Everything is Shit: Tracking the Great Enshittening

[TwiceHorn 31440]

Politics aside, it is somewhat strange that with the advent of the internet, a lot of people seemed to decide that everything should be free.

[Captainant 27639]

24 minutes ago, TwiceHorn said:

Politics aside, it is somewhat strange that with the advent of the internet, a lot of people seemed to decide that everything should be free.

I'm more than happy to pay for content - my problem is when content that I've paid for becomes no longer accessible or the platform simply vanishes. If buying isn't owning, holding my own copy isn't stealing.

 

Digital rights management - and the blind pursuit of ever stronger protections - have been an incredibly toxic force for paid consumer experience. IP holders have attacked their consumers with worms and trojans simply to ensure their music files aren't copied, and faced zero repercussions.

And besides in the case of art being """stolen""" through copying, it's not like money is being taken out of the pocket of the artist. They barely see a fraction of the overall money made off their work and art. You're gonna have a hard time getting me to feel sympathetic for a second/third/fourth/fifth/ad infinitum hand rights holder who's acquired the royalty rights missing their passive income payments

[TwiceHorn 31440]

7 minutes ago, Captainant said:

I'm more than happy to pay for content - my problem is when content that I've paid for becomes no longer accessible or the platform simply vanishes. If buying isn't owning, holding my own copy isn't stealing.

 

Digital rights management - and the blind pursuit of ever stronger protections - have been an incredibly toxic force for paid consumer experience. IP holders have attacked their consumers with worms and trojans simply to ensure their music files aren't copied, and faced zero repercussions.

And besides in the case of art being """stolen""" through copying, it's not like money is being taken out of the pocket of the artist. They barely see a fraction of the overall money made off their work and art. You're gonna have a hard time getting me to feel sympathetic for a second/third/fourth/fifth/ad infinitum hand rights holder who's acquired the royalty rights missing their passive income payments

Individual copying/piracy aside, it's an attitude that pervades online culture, including a lot of developers.

And a lot of it is post-hoc justification for copying and piracy that led to the ham-handed DRM.

It is exactly that kind of thinking (not yours, but "shit's so easy now") that leads to comments like Spotify's CEO about content generation being "free."

[immamac 42838]

19 minutes ago, TwiceHorn said:

Politics aside, it is somewhat strange that with the advent of the internet, a lot of people seemed to decide that everything should be free.

When you receive everything for free as a subsidy for decades is it not assumed to just be free to the layperson? 

Media in particular is a fucked up and weird thing when it comes to piracy. There are lots of artists on record that are fine with piracy as long as you support them with merch purchases/concert tickets/etc. Things they get the majority of the revenue from. 

Labels only exist as a racket. They intentionally stifle competition, they gatekeep music with their pedantic, restrictive and destructive licensing practices and overall they add extremely limited value to the ecosystem, they are more value extractors than anything in the modern world. 

Similar to film "studios" they are no longer there to facilitate the making of films, but as a mechanism of control for licensing and monetizing artistic work in perpetuity. Again, most of these studios stifle competition, destroy it hide work intentionally as write downs/offs instead of releasing it, burden content providers with unfair and incredibly stupid license costs in perpetuity and rev share minimal to nothing with the actual artists/actors. 

If you want to argue that there is merit within the media empire and licensing etc is actually a good thing then yeah you think piracy is the big bad evil. 

In the real world piracy only exists because it has to for the sake of a non shitty user experience. There are many people who would buy the content for a reasonable price and host it on their own infrastructure without the need for DRM or anything else. This isn't an option afforded to people and they rightfully do not trust the owners of this stuff to hold up their end of the perpetual license. 

Stealing software is never good, but stealing users data is far worse and more nefarious. 

['stache 21800]

On 6/10/2024 at 8:58 AM, Biff Tannen said:

I think you bring up a good point here.  Americans seemingly have come to believe they NEED to have all these things.  For example, they go to Moody to see a concert, pay $150+ per ticket and then get a beer for $18 and a basket of shitty chicken tenders for another $18 and then complain about inflation.  No one is making them do these things.  We continue to consume and pay exorbitant prices for things and then sit there and complain that the prices are too high.  

It’s more about having to make choices. People who pay for this have prioritized concerts and many are foregoing other entertainment products. I eat out far less than I used to, haven’t been to a pro sporting event since before Covid, and really only go to smaller local music acts and not the big shows at the arena. I still pay for a couple of family vacations a year which I prioritize over other things.
 

