True - but it did have the benefit of giving the majority of people who passed through it the same benefit of a baseline understanding of "things" - those with aptitude and talent (and time and privilege) could take that further and build upon those fundamentals.
Now however, if people are not even internalizing those fundamentals in order to even re-write things in their own words, using their own "mental model" (perhaps correct, sometimes not) - I fear they won't even develop "mental models" and abstractions...
The invasion issue is also further remediated by using a "workstation style" laptop which only gets 60-75m of battery life (plus also weighs far too much to be used on your actual "lap")...
Yeah, normal people look at me funny when I am "out and about" and they want me to do something on a random website and my reply is: "naw, I will look at that when I am back at a real computer"....
I have had every type of computing device, including pre-smart phone PDA's, and ultimately when I need to do something that isn't mediated by an "app", I will always gravitate towards doing it on an actual computer.
Now - while I do prefer a laptop as my primary machine - it is essentially a desktop, as I typically use it 90% of the time attached to either a dock at home or the office, with external screens, keyboard and mouse.
(Heck - my latest machine only gets about 75m of battery life... it is more a luggable than a "work-at-the-beach" kind of machine (i9, lots of ram, etc.) - and I am perfectly happy with that arrangement)
In a country far from home, on my own I was out late on a Saturday night in the bar district. Decided on a whim to buy a pack of cigarettes and have a smoke - a few minutes later a group of guys approached me and asked for a couple. Of course I obliged, when they found out I was there alone and Canadian, they invited me to join in their raucous bar-hopping bachelor party for the rest of night, we went until the sun rose.
In another place, far to the north, above the arctic tree line I heard so many stories and met so many indigenous people when braving the frigid temperatures to participate in smoke breaks.
So - while horrible for health, my "anecdata" does seem to indicate that it does help break down social barriers, remove my self-imposed "shyness" regarding talking to "strangers" and strengthens community and social bonds.
(Thankfully, outside of a 6-week period where a relative was in hospice care and I was up to a "pack a day", I was able to quit easily)
That's actually what I did - upgraded from a 5-bay Synology to an 8-bay in December (before HD prices skyrocketed even further than they had since my last NAS build), still have a couple free slots, but doubled my overall available storage space. eBooks are not the bulk of what is one there though...
As a book want-to-be-hoarder without enough room to actually do so, these stories always make me sad - I spent alot of time in quiet, cool empty libraries picking up random books as a child.
OTOH - I personally don't have enough room for real books, so everything I have is digital on a NAS. It's there, but "not the same".
Digitization reminds me of part of the plot of "Rainbow's End" (Vinge), where physical books get digitized, through a destructive process...
... try being a Canadian with a bit of a hearing deficiency that is always saying our "verbal tic" of: "sorry" just prior to asking people to repeat themselves...
Well - the fact that they don't pay attention (or lack critical thinking skills and a baseline reasonable education) is a large part of the problem.
But - with a person like POTUS - and those he surrounds himself with, they will throw every possible promise to get the votes - but, each of those issues are only part of their overall agenda and platform. When they got called-out on controversial issues, they outright lied about knowing about things like "Project 2025" during the last election cycle.
Choosing to live in ignorance - or abstaining from voting is accepting that agenda and platform, regardless.
I was lucky enough to have seen the initial controversy and install the X1Plus firmware on my X1C about 2-weeks before lockdown. It has worked flawlessly with OrcaSlicer ever since. For monitoring when I am away from my office, I setup VPN, HomeAssistant and could do it from my computer - but there was also a "Bambu Companion" app released pretty quickly in that timeframe (there are probably others now) which allowed my to replace the "Bambu Handy" functionality on my phone.
So - of course, I swore I would not buy another Bambu. But, when looking at the various pricing and other aspects of competitors - about a month ago I did end-up buying an H2C with double-AMS and an HT - mainly to reduce filament waste, have a larger build volume, be able to use multi-materials for support "quickly" and have active chamber heating for more "engineering" type filaments. Don't believe the hype about the chamber filter though - I have found with ABS, you still need external exhaust or air filtering as even though the chamber "closes" and recycles via the filter, you still have the "poop chute" venting fumes...
... and of course... even if I wanted to switch to LAN-mode, unfortunately OrcaSlicer does not yet support the H2C... perhaps it never will unfortunately...
Outside of Prusa - how would you compare Bambu's documentation against it's competitors?
In my experience, having owned 2-other printers prior to an X1C - there is absolutely NO comparison - EVERYTHING was community, Reddit, forum or random YouTube guidance from non-manufacturers.
I have seen one YouTube video that seemed to indicate a problem with pulling filament was because of a little flap within the new 4-1 PTFE filament adapter. There is a little rubber valve/flap (apparently it is a consumable, because the printer came with extra) - which he found if left in-place would cause filament jams, so he removed it, and no more feed problems. (Unfortunately, I cannot find the exact video - I have seen/bookmarked too many)
Now however, if people are not even internalizing those fundamentals in order to even re-write things in their own words, using their own "mental model" (perhaps correct, sometimes not) - I fear they won't even develop "mental models" and abstractions...