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Here lies the internet, murdered by generative AI | Corruption everywhere, even in YouTube's kids content
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this post was submitted on 02 Mar 2024
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Yeah, the difference is it’s expanding exponentially, and will continue to do so.
The real thing that ruined the internet, though, is the walled garden approach. The monetization. They took what was wild and free, creative and equal, and turned into something…gross. Generative AI is just the next step of that. It’s the continuation of a trend. And the acceleration of it. That’s a problem, even if the scaremongering around AI may be a bit overblown.
And while that also may be the case, it also might—this time—not be unfounded. Capitalism has strengthened its stranglehold on everything. Every new leap in tech has worked us harder, increasing profits, while we increase productivity. And that increase in profits, led to richer guys, which means they’re more powerful, and their grip gets tighter. It’s not just the tech that’s happening in a vacuum. At what point is the stranglehold too tight, the demand of people to produce too great, the power and control of business too great? Why not now. Because it’s already unwieldy and inhumane. Where once there were creative artists trying to get their work out there, we now have everyone flooding those spaces with AI generated bullshit.
Again, it’s not just the new tech. It’s this tech’s ability to make things worse than they’ve already been getting, to worsen the massive imbalance between a space for people and a space for business. It’s all business. And we’re now way in the margins. This will make that worse.
I keep hearing people repeat this idea that "they" destroyed the free internet. but isn't the internet still free and wild? can't I just create a website by myself and be as creative as I want just like the olden days?
to me, the biggest shift has been in the people, who let themselves simmer in the capitalist pan frog-style as companies took over. we stopped looking at the internet as a place to roam and explore and now expect content to be spoon-fed to us like we didn't have a choice... we just turned from brave explorers into lazy customers (and products) by our own will (though whether free will even exists is a whole other conversation hehe)
another interesting aspect here is the capitalist mindset that things are not worth if they aren't productive. in the internet this translates as reach and engagement. there have been absurdly long debates here about the "success" of lemmy/fediverse based solely on quantitative metrics. there's still internet beyond big techs and content aggregators but we simply don't think of them as relevant
I think the brave explorers are still here, they're now just vastly outnumbered. The early Internet was full of those explorer types because they in particular tended to have enough interest to overcome the hurdles of getting on the Internet: namely computers being expensive and somewhat difficult to use. The early Internet was more accessible to intelligent, innovative users, and it reflected its user base. Many got online to explore and continued to explore and innovate once there.
Now millions have a user-friendly computer in their pocket, so practically anyone, even flat earthers, is capable and intelligent enough to use the Internet. Most are attracted not by exploration but by access to specific services that have been advertised to them, especially social media. The Internet continues to reflect its user base, but the user base's composition has... changed. Let's just call it changed.