It used to be that you could do most of what you want on a regular basis. The entertainment industry as a whole will adjust to lower overall demand across all entertainment products, but it’s not making things more affordable, it’s just letting things fail like movie theaters and local restaurants and bars which people are having to set aside to do other things, and I think that’s pretty enshitified.

[TwiceHorn 31440]

9 minutes ago, immamac said:

When you receive everything for free as a subsidy for decades is it not assumed to just be free to the layperson? 

 

Who was subsidized?

in the early days of the intergoogles, people just slapped shit online without regard to ownership or rights.  Still do to a large extent.

And, my thoughts here are not an explicit defense of the recording industry or other established rights holders.  It's just an examination of the conduct and attitude.

And, again, I think your thoughts here are a post-hoc justification for piratical behavior.  It's ok as long as it doesn't really hurt the artist.

One of the benefits of technology is that content creators are less or no longer at the mercy of the recording or publishing industry to "get records (or books) made" and promoted. 

Will people start respecting copyrights now that the artist holds it instead of the recording company and it's an actual revenue source?

Edited June 11 by TwiceHorn

[immamac 42838]

9 minutes ago, TwiceHorn said:

Who was subsidized?

in the early days of the intergoogles, people just slapped shit online without regard to ownership or rights.  Still do to a large extent.

And, my thoughts here are not an explicit defense of the recording industry or other established rights holders.  It's just an examination of the conduct and attitude.

And, again, I think your thoughts here are a post-hoc justification for piratical behavior.  It's ok as long as it doesn't really hurt the artist.

One of the benefits of technology is that content creators are less or no longer at the mercy of the recording or publishing industry to "get records (or books) made" and promoted. 

Will people start respecting copyrights now that the artist holds it instead of the recording company and it's an actual revenue source?

You are joking right? The entire world as we know it online has been subsidized by VCs and corporations. Now it's being "enshittified" by advertisers. The subsidy is over, they have what they need from you and don't need you to use their shitty free service anymore - oh wait you have no choice but to use it because they've killed everything else that wasn't subsidized as a point of emphasis to kill any competition and create a false moat/walled garden that users can't leave because none of their friends are outside and they've spent a lot of time cultivating those relationships. It's the most toxic play ever. 

Technology enabled labels to exercise more value and instead they decided to extract the difference in publishing and technology that was afforded to them. I wasn't arguing that at one time the distribution mechanism of labels and studios wasn't intrinsically valuable and mostly necessary. I'm saying they no longer serve their purpose and are mostly just IP trolls at this point. Protecting "their IP" on behalf of the artist who gets nothing to show for it. 

It is in fact okay if the artist is unharmed and still receives compensation for their work. Artists and entertainers are just that and if they get paid for those things that's fantastic and an incentive to continue. To say that it's the artists god given right to all potential revenue is ridiculous and a falsehood perpetuated by the industry itself.

Put another way: if the record labels and studios could monetizes every ear that heard their IP every time they would and they would restrict those who didn't pay up. If there was a global sound wave mute button that didn't let sound move through the air without a toll they would attempt to charge it.

I worked at Western Digital and ran strategy and innovation for the entire global consumer business for more than a year. I have talked to the major labels and studios about a way to safely allow for storage of their media with the users that purchased it and they aren't interested. They are only interested in absolute control and planned obsolescence or relicensing as soon as they think it's feasible by rugpulling. 

[Frank Drebin 5661]

I would add how long it takes and how expensive it is to build any sort of infrastructure these days.

And the cost of construction period.

[TwiceHorn 31440]

5 minutes ago, immamac said:

You are joking right? The entire world as we know it online has been subsidized by VCs and corporations. Now it's being "enshittified" by advertisers. The subsidy is over, they have what they need from you and don't need you to use their shitty free service anymore - oh wait you have no choice but to use it because they've killed everything else that wasn't subsidized as a point of emphasis to kill any competition and create a false moat/walled garden that users can't leave because none of their friends are outside and they've spent a lot of time cultivating those relationships. It's the most toxic play ever. 

Technology enabled labels to exercise more value and instead they decided to extract the difference in publishing and technology that was afforded to them. I wasn't arguing that at one time the distribution mechanism of labels and studios wasn't intrinsically valuable and mostly necessary. I'm saying they no longer serve their purpose and are mostly just IP trolls at this point. Protecting "their IP" on behalf of the artist who gets nothing to show for it. 

