
The Metrics of Backpacks - tosh
https://www.artpractical.com/column/the-metrics-of-backpacks/
======
rfrey
I really liked this essay, and I think I would really like its author if I
knew her.

At the end of the essay, the vague sadness I felt was joined by a pretty
unsympathetic “well, what did you expect?” kind of feeling. I didn’t like
that, it put me into the shuttle bus of coyotes she might have been talking
about.

But she doesn’t like technical backpacks, or people who like technical
backpacks, and she took a job in a technical backpack factory.

~~~
CrestonePeak
When the town turns into a company town for the makers of technical backpacks,
I feel some admiration for the people that try to assimilate, but also... it's
kind of a shame.

There's no easy reaction to all the engineers and technical staff that don't
love making tech products, maybe don't even like it. I want to explain to them
why I love it in the hopes they'll start to feel the way I do and be happy.
But people are too complex for that. And you can't just be like "get some
other job" because there are very few other jobs that won't leave them
struggling to make rent, at least not without moving far away.

~~~
et-al
Bingo.

> Surrounded by transplants, we together inhabit a prehistoric California of
> 1970s sedans, rickety on the highway, hot air blowing through open windows
> into the backseat. [...] Our coworkers had moved here to be a part of the
> future, but we were left over from something that had already passed.

------
golergka
> Dustin wants me to know that it was his decision to not hire me. “I have to
> feel really good about a person before I bring them on, and I don’t feel
> that way about you,” he says.

Whenever I took a decision to fire somebody, I always made a point of openly
taking responsibility for it. I thought it was the right thing to do; I was
sick of people who couldn't stomach making a decision, and that I could at
least look the person I was letting go in the eye and try to explain, in the
most honest and open way possible the reason for my decision. Same for
declining to hire someone after an interview.

But reading this, it felt unnecessary cruel; now I wonder if it's sometimes
best to just let these things work out themselves. May be not everyone is like
me, and some people don't really need this conversation.

One thing for certain though: Dustin had no self-interest in having this
conversation, after author have already been informed about the decision.

~~~
samastur
I think most people want to know why they are being fired and they deserve
that information communicated delicately.

Some might want to know who fired them when it is not obvious, but few would
actually benefit from knowing this.

------
derrida
"What dismays me about technology is this: not the machine itself but the way
its architecture echoes outward, imposing a grid of quantification on
everything it touches. The sadness of numbers interferes with our thoughts,
begs us to apply logic to warm, messy things. What becomes of the ambiguity of
feeling? That which can’t be immediately identified is derided, denied, and
eventually erased." Amen.

~~~
781
Standardizing, gridifying and quantiazing it's what allows our modern huge
world to exist.

> _Social scalability is the ability of an institution –- a relationship or
> shared endeavor, in which multiple people repeatedly participate, and
> featuring customs, rules, or other features which constrain or motivate
> participants’ behaviors -- to overcome shortcomings in human minds and in
> the motivating or constraining aspects of said institution that limit who or
> how many can successfully participate. Social scalability is about the ways
> and extents to which participants can think about and respond to
> institutions and fellow participants as the variety and numbers of
> participants in those institutions or relationships grow. It 's about human
> limitations, not about technological limitations or physical resource
> constraints._

[https://unenumerated.blogspot.com/2017/02/money-
blockchains-...](https://unenumerated.blogspot.com/2017/02/money-blockchains-
and-social-scalability.html)

~~~
derrida
Standardizing and quantizing is also what enables conceptual proliferation
which makes reality increasingly intractable. Understanding this is why China
had Chuang Tzu and continuity in civilization. Things shouldn't be the slave
of reason, they should be a slave of the senses. Love, Hume/Buddha :)
perception in terms of quantization has that old problem 'with a hammer
everything looks like a nail'... everything looks like a market transaction...
to be solved by some financial instrument, bureaucracy or code. Chuang Tzu was
talking about this millenia ago and was required reading for China's leaders.

Meanwhile Global Warming carries on... reality doesn't care what we think.

~~~
781
> Things shouldn't be the slave of reason, they should be a slave of the
> senses

People say that. But then they are horrified when someone kills another one
because it made them angry. Or when a man rapes a woman because he couldn't
control his senses.

They say they want a "human touch" and "emotion instead of logic", but don't
like the consequences of truly doing that.

~~~
edejong
The solution IMHO is not to substitute the emotions, but to understand,
control and channel them by equanimity, concentration, meditation,
investigation and mindfulness.

------
areoform
Spare a moment for those whom change leaves behind. The ones with pretty
backpacks that have pony tails. The ones who have to cry.

Spare a thought for those whom numbers don’t define. The ones who draw
strength from stories of humpback whales. The ones who hear the redwoods’ cry.

Spare a feeling for those whom see through the self-congratulatory lies. The
ones who know that the X in UX is a haphazard lie. The ones who know that
sometimes even numbers can cry.

Spare a tiny piece of your heart before the day you too get left behind and
become undefined while feeling you’re seeing through the lies.

------
OneWordSoln
Something special happens when one reads a piece of such ineffable beauty.
Beyond thought or specific emotion, we are affected, taken to some other
undefined place. It happens very rarely for me, perhaps due to my lifetime of
tech-oriented pursuits, but it certainly happened to me today and I am
thankful for Ms. Gannon's soul-bearing work of beauty.

On another note and only because I am a paying, very satisfied customer, I
have to recommend MasterClass. I was originally simply interested in watching
Gary Kasparov's chess class with my 10yo son, but when I saw the list of
experts in writing, music and media production, we decided that $90 for one
class was inferior to $180 for a year of all the classes (and we live in
public housing so this was no easy investment). It has been an outstanding
decision. I literally did this within the past week and watching Judy Blume
and Neil Gaiman and Margaret Atwood with my 12yo daughter has been nothing
less than revelatory. I also have enjoyed Will Wright and Herbie Hancock and
Malcolm Gladwell and Frank Gehry and Hans Zimmer; excellence and passion
inspire us. The production on the classes is its own master class in
educational video creation in the internet age, but their choice of educators
is its own special kind of genius.

My favorite, however (and surprisingly, to me), has been the poet Billy
Collins. We need more poets' hearts in this digital world of MBAs ruthlessly
squeezing the populace and our beloved Mother Earth for everything the laws
they crafted will allow. I applaud Victoria Gannon for her wonderful piece of
poetic prose. Her poet's heart has inspired me this morning and I need all of
that I can get in this world of callous competition.

