Dead internet isn't a theory. The internet is literally dead. Idk how to use it anymore

[u/buttflapper444]

I've heard about the "dead internet theory" and never really thought much of it. But recently, I've noticed that the web is incredibly annoying in just about every single way imaginable. I dont wanna go on like a whole rant, so I'll just say for me, it's a few things

1. Information is really, really bad. AI summaries on Google, websites I've never even heard of coming up in search results and infested with AI slop. I found a website describing a very technical game development trick in Godot, and they were so lazy they left some of the AI boilerplate that obviously they wrote it with Chat GPT.
2. It's so difficult to find anything! I went through 4 years of college and each year we had this whole library trip and how to search for real information that is truthful, accurate.... it's so hard to find stuff now
3. I barely see what I want to see. On Facebook, it's all just a bunch of ads, recommendation on groups to follow, people sharing dumb memes. I barely see anything my friends share now. Bluesky has been the only place I can actually see things I want to see
4. AI is in everything, and can't be turned off. For example, how many times I've turned off copilot features in Windows, uninstalled Xbox, or removed optional stuff from Windows... it's like a plague
5. Ads in everything. I watched a series of Ads on YouTube, go to check the weather, ads... and go back to youtube, the page unexpectedly reloaded, more ads.
6. EVERYTHING is cloud based. I really miss when you could just download stuff to your PC. Thank goodness Discord has a PC application and isn't just out of your browser. I wish everyone had this idea. But the DRM and like, web stuff now is so crazy

The internet feels like it's basically worthless to me now

[u/PCMRBot]

Welcome to the PCMR, everyone from the frontpage! Please remember:

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4 - This end of year, we're giving away a super high end PC, with an RTX5090 and 64 gigs of RAM, to a lucky winner. Also, cases up for grabs for 2 others! Enter here: https://www.reddit.com/r/pcmasterrace/comments/1pqtd4j/giveaway_its_holiday_time_comment_in_this_thread/

We have a Daily Simple Questions Megathread for any PC-related doubts. Feel free to ask there or create new posts in our subreddit!

[u/Dokibatt]

Related: how are you supposed to shop for anything? You literally can’t trust the reviews anywhere.

Unless I find a forum or Reddit post discussing a product I have no way to figure out the quality of anything.

Edit: I was not saying there's no bots on Reddit or you should trust every post. I'm saying for a wide swathe of products Reddit and forums seem like the only place you have a chance of finding actual people discussing both the positives and negatives of a product. Please don't be the 85th person posting "Reddit is full of bots"

[u/indieaz → u/Dokibatt]

I have found it rather cathartic going into stores again and touching things before I buy them. You can go somewhere like beat buy and try headphones on to see how they feel and sound, then you don't need to rely on reviews.

Edit: I meant to type "Best Buy", but a headphone store called beat buy would be cool.

[u/VoidVer → u/indieaz]

In Japan I went to an electronics store and literally every single item had a “sample” you could handle out of box. It was great. Unfortunately I fear even if these items were disabled somehow, in the US they’d probably be stolen.

[u/Tac_Reso → u/VoidVer]

You can only do stuff like that in a really high trust society. I work retail, and anything not nailed down is gonna be stolen. We have hundrads of dollars a week stolen in mice and keyboard, and maybe multiple times that of headphones. It's gonna get to the point where everything in stores will be behind glass, and nothing will be on the shelf.

Added note: I work at Staples

[u/blazefreak → u/Tac_Reso]

the microcenter by my house keeps getting keycaps stolen from the mech keyboards on display. Even the cherry multi key tester the caps were taken.

[u/Double-LR → u/Tac_Reso]

Walmart keeps shoe laces behind glass already.

I know, because it was a total fuckin pain in those ass finding a ‘associate’ to open the damn glass. And they wouldn’t even let me feel them all to pick what I wanted, it was like hands off shopping in real life. It sucked.

[u/GoldenArchmage → u/Double-LR]

We have security tags on cheese and larger bars of chocolate in the supermarkets in England now - I wish I was joking 😔

[u/Miss_Chievous13 → u/Tac_Reso]

We have these demo pieces in Finland. The thing that gets stolen is some of the key caps from keyboards.

[u/mudslinger-ning → u/Tac_Reso]

I kinda prefer a hybrid warehouse with small display area. Some demo models out like a small retail store to explore. Items can be bolted down if they need to be. Then order at a terminal and they extract the stock from the big storage out the back. Collect at the outgoing counter.

Don't care if they just have minions or Amazon style robots fetching the gear as long as I am still given decent customer service at least. Preferably with a human manually checking the order is correct at collection.

This would also save effort trying to find what you want within the store.

[u/Baddad211 → u/mudslinger-ning]

Years ago they had that. It was called Service Merchandise.

[u/JohnnyTanker → u/Baddad211]

[u/Complete_Lurk3r_ → u/Tac_Reso]

USA is 3rd world

[u/plasma7602 → u/Complete_Lurk3r_]

A rich third world country

[u/pinkbunnay → u/VoidVer]

Or broken by shitty people/their kids. Japan would crumble if mixed with western society.

[u/Suitable-Nobody-5374 → u/indieaz]

dude tell me where beat buy is, I'd love to go

[u/zezent → u/Suitable-Nobody-5374]

Its across the street from wankmart.

[u/Suitable-Nobody-5374 → u/zezent]

Right next to the Hollar General right?

[u/snu22 → u/Suitable-Nobody-5374]

Yup right next to Five Guys

[u/Relative_Lock_7127 → u/snu22]

I heard that Five Guys are coming soon, and in your neighborhood.

[u/Chicken-Inspector → u/Relative_Lock_7127]

One at a time or simultaneously?

[u/angryray → u/Suitable-Nobody-5374]

They sell Beats Headphones, and the purple kind that go in your salad. 

[u/Dokibatt → u/indieaz]

Yeah, that’s more or less where I’m at, but it gets annoying for more niche items.

[u/FuckIPLaw → u/Dokibatt]

Like headphones, unfortunately. The traditional high end brands aren't exactly going to be at your local Best Buy, and the Chi-Fi stuff (which is much better bang for your buck) is just completely out of the question for brick and mortar. 

[u/Dokibatt → u/FuckIPLaw]

That's one I got frustrated with recently. Trying to figure out the best modern ANC headphones annoyed me into waiting for my current ones to die.

[u/itspicassobaby → u/FuckIPLaw]

Sweetwater.com is the place to go for good audio related things Headphones, speakers, instruments, etc. Been my go-to for over 10 years.

