And since you won’t be able to modify web pages, it will also mean the end of customization, either for looks (ie. DarkReader, Stylus), conveniance (ie. Tampermonkey) or accessibility.
The community feedback is… interesting to say the least.
What the fuck is happening to the internet recently?
Twitter and Reddit CEOs completely losing their minds, and now Google of all companies wants to lock down the whole internet?
This isn’t even close to being okay. It’s 100% bullshit.
Interest rates going up means investors are demanding more profit so all the tricks web companies have held off on till now are coming out.
A lot of them never had to make a profit before.
Rich idiots threw money at anything because while a million dollars is more than the vast amount of us will ever have, to them it’s like buying a lotto scratcher.
The underlying issue is wealth imbalance.
That wealth imbalance also pushes companies to force dumb shit like this on thier customers.
If Google were to just come out with a $10 a month plan that removed all the sleazy ways they try and profit from you, the overwhemling response would be “Oh great yet another subscription”, because these subscriptions have become a significant chunk of people’s income each month.
But what if greedy neoliberals hadn’t been pocketing our pay rises for $20 years and that subscription was functionally $1? Most people would be happy to blow $20 supporting 20 different content providers.
Unfortunately, their greed is insatiable. There’s always a room of executives doing their grubby little sums. “If people have $1, they probably have $2. We could double our profits! Then double our salaries!”.
Inflation just means “If rich people find out you’ve got more money, they’ll fuck you out of that too”.
The $1 will never be enough. They’ll keep charging more and more until people have nothing left to hand over. Then they’ll figure out more ways to squeeze a profit out of you. Manipulating you with ads, selling your private data, turning your body into expensive dogfood – whatever makes them a few more cents.
And one of the primary reasons they never had to make a profit was that, so long as interest rates were functionally zero, it didn’t really cost the investor class much of anything to park money in a money losing operation while waiting for it to become sellable.
With interest rates back to pre-2008 levels, though, there’s a price to money again. And a real opportunity cost. So, compete with bonds or watch your investors walk.
Better time than ever to be a FOSS enjoyer, that’s for sure
Honestly, this second half of 2023 for me has been about finding FOSS options for literally everything. And eventually I’ll have a home server I can use for the things I can’t use on the cloud
It’s like in Silicon Valley when the VC tells them they don’t need to be profitable they just need to market, then as soon as he dips below technically being a billionaire he demands that they focus on being profitable immediately
The enshittification of the internet shall continue.
We will fight and we will lose, as depressing as it sounds. The vast majority of people just don’t and won’t care.
We’re on Lemmy. We’re already winning!
We may win a battle or few, but not the war.
Then i’ll scrape the songs i currently watch on youtube with jdownload and stop using the page otherwise.
All they do is make the internet less attractive. Now that works to increase profits for a while, but eventually the content creators withdraw, the platforms become worse and eventually uncool and people stop using it, or use it less. Facebook is on a decline in western countries. We went through multiple video snippet apps already and tiktok and instagram too will be declining eventually.
We dont have to win the war because the war will never end. We just gotta make the best out of the battlefields we win.
You’ll finish your enshittification and you’ll like it!
But a small minority of really determined people is enough to change the world 🙌
I love to see how people nowadays find easier to imagine the end of the world than the end of capitalism… That’s how they’ve been brainwashing us till now.
I know, right? It’s so weird. In every single instance of some bullshit happening it’s easy to brush it off as incompetence or an attempt at profit maximization, but overall it feels a lot like some kind of targeted disassembly of whatever made the internet great and facilitated open discussions.
I don’t think it’s coordinated, I think it all starts from the same root cause: Silicon Valley Bank failed. These companies all need to do something they’ve really not done much of in the past: turn a profit. But these companies are not run by the business geniuses we were once convinced were running the show. Most of them live so far removed from a normal persons life that they don’t understand what motivates us, what we want in a platform, and as soon as we provide feedback after they’ve already made a decision, they decide it’s because we don’t understand the squeeze they’re under to make money.
- Twitter: Elon Musk thinks he could make more money from subscriptions than advertisements. The whole thing’s a disaster because that’s really dumb. This case may be a little different though because there’s some evidence Musk just wanted more people to see his tweets and to pay people to be his friend
- Reddit: Spez fails to see that he has multiple revenue sources available to him so long as he keeps his users around. Somewhere, there was the right balance of charging for the API at a reasonable price, performing better market research on his user base to provide a better ad platform, and keeping the Reddit coin system in place as the base liked it because the user base paid more for that than most similar online payment schemes.
