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It's ineptitude. Of course it is. Otherwise it would be indefensible. EDIT in which I clumsily express my weariness at hearing some of the smartest people in t

by rusk 12d ago

It's ineptitude. Of course it is. Otherwise it would be indefensible. EDIT in which I clumsily express my weariness at hearing some of the smartest people in the world claim they “didn’t know” because they have arbitrated foolishness against liability

spuz 12d ago
The decision to force you to sign in to view replies is clearly not by accident or ineptitude. It's probably not malice either - just a business decision.
- deleted 12d ago
  [deleted]
- treyd 12d ago
  A system that makes "business decisions" indistinguishable from malice is an interesting one.
  - ToValueFunfetti 12d ago
    If I have something you want and I could give it to you but instead charge you money, is that malice? If so, what system wouldn't make malice indistinguishable from business decisions? If not, what distinguishes that from a login wall in exchange for viewing content?
- butlike 12d ago
  So business decisions are absolved of morality?
  - drewbeck 12d ago
    No. “Malice” isn’t the only possible descriptor with moral weight. There’s many more ways this decision could be immoral without malice.
  - newfriend 12d ago
    Do you consider a login-wall immoral?
- muyuu 12d ago
  It's pretty much the standard to either soft-block or hard- block access into silos. Facebook, Reddit, YouTube, Instagram, Tiktok, etc ... all do it. Of course it's an openly anti-consumer practice, but it's one they get away with when they're big enough to flip the service burden to the client.
  - socalgal2 12d ago
    how is it anti-consumer? Claiming you should be able to freely access the content on some service feels like claiming you should be able to walk into any fast-food place and help yourself to their soda machine. A business is free to choose that you must login to access their content and you are free to choose not to do business with them if you don't like it. I generally chose the latter
    - Quibblingeek 12d ago
      You’re absolutely right. I can just choose to not participate. If I’m lucky enough, enough people realize that they have the agency to not give into this, but if they don’t it doesn’t affect me at all. Either way, I don’t care. The Internet has become so hostile to users that the only moral and rational choice is to not participate on platforms that have become so hostile that threatening legal action is the only way that they can protect their relevancy in facilitating social discourse.
    - kalleboo 12d ago
      Your analogy does not work since they can still show ads to logged-out users, nobody is getting anything for free. Meta even creates shadow-profiles of users without accounts to track them across the internet. It's all about getting people locked into walled gardens. I wish the EU DMA had taken a harder stance on this and required all social media to federate to some extent.

by rusk 12d ago

spuz 12d ago

The decision to force you to sign in to view replies is clearly not by accident or ineptitude. It's probably not malice either - just a business decision.

deleted 12d ago
[deleted]
treyd 12d ago
A system that makes "business decisions" indistinguishable from malice is an interesting one.
- ToValueFunfetti 12d ago
  If I have something you want and I could give it to you but instead charge you money, is that malice? If so, what system wouldn't make malice indistinguishable from business decisions? If not, what distinguishes that from a login wall in exchange for viewing content?
butlike 12d ago
So business decisions are absolved of morality?
- drewbeck 12d ago
  No. “Malice” isn’t the only possible descriptor with moral weight. There’s many more ways this decision could be immoral without malice.
- newfriend 12d ago
  Do you consider a login-wall immoral?
muyuu 12d ago
It's pretty much the standard to either soft-block or hard- block access into silos. Facebook, Reddit, YouTube, Instagram, Tiktok, etc ... all do it. Of course it's an openly anti-consumer practice, but it's one they get away with when they're big enough to flip the service burden to the client.
- socalgal2 12d ago
  how is it anti-consumer? Claiming you should be able to freely access the content on some service feels like claiming you should be able to walk into any fast-food place and help yourself to their soda machine. A business is free to choose that you must login to access their content and you are free to choose not to do business with them if you don't like it. I generally chose the latter
  - Quibblingeek 12d ago
    You’re absolutely right. I can just choose to not participate. If I’m lucky enough, enough people realize that they have the agency to not give into this, but if they don’t it doesn’t affect me at all. Either way, I don’t care. The Internet has become so hostile to users that the only moral and rational choice is to not participate on platforms that have become so hostile that threatening legal action is the only way that they can protect their relevancy in facilitating social discourse.
  - kalleboo 12d ago
    Your analogy does not work since they can still show ads to logged-out users, nobody is getting anything for free. Meta even creates shadow-profiles of users without accounts to track them across the internet. It's all about getting people locked into walled gardens. I wish the EU DMA had taken a harder stance on this and required all social media to federate to some extent.