[u/IKillZombies4Cash → u/indieaz]

I went into a Macy’s today for the first time in a LONG time, LOOONG TIME.

I loved it, it’s amazing but in person…shoes, clothes, sneakers, electronics, kitchen stuff…kinda amazing actually that we can go see and touch stuff before buying it

[u/exeis-maxus → u/indieaz]

“Beat Buy: We got the Beats [by Dre]!”

[u/Rhenic → u/Dokibatt]

Even reddit posts are horrible for reviews nowadays. Either it's hidden ads, or you'll find people complaining about everything.

[u/dookarion → u/Rhenic]

or you'll find people complaining about everything.

The trick is to find the people pissing and moaning about trivial shit, you can get some decent product insight reading between their nitpicking.

[u/ClockworkJim → u/dookarion]

A friend on Facebook use this to find watches.

review will be something like this: "I use this watch for 4 weeks during saturation diving at 100 m in frigid saltwater conditions. No problem for 4 weeks but then my arc welder touched it and all of a sudden it failed for 3 hours. POS. 0 STARS" 

My friend: " I work in an office. This sounds great!" 

[u/TheScottfather → u/Dokibatt]

Even then, you'll see some product or brand and then a million accounts come out of the woodwork talking about their awesome experience. Sounds great! Then I start looking at the individual accounts, and it's clear that at least half of them are bots. Posting in places they don't usually post, regurgitating stuff that's already been said, or outright shilling for the product across numerous posts.

It's going to get worse now that they can just block their comment history.

[u/Dokibatt → u/TheScottfather]

Yeah, Reddit is going (even more) to shit too.

I literally mean a discussion of it: two people actually talking about the pluses and minuses. Because anything else is suspect for exactly the reasons you describe.

[u/StopCollaborate230 → u/Dokibatt]

Lost track of the times people try to start a discussion about a product or piece of media, and someone just copypastes an AI slop summary…frequently with the declaration of “I asked chatgpt” or “i asked AI”

We didn’t need you to tell us you’re stupid.

[u/GenTenStation → u/StopCollaborate230]

I asked AI how to respond to this and it said to insult your mother. So here it goes. Ummm… your mom is larger than average and her cooking is mediocre at best… damn I’m bad at this without AI..

All joking aside you usually can tell when it’s an AI response because it’s a weirdly long response with loads of filler. The people that use it don’t even edit out the fluff and that’s what’s the saddest part. Absolutely no thought involved.

[u/LeadSponge420 → u/TheScottfather]

The best reviews are the three star reviews. That’s a review where someone actually used it. One star reviews are useless because it’s just bitching. Five star reviews are lies. The three star review is someone who used it and took the time to think about it.

[u/Selcotset → u/TheScottfather]

Fun fact, if you click on a profile and it says they have their comments etc hidden.. You can still click to search their profile and it'll show everything.

[u/SOUINnnn → u/TheScottfather]

Yes that was very obvious to me when looking for a vpn a couple years ago. A lot of people were shilling for the most mainstream vpns.

[u/a_can_of_solo → u/TheScottfather]

Yes nothing Lego™ brick play sets fellow consumers.

[u/No-Poem-9846 → u/Dokibatt]

...it's not even just reviews. Literally just had this happen:

Ordered a new phone case + screen protector + pop socket via the Verizon app for locker pickup. They sent an email saying the pop socket wasn't available to pickup. Charged twice for the items available, then again (with a separate order #) for all 3 items again.

Went to store, got the 2 items from the "first" order from the locker and went inside to let them know they created a duplicate order and charged us twice. 

The rep found the second order on her tablet and said it was also ready for pickup and asked her manager how to cancel. My app said the order was being prepared for pickup. They checked the locker that THEIR end said all 3 items were in and it was empty. They couldn't cancel the order and said now the 3 items needed to be returned. There were no 3 items to get, so nothing to return. She checked with her manager who said now the order needed to be cancelled via phone.

Not even exaggerating, the in-store rep said, "AI is causing issues again" to her manager, lol.

Called the provided number, and after going through their AI menu and waiting while listening to ~30 minutes of hold music later, a man I assume was in India (based on his accent) picked up, had audio issues (couldn't hear me) and hung up, but said he'd call back, which he did. I hated that because it literally makes me less confident it's an actual rep but whatever, I didn't have to give him any sensitive info. I told him what happened, provided both order numbers, which he could see on his end and verified we were charged twice (about 90 and 120 dollars).

After him looking into it for another 20 mins he said he couldn't cancel it, but since "an order was placed but won't be picked up because there's nothing to pick up it should be automatically cancelled and refunded in 3-5 days."

So I'll be watching my account like a hawk until it's actually rectified but JFC what the actual fuck is going on??

[u/odintheall → u/No-Poem-9846]

Oh fuck that id be attempting a charge back on that shit

[u/J0hn-Stuart-Mill → u/No-Poem-9846]

via the Verizon app

Haha, yep, there's your problem. Verizon is absolutely incompetent.

[u/RunFlatts → u/No-Poem-9846]

I feel your pain. Didnt want to pay the new higher gamepass fee, set to not autopay, used points for final month. Start of month charged on my credit card anyway. Got online help asking for a refund. Bot kept linking me to same refund page for games not gamepass. Fourth time of trying to reword I said "You failed. I will charge back with my bank." All of a sudden it understands me asking me not to do a charge back.....bro...

[u/bollincrown → u/Dokibatt]

It’s going to come full circle. The internet will be so full of cheap crap with 5 star reviews that people will want to hold the product in their hands before buying

[u/TheLordOfTheTism → u/bollincrown]

Good. Time to go back. I've been enjoying going to thrift stores and buying vhs dvd and books again. To be fair I have a crt so the visual quality isn't being murdered by modern panel tech. But the point is more so tangible in person shopping is always better than online, and so is physically owning your media. Bring back malls that are more than just clothes stores, put physical media back in best buy. I surely didn't ask for things to be the way they are now and I can't be alone.

[u/Arbsbuhpuh → u/Dokibatt]

For electronic stuff I usually use rtings.com, they use affiliate links but also test everything and explain their methodology.

For cars I use carcomplaints.com (don't use it very often but it's really useful for helping friends pick cars)

I really like ProjectFarm on YouTube, he's one of the few people I trust, though there often aren't long-term reviews.

Tirerack for tires.

I'd also love to hear other reputable sources for reviews!

