Ugh, that does sound terrible. I liked Reddit reasonably well before 2016 turned everything and anything into politics. And then covid and the whole Ukraine situation turned everything to shit even further.

I really miss the 2000 internet when it was just nerd discussions and the occasional funny gif.

How has it changed? I’m genuinely not familiar with it. I know of the spicy reputation it once had, but I rarely see it mentioned anymore these days. I assume censorship or something like it found its way there?

As a 44-year old who lived through all of those once-in-a-lifetime events (you also forgot 9/11) just once in my life, I’d like a boring decade where nothing happens.

Between the wars, politics, global terror, economic upheaval and the general state of things… I’m really fucking tired boss.

Yeah we remember. Because that’s a literal fucking warcrime. You’re not allowed to destroy historical sites.

While I agree that destroying books is bad - even common ones - it’s also not technically illegal. If I want to burn a first edition of whatever book worth thousands of dollars… I’m legally allowed to do that.

I can also see the benefit of having a digital version of a rare book that can be enjoyed by thousands as opposed to sitting on a shelf. But yeah, definitely hold companies accountable for destroying them. There has to be a better way to do that work and still have a useable book afterwards.

I hear ya.

These days I only buy things that have years of good reviews, or that I know how to inspect for quality issues. Learn what makes a good shirt, a good knife, a good tool… what are the signs of quality and signs of cost cutting that you should be aware of? A consumer really does need to do a bit of homework to find the diamond in the dung pile.

I also really love old gear and tech for that reason. Fewer things to break and easy to fix. I use film cameras that are older than I am, often by decades. It might be old, but at least it’ll keep fucking working AND can be fixed if it doesn’t.

Absolutely not. Just look at games these days. Number one complaint: everything runs poorly. Optimisation is an afterthought. If it runs like shit? We’ll blame the customer. A lot of games now run like trash on even the most high end graphics cards. Companies don’t seem to give a shit.

Vote with your wallet I guess.