DaveCinzano
WATCH OUT, GEORGE, HE'S GOT A SCREWDRIVER!
Garage, on the other hand (just not your typical joint)
Is Elon Musk the greatest visionary or the greatest snake oil salesman of our age?
- Thread starter tim
- Start date
Ax^
Silly Rabbit
NoXion
Craicy the Squirrel
You always have to ask, better at what? Facebook is no doubt a worse experience for users than it was a decade ago, but remember that Facebook wasn't built for the utility and convenience of its users in the first place. Have you tried getting in touch with Facebook support recently? It's basically impossible. Facebook has always been primarily a data-harvesting exercise, and I would wager that it's definitely improved in that respect. I wouldn't know for sure, I stopped using Facebook when I noticed it was having an injurious impact on my mental health. Given how opaque the operation of Facebook is, it seems hard to tell if it is in the terminal phase or if it's still going strong. Facebook certainly have a direct financial interest in hiding their oncoming demise, if that is indeed the case.
Another thing worth mentioning is that more and more segments of capital are becoming interested in providing a "subscription" or "service" model as opposed to offering customers a one-time purchase. So many have become convinced that regularly squeezing blood from a stone is the way forward, although with typical capitalist short-sightedness, seemingly none of them have stopped and asked themselves what would happen once the market becomes saturated with subscription-based bullshit.
Dogsauce
I’ve got Skol but I’m not a Scholar
The usual progression of new tech is that first of all they find out how to build something that works, then any subsequent research is on how to make it cheaper, working out which components they can get away with that will just about last to the end of the warranty period. It’s why things like my parent’s big old ugly brown microwave refused to die, I kept getting it back out of the attic to replace the compact and shiny new ones that would pack up after eighteen months. I guess it will be similar with electric cars, the early adopters might actually find themselves with more reliable vehicles that what will come to pass in a decade or so. Capitalism innit, the eternal quest to see what you can get away with.
BigMoaner
What A Load of Old Bollocks
Somewhere reckon google is going down the shitter user interface wise (but not profit wise), and there are those that theorise that they actually have a vested interest in “keeping it shit” cos if it was really good then users wouldn’t spend so much time there, getting what they need and fucking off. Not sure I buy that though.
BigMoaner
What A Load of Old Bollocks
Yes, always associated this with consumerism in general. The inbuilt shitness so nothing lasts too long. But with online tech it gets more complicated I guess. But these companies which are in so many ways outright monopolies pretty much have got worse I reckon. Fascinating.
Dogsauce
I’ve got Skol but I’m not a Scholar
Google has been shit for a while, I sometimes need it for work and it’s very hard to find what you want now, so many irrelevant sponsored results crowding out useful information. Amazon has a similar signal to noise problem. Stuff just gets shitter, such is life.
Dogsauce
I’ve got Skol but I’m not a Scholar
The only good websites basically survive (temporarily) on a business model of ‘we’ll build a decent user base doing a nice user friendly and functional site then one of the big cunts will come along and buy it off us and fuck it up to squeeze profit out of it, while we retire on our yachts’. I remember when Twitter, Flickr and even Facebook were simple and elegant (myspace never was). Vinted will probably be the next to enter the shittification process.
Saul Goodman
It's all good, man
This is one of the reasons I wish death on so many people. Mercedes make you pay a subscription to use the rear wheel steering on your car. BMW have recently dropped their €20/month subscription for heated seats in their cars. They surely didn't do this out of kindness, they did it because of the backlash, but every fucker seems to be at it now. Software has gone that way. Adobe want me to pay a monthly subscription for Photoshop. They can get fucked. I'll just pirate it, along with every other piece of software that tries to force this model on me.
It's getting to the stage where you'll soon be unable to buy/own anything. Even things that you think you've bought and own can be turned off at the whim of some cunt who decides to change the EULA.
Louis Rossmann has been ranting about it a lot lately. A couple of his most recent...
tommers
Busta Rhymes is an unstoppable movement
Recurring revenue allows companies to plan ahead with more confidence than discrete transactions. That also means that they are valued higher by people who want to buy them. They see it as a reliable indicator of future revenue. It's also easier to do the whole "only 49p a day!" thing.
That's why every single fucker is doing it right now.
That's why every single fucker is doing it right now.
NoXion
Craicy the Squirrel
Search Engine Optimisation (SEO) has done real harm to our ability to find useful and reliable information online, as opposed to finding places that want to sell you shit. I wish a lingering and agonising death upon any and all people involved in pushing SEO.
No it's not? Unless your definition of "basic needs" is broad enough to include things like hobbies and interests, people are always going to want to do things beyond just eating and sleeping. A lot of the time that will involve discretionary spending in the capitalist economy we have no choice but to live in. Even in a post-capitalist economy I can see getting more than peripherally involved in certain activities requiring one getting to know specific people or groups, a measure of quid pro quo, or even just putting one's name on a waiting list. I think the notion that a significant proportion of humans ever existed (or will exist in the future) in some state of Arcadian contentment free of want or ambition is a view of rose-tinted idealism. Even if everyone's material needs are met, there will still be people pursuing unrequited love, trying and/or failing to achieve intellectual goals, or chasing political agendas. As a species we had spread ourselves across the entire planet, tens of thousands of years before capitalism was even a notional concept. We didn't evolve into what we are now by standing still and never wondering what was over the horizon.
belboid
Exasperated, not angry.
we've already had the enshitification posts, haven't we?
