Does anyone else feel as if it’s over when it comes to really owning your own things?
As of now:
- You don’t have the option of having a phone with decent specs and replaceable parts
- You have to have really good knowledge in tech to have private services that are on par with what the big companies offer
- You have to put up with annoying compatibility issues if you install a custom ROM on your android phone
- You cannot escape apps preventing you from using them if you root your device
- Cars are becoming SaaS bullcrap
- Everything is going for a subscription model in general
And now Google is attempting to implement DRM on websites. If that goes through, Firefox is going to be relegated to privacy conscious websites (there aren’t many of those). At this point, why even bother? Why do I go to great lengths at protecting my privacy if it means that I can’t use most services I want?
It sucks because the obvious solution is for people to move away from these bullshit companies and show that they actually care about their privacy. Even more important is to actually PAY for services they like instead of relying on free stuff. I’m not optimistic not just because the non privacy conscious side is lazy, but because my side is greedy. I mean one of the most popular communities on lemmy is “piracy” which makes it all the more reasonable for companies not to listen to privacy conscious people.
I wouldn’t say that this is the endgame but in this trajectory, privacy is gone before 2030.
Cynicism, i.e. the view that everyone else has base motivations, is the definition of a self-fulfilling prophesy. You’re cynical? Well, soon everyone around you will be too, and where will we be then? All the politicians are crooks and phonies? Well, they sure will be soon if everyone voting for them thinks that. In fact, as far as I can see, cynicism is the rule across the world, and look at the state most countries are in. For comparison (there aren’t many), check out the world’s least cynical countries - i.e., those with the highest social trust, where people believe that “others are basically good”, where they trust their politicians. I won’t name them (you can guess them) but those countries just happen to have the best indicators on pretty much every measure of success - not just economic wealth but also all the social indicators and indeed happiness. To me at least, the connection is plain obvious. Being a cynic is a choice, and a completely counterproductive one if you want to see good things in the world.
Skepticism, on the other hand? I’m all in on that.