Creating Your Own Independent Digital Chiefdom
No one should deny that corporations provide many valuable services to consumers; however, a dark side exists to some corporate services that are never admitted in their advertising campaigns.
In this article, I will explain one of the dark directions that the giant corporations that dominate the Internet are taking to increase their profits, specifically their efforts to push as many consumers as possible into the cloud, whether this is in consumers' best interests or not. I will then give some concrete methods that consumers can use to resist. When I use the word 'independent' I mean standalone - i.e. NOT dependent on the cloud or a closed ecosystem such as Apple's. I mean that every item of hardware and software has full functionality regardless of whether you are online or not. I mean that you, and only you, decide what software and hardware you use. It is YOUR computer - and it is YOUR money that paid for it!
Today, giant corporations like Apple, Google, and Microsoft are increasingly designing their software and hardware to lock customers into their online platforms, where they control the software and services to which customers have access. With this end in mind, manufacturers are increasingly building computers that are only fully functional while on line. Google invented the Chromebook for accessing Google Classroom, Google Meet, the Google App Store, Google Drive, YouTube, Google Docs, Goggle Books, and the list goes on. Apple prevents applications that have not been cryptographically signed from being side loaded onto its new M1 Mac using Secure Enclave and hardware-verified secure boot. A side effect of Apple's security features is that if the M1 Mac's hard drive ever has to be replaced or reset to factory default, it must connect to the Internet to request a cryptographic signature from Apple before it will ever function again! If Apple ever decides to restrict or abandon that service for any reason, M1 Macs with bad hard drives will no longer be repairable. Apple's online services include Apple TV, Apple Music, iCloud, Apple Arcade, and Apple News. Microsoft seems to be using the stripped-down offline functionality of its Surface Go devices to increase its consumers' online dependence. For them, it has Teams, the Microsoft Apps Store, OneDrive, and online versions of Microsoft Office. I refuse to use any of these.
While cloud services and cloud computers sometimes make sense for those who are less tech savvy, companies' main motivation for pushing all computer users into the cloud is to increase corporate profits. The cloud is a place where they can force us to pay monthly fees for software and online services provided by their ecosystems. In most cases, we have the same capabilities at less cost with hardware or software that we purchase and run ourselves on our own computers. But, companies want us storing our files on their servers, where they can charge monthly fees. They want us using the software on their servers, where they hope to charge monthly fees. They want us listening to music on their servers, where they can charge ... Well, you get the idea.
For the sake of increased profits, companies are in the process of substituting their online services for everything we can now do locally on our own computers. Newer software and hardware are designed to force us to be connected to the Internet even when it does not make sense. If we want to edit a document, open a spreadsheet, listen to music, read a book, or have access to a file, we frequently have to be connected to the Internet.
Often, seemingly for no reason, some piece of software complains that it needs online access and refuses to function until it is connected to the Internet. I removed Office 365 from my new teaching computer a few years ago when it demanded that I connect to the Internet before it would let me open a document that I had written and stored on my hard drive. I have also stopped buying new video games because I am unable to find any of interest that allow me to play off line. I am not a big game player anyhow; I have a few for occasions when I do get bored. I always have been someone who will always find ways to pass my time.
Unfortunately, more consumers are accepting hardware and software that only works while they are on line. If consumers do not see the problem, they should - work stops if you are online for whatever reason. This means that work stops if there is an outage, and you cannot pass time on a long haul flight, for but two examples!
Another problem is that only a small subset of the tens of millions of software packages in existence (GitHub alone currently has 28 million public repositories) are run on or sold from Microsoft, Apple, or Google servers. Back in the 1960's, 1970's, and 1980's, we called servers "mainframes". "Microcomputers" did not exist before the late 1970's, and almost no one had one until the early 1990's. Before microcomputers, all our computing was done on servers. We had no offline capability at all. We were limited to the operating systems and applications that were available on a server. Of course, back then, servers also ran Fortran, Cobol, C, or other code that we wrote ourselves. Server time was really expensive back then. We moved from servers to personal computers, because they were less expensive. As functionality increasingly moves back onto servers, consumers will increasingly be limited to the applications that are provided on servers. That means Microsoft, Google, and Apple will increasingly decide what apps consumers are allowed to run. As a result, most of the applications that we have today will increasingly become unavailable. Want to get onto the ZeroNet network? Not from a Chromebook! And, don't count on finding Fortnite in Apple's App Store. In fact, forget about finding any security apps, tethering apps, anything that Apple finds offensive, objectionable, or inappropriate, or apps with unsigned code in the Apple iOS store. You will also not find apps that track drone strikes or otherwise tackle uncomfortable journalistic subjects in Apple's App Store. And, you will not find VPN apps or the Tor browser in Apple's Chinese App Store.
