You won't ALWAYS have Access to the Internet

This is a scary thought if I'm being honest. It came about when I was writing a post about downloading your own book list into a personal library. This is because Amazon had forced their Kindle users to be online only, and you could no longer download the books you bought.

Another angle that terrifies me is censorship. I'm not really too big onto data privacy, censorship conspiracy, or even just being private. I make tons of public content after all, and I willingly sign up for social media platforms. Which every single one of them collects data on you, not just TikTok, and you accept that when you sign on.

My point is that even despite my more relaxed take on data privacy, I still try to make sure my important stuff is local to my own servers or computers. I bought a local home assistant voice machine to replace my need for Google nest or Alexa, etc. I've even contemplated downloading Wikipedia, so that I could have offline access if the grid ever shut down.

My survivalist instincts

Look I grew up on zombie games, and post apocalyptic fallout games. The preservation of humanity was ingrained into me at a young age. Maybe that is partially what lead to the United Living Construct! haha

I've always had a thing for first aid (and aid kits), and even one year my mother bought me a survivalist kit for a go-bag.

The point I am trying to make is that I think about this kind of stuff, and I imagine what a world would look like if say an EMP knocked out the grid. Sure we get our power for a while from generators, but what if because of a solar flare we can't rebuild the internet again?

Alternatively, the internet companies have a monopoly on the market wherever you go. In the country, in the world, and it is a ticking timebomb if you ask me. This is why the ISP's (or internet service providers) can charge you whatever they want, and you have to just deal with crappy internet service. I know this is slightly better in bigger cities, but not by a whole lot. You either have Google fiber which was abandoned by Google, or Starlink which is owned by Elon. Neither are really good choices. Then you have the rest of the ISP's which have been notoriously bad for the last two decades.

This lead me down a rabbit hole of making a sort of go bag, but for the internet.

Having everything OFFLINE

Uggghhh I can't tell you how many times my Notion went down when I was using it. Part of it was because AWS would go down at least once a month, or at least a quarter, and so Notion would be taken down with it.

The majority of my issues actually came from my ISP, Mediacom where I'm at, and they're really my only option. Technically I can get cell tower based internet from T-Mobile or AT&T, but that would just be worse. I mean I can't even get signal on my phone, let alone for a device that needs more stable connection.

My ISP hadn't replaced the cables, not only in my building, but even to the tower outside my complex. Thus causing an immense amount of latency issues, or even full on disconnections. That would last for days if not weeks a few times too. It would literally go out every month, and often once a week. Do note that I was always calling them, and trying to get them to fix it!

This lead me to switching from Notion.so to a more advanced tool than even it, which was Obsidian.

After being in Notion for over six years I had enough. I was tired of the laggy databases, the AWS shutdowns, and the terrible internet service provider.

This tool also allows me to work offline, so maybe you can't get access at the cafe, or on an airplane. You can still work on stuff, and no Notion's electron app on desktop is garbage.

Other tools you could consider

I would highly recommend not wasting too much of your time with these other ones, as Obsidian has repeatedly beat them out in my experience. However just in case you want to explore, or experience for yourself. Here is a quick list.

Capacities (now local first)
Logseq
Affine
AnyType
Appflowy

Or just look at:

Back to the point at hand

I think it is very important for all of us to realize that we need to have FULL CONTROL over our data. Even if you have to still use big companies because they are so ingrained into our lives, then find ways to replace with local variants. Instead of using google drive, use a cloud NAS solution in your home. Meaning it is your own personal cloud that can be accessed when you're traveling. Although you don't have to even do that, just keep it local too.

Additionally, I used the ReadItLater plugin, and the Obsidian web extension clipper. To download various pages. From articles, to research papers, even github pages so I could have the instructions locally, and full on guides to using certain tech. I've downloaded thousands of pages to now have locally on my pc.

Little note here too, the Notion web clipper failed to ever grab the article for me when I used that.

I have experienced countless times trying to go to a website, and then the content was missing or taken down. Maybe that blog post is forever gone, even on the internet archive!
This is why I download any article I find useful or interesting, as I will presumably like to see it later too. If it is a one off, then maybe not, but still.

Having data downloaded is a smart way to go!