- Google: this is the scary one. This is the one that seems like they know exactly what they’re doing. They’re ramping up their enshittification following the fall of SVB, but the way they’re doing it is both malicious and a minor enough inconvenience that the majority of their users will stay. And they’re doing it in small quiet ways. A little bit of tweaking how YouTube bans users here. A little bit of RFCs about DRM on the web there. Some PRs to chromium and android no one will notice. All to squeeze more ads into peoples online experiences. Their search product has been utter shit for about 6 years now, but people still prefer it over Bing or DuckDuckGo (which is a wrapper for Bing). They’ve learned the following lesson: if you’re big enough, the citizens of the web will let you do it
That’s a good write up, thanks. I don’t claim it’s coordinated, just that it feels more and more that way.
Also, I switched to DDG a year or so ago and I haven’t heard that it was a wrapper for Bing. So I went to google it (I can’t not use this verb when talking about online searches, lol), and it seems like it’s not really the case. It gets some results from bing and utilises their ads to make profit, but it seems like it’s a small part of their output. Is that incorrect? Do you have some more info about it being a wrapper? I’m kinda curious now
I 100% would have signed up for Reddit Premium and payed monthly for Sync access if they had allowed me to hand them the money. Oh well ¯\_(ツ)_/¯
DuckDuckGo is not a wrapper for Bing, but is in fact a distinct and independent search engine. DDG does grab some results from bing. but it also grabs from other sources and it’s own crawler.
It can be a combo of several objectives:
- make a shitload of money
- stop people from realising we’re making a shitload of money off of their backs
- keep people poor so that even if they do realise there’s nothing they can do about it
What the fuck is happening to the internet recently?
Capitalism is spreading further into the dark reaches of the internet.
Google has already been a worthless pos for years. Impossible to get relevant results, even with operators. You just get ads and irrelevant SEO sites. And adding “reddit” at the end of the query will probably not work so well in the future either, seeing how that site has also gone to shit.
And they have already tried monopolising the entire internet with their amp bullshit.
So this is just in line with their vision of making the whole internet into a pile of burning shit under their total control.
One comment mentions possible incompability with article 22 of the GDPR, and I sure hope the EU will stand their ground on this.
I can only imagine noyb letting all hell break loose. We need more people like him, dissecting corporations legal bs to find every last little thing we can possibly hold against them.
Obligatory use Firefox
Let’s hope there’s already a law that the EU can find to apply (since they already don’t like the non-EU dominance of big tech), or that they make one in time.
I was just thinking that I’m sure Google will lobby the US government to get this model enforced as law, making it illegal for anyone to create workarounds, or alternative browsers. And the US legislative government being what it is, will hand Google whatever legislation it wants to turn their nightmare into a reality.
It is imperative to make as many people as possible aware
The EU is rapidly becoming a neoliberal hellehole resembling the US. I no longer have any hope for existing institutions resisting corporate encroachment. Best that can be done is the support of initiatives like the fediverse and foss in general but if the current trend continues even that is in a precarious position.
The EU is so utterly out of whack right now.
You got the proposal of chat control on one hand, and stuff like replaceable batteries on the other.
Like, make up your mind already, do you want to help your citizens or not? It’s almost like they do it on purpose to keep our expectations in check.
Obligatory use Firefox
No way. Why should I feel obligated to use something I feel has inferior UX and UI than the browser I’m using now? For Mozilla’s CEO to rais her wage (again): https://calpaterson.com/mozilla.html ?
You people are really delusional if you really think that Mozilla are the only good guys (or good guys at all, for that matters).
Inb4, unimaginative people downvoting just because they can’t stand different opinions.
I feel obligated to raise awareness about these topics. I won’t prevent anyone from choosing Chrome, but at the very least it’s important for people to know what their choice can entail, and base their decision on that.
I won’t prevent anyone from using FF, either. I just think that the “obligatory use Firefox” is quite arrogant, to say the least. And, to be honest, I’m quite happy it’s not going to happen until FF is managed by Mozilla and their poor choices.
They’re not saying you should feel obligated to use Firefox. It’s a tongue-in-cheek joke about how everything FLOSS, Privacy or GDPR related always includes a comment thread about using Firefox. I use Brave too but you gotta read the room. Lemmy users in general are going to be much more pro-Firefox than anything else.
I understand. I just feel it’s quite arrogant ans annoying to be (indirectly) schooled by strangers on the internet who think they know better.
