ВіталікMar 13
https://fireborn.mataroa.blog/blog/because-fuck-you-why-consumer-choice-is-being-stripped-away-and-how-the-tech-industry-profits-from-it/
“because fuck you”: why consumer choice is being stripped away and how the tech industry profits from it — fireborn

Show threadВіталік
A dependent customer who has invested enough — in time, in data, in purchased content, in ecosystem lock-in, in habits that would be painful to rebuild — is a customer who will absorb price increases, product degradation, and the removal of features they valued, because the cost of leaving has been carefully engineered to be higher than the cost of staying.
Mar 13 at 2:31pmWeb
Show threadВіталікMar 13
The thinness argument: the iPhone with the headphone jack was not appreciably thicker than the one without. The argument evaporated when Apple continued making the phones thicker again in subsequent years because users wanted larger batteries, which meant the “thinness requires removing the jack” premise was quietly abandoned.
Show threadВіталікMar 13

There is no escalation path that leads to a person who can actually change the product. There is no mechanism for holding a company accountable to fixing something they’ve been told is broken. The feedback loop is deliberately closed. Your complaint has been received. Your complaint has been processed. Your complaint has been filed. Nothing will change.

Because nobody is required to change anything. Because the indifference is structural. Because fuck you, but politely, with a ticket number.

Show threadВіталікMar 13
The content exists. The bytes are on a server somewhere. The technical infrastructure to deliver those bytes to you costs the platform money they’re already spending to serve other regions. The marginal cost of serving you is close to zero. You are willing to pay. And the answer is no.
Show threadВіталікMar 13

The defense of the status quo always leads with the most sympathetic version of the argument. Safety. Quality. User experience. It never leads with the revenue model, because the revenue model is the actual reason, and the actual reason would not survive scrutiny. So they lead with the sympathetic version and hope the scrutiny doesn’t come.

The “because fuck you” is always there, underneath. It’s just wearing a blazer and citing a whitepaper.