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.
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.
This has nothing to do with tech and EVERYTHING to do with FUCKING CAPITALISM.
What a dumb fucking post, tech didn’t promise us shit were still living in a capitalist nightmare where quarterly earnings are far and above the primary value, over any and all people.
What the fuck is this waaaa tech didn’t usher in an age of utopia!!! It’s almost like we have to solve other problems first. Fucks sake
"Tech" doesn't exist. Entire concept is a lie propagated by companies trying to appear like something different.
Not a tech company - a taxi company, a short term rental company, a video distribution company ...
Look at what they sell, not what tools they use to do it.
"the cloud isn't tech it's a rental company" is a pretty dumb take tbh.
Like, if you're trying to argue that AWS (or gcp, azure) services don't provide technical solutions that aren't available otherwise you just don't know what you're talking about. Is it expensive, yeah it definitely can be. But cloud is much more than server rentals at this point. Want a host that gives you bare metal? Great there are 'rentals' to choose from. I can see arguing SaaS hasn't really 'tech', but PasS and IaaS provide technology and solutions to problems. I hate Daddy Jeff as much as the next guy but AWS is very much 'tech'.
I could buy a server and run AD. I can rent a cloud server and run AD. In that way, you're correct.
But what I want to do is buy a local server and run AAD. They won't let me. Their cloud solutions are an artificial limitation to force us to rent servers rather than license software. It's another form of vendor lockin.
You know how to fix air conditioning? How about program an alarm system? These are side services a storage company provides their clients to enhance their main product. If uber is a taxi company and Netflix is just Blockbuster 2.0, the cloud is just a big Westies in the sky.
Capitalism would never allow utopia to come about, because the concept of utopia doesn't allow for an unequal distribution of goods. The inequality is very much a feature, not a bug.
It's not even that; those services were subsidized by investors money on this idea that once you get a user base, you can then capitalize on the user base.
Those promises were made at a loss which later had to become a profit. It's like Discord, there's no way hosting literal hundreds of thousands of servers for free and killing all the competition can and will continue indefinitely. I wouldn't be surprised if their monetization gets even more aggressive because transmitting all of that audio and video is not cheap.
That's not even a "capitalism" thing, that's just a "someone's got to do the work thing" and the majority of gamers went "yup that somebody can not be free!" And what always happens does, the existing solutions lost tons of revenue and became increasingly stagnant because they can't compete with "free".
That's why I've started paying for stuff (even when there's a "free" option or paying more for domestically produced goods -- even when there's a "cheaper" option). Cheap isn't cheap when it comes to manufactured goods (i.e., cheap imported junk), and free isn't free when it comes to online services. Ultimately, somebody's gotta make "free" happen (even if it's a government, and then that really means the tax payer).
The race to the bottom only exists because that's what people vote for with their wallets. If it wasn't rewarded with sales, it wouldn't happen.
I guess the thing where tech is relevant is that regulations thought it was different, so they didn't apply the rules against dumping and other illegal tactics ("because they're a start-up, it's different when they lose money year over year").
Well, you're right that the bigger issue is people expecting tech to solve social problems created by social structure. But Yes, tech is absolutely failing at this. How could it not?
Why not instead take this show of contempt for tech as another chance for people to recognize the underlying issue, not as a threat to the future of tech developments.