Dystopiary
putting up a hook to hang my hopes upon
Oh yeah, you used to be able to find all sorts of fun and interesting things but SEO shat on that. 
Dogsauce
I’ve got Skol but I’m not a Scholar
The one that frustrates me is when I need to find someone local to do a small slightly specialist job at work, but searching for any trade with a place name just brings up companies that fill their web text with every town in the country, but on further enquiry are based in fucking Perth or something and either can’t do the job or offer a preposterous price. Utter timewasting cunts. Bring back Yellow Pages.Oh yeah, you used to be able to find all sorts of fun and interesting things but SEO shat on that.
tim
EXPLODED TIM! (Help me!!!)
J.R. Harley was the great-grandfather of all utter time wasting cunts.
BigMoaner
What A Load of Old Bollocks
.
Mark Fisher talks about the “command of communication”, that in the 90s you got one or two letters a year from friends and a phone call once or twice a week. And that was fine, a lot of the time and in most cases just fine. Now as an equivalent he says we follow the postman around, begging for letters, or sit by the phone, begging for calls. A desire to communicate totally manufactured. And to actually walk away from it becomes almost impossible for some to bare. Social media has had a profound effect on desire itself. Masssive
Reddit seems pretty solid and unchanging. But could be wrong as have only used it in recent years and don’t use it anymore
That last line
Mark Fisher talks about the “command of communication”, that in the 90s you got one or two letters a year from friends and a phone call once or twice a week. And that was fine, a lot of the time and in most cases just fine. Now as an equivalent he says we follow the postman around, begging for letters, or sit by the phone, begging for calls. A desire to communicate totally manufactured. And to actually walk away from it becomes almost impossible for some to bare. Social media has had a profound effect on desire itself. Masssive
Orang Utan
Psychick Worrier Ov Geyoor
Thus proving the maxim that cars tend to reflect their owners’ personalities
Jeff Robinson
Marxist-Lentilist: Jackboots and Jackfruit
Perhaps this thread should now be renamed "why Elon Musk is a C**t"?
two sheds
Least noticed poster 2007
A couple of years ago I got a phone call from a mate who said "hello Arthur, will be across to see you in half an hour" "ok mate, see you then", end of phone call. The chimney sweep who was visiting said "that's my sort of phone call, usually I end up spending 15 minutes on meaningless stuff just to be polite". My sort of phone call, too, particularly since I was going to see him in half an hour anyway.
Reddit seems pretty solid and unchanging. But could be wrong as have only used it in recent years and don’t use it anymore
That last line
Mark Fisher talks about the “command of communication”, that in the 90s you got one or two letters a year from friends and a phone call once or twice a week. And that was fine, a lot of the time and in most cases just fine. Now as an equivalent he says we follow the postman around, begging for letters, or sit by the phone, begging for calls. A desire to communicate totally manufactured. And to actually walk away from it becomes almost impossible for some to bare. Social media has had a profound effect on desire itself. Masssive
Orang Utan
Psychick Worrier Ov Geyoor
The question has certainly been unequivocally settled by now, so perhaps the thread should be closed and a new but broader discussion opened?
BigMoaner
What A Load of Old Bollocks
yes, i remember it well, the "digital" world of communication back then. "hi mate, what time we meeting? 7? nice one, see you then", put phone down.A couple of years ago I got a phone call from a mate who said "hello Arthur, will be across to see you in half an hour" "ok mate, see you then", end of phone call. The chimney sweep who was visiting said "that's my sort of phone call, usually I end up spending 15 minutes on meaningless stuff just to be polite". My sort of phone call, too, particularly since I was going to see him in half an hour anyway
now:
Jeff Robinson
Marxist-Lentilist: Jackboots and Jackfruit
I think every day Musk will furnish us with further proofs.
Crispy
The following psytrance is baṉned: All
Reddit is still good, but they're about to IPO so enjoy it while it lasts
Serge Forward
Just enjoyin' my coffee.
Serge Forward
Just enjoyin' my coffee.
On in Londonish: Elon, you CAAANT!
Lurdan
old wave
Elon: Oh yes I CAAAN!
NoXion
Craicy the Squirrel
Yeah, we saw ripples of this with the change in API policy, which has definitely resulted in there being more bots on the platform, or at least more obvious ones. Reddit administration refuses to do anything meaninful or effective about them, because they can pretend that the bots reposting old shit count as organic engagement. Which is basically a form of investment fraud at this point, but apparently the Musk-worshipping scumbag Reddit CEO Huffman thinks he can get away with that.
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