[u/PaintItPurple → u/Arbsbuhpuh]

rtings looks and sounds like a spam site, but it's actually one of the few sites I trust.

[u/tuura032 → u/PaintItPurple]

Rtings and project farm are so dope! Glad we have people like them. 

Edit: how could I forget hardware unboxed! 

[u/HeronFew990 → u/Dokibatt]

Yeah I’ve started using Reddit for reviews as well. Product reviews are now like IMDb reviews. Whenever I see a movie I’ve never heard of with 10,000 reviews, has a 7 plus rating, and lots of people giving it 10s saying it’s one of the greatest movies they’ve ever seen I know all those were paid for.

I also love hyperbole in writing. “The greatest ever” “I’ve been waiting my whole life for this” “It changed my life” etc. I know there’s some bullshit going on.

[u/Ossius → u/HeronFew990]

Reddit is becoming unreliable too, there be bots swarming here, Reddit has not made a major effort to curb artificial activity online, in fact recently they made it so accounts can hide their history, which helps bots stay undetected.

X and Facebook are rampant with fake accounts too. Its well documented at this point.

[u/Dokibatt → u/HeronFew990]

> “The greatest ever” “I’ve been waiting my whole life for this” “It changed my life”

The product? Place mats.

[u/HeronFew990 → u/Dokibatt]

lol. Those must be some damn good place mats. They don’t happen to have three wolves and one moon on them do they?

[u/Dokibatt → u/HeronFew990]

Anime girls

[u/Shwinky → u/Dokibatt]

Okay those reviews might actually be real

[u/MacintoshEddie → u/Dokibatt]

For a while one of the fake review services was trying to be more authentic by specifically mentioning how they used it, not just that it's great, except they didn't give a shit and didn't match them to the product. So it would be stuff like floor mats but the review says they saved hundreds of dollars by installing themselves. Or they invited friends over and had a pizza party while setting up their sandals.

[u/Inexorably_lost → u/HeronFew990]

Yeah, it's a shit show. The sad truth is happy customers are usually quiet. They got what they wanted and have moved on to other things.

Thankfully the unhappy ones are loud as fuck so going off of negative reviews can be worthwhile. 

[u/ClockworkJim → u/HeronFew990]

The same thing happens on Goodreads. 

Latest 6th in a series  boilerplate trope filled nominally YA but actually written for adults genre nonsense from an author with an unhealthy and frankly dangerous parasocial relationship:

10k+ raitings at the highest maximum with hundreds of fawning reviews, hundreds of words long and people insisting it's changed their lives. 

Recently released literary hard sci-fi novel on a small independent press by an author with barely any social media presence. In 30 years the book will considered one of the high points of the genre that changed everything that came after:

100 raitings. 2.5 stars. 10 reviews. Three of which are zero star ratings Because the author fudged the science a little bit.

[u/OZ-00MS_Goose → u/Dokibatt]

Costco first, then look anywhere else. Costco generally only stocks stuff of half decent quality at a minimum

[u/Dokibatt → u/OZ-00MS_Goose]

And their return policy is great. But the selection is narrow. Always my first check though.

[u/DevilsPajamas → u/Dokibatt]

Even reddit posts and comments are decently likely to be AI generated.

[u/thesituation531 → u/DevilsPajamas]

Doesn't even have to be AI.

Just bots. There have been bot profiles for a long time now.

[u/Crazycukumbers → u/Dokibatt]

They used to have a plugin called Fakespot that could help, but they got rid of it

[u/lonewombat → u/Dokibatt]

Every single product has like 5k 5 star reviews... and its all just garbage.

[u/inwector → u/Dokibatt]

Us Turks have found a solution to this problem. We have a reddit like platform, but enterance to said platform is way tougher and rules are much more defined, and there are no subreddits, there are topics. It's called ekşisözlük (sour dictionary) and when you apply for a membership, you are meant to leave comments for at least 10 topics and based on those topics, your membership gets into the queue to become a member. It takes years, and when you become a member, there are rules to follow, you can't just blurt out the first thought you have, there are rules.

In there, the information is much more valuable and strict, because spreading misinformation knowingly with proof will get you temporarily banned, and your comments removed.

It's a great system, I have written there on many occasions, usually about relationships and sex, to guide people and help them understand or get educated.

[u/DaBoogiemanSJ → u/Dokibatt]

Reddit posts have even been astroturfed for reviews… so be leery even searching here

[u/Necessary-Contest-24 → u/Dokibatt]

Hardware unboxed or I see the product in store or I don't care because it's cheap, or it has a good return policy or I don't buy it.

[u/Easy_Alternative_907 → u/Dokibatt]

Ya, I've made the decision to go back to stores. The only time I purchase anything online now is if I can't find it at a store, or if I'm in a position where I need something asap and don't have the time to drive around looking for it. I've also found that a lot of name brand stuff I used to get cheaper online is now cheaper in-store.

[u/chambee → u/Dokibatt]

The whole gives us 5 star review and we’ll give you 20$ gift card thing is rampant and Amazon does nothing about it.

[u/Complete_Lurk3r_ → u/Dokibatt]

also, Amazon is so dumb when I search for an EXACT product name, it doesn't come until like the 5th page (if ever) I have to Google the fucker

[u/EmperorThor]

Correct, we passed the threshold in the last year or 2 and now it’s not coming back.

I use a lot of adblockers and stay picky with the sites I use and content I consume but nothing will bring back the human first experiences we have had for decades.

[u/BurroughOwl → u/EmperorThor]

I've been using ad blockers since... well, since they came out. Every now and then I have to use someone else's computer and I can not believe the bullshit they have to look at all day. It's crazy. Without ad blockers I probably wouldn't spend any time on the web.

[u/Iargueuntilyouquit → u/BurroughOwl]

Youtube is entirely useless without adblockers or paying hundreds of dollars every year. Which I'm just not doing. These fucking streaming services continue to make the base level package shittier, and shittier, more expensive and more expensive until you just HAVE to buy the ad-free level package. But wait, that too is also being enshittified until you have to upgrade to the pro++ package if you want the ACTUAL ad-free experience which will cost you $1200/year. Suck. My. Fucking. Butthole.

What I can't wrap my head around is that it's literally every vertical which is doing this. This model is infecting every fucking market and they only way that's possible is if the market was welcoming it. How?! Who are you fucking degenerate sickos not rejecting this proposition outright? Who the fuck are you?! I do not get it.