It is in fact okay if the artist is unharmed and still receives compensation for their work. Artists and entertainers are just that and if they get paid for those things that's fantastic and an incentive to continue. To say that it's the artists god given right to all potential revenue is ridiculous and a falsehood perpetuated by the industry itself.

Put another way: if the record labels and studios could monetizes every ear that heard their IP every time they would and they would restrict those who didn't pay up. If there was a global sound wave mute button that didn't let sound move through the air without a toll they would attempt to charge it.

I worked at Western Digital and ran strategy and innovation for the entire global consumer business for more than a year. I have talked to the major labels and studios about a way to safely allow for storage of their media with the users that purchased it and they aren't interested. They are only interested in absolute control and planned obsolescence or relicensing as soon as they think it's feasible by rugpulling. 

I'm not talking about the enshittification of fee-based services.  I think I might disagree that corporations or VC "subsidize" anything.  We are in agreement that they invest in what they seem to know are unsustainable revenue/profit models leading to eventual rugpulling, profit-making and -taking and enshittification.

 

I am talking about the pre-service broad internet in its early days being a duplication and infringement factory, leading to a "culture" of everything should be free and a general disrespect for intellectual property.  The justifications for it in the form of "artists aren't hurt, just evil corporations" is completely post-hoc and there's little or no evidence that the behavior would change if/when artists/creators are actually hurt by it.

[TwiceHorn 31440]

1 minute ago, BeardIP said:

Here is an interesting piece I read about music labels (to your bolded point), that I think you might find enlightening and interesting given your opinions:

 

In the olden days, record labels bore much or all of the risk in recording and distributing/promoting music.  Those were non-negligible investments.  Same type of deal with book publishing.  That's why creators/artists signed away most of their rights in recording/publishing deals.

Superstars like Swift and Stephen King have always been able to get better deals from record labels and publishing companies.  But the little guys always got screwed and had to rely on touring and merch sales to make tons of money (although a couple of gold records a) made them pretty good jing and b) increased the likelihood that they would get better deals in the future).

Now, with home-recording and production tech and various self-promotion platforms, record labels and publishing companies are less essential to the process and creators, even small ones, are more likely to own their own rights.

The question is, will the free-shit army start to respect those rights now that it is the little guy whose ox is getting gored?

[TwiceHorn 31440]

3 minutes ago, BeardIP said:

That blog post, if you read it, agrees with you to a point but then makes the case (and uses relevant, current examples) for why record labels are still valuable in the modern era where anyone can pay a $29 monthly fee to create and host their music and keep 100% of their proceeds.

My concern here is not so much with the old models and whether they were fair or not, or even the new models, where creators have the leverage and the ability to generate revenue for themselves.

My interest is in the culture of copying that evolved with the early internet and was justified by "well, the artist isn't being harmed, so I don't care."  Well, that justification is less justifiable these days and will only get less so.

Interesting question, will small-time artists start attempting to employ DRM to preserve their revenue/profit?

[Captainant 27639]

8 minutes ago, TwiceHorn said:

Now, with home-recording and production tech and various self-promotion platforms, record labels and publishing companies are less essential to the process and creators, even small ones, are more likely to own their own rights.

The question is, will the free-shit army start to respect those rights now that it is the little guy whose ox is getting gored?

Generally speaking when put to the test - very much so yes. There's a whole cottage industry out there of patreon-only podcasts and games and content that have little to no DRM on them but are still kept "in the family" along with donations to the creator. Sure patreon is the payment platform, but they're usually just giving you a custom RSS feed that can be from anywhere.

And yeah in my experience, the community makes sure the little guy is getting paid and not stolen from. There are absolutely still cases of theft and freebooting their designs into some etsy or ebay shop, but that's par for the course either way

[HenryJames 66038]

9 minutes ago, BeardIP said:

...a wildly divergent and niche conversation

New Surly motto?

[Brisketexan 105082]

2 hours ago, TwiceHorn said:

Politics aside, it is somewhat strange that with the advent of the internet, a lot of people seemed to decide that everything should be free.

Culturally -- in every respect, by the way -- we live in a land of extremes, with little in between.  The cultural economic models are either "everything should be free," or "charge for literally every incremental thing" (enshittification).

Lost is the "a fair product/amount for a fair price" in the middle.  Just like most everything else "in the middle" is dying.

