Tangible Cloud: Infrables

Stories collected during Tangible Cloud, Brussels, 18 May 2022

I did it my way

Back in 2019 I didn't have a smartphone. Firstly because I considered it an unnecessary expensive, but also because I didn't want to be constantly bothered with work. Which I think are 2 good enough reasons. In May that year, I travelled to New York for a presentation. Not having a smartphone had always meant extra organisation, as it came to make me realise how much information vanished from the public space since having a smartphone was considered the norm. So at that point I knew that I couldn't rely anymore on printed transportation schedules, maps of the neighbourhood at the metro exits or in the bus stops, etc... The day before I left, I printed out a Googlemaps screenshot with the address to the AirBnB and the list of steps to get there from the airport. Everything went smoothly and around 21pm local time I arrived at the Airbnb address. It looked extremely different from the picture I had. I rang the doorbell and heard some noise to which I replied: Come down David, I'm here! The door opened, and I had no clue who the person was. I told him confused that his house was at the address of the airbnb I had booked but he replied this was no airbnb. I showed him my paper Googlemaps and my printed airbnb documents. He looked at them briefly and told me that I was currently in Brooklyn and needed to be at the same address in the Queens. I had a mini phone book with my best friends phone numbers in case of emergency but I couldn't use it because, unlike my European friends' smartphones, my Nokia 3310 was not compatible with the US phone network. From my travel I couldn't remember having seen any map anywhere nor phone cabin. I was lucky enough that the man accepted to call me a taxi who was navigating using his smartphone.

Get with the times little lady

When the elementary school of my kids switched to Google services, both my kids suddenly had a Gmail address, were working on Chrome books and watching YouTube videos during their breaks. When I complained about this, sharing the concerns I had with such sudden surrender to Google with the director of the school, I was told to "get with the times". I tried sending links to articles discussing the many issues there were with Google services from surveillance to being exposed to YouTube unsupervised, and building dependence on these services at such a young age. A teacher tried to explain the benefits and ease of use of Google Docs to me, the blessings of Gmail's generous free storage and that it is really not hard to learn how to use these tech tools, all my hope for a turn of events evaporated. I was clearly seen as anti-tech, a luddite or simply old-fashioned. I did not give up yet, complained some more and was promised a meeting with even higher management, but never got to speak to anyone, my kids still have Gmail addresses.

Le droit de se perdre

2010-11: j'étais étudiant à l'université. L'Iphone venait juste de sortir. On avait de simple GSM, avec des forfaits téléphnique assez serrés. On se débrouillais pour se repérer et se délacer dans la ville. Je travaillais comme livreur chez Pizzahut. Les livreurs les plus expérimentés prenaient les nouveaux sous leurs ailes. Ils nous indiquaient quels itinéraires emprunter: les plus rapides, mais aussi les plus sympas. C'était stressant: il fallait mémoriser d'avance et se débrouiller quand on ne trouvait pas l'adresse. Quand on était perdu, on appellait le restaurant et quelqu'un faisait le co-pilote. On utilisait des cartes papiers, on s'arretait aux arrêt de bus. C'était une connaissance empirique, pas juste schematique. Il y avait une sorte de parrainage, de solidarité. Ils nous donnaient aussi des conseils pour éviter la monotonie. On qualifiait l'espace urban.

2014: Les forfait ont gonflés; tous les livreurs ont progressivement acquis des smartphones. Désormais, on utilise pour se guider celui-ci à travers maps avec les écouteurs, guidés par la voix de synthèse. La dimension qualitative de l'espace est ignorée par l'application. Il n'y a plus qu'à obéir; ça semble rassurant. C'est devenu un peu plus personnel, mais moins droit à l'erreur: on est équipé d'un appareil qui, lui, n'en fait pas. La durée tolérée d'une course diminue. On est plus supposé se perdre.

It is hard to resist

I always resisted to create a Fb account. For different reason. Among other, political reasons. And I'm not a social person, in terms of social networks. I'm not interested. I don't like staying in touch for the sake of staying in touch. After more than 10 years without Fb, it was still mysterious and almost exhilarating look over one's shoulder and try to understand the kind of interaction.