[u/YouOwMe50Grand → u/Iargueuntilyouquit]

I can't even use YouTube anymore because of the ads. I feel like ads aren't even trying to sell stuff anymore it seems like ads are designed to be the most annoying thing imaginable to force us to pay for ad free. And I refuse to pay for it. I just won't use it.

They might as well just have the ad break just consist of an ear piercing sound for 30 seconds.

[u/EvilGeesus → u/Iargueuntilyouquit]

Think of the dumbest person you know.....
Now realise 50% of the entire global population is as dumb, or dumber than that person.
That's why any of the bullshit going on on this planet is able to continue going on.

[u/TrekRider911 → u/BurroughOwl]

I block ads with Pihole, my router blocks ads, and I have a browser extension that helps. Ads still get through sometimes.

[u/hobbobnobgoblin → u/BurroughOwl]

I might start paying for mine. Every update they open a new web browser and us like we blocked 181k ads. Could we get 11 dollers. More tempting every day.

[u/EmperorThor → u/hobbobnobgoblin]

yeah i throw them a 1 time donation every now and then. maybe like $40 a year and its stopping countless thousands of ads on every single platform, its worth it.

[u/ColdSpringHarbor → u/EmperorThor]

My adblock has blocked 10.26m ads over the 4 years of installation. My old PC I had adblock for 9 years--the number is probably at least double on there.

[u/Zooshooter → u/BurroughOwl]

I haven't watched live/broadcast tv in about 2 decades. Whenever I go to some sort of shop or business that has a lobby tv on it just blows me away how awful tv has become. It's no wonder the average American thinks the way they do with this firehose of hot rancid garbage being blasted at them nonstop.

[u/co1dBrew → u/EmperorThor]

Someone should come up with a "bot blocker" that hides known bots / users' comments and posts that show obvious bot behaviour

[u/EmperorThor → u/co1dBrew]

fingers crossed it would also block your silly old auntie who forwards/shares those bullshit posts she thinks are real but are in fact ponzy schemes and AI cats mowing the lawn.

[u/seanred360]

I got bad news for you, Discord is made with Electron which is just a customized web browser. So nowhere is safe.

[u/majendie → u/seanred360]

This is one of my biggest gripes with the Enshittificaton - everything is just a fucking webpage. Spotify, Discord, etc etc. They're not apps they're a wrapper around a website pretending to be an app.

"Download our app!" "Oh cool so I have easy offline access to things?" "Well, no, it's just our regular website... But we can use it to access all sorts of stuff on your phone!"

[u/Vibe_PV → u/majendie]

Even Whatsapp killed their native desktop app (which, to be fair, was completely ass) for an Electron alternative... That traded old bugs for new bugs and is quite heavier

[u/Madd_Mugsy → u/Vibe_PV]

IIRC it idles at around 3GB of RAM usage

[u/bolmer → u/Madd_Mugsy]

They didn't even try to make a decent shut

[u/raagul2244 → u/majendie]

I have the opposite problem on phone why is everything an app? why can't the reddit website work alright in mobile browser???

[u/Piranata → u/raagul2244]

Rip i.reddit.com, you are missed.

[u/narrill → u/majendie]

"Download our app!" "Oh cool so I have easy offline access to things?" "Well, no, it's just our regular website... But we can use it to access all sorts of stuff on your phone!"

I was sort of with you for the first half of your comment, but this doesn't really make sense. Electron doesn't preclude the app from working offline, and webpages typically have less access to your device than a native app.

The real problem with Electron is that it's heavy as shit.

[u/Nailhimself → u/majendie]

And also a lot of applications in Windows are now based on edge. Don't know if you can even uninstall that thing without breaking half of the windows features.

[u/TurboBerries → u/majendie]

You have a fundamental misunderstanding of websites and apps. They’re both just interfaces to interact with something stored locally or on a server somewhere else.

Offline access is determined by how a company wants to control the data. Whether it comes to piracy, privacy, and security.

[u/SheriffBartholomew → u/seanred360]

Discord is a mess. Idk how it ever became so popular.

[u/throwaway60221407e23 → u/SheriffBartholomew]

When it first came out it was great and the alternatives were not. Skype was bloated and finicky and Ventrilo and TeamSpeak costed money if you wanted a proper server. Discord was free, lean, performed well, and did exactly what you needed it to do with nothing extra. Now Discord is locking features behind Nitro which costs money, has become super bloated with features no one asked for, and it's performance impact is absurd for a VoIP program. I'm itching for the day that someone releases a Discord-killer.

[u/descendingangel87 → u/throwaway60221407e23]

The problem with Discord is the same problem youtube has. It’s a money pit due to the resources required for it and nobody is going to make a free alternative because nobody can afford to make an alternative at the scale needed to compete.

[u/ajorn → u/throwaway60221407e23]

So tell me, what is it you actually want? An app completely separated from any type of browser based architecture ran by a company who delivers it for free, continues to improve it, but not in a way that makes it more taxing on your system, all while completely avoiding monetizing the use of their service in any way?

[u/YouDoNotKnowMeSir]

There is a reason that physical media is making a come back. Books, cds/vinyl, etc.

[u/cliqclaqstepback → u/YouDoNotKnowMeSir]

The last several years I’ve been buying physical movies, music cds, books. If I could buy physical PC games anymore, I would. As much as I like Steam, it’s still just a license to play the game I “own”.

[u/Ltroky → u/cliqclaqstepback]

GOG is your answer for some games.

[u/16yearswasted → u/cliqclaqstepback]

Good Old Games is your answer. They don't sell a license, you are buying the game and they even bundle it in such a way that you can download and install it whenever, wherever you want. Prices during sales tend to be pretty great, too.

[u/vladart4 → u/16yearswasted]

>They don't sell a license
What? Of course they are selling you a license.

[u/PunyParker826 → u/vladart4]

It’s definitely still a license, but it seems to be the best case scenario of one. The games don’t have DRM as a rule, you (usually) have the ability to download the offline installer, and with their GOG Preservation titles in particular, they’ve committed to keep games compatible and running for the foreseeable future.

[u/purritolover69 → u/vladart4]

Not really, they’re selling you the game files with no DRM. A license can be revoked, ownership cannot be

[u/TheObstruction → u/purritolover69]

No, it's literally always been a license. Even the old NES cartridges were considered licensed. The difference is that while it was technically a license, they had no practical way to revoke it. GOG is the same. Sure, you're paying for a license, but you can download the game without drm, and they can't exactly revoke your private copy.