[immamac 42838]

1 hour ago, TwiceHorn said:

My concern here is not so much with the old models and whether they were fair or not, or even the new models, where creators have the leverage and the ability to generate revenue for themselves.

My interest is in the culture of copying that evolved with the early internet and was justified by "well, the artist isn't being harmed, so I don't care."  Well, that justification is less justifiable these days and will only get less so.

Interesting question, will small-time artists start attempting to employ DRM to preserve their revenue/profit?

This is already answered. The creator economy is flourishing not flailing, in fact a ton of people are leaving youtube and going to their own platforms and using YT only as a marketing mechanism for some of their videos. 

Nebula, College Humor/Dropout, Brilliant, etc. All flourishing and making their creators WAY more money and the content quality is WAY higher than the "free shit" on youtube.

Music platforms like Bandcamp aren't just not getting used, people love to do this shit. There is limited to no value in labels. 

So, no smart artists will not use DRM, they will actually remove it to create more revenue/profit opportunities off of the network effect since the entire distribution mechanism is a multi fucking billion dollar infrastructure investment and a multi hundred dollar a month consumer investment. 

 

Positing that the only way forward is enshittified is the entire problem, it's broken brained and it's rot economy shit. There is a way better way forward for everyone and it just so happens that cutting out these fuckers that got too greedy and are not providing the value they claim they are are the actual problem. Do you know how incredibly shitty spotify, youtube music, etc etc are compared to basically anything that someone who actually spends real time and money on developing a streaming platform is? They are incredibly shitty. The issue is they create a sharing/paywall moat around their other free services like gmail, youtube, etc etc and force you into the ecosystem to do simple fucking things like "share a list of god damned songs with someone" which is completely horseshit. That's not a business value/model that's straight up consumer unfriendly nonsensical bullshit.

Capitalism and growth at all costs is toxic to the consumer who is unwilling or has been uneducated to the point of not being able to hold corporations accountable, that's the world we live in now. Limited consumer protections (data, services, licensing, etc) and limited antitrust enforcement lead to a rot economy, which we are living in, which is enshittification 101 if you read any of corey Doctorow's thesis you would understand this. Consumers could hold corporations accountable, and their elected official accountable, but they don't because America is an intentional accountability vacuum by design. 

[Brisketexan 105082]

6 minutes ago, immamac said:

This is already answered. The creator economy is flourishing not flailing, in fact a ton of people are leaving youtube and going to their own platforms and using YT only as a marketing mechanism for some of their videos. 

Nebula, College Humor/Dropout, Brilliant, etc. All flourishing and making their creators WAY more money and the content quality is WAY higher than the "free shit" on youtube.

Music platforms like Bandcamp aren't just not getting used, people love to do this shit. There is limited to no value in labels. 

So, no smart artists will not use DRM, they will actually remove it to create more revenue/profit opportunities off of the network effect since the entire distribution mechanism is a multi fucking billion dollar infrastructure investment and a multi hundred dollar a month consumer investment. 

 

Positing that the only way forward is enshittified is the entire problem, it's broken brained and it's rot economy shit. There is a way better way forward for everyone and it just so happens that cutting out these fuckers that got too greedy and are not providing the value they claim they are are the actual problem. Do you know how incredibly shitty spotify, youtube music, etc etc are compared to basically anything that someone who actually spends real time and money on developing a streaming platform is? They are incredibly shitty. The issue is they create a sharing/paywall moat around their other free services like gmail, youtube, etc etc and force you into the ecosystem to do simple fucking things like "share a list of god damned songs with someone" which is completely horseshit. That's not a business value/model that's straight up consumer unfriendly nonsensical bullshit.

Capitalism and growth at all costs is toxic to the consumer who is unwilling or has been uneducated to the point of not being able to hold corporations accountable, that's the world we live in now. Limited consumer protections (data, services, licensing, etc) and limited antitrust enforcement lead to a rot economy, which we are living in, which is enshittification 101 if you read any of corey Doctorow's thesis you would understand this. Consumers could hold corporations accountable, and their elected official accountable, but they don't because America is an intentional accountability vacuum by design. 

Fantastic post.  Quoting for repetition and emphasis.

[Bevo 13570]

13 minutes ago, immamac said:

This is already answered. The creator economy is flourishing not flailing, in fact a ton of people are leaving youtube and going to their own platforms and using YT only as a marketing mechanism for some of their videos. 

