scdnc

A tip: degoogle, demicrosoft, defacebook (and maybe also deapple)

I've used them for years. They're likely the most private VPN, but I still can't recommend them. Their IPs are constantly blocked, and with few servers, switching doesn't help (this was already an issue long before I was a customer). Plus, their macOS app has tons of issues.

Isn't this textbook enshittification?

Open source software often isn’t preinstalled, may not work flawlessly with many hardware configurations, in general hard to install, often lacks a GUI, has poor UX and UI, and high cognitive load. Also no marketing. They will be interested when open source devs would prioritize these, but it won't happen

If any devs are reading: please add compact tabs like safari and an extension that summarizes pages/video transcripts and enables LLM chat with that context.

I agree that it’s a function of moderation, but I also think moderation is deliberately done in a way to drive/keep engagement; otherwise, there would be far fewer ideological, current-events, and non-“hacker” posts that receive a lot of comments and upvotes.

For example my post got appropriately flagged while a lot of other popular post don't get flagged even though they don't meet the guidelines: https://www.hntoplinks.com/year?sort=upvotes https://www.hntoplinks.com/year?sort=comments

I don’t think it’s “enshittification” in the sense Doctorow coined the term.

While I didn’t mean it only strictly in the original sense and instead also used it as a synonym for general decline, I still think it fits the definition more or less, since while my post got appropriately flagged for not meeting guidelines, a lot of posts, mainly ideological and current events, that also do not meet the guidelines don’t get flagged these days [1][2], and since moderation is part of their service, the service is degrading, likely so that this site will grow.

What I do think has changed is me. And the "community" here over the years. I also have a (quite possibly wrong) view that as HN’s user base has grown, there’s a lower percentage of people here for genuine “hacker” discussions—by which I mean the interesting technical stuff, whether computer-related or not—and a higher percentage here for the latest tech fad, for YC or founder attention, or just for money, rather than pure intellectual curiosity.

Even though I’ve been here only a few years, I still feel the same way.

I 100% believe that for me, there was a higher signal-to-noise ratio for both the discussions I’m interested in and the people I recognize and respect, than there was 10 or 15 years ago. But I’m still here.

I’ve gradually stopped visiting most popular sites, be it social media, forums, etc. because as they grow, the noise overwhelms the signal, and the original reason to visit vanishes for me. I still will be here too but probably not for long.

[1] https://www.hntoplinks.com/year?sort=upvotes [2] https://www.hntoplinks.com/year?sort=comments

Someone already commented this and I responded to that here: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=44254640

While this post was appropriately flagged for violating the guidelines, many other ideological posts that go against those guidelines remain unflagged. Since moderation is part of their service, I think it still aligns with the definition. However, you are also correct. I didn't mean it strictly in the exact sense but was also referring to a general decline, regardless of their business model.

I like the idea of using a more glass-like UI, but the implementation is horrible. It looks like a school project rather than work from the biggest company in the world. I generally don't understand the idea of making every UI look more like a children's toy.

Like several others have said, this is probably gonna turn out like all the past EU IT projects.

I don't care much about that anymore because their VPN service has really gone bad. They are great in terms of privacy, but in every other aspect, they suck. Their VPN randomly disconnects again and again, once even without the killswitch being activated. They are getting blocked from websites much more often than other VPNs, making the service barely usable while costing a lot more. Plus, there are many other minor issues. I really hope they improve because I want to keep using them

My only problem with Mullvad is that you get a lot more captchas and blocks from websites than you get from other VPNs.

Why is there more and more talk about ideological topics on every social media platform? I don't know how it is for others, but I'm on HackerNews specifically to escape from this kind of thing.