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The Internet Is Kind of a Predatory Cesspit Now (www.stephendiehl.com)
submitted 2 months ago by to c/technology@lemmy.world
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[–] 21 points 2 months ago* (1 child)

Now?

I remember using netgroups and UUCP in the early 90's to piece together files from alt.binaries.pictures.erotica

Back then there were fewer financially/data-predatory websites, mostly because we didn't have payment methods on the Internet yet (we were just getting websites as opposed to news and gopher), and it wasn't yet practical for companies to scrape your data.

So instead we were inundated with viruses. Like every few weeks, somehow, a virus would eat your frickin' files. It was more simply malicious, not even greedy. Not going to try and argue which is worse.

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  • [–] 30 points 2 months ago

    I also used gopher, usenet, uucp, archie and all that in the early '90s. And if you were just a little bit careful, catching a virus or trojan was very rare.

    Now, everything is monetized. You're under constant surveillance on a scale it was unimaginable at that time, and being careful amounts to nothing (unless you're super paranoid) because your security depends completely on how others secure your data, assuming that they're trying to secure and not sell it.

    In this respect, now it's much, much worse than it was, even if in some other ways it's somewhat better.

    Peak internet was around 2005-2010, IMHO.

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