This past August 12th Devine gave this light-hearted talk for Critical Signals 2025, taking place in New Zealand. This talk introduces some old, some new and some eccentric ideas for keeping computers and their software running for as long as we can. It was meant to try and teach tricks to fight planned obsolescence and also build new things that might survive the onslaught of corporate capture.

This talk was streamed from aboard a little sailboat adrift somewhere in the Pacific. No prior knowledge of computing required.

Thank you to the organizers of Critical Signals for inviting us.

Rek & Dev

Critical Signals: https://criticalsignals.nz/

Image Credit:

Some of the images were produced by Devine, others by Rek (https://kokorobot.ca/), the other half of HundredRabbits. The credited images below belong to their authors.

01:41 "And actually, I surf with images off". The Computer Chronicles - The Internet (1993)

03:41 [redacted genie]. c2oh

05:49 Unknown. Sourced from https://wiki.collapsible.systems/

08:30 Shark with legs. Junji Ito, Gyo(manga)

09:14 System for converting television commercials into interactive networked video games https://patents.google.com/patent/US8246454B2/en

11:02 Sufficiently advanced technology. Towards a more Elvish vision for Technology. George Strakhov https://essays.georgestrakhov.com/elvish

12:06 "I've eliminated the friction". Cat & Girl, The Genius https://catandgirl.com/ CC BY-NC-SA 2.5

14:39 Super Chair. Ken Isaacs, Living Structures

19:20 Google Chrome RAM Hog. Author unknown. https://knowyourmeme.com/memes/google-chrome-ram-hog#fn2

26:37 Space Jam. https://www.spacejam.com/1996

33:18 MingMing II. Roger Taylor. https://thesimplesailor.com/

36:03 GIF, RAW, DOC, TAR. Jenny Mitcham(Head of Good Practice and Standards for the Digital Preservation Coalition)

38:15 There Will Come Soft Rains. Wood, Weird Fantasy #17