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.
Compatibility issues? Unspecified root problems? Nope, I ain't feeling'em.
Tech knowledge is required to use smaller services? Just a fraction of what was required before, just about enough to operate in digital world in general.
Cars are becoming SaaS? Whatever brings them closer to extinction works for me.
Some companies are trying to bring SaaS to the world of bicycles. It's not going well. Or rather, they're going out of business.
Consumers have choice. Even my non tech friends and family were suspicious of iot bs from the early days of it. something which worked for centuries , was repairable, and could be shared within a community now attempting to be sold at quadruple the price, requiring some bs cloud subscription (with data to be onsold to harvesting probably) and able to be crippled with the flick of a firmware switch on the other side of the world to allow you the privilege of ‘upgrading’ to a better model? nice try venture capital crippled tech bros. Bikes never needed to be sprinkled with silicon valley snake oil. Im sure the founders made their cash and ran, but what a waste of energy and productivity.
Yeah, and it's not just that. It adds unnecessary complexity. All that many parts to break. Bikes already have a problem with too many non-standard components. I had one part break that was simple, but specific to that particular bike. The manufacturer happened to have a few extra around that they sent, but my impression was that (a) there weren't many more and (b) they didn't even know where they had come from. When much of the industry is in that state, we don't need more fancy components.
VanMoof did this. Then their Dutch branch went tits up. Now they have sold shit bikes that won't unlock without their cloud services.
They say they're being bought out and the bikes still work for now, but who knows what'll happen when the new owners think these servers are costing them too much money.
Luckily there's an app out there for VanMoof customers to download their unlock keys and store them safely (in an app on their phone or in plaintext form). Made by a competitor of VanMoof, funnily enough...