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1900 – Teddy Roosevelt defeats a bear with his bare hands – Outcome: As far as Internet history is concerned, he did.

1910 – We will fly to the moon – Outcome: Kaiser Wilhelm was angry. Also, there was a Covid-like thing and nothing good came out of either.

1920 – We will party like there is no tomorrow. – Outcome: Prediction correct. For reference, see 1929.

1930 – A better human will emerge. A superhuman even – Outcome: Nooooooooooooooooooooooo. Hell no….. Never again!!!! (also applies to the 1940s)

1940 – We will get out of this horrible war, everything stops for tea and Jazz will be better with Bebop – Outcome: Yes, Yes and NO!

1950 – Tradition rules, everything is possible and lets keep this neat and tidy. Nukes are scary. No dissent or people that are not like us – Outcome: For reference of the outcome, see latter part of 1960.

1960 – Will be like the 50s. – Outcome: Nope. 1967 begs to differ. Make love not war. Also, pop and rock is awesome. Love everyone. Stick it to the man.

1970 – More hippie stuff – Outcome: Well, no. But we got an energy crisis, disco and cool movies.

1980 – I dunno, less crisis – Sorta kinda. Outcome: Economy booming, no worries, yuppies, morning in America, scare of nukes again, the future is unknown.

1990 – More good economy? – Outcome: No, kinda troublesome at that. But freedom! We got freedom! No Soviet! Brithop, Grunge and Eurotechno.

2000 – Everything is possible! Internet, baby! – Outcome: Yeah, until everything got a really bad (see “IT crash”, “WTC” and “Economy 2008” for further reference). Also surveillance.

2010 – Everything is mobile and possible – Outcome: Yes, yes, yes, yes, yes (I’ll have what she’s having). Then see “2020s” for further reference and don’t forget surveillance (seems most have).

2020 – It’s like 1920s again!!!!! – Outcome (TBD): Well, yes, so far. Spanish flu, meet Covid. Party without thought for future? yeah! Looming crisis? Sure! Also, everything is a weapon. Did I meantion you have no privacy? This is new!

Som en inbiten radionörd har många av mina vänner på sociala media skickat med länken med Jon Karlungs “Radio Nord stream 3”. Jag är ett stort fan av Radio Nord, även om de lade ner många år innan jag föddes. Så humorn i namnet är otroligt skön, tycker jag. MEN…
Jon är en slug räv som skriver att han kallar på alla “radioentusiaster” och inte radioamatörer eller professionella radiooperatörer. Han vill helt enkelt få folk att börja sända piratradio med budskap som han skaffar fram åt de hugade. Som radioamatör vill jag säga några ord angående detta. Jag sympatiserar med Ukraina och anser att Putins invasion måste besvaras med sanktioner snarare än arga tillmälen. Men låt oss bryta ner detta med att sända olagligt till en värld som ändå inte kommer lyssna.

• Kortvågsradiolyssning (SWR) är en rolig hobby och jag har givetvis sysslat med den själv. Men hur många har en kortvågsradio hemma som de lyssnar på idag? Ja, då även i Ryssland… Inte många. De som lyssnar har det som en hobby, eller för att de kommer från länder långt borta som de vill höra program från. Karlungs sändningar kommer att höras av mycket få personer. Det är inte som när Voice of America sände in i Sovjet och Ryssarna gömde sina kortvågsmottagare och lyssnade i smyg. Då hade det verkan!
• Skulle detta mot förmodan bli ett problem för Ryssland, kommer de svara med att störa brett över alla band som de kan. Effekten blir att radioamatörhobbyn kommer få en mycket tråkig tid.
• PTS (Post och Telestyrelsen) kommer garanterat inte dela Jons entusiasm över detta. Det är olagligt att sända på frekvenser du inte har tillstånd till. Om du är radioamatör, kom ihåg att du inte har rätt att sända rundradio på amatörfrekvenser. Det står klart och tydligt att hobbyn är till för tester av utrustning, sändningsslag och för att utveckla radiokunskap och teknologi (för att förenkla det). Inte för politiska budskap, åsikter och att signalera protester och värdegrunder. Sorry, det är det tråkiga sanningen.
• Jag förstår att protester ofta är olagliga, det ligger liksom i deras natur. Men betänk vad jag skrev ovan, det kommer inte hjälpa någon och ställa till problem för folk om folk börjar sända lite på måfå utan kunskap om vad de sysslar med.