The Facebook-isation of the Internet, is another aspect of the move back to the cloud. Companies want total control of our online life. Facebook users who see Facebook as "the Internet" can go anywhere on "the Internet" they want, as long as it is on Facebook. They will never discover the rest of the Internet. They will rarely read an article posted on a personal website, and only then because someone happened to post it to Facebook. They are very unlikely to ever read this article. They will never see anything on the Gopher, Gemini, Aether, ZeroNet, IPFS, or I2P networks. They will never run any peer-to-peer application of any kind. And, of course, anything that Facebook, corporate lawyers, or governments decide not to let them see will not be available. Chinese citizens will not accidentally stumble across anything about Tienanmen Square. Turkish citizens will not find Wikipedia's page on Turkey on the IPFS network.
Tip: Wikipedia is blocked in China; but Gopherpedia and Gemipedia are not! These are mirrors of Wipipedia on Gopher and Gemini, respectively.
Cloud computing also fundamentally changes the way the computers in our homes function. Most of us are aware that Windows 10 has become like a telephone party line from the 1960's. Microsoft has somehow coerced its Windows 10 users into allowing it to freely use their computers and Internet connections for disseminating Windows updates to other customers. And, if I had told someone 20 years ago that Microsoft would one day have us paying for software that delivers advertisements to our computers, they would likely have laughed at me. These incredible insults to our ownership of our personal computers will only end when we switch back to computers and software that we own--instead of software, online platforms, and consumer devices that are effectively owned by Google, Apple, and Microsoft.
The final problem with consumers being locked into cloud-based platforms that I would like to discuss is that it makes reaching technological competence much more difficult. Nearly all the knowledge I have about computers is the result of decades spent tinkering to solve my computer problems as they arose. I took my computers apart, substituted parts, and put them back together again. I upgraded motherboards, RAM, video cards, hard drives, and every other part of several of my computers. I configured my own servers. I struggled with recalcitrant routers and learned basic networking skills. I even built high-gain microwave antennas out of tin cans, aluminium foil, and other parts and connected them to my computer with coaxial cable.
Well, I have been a licenced radio amateur since 1995; if you do not believe me!
And, I have installed operating systems literally hundreds of times over the years, as well as tinkering with thousands of programs to produce the functionality I wanted. When all computing takes place on cloud servers, nearly everything I have mentioned above becomes impossible. We cannot learn nearly as much about computers when we cannot physically get our hands on the computers we use. When the only hands-on computer you own is a cell-phone, you have very little opportunity for tinkering. The way mobile phones have evolved, they may as well be sealed in solid blocks of plastic.
The Purpose of a Independent Digital Chiefdom
In this article, I will explain how to configure what I am calling a "Independent Digital Chiefdom". This is simply a computer with maximum offline functionality. Those who choose to connect their computer to the Internet can still receive all the benefits of services and information that can be found online, but they are not wholly dependent on them. While off line, they can still watch movies, listen to music, read books, play games, research many topics of interest, write, and perform other functions without being dependent on services provided by corporate servers. A independent personal computer is also useful for safely storing personal records. And, an independent personal computer can run software to perform functions that are not provided by online services.
Several other benefits result when we disconnect from the Internet and go back to using hardware and software that work off line. Many have found that working off line creates a more peaceful work environment with fewer distractions. Offline work again becomes possible in places without Internet connections. Work continues when the Internet shuts down due to unforeseen problems or is intentionally shut down or limited by governments. Another benefit of offline computing in the age of surveillance capitalism is that Google, Apple, or Microsoft will not have access to every file we open, every program we run, and every keystroke we make.
Those who choose to create independent digital chiefdoms for exclusively offline use will enjoy other valuable benefits. A computer dedicated entirely to offline use is far less likely to have problems with malware. Not only is malware much less likely to find its way onto such a computer in the first place, any malware that might be present has no way of communicating with the outside world. This greatly reduces the likelihood of ransomware infections and makes email phishing attacks impossible. Computers that never go online have operating systems and software that cannot be deactivated or "updated" without their owners' consent or at inconvenient times (with functionality either increased or decreased, depending on some company's whim). If users so choose, they can theoretically run the same version of the same word-processing application for the rest of their lives--or at least the rest of the lives of their computers - without paying a single extra penny. They are also freed from the "support cycle" that companies use to artificially limit the useful lives of their hardware and software.