I downvoted you because you made a terrible case for yourself. Learn to make a salient point, or learn to love being “edgy”. the choice is up to you, but the internet already has plenty of the latter, why not become the former?
Nice to know that you downvoted me for no actual reason, as I didn’t make any “case”. Have a candy.
There is a huge difference between mozilla and google. That’s quite obvious to most. The ceo raising his salary is a problem for you, and you prefer Google, where they have enormous salaries and incomes? It’s one of the richest companies in the world.
Firefox doesn’t have inferior UX at all. It has more functions and features than chrome. It also has very good default privacy and the plugin system is amazing.
And it just became faster than chrome as well.
Keep being delusional, It’s free, after all.
The ceo raising his salary is a problem for you
It’s not for me (anymore). It should be for you. She was raising her salary while firing devs… But whatever. Mozillians are seldom rational.
Mozilla is not good, but they are the lesser evil of the two, considering Google is known as being:
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NSA partner and collecting data and spy on users in googolplex capacity
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AI used by US military for drone bombing in foreign countries based on metadata Google collects on smartphones (https://www.wired.co.uk/article/google-project-maven-drone-warfare-artificial-intelligence)
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use dark patterns in their software to make users accept their TOS to spy
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repeated lies about how their data collection works claiming anonymity
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forcing users to use their Play Services which is spyware and scareware
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monopolising the web and internet via AMP, FLOC and now DRM proposal
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use of non standard web browser libraries and known attempts to cripple lone standing ethical competitors like Firefox and Gecko web engine (now with Microsoft making their default Edge Chromium-based too)
Moreover, Firefox’s UI is incomparably superior to that of Chrome, even without considering the infinite userchrome.css customisations. The fact that you can have a dedicated search box, extensions movable and a download list button on the toolbar makes Firefox incomparable.
Moreover, Firefox’s UI is incomparably superior to that of Chrome.
No. It’s crap. Utter crap.
without considering the infinite userchrome.css customisations.
“Unsupported” and surely an incentive for less tech-savvy people to look elewhere. But whatever. I’ won’t bother to reply to anything else, as you’re statistically one of these persons that spend their life watching crappy youtube videos and buying shit on Amazon.
No. It’s crap. Utter crap.
I see no reasoning from you on why Firefox’s customisable UI is crappier than Chrome based browsers’ UI, or on double standards of morality regarding Brave CEO’s anti LGBT right funding, or on all the other stuff you are saying. Nothing sounds coherent or reasonable. I am not your r/privacy mod who uses iPhone and Google Chrome on Windows, I daily Debian and write guides.
“Unsupported” and surely an incentive for less tech-savvy people to look elewhere
How is userchrome.css unsupported on Firefox? And where is this customisability on Chrome based browsers?
spend their life watching crappy youtube videos and buying shit on Amazon
Interesting approach to convince people.
I have received about a dozen reports against you for trolling. If you want to be Brave™ here, will you take the L and move on, or do you need the hammer? I will not hesitate in the future, unlike now.
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What do you use?
Not Firefox.
I think they probably use Netscape
Indeed, I’d love Seamonkey to be a viable alternative, for instance.
You criticize but don’t even have the balls to name your browser? To back up your claims?
That is pathetic.
It’s Brave, as evidenced in their history. The browser that peddles crypto ads, has a transphobe CEO, and has been accused of selling copyrighted data
I surely deserve death for using a browser you don’t like. Jeez, people can be so obtuse sometimes…
Someone just insulted me and called me “alt-right” person or “crypto bro” (I’m neither of both). So, do you really think that I’m the pathetic one?
And… Which “claims”, by the way? I just said that I’m annoyed by people telling me “I should” do something and that I’ll decide by myself. Full stop. Coherently, I’m not giving you alternatives nor have I to disclose anything.
Sometimes it looks like one has to apologize for using Brave or Vivaldi or any other shit that didn’t come out from Mozilla’s ass. Keep using FF if this makes you happy. It made me happy for 20 years, but then I got fed up by 1) Mozilla, 2) Mozilla’s community 3) The browser itself.
Don’t worry. One day Mozillians will receive a reality bath and realise the farce they have supported.
This is the result of the world blindly using Chrome and other Chromium based browsers. Now with effectively full control over the browser that more than 90% of the world uses Google can force its will on the internet
And we saw this was going to happen at least 5 years ago. But since the majority don’t care, we get what we deserve I guess.
Let’s just hope this doesn’t go through.
Wait, is Google in the process of Embrace, Extend, Extinguish on the free internet?