[u/mordread666 → u/cliqclaqstepback]

My friend and I have been gamers since the 90s. We've been collecting physical games for years now. It's a hobby for us. We usually thrift for them or find deals online and elsewhere. And some remain from buying games in our teens.

Physical games are such aesthetic relics. And many of them still work well. I've managed to find childhood favourites. It's a blast collecting them and retrying old classics.

[u/Firm-Relationship221 → u/YouDoNotKnowMeSir]

At this point, it feels like books can no longer be trusted. Every day, countless low-quality AI-generated titles are being produced, and I think we may soon reach a kind of “dead book” era as a result. I recently bought a book related to my hobby, and the quality was so poor that I still can't believe a publisher agreed to print it. It appeared to be nothing more than blog posts copied from the internet, run through Google Translate, and published as a book. The number of errors and incorrect word choices made it nearly unreadable. We really can't be sure of the quality of a book until we buy it and start reading it, and that's really frustrating to me.

[u/HeronFew990 → u/Firm-Relationship221]

Yeah back in the day publishing houses were generally the gatekeepers for preventing crap from filling up shelf space at book stores. They weren’t perfect but they worked. Now between terrible writers and AI anyone can lay a turd upon us.

[u/westisbestmicah → u/Firm-Relationship221]

Old ones can! Just finished our family tradition of reading “A Christmas Carol” together and boy does it still hold up

[u/DavidLynchsCoffeeBea → u/westisbestmicah]

Most of the old ones are remembered for a reason, same as with music and other artforms. Because they're good. There are so so many classics in all kinds of different genres out there, and while I don't like having fewer and fewer major players left as publishers, Penguin and Macmillan and the others are still doing plenty of good work keeping the classics alive with new releases, both digitally and in physical print.

Project Gutenberg is a godsend as well.

[u/dixiewolf_ → u/Firm-Relationship221]

I was given a book on ragdoll cats that on its surface looks like a short informational text. The content of that book was absolutely completely slop. It told me to get chickens for the cat fleas, and snakes for the chickens. It told me to shake the cat by its tail and if its upset, swing it around by the tail. It also told me that all female cats are lazy and all male cats are proud. The book was published the day it was likely bought, about 4 days before i got it. I still have it because its a hysterical read.

[u/snoogins355 → u/YouDoNotKnowMeSir]

Library for DVDs. It's like my old school neighborhood video store before it got blockbustered

[u/TheRealTreezus → u/YouDoNotKnowMeSir]

Yup been on a kick of just hoarding my own music/shows/movies. Soon enough I'll be able to get entirely off subpar streaming services and just have my own hosted content.

[u/BenjiLixx]

I thought the main point of Dead Internet Theory is that there are far more bots than people. It's certainly true for Twitter, Instagram and Reddit.

[u/terrorjshark → u/BenjiLixx]

yeah op is confusing "Dead Internet Theory" which is a bot problem, with the, "internet is dead" in a, it isn't good/fun/useful anymore sort of way.

[u/Nathanos → u/terrorjshark]

Yep I think enshittification is more what OP was trying to say than Dead Internet theory.

[u/BirdieOfPray]

Discord is horrible because it gates information from Google searches

[u/Yuscha → u/BirdieOfPray]

I really hate how discord replaced forums for nearly everything

[u/rui-tan → u/Yuscha]

For real. No I don’t want to join your weird personal powertrip Discord just to get the two sentences information or single file I need. It feels so egoistical how everyone needs to have their own Discord kingdom where they gate everything to.

[u/Sasselhoff → u/Yuscha]

It has been a huge loss for anyone who does DIY or has even remotely niche hobbies.

[u/RxZ81 → u/[deleted]]

I was pleasantly surprised to find out a few years ago that I could download uBlock and Adblock extensions onto my work PC. I look at my colleagues screens and shake my head.

[u/CapElectrical7162 → u/[deleted]]

What kind of content blockers do you use? And what browser?

[u/Br0k3Gamer → u/CapElectrical7162]

On pc Brave browser is the most convenient (although not the best, objectively) because it has the chrome compatibility with ad blocking and some data protection baked in. 

On Apple devices I still use safari + AdGuard (green shield with a white checkmark)

My phone also has a dns-based ad filtering app which removes most mobile ads

[u/foo-bar-nlogn-100 → u/[deleted]]

Start downloading backup from Anna's archive. Internet will be AI slop in 1 year.

I am a bot.

[u/m00nf1r3 → u/[deleted]]

People hate when I try to say that reddit isn't social media lol. I mean it technically is, it's media that's social, but the complete anonymity removes it from the 'social media' category in my head. Same as any online forum really. I think Facebook and that are now considered social networking, a subcategory of social media

[u/Lonecoon]

1. Change your browser to Firefox or Waterfox
2. Load up the extensions Ublock origins, Ghostery, Privacy badger, and ScriptBlock.
3. Don't accept cookies for anywhere unless you're buying something.
4. Download the optional AI blocker for Ublock Origins.

Every time i use another person's computer, I can't believe how the internet looks. Sure it breaks some sites, but I deal with those on a case by case basis rather than surf the internet without every protections I can turn on.

[u/Jita_Local → u/Lonecoon]

I’d also recommend sponsorblock which automatically skips sponsored ad reads in podcasts and stuff, and allows you to jump to the highlights of clickbait-y videos. 

[u/Zooshooter → u/Jita_Local]

Keep in mind, those skipped sections are defined by other users of the extension, so you may periodically run across very new youtube videos that haven't been marked out yet.

[u/heliamphore → u/Lonecoon]

The same way, I was complaining about my reddit experience until I really started filtering things. No more Trump bullshit, no more shitty ragebait and garbage meme videos.

[u/StupidSexyEuphoberia → u/heliamphore]

How do you block things on Reddit?

[u/AltByFire → u/Lonecoon]

I use uBlock Origin but I haven't heard of an AI blocker for it, where could I find that?

[u/Yaggamy → u/AltByFire]

https://github.com/laylavish/uBlockOrigin-HUGE-AI-Blocklist

[u/kadfr → u/Lonecoon]

Firefox is shifting towards becoming a memory hungry 'AI browser'. If you want to get rid of the AI bloat then you have to change a number of config settings. 

[u/StableLamp → u/Lonecoon]

Not sure about the others but I remember there being some controversy about Ghostery. Something about it not being trustworthy anymore.

Honestly Unlock Origin may be the only one you really need.

