Comment by tivert

> I'm a little sad for anyone who didn't get to experience the Internet of the twentieth century. It was a unique point in time.

Sadly, they won't know what they were missing. It'll be the new normal

Some asshole tech apologist is probably getting ready to post that section from Plato where Socrates complains about writing any minute now.

Of course, that asshole is oblivious to the fact that most if not all of us probably just don't understand what Socrates was missing, so he's just showing his ignorance and stupidity.

> I'm ready to pay for a walled garden where the incentives are aligned towards me, instead of against me. I know that puts me in a minority, but I'm tired of the advertising 'net.

The problem is that, even if you try to do that, the incentives are probably still aligned against you, just maybe less blatantly.

Just look at how many formerly ad-free paid services are adding ads, and how hardware users literally own acts against their interests by pushing ads in their faces (e.g. smart TVs).

The guy who runs the walled garden will always be tempted to get some extra cash by adding ad revenue to your subscription feed, or cut costs by replacing human curated stuff with AI slop (maybe cleaned up a bit).