Russian typewriters and Somerville's reputation

[ron_newman]

A editorial in Thursday's Boston Globe whimsically(?) connects Russian intelligence agencies' decision to buy typewriters with our local "hispter" culture:

In Russia’s case, the typewriters are a security measure; according to the newspaper Izvestia, Kremlin officials decided that the only way to protect against American Internet snooping is to avoid computers entirely for sensitive communications. But perhaps we’re also finally seeing the fruits of the Cambridge-based Russian spy ring that was busted in 2010: Those agents may not have discovered the state secrets they wanted, but apparently they did discover Somerville.

If so, they would have returned with news of a hipster fascination with analog technology — manual typewriters, vinyl records, knitting — that’s been one of the more fascinating cultural backlashes of the 21st century. Chasing the latest vintage fad often looks like a form of status seeking, a way of keeping up with the Joneses for people who believe they’re above that sort of thing. More charitably, though, hoarding bygone technology may also reflect a modern yearning for a sense of connectedness with the material world that’s increasingly lost in a digital sea of ones and zeroes.

Comments

[cos]

Nahh, Somerville was being progressive, alternative, cool, and urban, before hipsterism was invented!

[ron_newman]

- before hipsterism was invented

.... in the 1940s?