Why big tech companies suck right now. Looking at you Amazon, Netflix, Uber, Spotify, Facebook, Snapchat, Instagram, TikTok, YouTube… (sponsor was here)

Some of Cory Doctorow’s stuff! Ensh*ttification: https://www.wired.com/story/tiktok-platforms-cory-doctorow/ End-to-End: https://doctorow.medium.com/end-to-end-d6046dca366f

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  • filister@lemmy.worldEnglish
    17·
    7 months ago

    I think this is the market model of a lot of American startup companies having a huge financial backbone. Work years even decades on loss in order to catch as much of the market as possible, and once you are a market leader start the enshittification and abuse your market position.

    • rottingleaf@lemmy.zipEnglish
      31·
      7 months ago

      I think it’s a human trait. In many places people imagine a successful life as enduring to get to some position and then being an important guy who can screw everyone.

      And patents and IP indirectly perpetuate that worldview. “Invent” something and then live on royalties. “Discover” something and then that too. Write a book and then any reference to it means royalties. At least in dreams and fairy-tales it looks like that.

      The incentive is privilege. It’s a very old mechanism, not really making any sense for economics as known today.

      That is, it makes some sense - before IP and patents people would have trade secrets. A secret technology of making some dye or some material or some kind of steel. Patents allowed for faster modernization - you don’t have to keep it a secret anymore, which allows to scale production.

      With things hard to cover by IP and patents they use the network effect instead.

  • disguy_ovahea@lemmy.worldEnglish
    132·
    7 months ago

    The only way to change this is to vote with your money. I know that easier said than done, because these companies have driven down their cost with criminally low wages or by selling user data. Pay for domestically made goods from local businesses. Use ride-sharing or public transportation, ride a bike, or walk when possible. Pay artists directly through their website, or fair compensation sites like Bandcamp or Patreon.

    Any other suggestions on services that support the manufacturer/artist/creator?

    • iopq@lemmy.worldEnglish
      71·
      7 months ago

      Self host all the things. Don’t use Google drive, self host nextcloud. Run your own VPN from a VPS, since the Google one is shutting down anyway. Oracle offers always free servers.

  • ASaltPepper@lemmy.oneEnglish
    9·
    7 months ago

    Glad he linked Cory Doctorow at the end. His recent works like the internet con cover this topic well.

    He does offer solutions but as you could guess these things aren’t easy to fix.

  • taanegl@lemmy.worldEnglish
    5·
    7 months ago

    The venture capital samba:

    1. Make free service (it’ll pan out, trust me bro).
    2. 1 years passes… trust me bro
    3. 3 years passes… look at all this user data we can sell - trust me bro
    4. 2 more year passes… look, we’re going to have to fire some people…
    5. 1 year passes… we’re not really making any money, so trust me bro - we’re only going to increase subscription fees a little…
    6. 1 year later, increase subscription fees…
    7. 1 year later, increase subscription fees…
    8. 1 year later, increase subscription fees…
    9. Listen, Mr Creditor - I have liquidity. So much liquidity. I’m rife with the stuff… increase subscription fees

    And so forth, and so on…

  • scorpious@lemmy.worldEnglish
    55·
    7 months ago

    Can’t help but think that the all-too prevalent (here, at least) attitude that one shouldn’t have to pay anything, or very, very little, for quality content has a lot to do with it.

    • thepaperpilot@incremental.social
      9·
      7 months ago

      I honestly think that philosophy is fine. Before the major social media sites all came about, the Internet was filled with much smaller communities that didn’t need to be profitable or scalable - they could be run by an individual as a hobby project. I think returning to that (possibly with the use of federation so these small communities still have a good amount of content) could keep things free, ad free, and privacy conscious

      • scorpious@lemmy.worldEnglish
        33·
        7 months ago

        Do the journalists (and researchers, editors, verifying staff, etc.) all work for free?

    • r00ty@kbin.life
      3·
      7 months ago

      Nah. Netflix used to be a reasonable price and a very decent alternative to the rip off prices of cable and satellite TV.

      Then of course every other media company wanted to charge the same price each time splitting off shows that used to be on Netflix.

      It’s reached the point that it would cost the same ripoff prices to get all the services needed for most people to watch what they’d like to watch.

      This is just too much to pay per household per month for entertainment.

      Bring back one service that provides all the TV (not even movies) for less than 30usd/25 gbp and I’m there. But I’m not subscribing to them all. It’s ridiculous.