There's a post going around right now that is a long, thorough analysis of the failures of technology in the last decade, and its is very good.

Andrew (Television Executive)

Never Forgive Them

In the last year, I’ve spent about 200,000 words on a kind of personal journey where I’ve tried again and again to work out why everything digital feels so broken, and why it seems to keep getting worse, despite what tech’s “brightest” minds might promise. More

Ed Zitron's Where's Your Ed At (www.wheresyoured.at)

It's full of zingers like "The average person’s experience with technology is one so aggressive and violative that I believe it leaves billions of people with a consistent low-grade trauma. We seem, as a society, capable of understanding that social media can hurt us, unsettle us, or make us feel crazed and angry, but I think it’s time to accept that the rest of the tech ecosystem undermines our wellbeing in an equally-insidious way. And most people don’t know it’s happening, because everybody has accepted deeply shitty conditions for the last ten years."

(Thread)

Andrew (Television Executive)

The author names it The Rot Economy, which I think is a good, appropriate, and accurate name.

He touches on Enshitification theory (via @pluralistic ) but spends less time talking about the mechanism by which things are getting worse, and more time talking about the subjective experience of living through enshitification, and also about the growth mindset that enables it.

The analysis is good! The subjective experience of using technology today is deeply painful. We've allowed the shitty smug nerd in our heads to convince us that it's acceptable becuase we know how to deal with it, but it's still a struggle, an assault. It's still Bad.

Growth for the sake of growth is rot.

Seeing it spelled out in very clear terms, in very specific terms, sends a powerful message.

(Cont.)

Andrew (Television Executive)

The call to action section is the weakest part of the piece. It is not weak, but it is weaker than everything else.

I want to talk about that for a second, both what the author recommends and also what I recommend.

The author recommends putting a name to this rot, calling it out, explaining it to others, and identifying the people responsible. This is a great start! Google search didn't just get worse on its own, Prabhakar Raghavan instructed a team to destroy it. There is a person, a team of people, behind this decay.

I see the change for the sake of change / growth at any cost mindset in places where I really shouldn't, thought. Mastodon, for example. It seems like each new release has some new Growth Hack inspired assault. Eugen isn't doing it for exactly the same reasons, but the root is still a mindset that values Growth over every other metric.

Andrew (Television Executive)

We are in an abusive relationship with technology.

So, yes, give it a name. Explain it. Notice it. Be outraged by it.

But also, at every opportunity we have, we have to reject it. (I noted, as I read the original article that I was accosted and asked for my email address twice, the second time while reading a section about how invasive and useless that is)

There are places that the Rot has not yet reached. We must identify them, share them, and embrace them.

(Linux and BSD, the fediverse in general, peertube, physical media, jellyfin/kodi)

When The Rot comes to places that should have been safe, we have to destroy them. Starve them of the users that power them or actually burn them to the ground. If you don't sanitize the area, the Rot will spread.

That means Ubuntu. That means bluesky. That means, in many ways, mastodon as a software platform.

Andrew (Television Executive)

This kind of vigilance is exhausting, and thats the point. Canonical knows that abandoning Ubuntu for Debian will come with a cost, and they're angling that the cost of abandoning Ubuntu is higher than the annoyance youll experience from the advertisements they've shoved in to Apt, or the fact that they partner with Amazon out of the box.

Eugen knows that migrating an instance (or even a single user) off mastodon and on to something else is a big, fragile task. (Hometown exists, and is significantly less GrowthHacky than mastodon, but is a direct migration and mastodon derivative. OTOH, as a mastodon derivative, most of the dev effort has to go in to either improving or undoing what's been done to mainline mastodon.

Account migration exists and works, even to other platforms, but you lose post history (which is a bigger deal for some people than others.)

I'm not saying it's impossible, it's just Effort.)

Andrew (Television Executive)

But there's a beacon of real hope in what I said above, and I'm not sure if you caught it.

When we embrace the free software world, if The Rot does come, we can fight it.

When The Rot comes on Windows, or on Spotify, or on Facebook, we have to either accept that rot or abandon that platform.

When The Rot came for Ubuntu, I had a clear, direct, simple migration path to a platform that was not covered in Rot. The majority of my tools and skills transfer directly. I did not have to make any major changes to my workflow. I had a couple of minor annoyances, I dealt with them, I moved on.

I can (and have planned to for a while, though I haven't actually done it yet) move this fedicerse instance to Hometown without losing anything but a few hours of my day.

There will come a time when the same is true of other platforms and, until then, you can at least preserve your contacts and keep an archive of your posts.

When Plex started tightening the screws, I took my library and left.

Free software is not a silver bullet. It doesn't protect us from The Rot, but it does give us the tools to fight back.

Andrew (Television Executive)

So, when you encounter The Rot, name it. Get angry about it. Find out who is responsible for it. Talk about it.

But also, if you're able, fight it directly. If you're able, offer your services in Rot Fighting to your community.

(Even if that Rot Fighting just looks like lending a CD or a bluray.)

Mastodon Migration

@ajroach42

It's a good article, but antithetical that the author publishes on Substack. Why is it so difficult for these self professed information warriors to demonstrate the courage of their convictions?

Andrew (Television Executive)

@mastodonmigration Agreed, and I believe I called it out in the thread.

Mastodon Migration

@ajroach42

You did. Thank you. Was not implying you didn't. Just reinforcing the point. Other thought leaders who post on Substack include Timothy Snyder and Simon Rosenberg. How can we prevail against the corporate rot, when we embrace their platforms? How do these folks not get it?