[u/pepapi → u/Lonecoon]

I want to add that OP can use YouTube Revanced to have an ad-free experience with ton of options you don't get on normal YouTube.

[u/BattleGrown → u/Lonecoon]

I just discovered the duck duck go browser and it is amazing. No cookie popups, no ads, and it creates a local vpn (i don't know how it works) that blocks ALL tracking attempts from your phone. Last month it blocked 10k+ tracking attempts for me. Fuck google, facebook, and all other surveillance companies.

[u/Ironclad_Cat_1773 → u/Lonecoon]

Not Firefox, they have announced they are going all AI

[u/tarosago23]

Thank goodness Discord has a PC application and isn't just out of your browser

nope, it's electron i.e. web app + chrome in a box

also Discord's memory leak is so bad they added an auto-restart to "fix" it

[u/Aphexes → u/tarosago23]

OP doesn't know that Discord is essentially just a web browser to the Discord website that stores all the functionality.

[u/fritofrito77]

I'm using the internet as I did in 2005. I don't have social media (except reddit). I use Linux on my PC and LineageOS on my phone. I also bought a custom router to block ads and tracking with AdGuard so anything in my WiFi is ad-free. I r/degoogle and self-host my own media and services (except email, which is Proton). All this took money and a lot of time, but now the internet feels like a tool again.

Not everyone has the knowledge and time to do this, so something easy and useful is using the Adnauseam extension. It blocks ads and generates fake engagement. Avoiding ads is not enough, we have to poison their mechanisms.

The best way to fight this dumpster fire is denying them what makes them money. That is, our data.

[u/SageOfStupidity → u/fritofrito77]

Your router blocks ads directly? What are you using, and how does it work?

[u/akitash1ba → u/SageOfStupidity]

pihole

[u/cabblingthings → u/akitash1ba]

pihole does block some stuff. these days the most intrusive ads are usually served directly from the CDN of the resource you're visiting. so DNS based blocking (eg pihole) won't work

it won't block YouTube ads, ads on Google, ads on your streaming device's home screen, etc. I set it up a while ago but when I moved routers, I didn't even bother setting it up again. not worth it imo

[u/fritofrito77 → u/SageOfStupidity]

Not pihole as others said but it's a good option too. I'm using OPNSense with the AdGuard Home plugin. AdGuard acts as a DNS server for all my devices. It intercepts all DNS requests and checks them against its ad and malware blacklists. If they match then the requests are blocked and the content is not even loaded.

[u/Jeth84 → u/fritofrito77]

I've done similar, takes a lot of curation but it's definitely worth the time. I'll note that certain routers you can install adguard right on, and if you have any old devices lying around you could run pihole on them to block ads on your network.

Grateful I built a server before all the PC part prices started getting jacked up

[u/BingpotStudio → u/Jeth84]

I had planned a server this year with 256gb. RIP me.

[u/Justsomedudeonthenet]

Welcome to the future.

Turns out the Amish might have been on to something.

[u/Hexamancer → u/Justsomedudeonthenet]

Not really, they're against the technology, the tech is fine, the Internet was great when it was being run by enthusiasts and nerds. 

The problem is capitalism, it was marketing teams and executive boards that ruined the Internet.

[u/NightOfTheLivingHam → u/Hexamancer]

I always maintained in the 2000s, that we should be glad that politicians had zero grasp of the internet and most CEOs had no idea how it worked, only the engineers and techs did.

Then we got the CEO of AT&T who pushed for creating a tiered internet in 2005

then politicians got wise to using the internet and suddenly propaganda started getting heavily pushed by 2008 on early social media. But didnt really hit hard until around 2012.

Some social experimentation shit started around 2013/2014, and it's been downhill since.

[u/DerangedGinger → u/NightOfTheLivingHam]

I miss old internet. Only the people with the technical skills to get on could get on. Once we removed the barriers to entry to where a toddler can access the internet while chewing on an ipad things changed. I went on the internet to avoid the average person in my youth, to be with other geeks and geek out.

The internet used to be awesome and fun. Now it just gives people anxiety. Children doom scroll. I want to go back.

[u/Panic_Azimuth → u/DerangedGinger]

When the WWW started becoming available to average people in the late 90's, us BBS folks felt the same way. Yes, it was bigger and there were more people, but part of what we liked about BBSing was the tiny communities of local nerds.

That's largely what I'm on Reddit for. It's about the closest thing that still exists.

[u/Kiwi_CunderThunt → u/Panic_Azimuth]

Absolutely, back when the internet required technical skills, trouble shooting required critical thinking and common sense prevailed.

AI has its use but it's abused by a lot of mindless people who demand half assed answers on the fly rather than doing actual research.

Companies have capitalized on the slop they can feed you (AI, Social Media, Ad serving, FOMO products endorsed by influencer culture etc).

[u/Threweh2 → u/Hexamancer]

They use cellphones the problem is they recognize the inherited isolation that is caused by technology. So they try to balance that by limiting their usage.

[u/NightOfTheLivingHam → u/Threweh2]

They know their neighbors, I imagine most people who are wired into the internet today don't even know their neighbor's names but they know what Kim Kardashian's asshole looks like.

[u/CuttlefishDiver → u/NightOfTheLivingHam]

I never understood the Americans fascination with Kim, she looks (relatively) mid to me.

[u/TheObstruction → u/CuttlefishDiver]

Most Americans aren't fascinated with her, we find her morally repulsive. But there's a loud cult of celebrity worship in this country, and there's nothing more peak-celebrity than being famous for nothing more than being famous.

[u/DinosaurAlert → u/Hexamancer]

>The problem is capitalism, it was marketing teams and executive boards that ruined the Internet.

Close...but the real problem is corporatism.

The early internet wasn’t anti-money. The people who built it absolutely wanted to make a living. They just didn’t want to make all the money. If you wanted to build a website, you built a good one. If it was useful or interesting, people showed up, and money followed. If you wanted to make a video game, you made a game....and if it was good, it sold. If it was bad it didn't. That’s healthy capitalism: create value, get rewarded.

Corporatism is different. Corporatism is when everything gets bought up, consolidated, and optimized into sameness. “Synergies” get inserted. Risk gets sanded down. Content has to be safe, reusable, and inoffensive to every possible demographic: from retirees in Omaha to trend-chasing twenty-somethings in San Francisco, because offending anyone might upset advertisers or shareholders.