Those who choose to create digital fortresses with the intention of also using them on line have many advantages over big companies' online apps and platforms. A digital fortress should be able to visit any location on the Internet, not just the walled gardens accessible by online apps, or even just the approximately 500 million active websites accessible by browsers available from online app stores. Digital fortresses can also visit alternative networks like Gopher and Gemini and distributed networks like ZeroNet, I2P, the Interplanetary File System (IPFS), and others. Digital fortresses can also be configured to block advertising, tracking, and JavaScript on the regular Internet. They can even choose a text-only approach to surfing the Internet with browsers like Lynx and w3m. And, a digital fortress can be designed to maximise the user's privacy and anonymity through the use of software like the TOR browser or the TAILS operating system. Chromebooks can run the Tor browser, but what is the point with Google watching everything you do on line?
Now that we have touched on some of the benefits of having a partly offline or fully offline Independent Digital Chiefdom, how do we create one? Several approaches exist, and different individuals may choose different approaches, depending on the level of functionality, privacy, and security they want or need. Since I cannot cover every approach here, I have chosen one that I feel will appeal to the largest group of computer users. My solution will maximise offline functionality while retaining the ability for frequent online use. Here and there in this article, I will also include text boxes with extra information for those who prefer to take different approaches.
Selecting Hardware for Your Digital Fortress
Begin this exercise with a general-purpose computer on which can be installed the widest possible range of operating systems and software. Rule out computers that intentionally block the installation of alternative operating systems through the use the use of UEFI with Secure Boot that cannot be turned off. Also rule out newer computers like Microsoft's Surface Go that prevent the running of application software that is fully functional while off line. If you prefer a new computer, consider a gaming computer. They are designed to be highly configurable and more upgradeable than most. Many Dell business-class computers are also very versatile. If price is not a concern, but privacy is, you may want to consider computers from System76 or Purism. The computer you choose should also be compatible with as many third-party hardware accessories (flash drives, DVD drives, external hard drives, cables, printers, monitors, etc.) as possible. These criteria rule out Apple computers, Chromebooks, tablet computers, and mobile phones.
Bootable External USB Drives
Some may prefer to use bootable external Linux USB drives as the basis of their digital chiefdom. A computer that can boot from a Linux USB drive can have a sort of dual identity, like Clark Kent and Superman. Without the bootable USB drive, it looks and functions perfectly normally, like Clark Kent. When booted from the USB stick, it becomes something completely different, like Superman. It now has completely different capabilities. It can run alternative software, access alternative networks, and have increased privacy. A bootable USB stick running the TAILS operating system is just one example.
This approach is fine for those who do not have a reason for encrypting their digital fortresses. However, those whose computers and storage media are subject to searches by schools, employers, or governments may need encryption with plausible deniability. They will be forced to install their operating systems on their computers' internal hard drives because no encryption software of which I am aware can encrypt the system partition of a bootable USB drive. That is too bad, because an encrypted bootable USB drive would otherwise be an ideal solution for many.
I chose to use my Dell Latitude E6500 (now 12 years old) with a Core 2 Duo CPU and 4 GB of RAM as my own Independent Digital Chiefdom. In order to install the extra software that I had in mind, I upgraded from a 120 GB SSD to a 240 GB Kensington SSD (for which I paid $35 on Amazon). Note that 75 GB of the drive was allocated for a Windows partition that I did not want to delete. No other hardware upgrades were necessary.
Choosing Alternative Hardware
One way of navigating around the problem of computers being increasingly designed to work only while connected to the Internet is through the use of older computers. Older computers are great for running open source image viewers, word processors, some software development environments, older games, and a multitude of system accessories. Another use for older computers is as cheap home theatre PC's. They are great for watching movies on DVD's and listening to music on CD's. If they have powerful CPU's, they can also be used to rip DVD's and CD's and store the digital files on their hard drives. Movies and music can also be obtained from other sources and saved to hard drives.
Some individuals may have old cell-phone that they want to use completely off line to read ebooks, watch videos, listen to music and podcasts, and not much else. If this fulfils your needs for an offline, take-anywhere, Independent Digital Chiefdom, a variety of android multimedia player and ebook reader apps are available for you to use. However, you may need to learn to sideload them onto your cell-phone. One website for downloading sideloadable Android apps is APKMirror. The Kiwix offline Wikipedia program can also be installed on Android and iOS phones.