Nebula, College Humor/Dropout, Brilliant, etc. All flourishing and making their creators WAY more money and the content quality is WAY higher than the "free shit" on youtube.

Music platforms like Bandcamp aren't just not getting used, people love to do this shit. There is limited to no value in labels. 

So, no smart artists will not use DRM, they will actually remove it to create more revenue/profit opportunities off of the network effect since the entire distribution mechanism is a multi fucking billion dollar infrastructure investment and a multi hundred dollar a month consumer investment. 

 

Positing that the only way forward is enshittified is the entire problem, it's broken brained and it's rot economy shit. There is a way better way forward for everyone and it just so happens that cutting out these fuckers that got too greedy and are not providing the value they claim they are are the actual problem. Do you know how incredibly shitty spotify, youtube music, etc etc are compared to basically anything that someone who actually spends real time and money on developing a streaming platform is? They are incredibly shitty. The issue is they create a sharing/paywall moat around their other free services like gmail, youtube, etc etc and force you into the ecosystem to do simple fucking things like "share a list of god damned songs with someone" which is completely horseshit. That's not a business value/model that's straight up consumer unfriendly nonsensical bullshit.

Capitalism and growth at all costs is toxic to the consumer who is unwilling or has been uneducated to the point of not being able to hold corporations accountable, that's the world we live in now. Limited consumer protections (data, services, licensing, etc) and limited antitrust enforcement lead to a rot economy, which we are living in, which is enshittification 101 if you read any of corey Doctorow's thesis you would understand this. Consumers could hold corporations accountable, and their elected official accountable, but they don't because America is an intentional accountability vacuum by design. 

I don't know what you are talking about, but I have a question for you. I used to use Pandora and now I am using it again. I'll pick some group like the Animals or Bob Dylan, and it seems like the songs played end up being the same. Eagles, CCR, Crosby, Still, Nash, and Young, The Guess Who... If I pick The Beach Boys, it is a lot of the same stuff with some 50s music mixed in. It isn't beach music like the Safaris and the Ventures. Moreover, it is never more obscure stuff: It is always the same songs. And if you listen more than about 4hrs, it will basically repeat. Has their algorithm always been shitty or has it gotten worse? Is there anything better and if not, why?

[Captainant 27639]

17 minutes ago, Bevo said:

I don't know what you are talking about, but I have a question for you. I used to use Pandora and now I am using it again. I'll pick some group like the Animals or Bob Dylan, and it seems like the songs played end up being the same. Eagles, CCR, Crosby, Still, Nash, and Young, The Guess Who... If I pick The Beach Boys, it is a lot of the same stuff with some 50s music mixed in. It isn't beach music like the Safaris and the Ventures. Moreover, it is never more obscure stuff: It is always the same songs. And if you listen more than about 4hrs, it will basically repeat. Has their algorithm always been shitty or has it gotten worse? Is there anything better and if not, why?

It's not just the algos, it's the rightsholders to that music revoking the license that pandora had to play the music. But yeah, Pandora did enshittify by building a system to let labels pay to get their songs played more

 

Tbh music discovery has gotten worse and accessibility even moreso if you're not curating your own collection. Music labels are so toxic and greedy that artists have to re-record old tracks in the studio just to get access to their own library again. It's all a huge mess that's driven by greedy IP holders and their army of lawyers

[Fudge Nuggets 19189]

12 hours ago, Incredulity said:

Strange that someone so self proclaimed successful would be proud of stealing. Maybe you’re just completely full of shit.

 

Or maybe you should just shut the fuck up and stay in your lane.

[immamac 42838]

38 minutes ago, Bevo said:

I don't know what you are talking about, but I have a question for you. I used to use Pandora and now I am using it again. I'll pick some group like the Animals or Bob Dylan, and it seems like the songs played end up being the same. Eagles, CCR, Crosby, Still, Nash, and Young, The Guess Who... If I pick The Beach Boys, it is a lot of the same stuff with some 50s music mixed in. It isn't beach music like the Safaris and the Ventures. Moreover, it is never more obscure stuff: It is always the same songs. And if you listen more than about 4hrs, it will basically repeat. Has their algorithm always been shitty or has it gotten worse? Is there anything better and if not, why?

Pandora sees no business value in actually doing what they set out to do initially. Now they play the cheapest/most financially advantageous music for them based on your selection. If the initial project would have continued it would have been an incredible mechanism for artists and listeners alike to create what's most listened to and find new stuff that you are already predisposed to liking. 