Always have been, and they’re in it for the long game. They’ve already acquired a stupid amount of control on the web and web standards with everything from Chromium to Youtube, not to mention it doesn’t help that they basically control the world’s most popular mobile OS. Google wants it all if we let them.
So soon we’ll need uBlock Origin FitGirl Edition?
Hopefully we won’t have to deal with a uBlock Origin Empress Edition
Inb4 you can only browse the internet with Chromium.
Well, the engineers say it themselves: nothing would prevent websites developers to prevent access from browsers that do not support this “Web DRM”.
My biggest fear though is that it becomes a standard which all browsers will have to support to stay relevant. And with Google building the engine used by the vast majority of browsers, they can force this upon other browser engines (ie. Safari and Firefox).
It’s such a potent example why everyone who cares need to stop using Chromium based browsers before it’s too late. Stunts like this would be much harder to pull if there wasn’t a de facto browser monopoly.
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Don’t give those monsters ideas
Fuck DRMs and fuck these turds
And they went ahead and blocked comments now - “An owner of this repository has limited the ability to comment to users that have contributed to this repository in the past.”
Fucking cowards
EDIT: I went ahead and reported the distro as malware. Also, it feels like the internet is about to split in a open internet (basically just like tor) and a corporate internet where if you don’t pay the big tech you can’t access anything.
Ben Wiser (Google) Borbala Benko (Google) Philipp Pfeiffenberger (Google) Sergey Kataev (Google)
Congratulations, guys. You are now internet pariahs. Your unrepentantly mercenary lack of engineering ethics is now recorded for all eternity. You have nobody but yourselves to blame.
Google is hindrance to open web, like IE7 was with ActiveX.
Only difference is that IE7 wanted developers to develop for IE7, while Google also want to fully control the web and bend it according to its needs
And there’s zero chance of some other company dethroning Chrome like IE was. The only way that happens is with government intervention to protect the free market.
But of course antitrust enforcement is dead in this country, so that’s not happening. Just look at the obviously anticompetitive Activision acquisition that went through recently. Too many politicians slept through their economics classes, and they think that giant corporations are good for consumers.
I literally swapped to Librewolf before the Rossman video was done. I was on Brave Browser before, but it’s based on Chromium. Fuck Chromium and fuck Google. Fuck this shitty amoeba that tries to spread into and control everything.
I will post stupid shit on my federated forum and you will fucking live with it Google. Fuck you. Burn. It’s time to break up the internet monopolies and do some trust busting. Someone pull FDR’s rotten corpse out of the grave and put it back to work.
This is exactly the kind of thing that demostrates why DRM shouldn’t be part of the web standards. It’s very existence is abuse and this use even more so.
DRM needs to be illegal.
I reported him on github, for all the good that will do.
I’m afraid that reporting him to another big corporation(Microsoft owns Github) is rather futile.
You’re right, why are we allowing the internet be be monopolized like this? it is futile because we’re basically giving up all control and forming a dependence on these few select tech companies.
Fediverse is the opposition to that
Next steps are getting rid capitalism
If you think that’s a realistic next step, you’re crazy.
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Same for “Security Considerations” lmao
https://rupertbenwiser.github.io/Web-Environment-Integrity/#security
“Please click on all the crosswalks before you can enter this site”
This is why people pirate things.Having thought about it for a bit, it’s possible for this proposal to be abused by authoritarian governments.
Suppose a government—say, Wadiya—mandated that all websites allowed on the Wadiyan Internet must ensure that visitors are using a list of verified browsers. This list is provided by the Wadiyan government, and includes: Wadiya On-Line, Wadiya Explorer, and WadiyaScape Navigator. All three of those browsers are developed in cooperation with the Wadiyan government.
Each of those browsers also happen to send a list of visited URLs to a Wadiyan government agency, and routinely scan the hard drive for material deemed “anti-social.”
Because the attestations are cryptographically verified, citizens would not be able to fake the browser environment. They couldn’t just download Firefox and install an extension to pretend to be Wadiya Explorer; they would actually have to install the spyware browser to be able to browse websites available on the Wadiyan Internet.
Once you get to that point it’s gonna get back to dark web or some other nonstandard communication form to bypass the traditional http/https protocols for “web browsing”.
🤔 People could just make a new protocol and build a separate internet from the ground up.
But they’d have to do it on free Linux computers, because the ones with Windows and Mac OSes (and the specially made chips) can be accessed directly by those companies. In principle, they can see into everyone’s hard drives and add or delete shit to their whims. So a way around that would have to be found too. Scary…