Then my daughter went to school and I received a small brief asking for authorization to publish photos of the class on the Fb account of the school. At first, I said yes, but ask to obfuscate her face. But she was always alone with a smiley face. The next year, I Gave up a bit more and we authorised publications without smileys. But still, we had no way to easily watch the pictures because of no Fb account.

I would have been to much effort to ask the school and the parents to change platform, to change their habits. We felt we had no lever. I asked my mother in law if I could use her account. I dedicated a web browser only for that. It is strange because I fell like I'm intruding her space. I fear to «like» something by mistake, or to read a message I'm not suppose to.

In the end, it would have been easier just to create an account.

Cadavre Numérique (Digital Corpse)

Le smarthphone tombe mais ne se même brise pas. Le server, celui-ci n'était enfait pas connecter au reste du zeppelin. La prise qui s'est toujours prise pour un serpent était au milieu de cable impossible à différencier.

J'ai mis ma main dans le sac de noeud, dans son code à ne plus savoir les slaves ou les masters. Les masters en clouds ne savait pas différencier les infrastrutures des vrais nuages, des vrais nagivateur, des vrais surffers, des vrais corbeilles, tout se dématerialisait petit à petit pour devenir des NFT pour toujours. Le smarthphone ne se brise toujours pas.

Detective Facture

Tous les ans on doit faire un bilan comptable pour l'entreprise. Je m'exécute et me rend compte qu'il y a une dépense sans facture, pour une assez grosse somme, genre 200€. La facture est introuvable, le comptable insiste ; on a besoin de cette facture. Il se trouve que cette année là, plusieurs employé.e.s ont quitté l'entreprise, et comme je ne me souvient pas de cette dépense, j'imagine que ça doit être l'un d'entre eux qui l'avait effectué. Je regarde sur l'appli du compte bancaire qui croppe tout les noms des transactions et je retrouve cette dépense puis le nom du site internet qui y est lié en cherchant sur google. C'est ma première piste de l'enquête.

C'est un site d'outils et je comprend que je vais pouvoir retrouver la facture si je retrouve les identifiants de la personne qui a fait la transaction. Je commence alors à tester toutes les adresses mails des employé.e.s partis dans l'année. Il y en a effectivement une qui est liée à un compte chez eux. C'est celle de Charlotte. Le truc c'est qu'une que les employés sont partis ont avant supprimé leur adresses mails. Comment acceder à un compte dont l'adresse email n'existe plus ? Je me retrouve alors obligé de recréer l'adresse mail de Charlotte vuq ue j'ai accès au nom de domaine, puis de faire la manip "j'ai oublié mon mot de passe", pour recevoir le mot de passe temporaire et enfin accéder au compte en ligne et récupérer la facture. J'ai du me faire passer pour Charlotte, je suis pas sur que ce soit légal. Je me suis rendu compte du pouvoir en tant qu'employeur de réécrire les mots de passe de tout le monde.

Serigraphic Non Solutions

Mon copain m'avais offert un bon d'achat pour des cadres de sérigraphie. J'achète les cadres genre 4 ans plus tard. Je voulais acheter des neufs en alu pour la performance. Je veux pas passer par amazon.

Je regarde donc où je peux acheter sur place à Bruxelles, mais c'est trop cher. Je trouve des revendeurs en France. Je commande auprès d'eux. Ils s'appellent Serigraphics Solutions. Au bout de 2-3 jours je devais les recevoir via le transporteur DPD. Je regarde où ça en est. Je sais pas pourquoi mais je trouve qu'il y a un truc qui cloche.

Je regarde sur le site des vendeurs et je vois que l'entreprise est en liquidation judiciaire et qu'ils ne peuvent pas répondre de suite. Donc j'écris un mail pour savoir si c'est envoyé. Je ne savais pas si le colis avait été remis. Ils me disent que c'est bien parti dans la dernière livraison. Du coup je suis rassurée et je me sens chanceuse, peut être la dernière à pouvoir recevoir la commande de cette boite. 2 jours plus tard le colis n'avance toujours pas sur le site du livreur et stagne dans un centre de tri dans le Jura. Je regarde donc de nouveau le site du vendeur et ça y est Serigraphie Solution n'existe plus quand j'essaie de les contacter il y a juste un message d'erreur.