~~~
satokema
He had found a Market-Matic machine which had provided him with a plastic cup
filled with a liquid that was almost, but not quite, entirely unlike a real
comment. The way it functioned was very interesting. When the Reply button was
pressed it made an instant but highly detailed examination of the subject's
taste buds, a spectroscopic examination of the subject's metabolism and then
sent tiny experimental signals down the neural pathways to the taste centers
of the subject's brain to see what was likely to go down well. However, no one
knew quite why it did this because it invariably delivered a cupful of liquid
that was almost, but not quite, entirely unlike a real comment.

~~~
OneWordSoln
When one tells the truth there is no guarantee that the listener lives closely
enough with the truth to recognize it as such, the filters of their life often
obscurring the simpler reality that some few others choose to inhabit.

All that is important is living and telling one's truth because, in the end,
most people don't even know who Dunning & Kruger are, let alone that McArthur
Wheeler bears a great resemblance to the vast majority of humanity in the
early 21st Century.

------
auggierose
I don't get it. Was hoping to learn something about how to make the perfect
backpack. ;-)

~~~
somada141
I feel pretty shallow for saying this but I was hoping for information on
perfectly adjusting one's backpack based on their anatomy/measurements.

Who has time for literary beauty when so many dumb things occupy one's mind :D

~~~
EliRivers
So part of this is all about you, but not in the way you wanted. You're not
just a reader in this; you're part of the ensemble; did you see yourself as
you read?

~~~
somada141
I'm gonna fess up and say I didn't read it at first. Within a few seconds when
I realised it wasn't about literal backpacks I checked the comments to see if
anything of value is discussed. Agreed with the person before me and moved on.

This is how I operate these days I'm afraid. I subconsciously attribute some
vague numerical value to anything I do and should it fall under some equally
vague threshold the effort is abandoned.

I think the more I work as a coder the more I allow my behaviour to become
algorithmic :D

------
lawkwok
I haven’t read writing this long without closing the tab in a very long time.

The writers melancholic stream of thought in the context of working at a tech
startup is great.

------
simplyinfinity
huh, so i'm about halfway trough and i'm having a hard time following what the
writer is talking about.

To me this feels like someone with ADD trying to tell me something but gets
distracted every other sentence. is it just me?

~~~
shaftoe
I abandoned about halfway through when I realized it wasn't going to get to a
discussion of backpack design and I had no idea what the actual point was.
You're not alone.

~~~
barryhoodlum
Hope you guys manage to convince your wives to watch some sci fi!

~~~
thih9
Why are you assuming that parent commenter has a spouse that doesn't watch sci
fi?

I'm sure you have a point, I wish you wrote about it in a clear way instead of
implying unhelpful things about other authors.

~~~
everythingswan
In the article, the author describes the people she works with in this exact
context.

Parent you're replying to is lumping those further up the comment chain with
the people described in the article. She says they often talk about how to get
their wives to watch more science fiction movies.

I felt it landed perfectly given the context of the article, YMMV.

------
HenryBemis
I travel almost every week. One of my 'favourite' things on this planet is the
one that I use most. My backpack. It usually carries a 1lt bottle of water, 4
pens, dental floss, 2 laptops & chargers, phone charger, 1 journal, 1 A4
notepad, clean socks. I love using this backpack because I don't have to check
it in the airports.

I was hoping for a backpack article that would suggest tips, tricks for people
like me/us. Travelers with laptops. I was initially disappointed until I
started reading. Thank you for this.

~~~
notoriousjpg
What pack do you use?

------
antoniorosado
My god, what a wonderful read.

------
mtlewis
This was a beautiful and unexpected read.

~~~
CrestonePeak
The unexpectedness of it was a lot of how it got to me.

------
Multiplayer
This is amazing writing. I hope the author is able to find the appropriate
outlet to use her obvious skill.

------
scarejunba
Entertaining read. I quite liked it. Also a weird feeling to be one of the
tangential villains in the story.

Though I imagine I would conclude that either the person doesn't trust me _or_
they're an idiot if they don't incorporate my data into their world view.

------
djrockstar1
This was written beautifully. Anyone have recommendations for similarly
immersive prose?

~~~
photon_lines
Fernando Pessoa and Vladimir Nabakov come to mind. Primo Levi is great as
well.

------
mejarc
So much of this account resonates with my experience as a UX ("X!" Must be
technical!) developer in the Bay Area. I love this line particularly: "A film
of pseudoscience sticks to everything we touch."

------
iovrthoughtthis
This is beautiful.

------
Creationer
As humanity we need a greater purpose. We need to constantly expand and move
into more difficult frontiers. It is what defines us as a species and the
challenge keeps us collectively sane.

We need to push as a species into Space. To mine asteroids and setup bases. We
need to get our home planet off fossil fuels and maintain it as a haven of
life, with a smaller and more productive human workforce.