A third choice is a Raspberry Pi 4 computer. These latest Raspberry Pi's are so powerful that they can be used as desktop computers for functions that most users need. The flexibility of Raspberry Pi's has been increased by the availability of several operating systems.
Operating System Choices
A general-purpose operating system is best for an Independent Digital Chiefdom because it provides the maximum amount of flexibility, freeing the user from the ecosystem prisons of hardware and software vendors. I prefer Linux, thanks to its many free software packages, and Linux distributions are updated frequently as new security vulnerabilities are discovered.
Since I have been happy running Parrot OS for the last ten months, I decided to continue using it as the operating system of my own Independent Digital Chiefdom. Parrot OS is a distribution of Linux designed specifically for penetration testing, but I don't use it for that. I simply like that it runs well on my computer, allows me to add a wide variety of Linux software packages, and seems to be relatively secure.
Old Windows Computers
Some may want to re-purpose a PC with Windows 7 or earlier as an offline computer. I think this is an acceptable idea for those who are uncomfortable with Linux and are fine with not being able to upgrade software. I have a friend who bought a laptop in 2007 with Windows XP Media Center Edition that she still uses to watch movies. If you want an offline-only computer, no additional software security updates need be installed. However, I will be giving some software recommendations shortly for which you may have difficulty finding compatible versions for older versions of Windows.
Most Linux distributions should be fine for a digital fortress. Many Windows users find Linux Mint to be an easy distribution to which to transition from Windows, perhaps because its "Start" bar and menu structure are similar to Windows. Fortunately, huge amounts of online help now exists for new Linux users. Once you have had some experience with one Linux distribution, you should find transitioning to another that is derived from the same ancestor to be relatively easy. I tend to stay with Debian Linux derivatives because they seem to be the most numerous, thus, offering the widest variety of choices.
Application Software for Offline Solitude
I will now offer some suggestions for software to run on your Independent Digital Chiefdom. These are just suggestions. Many other programs can be substituted for those on my list, so do not feel locked into my choices. Feel free to use whatever software you prefer.
Office Software
Most Linux distributions come with LibreOffice. If not, LibreOffice can usually be installed with the simple Linux command: "sudo apt-get install libreoffice". Two other fine open source office suites that are mostly (though not completely) compatible with Microsoft Office are FreeOffice and OpenOffice. For those with simple writing needs, Gedit may be an even better choice for a word processor. All four of these can run entirely offline on both Linux and Windows computers.
Entertainment Software
Many now recognize the transitory nature of the content of online streaming media websites like Netflix, Hulu, and YouTube, not to mention their rising monthly fees. To my great disappointment, one of my favorite TV series disappeared from Netflix last year, and Disney has reserved its Star Wars movies for its own streaming service. Content increasingly seems to be horded by content owners, forcing streaming services to create their own content, which requires them to raise monthly subscription fees. Many people have digitized their collections of DVD's and CD's to hard drives, so at least they will have videos to watch and music to listen to as YouTube becomes increasingly unreasonably expensive. One of the possible functions of a Independent Digital Chiefdom may be as an offline home theatre PC for storing and playing content that is available inexpensively nowhere else.
The VLC media player plays just about every video and audio file known to man. It also has such an enormous variety of features that I would be surprised if anyone actually needed another media player program. However, Linux also has several other open source packages for watching movies and listening to music. Two of the fine Linux music players that I have used are QMMP and Audacious. Linux also has many packages for ripping and transcoding DVD's and CD's.
An all-in-one sort of multimedia player is Kodi. Many use Kodi as a slick interface for playing their offline content. Personally, I am a bit suspicious of the user tracking present with Kodi, but I do not remember hearing anyone complain. Perhaps I am overly paranoid.
Update 4-20-21: Unfortunately, Parrot OS seems to have a problem with the DRM of DVD's, so it will neither play DVD's nor rip them. When I tried to fix this by installing libdvd-pkg and then executing the command "sudo dpkg-reconfigure libdvd-pkg", this error message appeared:
libdvd-pkg: Checking orig.tar integrity...
/usr/src/libdvd-pkg/libdvdcss_1.4.2.orig.tar.bz2: OK
libdvd-pkg: `apt-get check` failed, you may have broken packages. Aborting...
Hopefully, the developers of Parrot OS will solve this problem soon. Non-DRM'ed multimedia files play without problems on Parrot OS.
