privacy, my autonomy, and my peace of mind. And I find it easier to connect with the flesh-and-blood world when I’m unplugged from the data-surveillance industrial complex that is the modern internet.

Perhaps that makes me weird? If so, I can live with that. Keep in mind that this isn’t advice. I’m simply sharing notes on what I like to do.

This page describes how I “turn off the tap” when I’m not actively internetting.

I’ve spent a lot of time researching options for giving up my iPhone. There’s a lot that I dislike about my iPhone, and I won’t enumerate the reasons here. Unfortunately, there are too many moments where a smartphone is necessary to move through our world with ease.

My compromise is to keep using a smartphone, but to make my iPhone as dumb as possible.

My Fix: I set up a shortcut button that turns off my iPhone’s bluetooth, wifi, and cellular data. It also changes my color scheme to black and white. This is my “dumbphone mode” and it only allows me to receive cellular phone calls and SMS messages.

Most of the time, I leave my phone in “dumbphone” mode. But if I want to “internet” I’ll flip my internet on, take care of the task, and flip it off.

Why I Bother: Smartphone apps load data in the background, send telemetry to Apple and other service providers, log your location, habits, and proximity to other devices, and so on. It’s possible to toggle some of these things on and off, but I find it simpler to make my phone super dumb and only flip it on when I need something.

My family and close friends can reach me via SMS or cell at any time, and that’s important to me.

While I trust my laptop far more than I trust my phone (hooray for Linux), the internet can be a distraction while I’m working so I generally leave my laptop offline.

Writing fiction requires me to look things up as I work. Sometimes that means checking the spelling of a hyphenated word, and other times it might involve looking up different types of carnivorous plants, or the length of a day on Mars.

I’ll flip on my internet if I really have to, but I prefer to keep most of my research materials offline. Here’s what I keep at my desk and on my computer:

Reference Guides

• Merriam Webster Collegiate Dictionary
• Oxford American Writer’s Thesaurus
• The Chicago Manual of Style

Depending upon what I’m writing, I may have others. Such as the (index of poisons). On the whole, I find physical reference books to be a pleasure to use, and far better organized than most information on the internet.

Digital Databases

• Using a neat piece of software called Kiwix, I have a fully offline, searchable version of Wikipedia on my computer. It’s super handy!

My Own Notes

• I keep my personal notes in markdown format, a kind of basic text file. My notes include my journals, to-do lists, and lots of other things grouped by topic. Basically, if something isn’t a manuscript file, it goes into a markdown file on my computer, because text files are fast and searchable.

Using these things, I rarely need to get online while I’m working. Although I do pop online once or twice a day to sync my files, check my email, and enjoy some chitchat.