I've posted about this somewhere, but everywhere you look the top 10 anything is dominated by stuff pre 2018ish. Music, movies, video games, etc etc. It's too new to be nostalgia and it's too old to be popular. People have given up trying to find/follow/do new shit because it's all so fucking bad now. 

The amount of available content is at an all time high and the quality of that new content is at an all time low. Ever wonder why the old transformers movie is better than the latest and greatest that could have 20k GPUs crunching it out and making it look like fucking real life? Because they don't give a shit about making good movies. They want to have something that lacks controversy, substance or meaning and just pump it into the white space that used to contain gray matter between people's ears in the United States.

[Js1 85296]

2 hours ago, Fudge Nuggets said:

Or maybe you should just shut the fuck up and stay in your lane.

Absolutely motto worthy

[Incredulity 11657]

3 hours ago, Fudge Nuggets said:

Or maybe you should just shut the fuck up and stay in your lane.

Sure thing tough guy

[HenryJames 66038]

[Fudge Nuggets 19189]

11 hours ago, HenryJames said:

Glad to see I am amongst good company here.  I have an external HD that I save everything to; absolutely nothing goes to ye old cloud.

[elfenix 34227]

  

Quote

Life360, is used by parents to keep track of their children. MyRadar offers weather forecasts. GasBuddy helps people save on fuel costs.

All of these apps also have opt-in driving analysis features that rely on sensor and motion data from the phone. You can turn on these features to get notifications if a family member crashes or suggestions for a more fuel-efficient route to work. Those features, though, are provided by an analytics company, Arity, which was founded by Allstate in 2016 and pays for access to the data.

note that these are opt-in enshitifications.  still, comes on the heals of the revelation that onstar and others are tattling on you to insurers:

Quote

Though the mechanics of the Smart Driver data siphoning are somewhat unique, the end result—insurers gathering your data via your car's manufacturer—isn't limited to GM.

,,,

Even if you don't own a GM vehicle, the maker of your car could be sharing or selling data to a broker like LexisNexis— The New York Times identifies several automakers that do so, albeit with somewhat better, clearer consent options and to various brokers, including Honda, Hyundai, Subaru, Ford, and others. We suggest to check whether your user agreements—and, annoying as they can be, always read them, though they might not be completely helpful.

 

[HenryJames 66038]

Feels like 99% of tech now is just selling your data.

[Captainant 27639]

14 minutes ago, HenryJames said:

Feels like 99% of tech now is just selling your data.

🌕👨‍🚀🔫👨‍🚀 Always has been

[immamac 42838]

On 6/12/2024 at 8:32 AM, Fudge Nuggets said:

Glad to see I am amongst good company here.  I have an external HD that I save everything to; absolutely nothing goes to ye old cloud.

What do you do for your off-site copy? This is that. 

[MonkeyDoughnut 10229]

On 6/12/2024 at 8:32 AM, Fudge Nuggets said:

Glad to see I am amongst good company here.  I have an external HD that I save everything to; absolutely nothing goes to ye old cloud.

Aren't most of the documents you might save to HD already in the cloud in some form or fashion? Not sure of wanting to live "off the grid" so to speak when the grid is where everything is.

[TwiceHorn 31440]

On 6/11/2024 at 11:20 AM, immamac said:

This is already answered. The creator economy is flourishing not flailing, in fact a ton of people are leaving youtube and going to their own platforms and using YT only as a marketing mechanism for some of their videos. 

Nebula, College Humor/Dropout, Brilliant, etc. All flourishing and making their creators WAY more money and the content quality is WAY higher than the "free shit" on youtube.

Music platforms like Bandcamp aren't just not getting used, people love to do this shit. There is limited to no value in labels. 

So, no smart artists will not use DRM, they will actually remove it to create more revenue/profit opportunities off of the network effect since the entire distribution mechanism is a multi fucking billion dollar infrastructure investment and a multi hundred dollar a month consumer investment. 

 

Positing that the only way forward is enshittified is the entire problem, it's broken brained and it's rot economy shit. There is a way better way forward for everyone and it just so happens that cutting out these fuckers that got too greedy and are not providing the value they claim they are are the actual problem. Do you know how incredibly shitty spotify, youtube music, etc etc are compared to basically anything that someone who actually spends real time and money on developing a streaming platform is? They are incredibly shitty. The issue is they create a sharing/paywall moat around their other free services like gmail, youtube, etc etc and force you into the ecosystem to do simple fucking things like "share a list of god damned songs with someone" which is completely horseshit. That's not a business value/model that's straight up consumer unfriendly nonsensical bullshit.