J'appelle donc les livreurs qui me disent que ça va arriver. Mais au bout de quelques jours le colis commence à faire le chemin inverse ! Le colis est en retour à l'expéditeur ! J'oscille entre euphorie où je me sens trop chancheuse et moment de déprime. Ils me disent qu'il y a eu une demande de retour de colis mais c'est impossible puisque l'entreprise n'existe pas.

ça a duré pendant des mois au téléphone, où j'étais dans une boucle et on me répondait : "Il faut contacter l'expéditeur", "oui mais il existe plus" , "oui je comprend mais il faut contacter l'expéditeur".

J'ai finis par contacter le liquidateur juridicaire pour faire une reconnaisance de créance, et il m'a renvoyé vers le transporteur. On une sensation de contrôle via le suvi étape par étape en ligne mais bon, au final tu ne contrôles rien.

Say Cheese

When we were going from Hong Kong to China, we had to pass through customs with packed bags that included some souvenir Dutch cheese (Gouda). We hadn't kept it in the proper wrapping nor refridgeration (it was in plastic in 30+ degree heat for about 2 weeks. When we arrived at Customs, some security guards called us over and pointed out the mass they had detected in their x-ray scanner. We didn't speak much Mandarin, and they didn't speak much English, so we gestured back and forth to indicate that it was cheese by inviting the officers to smell it. They opened it up, took one smell and very quickly hurried us through without any more questions.

Past the Point of No Return

I was living in Japan and had decided to take an impromptu holiday to New York City as flights were cheap. The thing was, in order to come back into Japan on my visa, I needed a re-entry permit. To get this, you had to go to a city office and have your passport stamped in person. I kind of forgot about it until the day before my flight, when in a panic I looked up where my nearest city office was. It turned out that as a cost-cutting measure the Tokyo Metropolitan Government had closed all but one location, which was on an artifical island in Tokyo Bay. I went there straight away, and crossed a bridge (the only one to access the island) to find a large, 8-storey government building. The lower 4 floors were for processing permits, licences and visas and the top 4 floors were a detention centre. I hadn't yet paid my city taxes so I was a little terrified that I would be sent upstairs. I took a ticket (number 467 or some ridiculously large number) and waited. The office closed at 5pm, and by the time it was 4:45pm they were only up to number 300. I started to worry and decided I should try to get served as soon as possible. A clerk called out number 301, and nobody answered. I saw my chance, went to the counter and said I had lost my ticket. I got my permit, got the hell off the island and escaped.

Jerome anti-covid

Pendant le lockdown en France, au moment où il était seulement possible de se promener à 500m de chez soi, un ami, Jérôme, a crée un script permettant de générer des attestions avec une adresse à moins de 500m du point où on se trouve, à partir des coordonnees gsp. Un pdf d'autorisation de sortie était donc généré, quelque soit l'endroit où je me trouvais, à condition qu il y ait des habitations autour.

[EN] During the french lockdown, while it was only possible to go as far as 500m from your house, a friend, Jerome, created a script allowing us to generate autorisations based on your GPS current location with a "home address" within 500m. The generated PDF allowed me to go anywhere as long as there was houses less than 500m away.

Belgique vs Linux

En Belgique, un certain nombre de services publics sont accessibles via la carte d'identité électronique (e-ID), mais à chaque mise-à-jour, il y a un temps avant que ça marche sur Linux, selon les naviagteurs etc. Un moment, à force de ténacité, j'ai trouvé un technicien du service féderal qui avait à coeur de rendre e-ID disponible sur Linux et firefox. A force d'échanges, j'ai eu son addresse email direct, tout allait bien jusqu'au moment où il a changé de service. Je dois donc maintenent emprunter un ordinateur Windows pour mes démarches administratives.

[EN] In Belgium, many public services are accessible via your digital ID card (e-ID), but for each updates, there are issues with linux and certain browsers. After a while, and with some tenacity, I was able to reach out to a technician in the federal office who was eager to make it work for Linux. Everything was fine until he changed of office and now I have to borrow and Windows computer when I have to do administrative tasks.

