this post was submitted on 21 Aug 2023
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Tech's broken promises: Streaming is now just as expensive and confusing as cable. Ubers cost as much as taxis. And the cloud is no longer cheap::Some tech is getting pricier and looking a lot like the older services it was supposed to beat. From video streaming to ride-hailing and cloud computing.

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[–] [email protected] 93 points 2 years ago* (last edited 2 years ago) (5 children)

Can we actually have a discussion on what's at hand here instead of knee jerk reactions?

Perhaps you had to have been there for all the "building better worlds" and "bringing people together" horseshit every silicon valley company was spewing since the dot com boom in the 2000's

It's not an actual promise so don't act pedantic. The point is- society was sold these concepts and ideas as solutions to existing problems, and they've instead become bigger and more expensive problems.

[–] [email protected] 36 points 2 years ago* (last edited 2 years ago) (1 children)

Honestly, not to blame the public, but people were sitting here for the last decade going, don't like being censored? Don't use Google/Facebook/whatever. Don't like being tracked across the internet? Don't use Google/Facebook/whatever. And everyone kept using it. As for streaming services, I mean, if you don't want monopolistic pricing power, abolish copyright/DMCA. We complain constantly about the consequences of these big corps but society keeps religiously buying shit from them or participating in their services. Just like complaining constantly about global warming but driving your car 3 miles to the store to get a 1L bottle of water. We set up these structures and put people in these positions where they can exploit you, then act surprised when they do, and we have an excuse for why we think every individual part of it needs to stay exactly the same.

OK, maybe to blame the public a little.

[–] [email protected] 13 points 2 years ago

abolish copyright

17 years is enough.

[–] [email protected] 4 points 2 years ago

Yeah, but they said those things before going public or when a few people had the vast majority of shares.

If they cash out, there's now a board in control, and the big investors want big returns. So that's the direction companies inevitably go.

Because if capitalism.

It might be the same company, but it's often not the same people calling the shots

[–] [email protected] 4 points 2 years ago (1 children)

They were/are solutions to some of the problems though. Uber makes it way easier and convenient to get a ride which also helped lower the amount of drunk driving happening. Streaming made it was more convenient to watch what i want to watch when i want to watch it and without ads.

The real solution would be for public infrastructure like subways, busses, etc so we dont need privatized solutions that start cheap and then ramp up the prices when we’re hooked. And we could have had films/series that get funded directly by the viewers without middlemen so for a cheaper price we can enjoy the art and have the money go directly to the artists but we instead we got different middlemen

[–] [email protected] 2 points 2 years ago

Friendly reminder that Uber makes use of public infrastructure to do its thing.

As do all the airlines.