To make that scale work, you hire as few people as possible and squeeze maximum output from each one. Originality becomes expensive. Personality becomes dangerous. Everything has to fit into a template, be endlessly reusable, and pass through layers of legal and brand review. The result isn’t better, it is just blander shit.

That’s why the internet sucks now. Not because people stopped caring, and not because capitalism failed, but because corporatism replaced creation with optimization. Success used to be the REWARD for making something people wanted: a product earned users, revenue, and sometimes a great exit. Today, massive profit is the START. No real competition exists, the machine guarantees X% profit, and they just just need to squeeze it until it is awful and dry. The product isn't a product, the product is a vehicle to extract more profit.

[u/Zeppy_18 → u/DinosaurAlert]

Dude, corporatism is an actual ideology, completely different from what you are saying. This is just monopolies and oligopolies stiffling innovation and worsening it all.

[u/memeticmagician → u/Hexamancer]

The problem isn't capitalism, it's unregulated capitalism. Unless you can demonstrate the case that a centralized economy where the state owns the means of production would yield better tech and middle class to use it, or that monarchic fiefdoms are successful...

[u/thejesterofdarkness → u/Justsomedudeonthenet]

Livin in an Amish Paradise?

[u/lkl34]

You can toss in

-Stuff you seen pre 2020 that has been removed even youtube vids

-Current govt blocking access to sites and or making them selves look good with filtered content

-Countries putting in new laws which again censoring stuff deleting other stuff( child safety law bs)

38% of webpages that existed in 2013 are no longer accessible a decade later

https://www.pewresearch.org/data-labs/2024/05/17/when-online-content-disappears/

27.6% of the Top 10 Million Sites are Dead

https://tonywang.io/blog/top-10-million-sites-27-percent-dead

The last thing to toss is the death of forums which held alot of information and image sharing sites that killed off even more information. Every time i turn around i am told go to discord well sorry but i think discord is shit and trying to find/do anything on there is a pain in the ass.

Great point OP we are racing there to fast i too have way to many issues with the WWW today.

[u/CumminsGroupie69 → u/lkl34]

The fact that things are being hidden or completely removed from the Internet should show people just how much of a joke our reality is nowadays.

[u/ThisIsMyCouchAccount → u/lkl34]

I don't think those numbers are outlandish. Sites/companies come and go. Hosting costs money. Making critical updates to whatever is driving them costs time. I work in web development and the vast majority of everything I've ever worked on in the last 20 years no longer exists.

Forums are okay in concept but finding them was difficult. A lot needed accounts. They might have new user rules. There were downsides. Discord isn't great but I did have a good experience the one time I needed to go that way. Great for active issues but terrible at archival information.

[u/ksx4system]

Of course the enshittification process has happened to the Internet too. I'm going to add my insights and possibly replies to your post in similar format that you've used:

1. The quality of Google results has deteriorated dramatically in last few years. Fortunately there are other search engines available and some of them have absolutely nothing to do with big tech - a good example of some lesser known ones would be Dogpile, Gigablast, Kagi (this one is a paid product) and finally my favourite Qwant.
2. Stop or limit using Google and/or Bing search engines, there are alternatives. You will get pre-2020 search experience at least temporarily (which could mean: for multiple years to come).
3. Since this subreddit rules don't encourage discussing politics I'm going to provide a very laconic reply - stay off social media products maintained by big tech companies. There's wide variety of alternatives for everyone, some of them are completely decentralized and/or powered by FOSS software.
4. Have you considered switching to a FOSS operating system and non-commercial software (which can but not always does mean FOSS)? There's literally zero built-in AI capabilities in *BSD family of OSes and most of GNU/Linux distributions - the same goes for most of open source software that isn't specifically built for running AI models locally on your own hardware (eg. fully offline, without sharing any data to third parties). If you're not ready to do that - you could dual boot your computer and/or replace some of your software with open source equivalents.
5. There's an ad blocking solution for almost every browser available, for Firefox I recommend uBlock Origin. Of course YMMV but for me it's doing very good job blocking ads on YouTube or any other page on the World Wide Web. Changing some of your habits might help too - not all websites providing services like weather are emitting ads. Maybe your local weather institute and/or university runs one?
6. No, not everything - just mainstream products. Build your own NAS to replace cloud storage (there's a wide variety of ready made FOSS software products that can do that like XigmaNAS or OpenMediaVault and there are commercial products with commercial grade support like Unraid). Run your own mail server or pay for commercial hosting to run your own e-mail service (this is cheaper than you probably expect it to be). Maybe consider testing an alternative OS like LineageOS on your old phone? It's completely ungoogled out of the box.

I hope I helped at least a little.

P.S. obviously AI was *not* involved in writing this post :)

[u/Doc_Croc_26 → u/ksx4system]

Damn, I didn't know DogPile was still a thing lol

[u/IGotRangod → u/Doc_Croc_26]

Maybe you should have asked jeeves

[u/ImStillExcited → u/Doc_Croc_26]

I used to use that, in 1998 (just to make people gasp).

Current me is now gasping.

…..well played dogpile.com….

[u/Inspector330]

Internet is controlled info now. I think that's obvious if you grew up with it in the 90s.

[u/ScuddsMcDudds]

Why does everything need a damn HD video ad?? I have a very simple macro tracking app. Basically a fancy calculator. It should only need a few kb of data to pull nutrition facts from a database. But every time I open it first needs to load these damn banners that are playing a video ad. If my wifi signal is weak the whole app can cease to function. I’m fine with ads but shouldn’t they be on a lower priority than the actual functionality of the app??

Edit: to all of the people missing the point… I’m fine with ads. Regular banner ads that take up next to no bandwidth. My issue is with forcing HD video ads, specifically

[u/Common-Trifle4933 → u/ScuddsMcDudds]

From the publisher’s point of view the app’s purpose is to serve ads, and any macro tracking functionality only exists to lure you in for those ads. There’s no point in letting people use the app if they’re not going to watch ads while doing it.

[u/jadenthesatanist]

The newest AI thing I’ve noticed that’s pissed me off is now if I’m googling for something to find opinions on Reddit for a purchase or something (so the google search terms would be “____ reddit” right), as of just the last week or two there’s now a bullshit AI summary under like half of the results instead of a preview of the comments that include my search terms like it used to be.

Completely useless when I now have to click into every single thread and dig to try to find whatever comment was relevant to my search terms instead of being able to gauge the context from the google search, and of course there’s no way to disable the shitty summary

[u/MoneyLow4467]

Yeah, gotta be honest i 100% believe the birth of the internet was the beginning of man's end. We won't think if we don't have to. Keep making things more fool-proof and the fools will become greater fools.