Capitalism and growth at all costs is toxic to the consumer who is unwilling or has been uneducated to the point of not being able to hold corporations accountable, that's the world we live in now. Limited consumer protections (data, services, licensing, etc) and limited antitrust enforcement lead to a rot economy, which we are living in, which is enshittification 101 if you read any of corey Doctorow's thesis you would understand this. Consumers could hold corporations accountable, and their elected official accountable, but they don't because America is an intentional accountability vacuum by design. 

Not sure I disagree with any of that.

But it still doesn't address my question, which is probably more rhetorical than anything.  And that is that there is a culture of copying on the internet, why?  

Also, it strikes me that the notion of artists freely permitting copying of their work, without compensation for promotional purposes, is a relic of the old model, where the real revenue for artists came from touring and merch, while recording and distribution was sort of a nuisance that may or may not pay, depending largely on the creator's leverage.

Also, the fact that most self-promotion platforms are now streaming as opposed to fixed media like mp3 inherently cuts down on the copying.  But the question remains that once creators are successful, will they attempt their own form of rugpulling in resisting the free reproduction and distribution of their work?

It would seem that the classic model for creator compensation is directly for the reproduction and distribution of their work.  Anything else is a distortion created by the recording/publishing industries.

 

Edited June 14 by TwiceHorn

[immamac 42838]

Just now, TwiceHorn said:

Not sure I disagree with any of that.

But it still doesn't address my question, which is probably more rhetorical than anything.  And that is that there is a culture of copying on the internet, why?  

Also, it strikes me that the notion of artists freely permitting copying of their work, without compensation for promotional purposes, is a relic of the old model, where the real revenue for artists came from touring and merch, while recording and distribution was sort of a nuisance that may or may not pay, depending largely on the creator's leverage.

Also, the fact that most self-promotion platforms are now streaming as opposed to fixed media like mp3 inherently cuts down on the copying.  But the question remains that once creators are successful, will they attempt their own form of rugpulling in resisting the free reproduction and distribution of their work?

It would seem that the classic model for creator compensation is directly for the reproduction and distribution of their work.

 

Copying is required to control the access and longevity of access at a fundamental level with computers. 

Streaming cut down on copies, but made duplicate streaming data a thing requiring more and more bandwidth over networks. It's a trade that benefits all the commercial entities and not the consumer. Streaming is the most consumer unfriendly thing that has ever existed, but now consumers can be their own streamers most places because the tech is baked and the Internet pipe they have at home is insane.  

[Captainant 27639]

6 minutes ago, TwiceHorn said:

And that is that there is a culture of copying on the internet, why?

I would argue that it stems from the backbone of the internet being FOSS projects and software. 

 

7 minutes ago, TwiceHorn said:

the question remains that once creators are successful, will they attempt their own form of rugpulling in resisting the free reproduction and distribution of their work?

I think the disconnect is that artists aren't business ghouls looking to exploit their audience. There's millions of people who don't have the brain worms of unlimited growth and are happy to do what makes them happy and keeps a roof over their head

[Fudge Nuggets 19189]

1 hour ago, immamac said:

What do you do for your off-site copy? This is that. 

Haven't needed one in 35+ years so don't see why I need one today.

Really important shit like tax returns go on another thumb drive. 

[Fudge Nuggets 19189]

1 hour ago, MonkeyDoughnut said:

Aren't most of the documents you might save to HD already in the cloud in some form or fashion?

Not on purpose.  Programs might nefariously be saving my crap on their servers, but I'm not deliberately putting it out there.

[Captainant 27639]

6 minutes ago, Fudge Nuggets said:

Really important shit like tax returns go on another thumb drive. 

 

Those things are volatile AF unless you're spending on high end portable storage. You'd be much better off putting it on another HDD that's cold storage

[Fudge Nuggets 19189]

3 minutes ago, Captainant said:

 

Those things are volatile AF unless you're spending on high end portable storage. You'd be much better off putting it on another HDD that's cold storage

20 years or so of using them hasn't let me down yet.  I do periodically move them to newer thumb drives since they are so cheap.  Not all of us are super users that have hundreds of websites we manage that need to be backed up constantly.

