[scottious]

I miss the optimism too. What drew me to tech was how it felt like we were trying to make people's lives better.

These days, it feels like tech is primarily interested in extracting value from us. I guess this is nothing new. Profits at any cost, and all that.

I don't know, I'm just kind of sad about all of it. Even though my smartphone is like 100x more powerful than my first computer, it still feels like something was lost

[wat10000]

There was the sense that tech and the internet would change human systems. Information wants to be free and all that. The individual power granted by tech would lead to individual liberty. Traditional power structures would crumble when faced with this.

We didn't realize that it only felt that way because the people with power didn't care yet. Tech was like an ant crawling across a picnic blanket and thinking it's powerful because the people aren't doing anything about it. Once traditional power structures woke up to tech and the internet, they coopted it all.

[tracerbulletx]

This is a great point and way of saying it.

[fragmede]

It's all feels though. If you stare into the void, the apocalypse is coming. OTOH, bringing an AI assistant to every person in the world to make their lives better, is one perspective to take. It's all a matter of framing.

[anthk]

There's still that at usenet at comp.misc, comp.arch and so groups. Good discussions with almost no clickbaits and the like.

[ryandrake]

> These days, it feels like tech is primarily interested in extracting value from us. I guess this is nothing new. Profits at any cost, and all that.

Not just that but the whole "shaping the future whether you like it or not" push.

In the 90s, building the computing future meant figuring out a user need and building a product that fit that need. Now, there is this idea that technology companies are just building their idea of what the future should be, minus any product imperative, minus input from customers or the public, and then it's up to us to "get on board" and adopt it. The cart is driving the horse.