In-door camping

I was still living in Brussels back then, and this a was a typical bar evenening. I had friends visiting, so I was in a very good mood, glowing if I may say. So we go to this bar, when I met a very pretty person, which I happen to bring back home. So we spent the night together, everything is quite pleasent, and we end up chatting about our lives. I told him I happen to have friends now living in a caravan somewhere in the swiss mountains, among other stuffs. He eventually leaves, and I'm now hangover hanging out in the house, so I figure I should check what's going on on my Instagram account. I start scrolling hazily when something catches my attention. It's a very neat looking little add for buying a very pretty *caravan*. I scroll down a bit athen BAM another add for buying another even nicer looking caravan. I must say I wasn't following any caravan or camping account of any kind. Last time I went camping I was about 8 and it was definitely not with my consent. I do happen to like walls, and I'm not so sure nature is a friend. So I figured, the only explanation was, the nice little pink photosharing app might have eavesdropped on the conversation. And probably on what did precede the conversation. I started to completely freak out, like my heart literally went down into my shoes. I figured I should throw the phone out right away and go back to my dealer phone phase, whch lasted approximately 2 years. But I did not have the strength to give it up. Again. What I did was, delete the app and prey so that all these conversation evetually burns in a hudge warming fire, like the OVH servers did.

Covid E-life at university

So my story takes place at the university. I had to make a presentation for my teachers (4 teachers).

In the first time, I had a one teacher with sound problems. The sound was choppy.

Finaly, I Resolved to send a teams link (official link of the university).

Result: only 2 teacher could connect.

The 3rd person took 35 minute to join us and the last one never came. Probably because she was connected by an other institution in teams software.

Moral: the free software doesn't work well, the proprietary software doesn't.

Web knowledge issues

I’m lucky, I have two stories to tell.

I’m a teacher and I teaches some web lessons for students in graphic design. For the lesson, they begin to create some local pages in HTML and CSS on their own womputer. During the break, a student send me an email with a link to his website... with the whole local path of his website on his computer as an URL for me to see the website.

Second anecdote : It's also during one of the lesson. I show the website of internet archive to the students – for those who don’t know, it’s a website which show some copies of website from diffrent times. As I began to type "Youtube", the sites auto-complete with the name of a known pornographic site. The students laugh and I ask them « why » ?

They explain that another teacher has some tabs open in his web browser with his favourites porn pages and all the student can see it as he share his screen in class.

We can ask : does this teacher have a lack of basics abut privacy questions or a lack of kwnoledge of what he do ?

Getting a Smart Phone

I was sort of trying to use, as much as I could, public phones. It was interesting. I had to maintain a local map of the still-existing public phones because obviously, they were disappearing. I could still manage to live without a mobile phone. Then I moved to Spain. I didn't have this knowledge about where phone booths were in this city. That was already a big problem. The second was that people were deciding, using smart phones, where to eat. It was decided over eating, with text messages, where to go. To meet someone implied that you had a telephone.

Interesting, we would go to the house of a friend and it would just have numbers. Unless you knew that the number was 3-B. So normally you would text message to find out the number to ring. So the telephone was deep down in the social habits.

So I bought one. At that time I had a prepaid card because I did not want my name associated with the phone. So it was very expensive to use it to go online and I just didn't do it. Until recently. For some reason it stopped working (the internet) from one day to the next and I just didn't bother to fix it. But I could still use WiFi if I really needed it.

I bought a new FairPhone and now I'm completely in to the system.

Theory of Conformity

I grew tired of these discussions about technology going nowhere

privacy or exploitation, limitations, operate within parameters do it their way, none of these arguments worked with my friends

frustrated about being party pooper, rational discussion

frustrating irony of seeing people discusssing Negri over Zoom with their macs. They have the imagination to talk about these theories but not try out another chat program.

Commodity Cameraderie

Another problem, we are caught into discussions about products

My mom has a knitting group . They knit together and during pandemics decided to knit online. They paid for Zoom. When asked why pay for software instead of using something free, she said they didn t work as well as Zoom. With Jitsi if something doesn t work it's the fault of the software, when Zoom doesn t work it is the fault of the user: you should update

Recently I am more trying to make aesthetic argument, using food as an example. Something that is not necessarily efficient. Optmisation conformity efficiency you loose aesthetics Lose any possibility for sthg expressive, personal, local, regional

Something that comes from a tradition like food is a nice example or architecture, furniture, material culture.