[immamac 42838]

57 minutes ago, Fudge Nuggets said:

20 years or so of using them hasn't let me down yet.  I do periodically move them to newer thumb drives since they are so cheap.  Not all of us are super users that have hundreds of websites we manage that need to be backed up constantly.

Thumb drives are made with the shittiest nand now and I wouldn't trust them for longer than 6 months powered off without causing bitrot or uncorrectable corruption. 

[Mole 4330]

I get that it’s a handy way to encapsulate a lot of loosely related activities and people, but the rise of the term “content creator” speaks to the commodification of everything that drives this problem — art, music, film, written word, and criticism has become merely a product to be consumed.

At least when it comes to music, the application of IP law is insane and comes from a place of total musical ignorance that is only possible once it’s been relegated to just a commercial venture and the creation of some product rather than an act of community that we engage in together.
 

I’m looking at you, Marvin Gaye’s estate.

Edited June 14 by Mole

[Captain Ron 12872]

1 hour ago, Fudge Nuggets said:

20 years or so of using them hasn't let me down yet.  I do periodically move them to newer thumb drives since they are so cheap.  Not all of us are super users that have hundreds of websites we manage that need to be backed up constantly.

... Until it does, then gonzo.

I used to do much of this same but with HDDs. That worked great until one day my PSU died on my PC, it took the HDD with it - all my data lost.

I run redundancy on a lot of my local data here - but I still back up the " Really important shit like tax returns" on the cloud.

 

I really just look at it this way - I pay them money for assurance of my data. They do backups, they maintain their PCs, they take on the risk - and that's what I pay for.

 

I will note I don't use OneDrive, it's a combo of Dropbox and Spider Oak. This is a realm where I trust a company that is dedicated to a task.

[HenryJames 66038]

https://www.complex.com/life/a/cmplxtara-mahadevan/man-sue-apple-wife-found-deleted-sex-worker-texts

[PRONG HORN 3141]

 

 

Quote

Paul Nakasone is a retired general in the United States Army who served as the commander of United States Cyber Command. He concurrently served as the director of the National Security Agency    and as chief of the Central Security Service. Nakasone took command of the United States Second Army and Army Cyber Command in October 2016,    until the Second Army's inactivation in March 2017.   In May 2018, he became head of the National Security Agency, the Central Security Service and the United States Cyber Command

 

[immamac 42838]

6 minutes ago, PRONG HORN said:

 

 

 

What's this guy gonna do call his old buddies and secure it lol what a stupid fucking appointment 

[PRONG HORN 3141]

Just now, immamac said:

What's this guy gonna do call his old buddies and secure it lol what a stupid fucking appointment 

 

 

Some dude with a pretty whacked out X feed (thus making this quote questionable) had this quote about him.  

 

Quote

OpenAI just hired the guy who was in charge of mass surveillance at the NSA. He outsourced the illegal mass spying against Americans to British spy agencies to circumvent US law. He gave them unlimited spying access to US networks.

 

 

 

 

[HenryJames 66038]

Can I think of new ways to kill myself? 
 

Watch me.

[Biff Tannen 45665]

On 6/12/2024 at 8:32 AM, Fudge Nuggets said:

Glad to see I am amongst good company here.  I have an external HD that I save everything to; absolutely nothing goes to ye old cloud.

I refuse to use onedrive for anything that isn’t a collaborative doc. 

[TwiceHorn 31440]

22 hours ago, Captainant said:

I would argue that it stems from the backbone of the internet being FOSS projects and software. 

 

I think the disconnect is that artists aren't business ghouls looking to exploit their audience. There's millions of people who don't have the brain worms of unlimited growth and are happy to do what makes them happy and keeps a roof over their head

Not sure I disagree.  Certainly empowering for the little guy.

But then you have the artists buying back their catalogs from recording companies.  I'm not sure the artists then become eleemosynary institutions.

[Biff Tannen 45665]

15 minutes ago, TwiceHorn said:

eleemosynary

Fuck you that’s not a word 

[Captainant 27639]

1 hour ago, TwiceHorn said:

But then you have the artists buying back their catalogs from recording companies.  I'm not sure the artists then become eleemosynary institutions.

Better the artists own their own art than the recording labels memory holing their work just to secure a tax write-off, as has been happening with a shitload of media properties lately

[HenryJames 66038]

https://www.wsj.com/tech/ai/the-big-ai-question-are-you-ready-to-pay-for-it-534d95e9

[Armybrat 40826]

I have no idea what any of this is all about.