Games
Games for personal computers have led the move into the cloud to such an extent that one can hardly find a new game that will still function offline. For this reason, I stopped looking years ago for new games. Fortunately, a vast array of old games are still available that I have not played.
Many older game DVD's and CD's are still sold on Ebay and Amazon. Unfortunately, DVD's and CD's degrade over time, so one can easily buy DVD's and CD's that have aged to the point they are no longer playable. For this reason, I recommend not buying game DVD's and CD's that are more than 15 years old.
Abandonware is a product that has been ignored by its owner and manufacturer and for which official support no longer exists. Old DOS and Windows games often fall into this category. Many have been preserved and are now downloadable from the Internet for free.
Here is a website for old DOS games.
Old Windows games can be downloaded here.
Retro games can be played in an Internet browser on this website, if you can figure out how to control them.
Reference Material Software
Linux has many offline reference material packages. Many of them also run on Windows computers. Artha is an offline thesaurus (sudo apt-get install artha). GoldenDict is an offline dictionary (sudo apt-get install goldendict goldendict-wordnet). FBReader is a simple, lightweight offline ebook reader (sudo apt-get install fbreader) that runs on Linux, Windows, Android, iOS, MacOS, FreeBSD, Windows Phone, and other operating systems. It can read ebooks in a variety of formats--including ePub, ePub 3, mobi and azw3 (Kindle), FB2, HTML, DjVu, Doc, Plucker, RTF, CHM, LIT, and plain text. It also has a PDF plugin for Android.
Another program that I highly recommend for offline reference is Kiwix. It enables users to download and read off line all or select parts of Wikipedia, Stack Exchange, Wikibooks, and other online reference material. Kiwix users can also download and watch selections of TED talks. Kiwix runs on Windows, Android, iOS, and MacOS. It is also available as plugins for some browsers. Kiwix is rather hard to install in some Linux distributions, but on Parrot OS, simply enable the backports repository (deb http://deb.debian.org/debian buster-backports main), and use the "sudo apt-get install kiwix" command.
Portable Apps
Many software applications now have portable versions. A portable app is one that can run without first being installed onto a computer. A portable app has an isolated directory (folder) structure that allows it to run from an external USB drive. This means portable apps can run without modifying your computer in any way. Portable apps are available for several operating systems, including Windows and Linux. Portable applications can also run from an encrypted USB stick, since the USB stick does not have to be bootable.
Over 400 portable apps for Windows can be downloaded here.
Various other Windows and Linux programs are also portable, even though they are not advertised as such. For example, as far as I can tell, the Linux Firefox ".deb" package is portable.
Surfing the Entire Internet with Your Digital Fortress
One of the many benefits of having a general-purpose computer is that it can be used to reach all parts of the Internet, not just the world wide web or websites that can be accessed by online apps. The Internet contains alternative networks and other lightly-travelled, out-of-the-way places. Many do not provide the same opportunities for advertising and tracking that are ubiquitous on the world wide web. Others have simply not yet been commercialised. The lack of commercial content makes lightly-travelled parts of the Internet feel more relaxing to some Internet surfers, which fits nicely with the idea of a Independent Digital Chiefdom. I discussed several lightly-travelled parts of the Internet extensively in my last article, How to Take Back the Internet by Choosing the Internet Less Traveled, so I will not dwell on this topic here.
Using Your Digital Fortress to Communicate with Others
The extent to which you choose to communicate with others from the peace and quiet of your Independent Digital Chiefdom is up to you. If you are so inclined, the world wide web can be bypassed through the use of desktop email clients, chat clients, and forums on alternative networks.
I have assembled a list of alternative forums that are mostly on the world wide web here. The ZeroTalk forum on ZeroNet is my favorite means of communicating with others in non-real-time without the use of centralised servers. I do not use Linux to communicate much in real time, so I cannot recommend specific Linux VOIP or chat programs, but I known that Pidgin is available preinstalled on many Linux distributions, including TAILS.
Final Words
Hopefully, this article has helped to open the eyes of a few who may otherwise have been inclined to be content with computer hardware and software that is practically useless when off line. I hope those who have been motivated to take this topic seriously will make an effort to reduce their dependence on server platforms and services. The only way for consumers to fight back effectively against the online-only future that we are increasingly being forced into is by refusing to pay for software and hardware that is not in our best interests to use. Remember, even giant corporations cannot make products that consumers refuse to buy.