Semblance of a Whole

We are Living in a Digital World, and I am a Laptopless Girl

Actual phone conversation between my husband, Dan, and a clerk at Best Buy, when he was checking to see where he could buy a book on PHP 5 (a computer programming language):

Dan: Do you carry computer books?
Clerk: What's a computer book?

It took Dan quite a while to explain that he was looking for a book (made of paper) that tells you how to do something on a computer. In the end he still wasn't sure the clerk understood the question.

And on a related note . . .
I feel like I am one of the last people in America to not have a laptop computer at home or work. Well it's true that Dan has one and he lets me use it sometimes, but it's definitely his computer. During a meeting at work last week, I noticed I was the only one in the room who didn't have a laptop. My employer has been replacing most desktop computers with laptops when they are scheduled for replacement, but whereas my two office mates are getting laptops within the next couple of months, my computer is apparently not old enough to merit replacement for the time being. I don't know for sure (and I'm too lazy to check for real statistics), but it seems like laptop computers have now become the standard, and desktop computers are going the way of CRT screens and the Commodore PET. And now the iPhone is fueling a new interest in handheld devices with Internet capability.

Thinking about my laptoplessness got me to thinking about the impact of their widespread use on attempts to force libraries to filter the Internet. As you may know, the Federal Children's Internet Protection Act makes the use of filtering software to block access to material that is "obscene," "harmful to minors," or considered child pornography a condition of receiving federal funds. With the availability of wireless networks (the city of Minneapolis will finish installing a city-wide network by the end of the year) and the increasing number of young people who come to the library with their own laptop computers, I can foresee a day in the not-too-distant future when filtering software on library-owned computers will be be irrelevant. Only the poor and laptopless will be stuck using the library's computers and dealing with their accompanying rules and restrictions.