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The internet is kind of a predatory cesspit now

stephendiehl.com

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Re: The internet is kind of a predatory cesspit now

#151

Post by thegrim33 »

The root cause underlying all of that is the simple fact that the average person just isn't intelligent enough. They fall for the grift, they fall for the advertising, for the manipulation, the propaganda, the echo chambers, the emotion, the hate, they fall for it all. They're either unable to see it or escape it or both.

With the internet connecting everyone together, giving you direct, immediate, access to billions of people from the comfort of your own home, of course there's going to be classes of people working to siphon money (or power) from the unintelligent into their own pockets, rather than doing the hard work of actually producing value for their civilization.

There's also no real solution to this.

Of course, educating people is a solution, somehow getting people to be more intelligent. But that's a slow, long, process, and the more I see, the more I realize just how commonly intelligent people still fall prey to the same things.

The only other solution I see is blocking access for the majority for either consuming information from or contributing information to the internet, which is a hard pill to swallow, and which has its own horrible, and mostly unsolvable issues.

Re: The internet is kind of a predatory cesspit now

#152

Post by spacedcowboy »

This is a little premature - I'm about a month away from a really good launch date, but the sentiment here is too good a match to miss...

A long time ago, when dinosaurs roamed the Earth, I set up my first webserver. In those halcyon days you had to email CERN to get your website added to the list of websites in the world; a list people downloaded as the sum total of what the web was and where they could visit.

Things have come a long way since then, but maybe not always for the better. The ad-companies have wormed their way into just about everything on the web, and the tech billionaires have funded it because they can make even more money at the general public's expense.

I recently got very fed up with Reddit's anti-user policies, and decided 'screw it, there's not that much special here'. As a result, Blewit[1] came into existence: it's an experiment - can an old-style just-for-the-good-of-the-community-it-represents website still function in today's modern world? We'll see...

Blewit takes no user information other than a username/password. We're forced to accept cloudflare's country-code so we can be compliant with the Online Safety Act, but we deliberately don't even ask for an email address.

We don't track. We don't have ads that are other ways to track. We don't have algorithms that force engagement along the most-outrageous pathway. We don't have analytics to sell you stuff. We don't put tracking pixels in our site, and when you upload an image, we strip it of all the EXIF/Location data so it can't be used to track you by proxy.

More bluntly, all the dark patterns are missing. By design. It hearkens back to a simpler time, where people did things simply because they thought it was cool, and others might like it too.

So it'll be interesting to see if something like Reddit (I think it's better, but I'm biased) can survive in the far-more-predatory world that we live in, than when I first started using the web. The site is deliberately lean-and-mean, and I think I can give it the on-ramp it needs to become successful if it gets the engagement of sufficient people. Again, I guess we'll see :)

Enjoy.

1: https://blewit.uk/

Re: The internet is kind of a predatory cesspit now

#153

Post by [deleted] »

Biologist123 wrote: post #24

> People increasingly behave like addicts because addiction is the business model. I sense my internet addiction got a lot worse in recent years. I don’t use social media, but I consume news, blogs and newsletters - and comment threads - voraciously. I think the addiction began as soon as I started to work at a desk behind a computer which had internet access - 20+ years ago. Like putting an alcoholic to work behind…

[deleted]

Re: The internet is kind of a predatory cesspit now

#155

Post by AlexB138 »

noir_lord wrote: post #63
stillpointlab wrote: post #31

One thing people go through as they age is an elevation of cynicism and general misanthropy. After decades of being disappointed when naive idealism and speculative optimism fail, one can just get down on it all. It is really hard not to succumb to this. It requires active effort and sometimes even a willful ignorance. "turn a blind eye" is the idiom here. Monty Python's "Always look on the bright side of life" kind…

I think that's why historical education is so important (or just liking history as in my case), looked through the lens of history all of the current shit as bad as it is, is really nothing all that new either, the only constant is change after all. As the aphorism goes: History may not repeat but it sure does rhyme.

You're absolutely correct that history helps you see that none of this is new. However, is it better to be the person who sees the waterfall their boat is inevitably going to go over, or the person completely ignorant of it until it happens?

Re: The internet is kind of a predatory cesspit now

#156

Post by paxys »

Biologist123 wrote: post #24

> People increasingly behave like addicts because addiction is the business model. I sense my internet addiction got a lot worse in recent years. I don’t use social media, but I consume news, blogs and newsletters - and comment threads - voraciously. I think the addiction began as soon as I started to work at a desk behind a computer which had internet access - 20+ years ago. Like putting an alcoholic to work behind…

> I don’t use social media

You are using social media right now.

Re: The internet is kind of a predatory cesspit now

#157

Post by hypfer »

s1artibartfast wrote: post #142
hypfer wrote: post #129

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I (self-servingly) don't think that cynicism is bad, nor that it would be a good idea to pathologize what is simply a healthy defense to a hostile reality. It depends on how you wield it. Cynicism shouldn't cloud your judgement. That's the actually correct point you wanted to make, I think.

Cynicism is a negatively biased view of the world. People should strive for accuracy. Sometimes accurate is also harsh, but that is different. Maybe this is the same thing you intended by saying it shouldn't Cloud your judgment.

Yeah, probably.

It doesn't help that the clinical meaning and the colloquial meaning of the word are different, with the latter being used by people to hit you over the head with, pretending that it would be the former.

Re: The internet is kind of a predatory cesspit now

#158

Post by mrkeen »

Good writing includes some examples or statistics.

The ratio of grifters to non-grifters could have halved or risen tenfold in the last few decades. How would we know?

What percentage of the population "now appears willing to devote every waking hour to fleecing their fellow man as a career choice?"

How "many online grifters are themselves marks"?

Re: The internet is kind of a predatory cesspit now

#159

Post by KronisLV »

Biologist123 wrote: post #24

> People increasingly behave like addicts because addiction is the business model. I sense my internet addiction got a lot worse in recent years. I don’t use social media, but I consume news, blogs and newsletters - and comment threads - voraciously. I think the addiction began as soon as I started to work at a desk behind a computer which had internet access - 20+ years ago. Like putting an alcoholic to work behind…

> I’d like out, but the dealers are on every corner.

Since the industry stops for noone (and you kinda have to keep learning in software dev) and due to the state of the economy it feels like one big rat race to me, I don't foresee that sort of outcome for myself.

I can easily imagine how lazing in the sun in Italy or someplace like that (if the hot summers nowadays don't fuck that up), going swimming and eating healthy food with not a care in the world would surely help one get rid of the dopamine addiction, getting there being the hard part.

The fast paced modern lifestyle and being always online can feel a tad anxiety inducing and unnatural.

Re: The internet is kind of a predatory cesspit now

#160

Post by queenkjuul »

noir_lord wrote: post #63
stillpointlab wrote: post #31

One thing people go through as they age is an elevation of cynicism and general misanthropy. After decades of being disappointed when naive idealism and speculative optimism fail, one can just get down on it all. It is really hard not to succumb to this. It requires active effort and sometimes even a willful ignorance. "turn a blind eye" is the idiom here. Monty Python's "Always look on the bright side of life" kind…

I think that's why historical education is so important (or just liking history as in my case), looked through the lens of history all of the current shit as bad as it is, is really nothing all that new either, the only constant is change after all. As the aphorism goes: History may not repeat but it sure does rhyme.

I would kinda be with you, except, climate change. And like, we didn't have nukes when the last world war started. This time we will.
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