HN is not immune to this. I do not take HN seriously, because empirically so many takes across so many subjects have been wrong in a melodramatic fashion and the “adults”, often people with training and first hand experience have to show up to set the subject matter right before someone gets hurt. But as a barometer of unhinged hype? Only X is comparable.
The surge of authoritarianism is a response from people who, much like you, have tried to unplug but who realized closing their eyes does not stop the changing world around them.
Medicine is often times not only bitter, but outright toxic to the body. It needs to be, because it has a job to do.
I’m not saying you’re doing anything wrong, I’m saying there are people who have had a head start on your current conundrum and who could not, at their own time and place, find a way out. Will the same happen to you? I’m not an oracle, but I hope not.
Personal bias: I’m in slight favor of nationalism. The citizens of a country must put themselves, other citizens and the country first. Otherwise they will wake up tomorrow without it.
> The surge of authoritarianism is a response from people who, much like you, have tried to unplug but who realized closing their eyes does not stop the changing world around them.
I'm not really following your logic there. If the argument is that people choosing to disengage allows the rise of authoritarianism, I could buy some of that. And I'll accept whatever guilt I deserve. But I don't see how that could be the proximate cause of the surge of enthusiasm for authoritarianism. I believe it has more to do with macro-scale world events. And I'm sure one could construct a "just so story" to run the trail back as far as one wants, but I think an awful lot of it can be traced back to the 2008 financial crisis. That along with the continued deterioration of the middle class, rising wealth inequality, etc. And, as much as I kinda hate to say it, I think there's a hint of lingering White angst over having had a Black POTUS for the first time not so terribly long ago.
I’m not saying you’re doing anything wrong,
No worries. And for what it's worth, I'm not - for various reasons - going to elaborate on everything that's on my mind, or every action I still take, or hope to take, in the name of trying to support the aforementioned "freedom and Enlightenment ideals". I'm not trying to write an essay here on HN or anything. :-) My reasoning is in part that if I stop sending time engaging with people on Facebook / Twitter / etc. then I can spend that time on higher value activities.
That said, I'm just a regular Joe (er, "Phil") and I'm no hero. I figure I do what I can in the end I can live with that.
> If the argument is that people choosing to disengage allows the rise of authoritarianism, I could buy some of that. And I'll accept whatever guilt I deserve. But I don't see how that could be the proximate cause of the surge of enthusiasm for authoritarianism.
No, I am saying they tried the thing you tried, and realized they are no better off for it, and eventually landed upon the hypothetical that authoritarianism may be the thing that would make the difference. I’m not saying it’s right or wrong either, just that enough of people’s lives converged to such a conclusion that it has become an issue. Once upon a time, they too tried to take the high road.
People stopped trusting tech industry and stopped seeing it as something that helps or good or better then politicians. Majority of its complains about freedom and what not are not really about freedom are self serving bullshit and its actively trying to cause harm. Tech industry is really good at blaming the user while spending millions on making the user do what they are blaming them for.
So, result is that people at best don't care. They see the whole fight as basically assholes vs assholes ... and tech is perceived as bigger assholes.
Outrage against what? That age restrictions haven't been enforced sooner?
I read an article where some children were asked about their social media use. A few made the point that they just felt crap after a scrolling session. I think everyone here knows what it's like to realise you just lost an hour to two of potential productive time to HN. And this is just a text site.
Social media is engineered to steal your attention and feed you junk, divisive information. Why on earth would we allow kids to become addicted to that?
I agree with that. Platforms have continuously added more and more things to create accounts, and the history shows that people submit and give up pretty easily.
I think it's a jump to take that historic metric and expect the same results with ID verification...but we shall see.
I certainly don't know anyone in my peer group who would submit ID for account access. By the time the kids can finally sign up for there great shiny social media account with valid ID, hopefully something better has taken its place with roots pointing towards the old ways of the internet.
I liked every version of Windows that I’ve used, back to 3.1 all the way up to 11. Nowadays I mostly use 10/11 at home and at work. A new Windows upgrade was always a magical treat for me, the old slow HDD speeds building up anticipation during the installation phase, making me excited to finally use it. Growing up with computers unfortunately demystifies many things, but such is the price of poignance.
I felt the same way up until around Vista. The launch of Windows 95 was probably the pinnacle for me. XP already started having a sour taste with the whole activatin thing, and Vista and 7 weren't really exciting anymore. My reaction to a new version went from curiosity and excitement about what new things might be in it, to dreading finding out about all the things they removed or made worse this time. I went from wanting to try out the new versions soonish, to trying to stay on the previous one for as long as reasonably possible. And I don't think it's just a nostalgia or age thing, it's about very concrete things for me (dwindling customiation options and growing usage restrictions being the main ones).