[u/snoogins355 → u/MoneyLow4467]

Feels like the start of Wall-E.

[u/cyberdude419]

It’s the product of capitalism and enshitification

[u/jacowab]

It was never a theory, it was always a question of what percentage.

[u/foursaken]

Google. Facebook. Microsoft. Youtube.

See the problem?

[u/Crazycukumbers]

Corporate entities have hijacked the Internet and turned it into their greatest tool for advertising and control. It's no longer for people first, it's used to harvest data on them.

[u/Foreign_Emphasis_470 → u/Crazycukumbers]

Exactly that.

[u/ArguesWithZombies]

The Internet was cool when the only people using it were people brought up on tech and understood it and understood the internet's value.

Then one day we got better tech like smartphones and idiots who know nothing flooded the net. Social media made it so people would just dump tons of bullshit vapid useless content onto the net and now it's full of bots trying to monetize everything.

Now all the cool people are using the Internet less and less. The normies are still about dumping pointless shit everywhere. Companies and corporations are all over it trying to make money anywhere. And there more bots than ever.

Yeah we had ads back in the day. But when I needed help with something I could find stuff usually. Or find a forum with other people interested in the same hobby or topic. Now it's AI generated falsehoods on search engines followed by 5 results that are either ads or paywalled.

If I couldn't find something before I could add reddit to the end of a search and 99% of the time I'd find someone with the same problem as me and someone else who's given them a perfect solution.

Now reddits flooded with normies and specialist subs are flooded with more crap.

The Internet is in decline and been for a while. It will continue I suspect and the dead Internet theory is no longer a theory nor has it been for some time.

[u/TRIPMINE_Guy]

Yeah I'm honestly probably gonna move to steam os if Microsoft bakes ai into the os. There's a couple of other features steam os is doing specifically for gamers that Microsoft isn't as well drawing me to it besides that. Wonder if I can get an ai to scan websites for ai generation before even showing it in search results. That'd be a hilarious use of ai to filter out the ai. 

[u/ABotelho23 → u/TRIPMINE_Guy]

Yeah I'm honestly probably gonna move to steam os if Microsoft bakes ai into the os.

Just do it now dude. It's inevitable. Start getting used to it now. The more people continue to use Microsoft products, the faster this heads into enshitification.

[u/hutre]

Nothing of what you described is about the dead internet theory...

Dead internet theory is about how most of the internet users are bots now, and how real people is shoving AI into their workflow/daily routine is nothing to do with bots running the internet.

[u/Neat_Chart_5255]

Shout out to Linux for giving users control of their OS and not bombarding them with ads. Moving away from windows was a big help. I would just avoid all social media it's a race to the bottom. Bluesky is pretty solid but you never know when that could change.

[u/00raiser01 → u/Neat_Chart_5255]

Got any idea on how to get back something like the old google/forums websites for information. Google search is literally shit now.

I managed to get by because of all the old sites and tracks I picked up the pass decade to filter and find information currently.

[u/viviolay → u/00raiser01]

Kagi feels like old google to me. i even stumble upon random blogs again. yes, i pay for my search engine.

i still use google or even bing when shopping though. which since they're in the business of trying to sell me stuff - seems like what its best for anyway.

[u/vaikunth1991]

Use alternative search engines and Have you heard of a thing called ad block

[u/No-Setting5273]

Pihole raspberry pi, portmaster, extension adblocks, tampermonkey, etc there are definitely many layers of options that exist. I legit haven’t seen many ads since 2015

As for low quality content on the internet, yeah idk if there’s a fix for that. Ai videos are the worstttttt

[u/Aussois1]

I’ve gone back to spending a lot of time reading books, listening to music and playing instruments rather than scrolling social media and trawling the internet. Reddit is the only social I’m on now. I feel less connected but way happier.

[u/IBJON]

While you have a point about the current state of the Internet, that's not dead Internet theory.

[u/Icedman81]

Well, enshittification.

But, on the 6th point:

There is no actual app, that's just Electron (as in Chrome) running the website. Just like most "apps" are. MicroShaft ButtPilot 365 "apps" are the same. Lazy SPA crap running inside Electron (sorry, Microsoft ButtView).

Humans are lazy. Corporations want money with less effort. This becomes Lazy + More Money = Shitty Unoptimized Code That Wastes Resources.

On that note, statistical analysis (Low-quality Loser Models (LLM) or Atrocious Impotence (AI)) wastes energy into hallucinating chatbots. I hope the fucker who came up with this shit (and all of his subordinates) rest in hell talking to a combination of Clippy + Hallucinating LLM models.

[u/elliotborst]

Have to agree

Ads have been bad for years but they are crazy now

AI is creating junk / incorrect data

Paid services are putting ads in, dreaming devices and YouTube premium allows ads in the creators content.

Ads in operating systems and appliances.

It’s horrible

[u/Sitheral]

That looks like a very casual perspective tbh. Yeah you need to dig a bit to get to the good stuff but in a way that was always the case.

Back then, majority of people would never look at second page of their google results.

[u/Dantai]

This is a good post. The Internet is wilder than ever, and I feel more disconnected than ever. It used to be fun and actually social. My feeds are absolutely polluted no matter what I do. I hate my phone, it's addictive as hell

[u/ROEdkill820]

Time to start living outside and with people, in person again. 😮‍💨 lol

[u/DentalStone]

Hate to break it to you, but the discord app is just a fancy wrapper for Chrome 🤣

[u/Alternative_Work_916]

I thought it was funny my searches no longer show reddit results even if I tag them for reddit. But I get the same forced websites with AI articles every time.

[u/Fakjbf]

That’s not what the dead internet theory is. The dead internet theory is that most of the “people” you interact with are actually bots, it has nothing to do with AI summaries or ads.

[u/ToxicBuiltYT]

Between AI and the newer government control laws disguised as "protecting children" the internet has genuinely become unusable.

[u/B16B0SS]

Honestly there needs to be an internet reboot. We basically need a darkweb without all the illegal stuff lol.

[u/Quint87]

This is the 4th post on my feed this morning about AI slop ruining the internet.

Fuck Ai slop.

[u/EmploymentNegative59]

Frankly, I'm getting a bad taste in my mouth even on Reddit.

Too many karma farming accounts. International accounts asking about overseas culture that seems designed only to keep users engaged.