Something that I think articles like this should probably address that they often ignore is how much society has improved the public's lives, often in ways that also exploit content creators. Spotify gives me access to almost all the music in the world, for only $9.99 a month. Youtube gives me access to academic content, amateur video essays, philosophy discussions, and all sorts of other interesting creators for free. Wikipedia gives me an unimaginable amount of human knowledge for nothing. Streaming services give me access to more and better television and movies than humans have ever had access to before. If tech is at war with it's users, it's users are waging war right back demanding ever more content for insanely cheap prices, and if they don't get it they'll figure out a way to get it for free. In between all the artists and creatives are the ones getting squeezed. I'm extremely sympathetic to the argument made in this piece, but I'm skeptical that this can be lain solely at the feet of tech moguls. I think tech has incentivized some of the worst impulses of both users and tech companies, and technology has empowered both sides in ways never seen before in human history.
Just looking at how tech has disrupted the news media really shows that in a lot of ways tech really empowers the worse impulses of the collective public. The responses tech has had, such as with low effort clickbait journalism, while nefarious and insidious and rots away at our collective trust and intelligence, is also a direct response and engagement with poor behavior by the public. We've been given access to more journalism than ever before, and we consistently choose to engage with poor quality nonsense, while refusing to pay for local or investigative journalism that actually provides a benefit to society.
So I guess the question is, how do were incentivize better behavior when one side is incentivized to offer deals to good to be true, then figure out sneaky ways to exploit customers over time, and a public who seems increasingly demanding of ever cheaper content that they seem to engage with in lazier and lazier ways. I don't know the answer, but I think if we don't consider the problem holistically, we won't ever arrive at an actual solution.
I mean, one can be immeasurably better off in the broad strokes while also being extremely harmed otherwise. The exchange we've made for a firehose of knowledge and content is endless data collection and aggressive tactics designed for engagement and clicks rather than some sort of equitable or reasonable split.
Yep, I agreed with all that already. The question is, how do you fix the tech companies malfeasance when the environment partially incentivizing their behavior is demanded by consumers?
So make tech companies do expensive human trials before their allowed to make changes to their website? Chain of custody and lots of paperwork on coding changes? Censor any websites that haven't been approved by this new agency?
As someone who has worked in big pharma, that phrase doesn't make sense to me.
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u/Aldryc 11d ago edited 11d ago
Something that I think articles like this should probably address that they often ignore is how much society has improved the public's lives, often in ways that also exploit content creators. Spotify gives me access to almost all the music in the world, for only $9.99 a month. Youtube gives me access to academic content, amateur video essays, philosophy discussions, and all sorts of other interesting creators for free. Wikipedia gives me an unimaginable amount of human knowledge for nothing. Streaming services give me access to more and better television and movies than humans have ever had access to before. If tech is at war with it's users, it's users are waging war right back demanding ever more content for insanely cheap prices, and if they don't get it they'll figure out a way to get it for free. In between all the artists and creatives are the ones getting squeezed. I'm extremely sympathetic to the argument made in this piece, but I'm skeptical that this can be lain solely at the feet of tech moguls. I think tech has incentivized some of the worst impulses of both users and tech companies, and technology has empowered both sides in ways never seen before in human history.
Just looking at how tech has disrupted the news media really shows that in a lot of ways tech really empowers the worse impulses of the collective public. The responses tech has had, such as with low effort clickbait journalism, while nefarious and insidious and rots away at our collective trust and intelligence, is also a direct response and engagement with poor behavior by the public. We've been given access to more journalism than ever before, and we consistently choose to engage with poor quality nonsense, while refusing to pay for local or investigative journalism that actually provides a benefit to society.
So I guess the question is, how do were incentivize better behavior when one side is incentivized to offer deals to good to be true, then figure out sneaky ways to exploit customers over time, and a public who seems increasingly demanding of ever cheaper content that they seem to engage with in lazier and lazier ways. I don't know the answer, but I think if we don't consider the problem holistically, we won't ever arrive at an actual solution.