Jag har ingen jurisdiktion annat än i mitt 69 kvadratmeter stora hem, så jag kan bara ge er ett gott råd: sänd inte olagligt. Tack.

• Ham News om diskussionen
• SSA (Sveriges sändareamatörer) kommenterar det hela
• Öppet brev till Sveriges “radioentusiaster” (Bahnhof/Karlung)

In the 50s and early 60s mass media were tightly controlled in the US. Movies were regulated under the Hayes code and Television had severe restrictions. A lot of producers tried to work around the problem by using metaphors and innocent-looking euphemisms. Have you ever seen old movies where two lovers go into a room and then you see fotage of trains going into tunnels for a while? Pretty obvious, right? But you couldn’t censor it, as it wasn’t dirty per see..

In 1959 the Twilight Zone made its debut. Created by Rod Serling, it explored love, hate, mystisism, racism, intolerance and inequality in the guise of science fiction. One the most well-known episodes was “The monsters are due on Maple Street”. The whole story starts with a sudden loss of power and as people get more and more scared, they start accusing each other of being behind the whole thing. Friends become enemies and everyone is potentially a spy or a saboteur. It ends with a person getting shot and then we get to see a number of aliens watching from afar. They note how easy it is to destroy the fabric of society and civilization. The realization is that they can use this to destroy the human race without ever having to attack them with real weapon power.

This is probably based on the horrible experiences the Hollywood industry had during the McCarthy-era and the ever lingering threat that was the HUAC. But disguised as just mere science-fiction, Serling’s scathing critisism could easily pass scrutiny by the censors.

But even in societies that are generous with what can be said and written, this is often done to make people think. A seemingly cute story that in reality unmasks the goverment or societal norms, is a very common theme in litterature.

George Orwell does quite the opposite. 1984 has NO such thing as talking in riddles. It clearly exposes the very leadership it seeks to mock and ridicule. Or is that it? I actually get the feeling that the proper emotion at work here is hate, as Orwell was a jilted lover of a communist, who saw what the Soviet union had become without understanding that it is the ineviatable effect of all communism to destroy its own people.

The mysterious leader “big brother” is Stalin in everything but the name. He even has Stalin’s trade mark oppression mustache ™.

Today, we seem to live in a mix of the best and worst of times.

In my opinion, we can scratch many of those above from “where western society is today”. I would say that the most fitting story is “Brave new world” with a few of the elements of “1984” and a small helping of “Fahrenheit 451”.

But they rest… Oh please…

• Soylent green? NOOOO!!! Come on… Can you say death by Kuru-kuru?
• Logan’s run. Maybe the “culture of youth/never trust anyone above 30”-theme, but that’s about it.
• Brazil… Not here, but maybe elsewhere .. at some time..
• The Matrix… Haha, you wish… I haven’t found the VMWare tools icon in real life yet…
• Lord of the flies, obviously not. That story can never scale into large groups of society.
• A handmaid’s tale. May be the only dystopia we’re actually leaving… Thanks!

Then yet again…

• Animal farm. Yeah, sorta kinda. It was meant as a discussion on how naive people put power hungry manipulators in charge and afterwards never really understod where it went wrong. It might sound strange, but has happened before I have you know.
• Gattaca, we could be going there some day. I’m looking at you Ancestry.com! … And everyone else who would fancy a global DNA-database.

My mind is an unquiet rambling one. I originally didn’t mean to write this text. I thought that putting this picture as a funny but still tragic epitaph over a world heading into that good night, would be good for a lark. It wasn’t…. And it never will be…