Where the Sidewalk Ends: The Death of the Internet

[Leotardo DaVinci]

View attachment 2666956

Maybe Tracer Tong really was onto something...

 

[JAKL II]

funny how a certified florida man from Pepsicola is better at writing than a name by the name of Ralph who has an actual journalism degree and does it for a living

He never graduated. He has no degree. He also has crippling student debt.

 

[Ralph Barnhardt]

Lmfao
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The duality of man
EDIT:
goddammit ninja'd lol

The duality of man

 

[THEY STOLE MY FORESKIN]

@Null I know you said on your article that you believe content which is not illegal should not be hidden away from the masses on the Internet, but have you ever considered using BBS or Usenet to keep KiwiFarms alive in the past? I was surprised how much effort it took to keep this site alive and wondered why not just abandon this Internet we are accustomed to (which is for sure falling apart as you said) and try something else that's easier

 

[Dr. Jekyll]

Based and nullpilled. Seriously though we gotta save the internet before we all end up like China.

 

[Sperghetti]

This is a personal anecdote but it has occurred to me several times that I cannot ignore the pattern. Twitch, for instance, used to be an enjoyable experience even on smaller channels in my opinion (pre-2016ish). However, in the last few years there has been a trend with the company to make absolutely fuck-all exceptional decisions. It seems to be in an attempt to "protect" individuals, but anyone with more than room temp IQ will tell you that Twitch promoting groups such as (((females))) and POC creators on the front fucking page is an act of making those individuals targets for harassment rather than helping their community grow. Sites like Twitch and YouTube are a new genre of mental pornography in that content creators are exploited for entertainment and monetary gain. It exploits the same kind of people who have addiction problems (both creator and consumer). It's hard to believe both sites are unaware of this as they sacrifice their creators as scapegoats so they can write 100 articles about how despite all their efforts "literal Nazis" still use the platform just to get a finger in another pie.

This isn't something I've noticed before as I tend to grumpily avoid any and all promoted content... but I really think you're on to something. It's like an advanced form of concern trolling: Promote users you know are going to be controversial, but do it under the guise that you're doing it to "support" them. Then watch as the drama breaks out and the traffic rolls in. Afterward, pretend like you're disgusted at all the "haters" while you count your stacks of advertising cash. It's both brilliant and disgusting.

It's basically the streaming version of publishing some garbage article that you know is going to generate a bunch of outrage, but you do it anyway because outraged clicks are still clicks.

 

[SpaceJesus]

Very well written article, thank you Josh for your work.
I just wonder, what can one do who lives, let's say, in Western Europe, in a fairly "open" Country. We do have some censored webpages (as far as I know mainly Gore and Pedo sites). When you try to access them, you get a big official warning sign to kindly fuck off. But this kind of censorship doesn't hurt, imo.
It just begs the question, where does this kind of censorship end. If we could stay at the current level, it would be ok, but I have a bad feeling it won't.

But even if we could keep this level, we still depend on you guys in the States to not fuck it up, because like you said, there's just no alternative to the current "setup".
I guess there's still the way of financially supporting guys like you who don't follow the mainstream. That's at least something, even if it's just a drop in the ocean

 

[Puck]

Lmao Jersh gets published on zerohedge while the gunt has to settle for his shitty blog, that Noone reads, Ralph's gotta be on suicide watch rn

 

[Zig-Zag the Grand Vizier]

This isn't something I've noticed before as I tend to grumpily avoid any and all promoted content... but I really think you're on to something. It's like an advanced form of concern trolling: Promote users you know are going to be controversial, but do it under the guise that you're doing it to "support" them. Then watch as the drama breaks out and the traffic rolls in. Afterward, pretend like you're disgusted at all the "haters" while you count your stacks of advertising cash. It's both brilliant and disgusting.

It's basically the streaming version of publishing some garbage article that you know is going to generate a bunch of outrage, but you do it anyway because outraged clicks are still clicks.

Last time I checked out Twitch promoting "female run communities" they had a woman with Tourette's syndrome on the front page. Within 2 minutes of me watching her stream, she ticked and said the phrase "I'm a fucking nig-" and cut herself off. You can guess the sort of reaction she got. Tons of "REPORT HER. SHE'S RACIST." Then the poor woman had to go on to explain for perhaps the thousandth time that day what Tourette's syndrome is to literal mouth breathers. It was such torture to witness.

 

[Sammich]

Glad to see you do this, someone writing/putting out something they are passionate about is always a good thing. Good stuff!

 

[Lieutenant Rasczak]

The ZeroHedge article was an interesting read. It's sad that a lot of people won't see the underlying problems at hand in favor of short term politicking. At this point most political groups are essentially cults.

 

[Racist Trash]

The fact there is absolutely no mention about the evil of gamergate in this article makes me doubt your journo cred, you will never be a catparty approved article at this rate.

 

[DavidFerrie]

Excellent article, Josh. Am sharing it in my Normie circles.

 

[libRT]

Part of me wishes the internet would just reboot, so it can go back to being fun again, at least until mainstream invades nunet.

 

[New001]

Nicely Done. I never knew about the finer points of colocation and the large charges incurred for directly managing a domain
Makes me want to do some more research after reading that piece.

 

[Blue Screen of Death]

When you try to access them, you get a big official warning sign to kindly fuck off. But this kind of censorship doesn't hurt, imo.
It just begs the question, where does this kind of censorship end. If we could stay at the current level, it would be ok, but I have a bad feeling it won't.

All censorship is bad censorship. It will continue to spiral out of control until you can only access websites the government whitelists.

 

[Big Nasty]

Josh, I really don't know if there's anyone more deserving of the title "cyberpunk" than you.

 

[Sea Urchin]

Great article Jewsh, I always really enjoy reading your takes on free speech and the Internet, considering who you are and what you had to deal with in the past. Keep it up, man.

Given how centralized the Internet has become, is it really so much of an ask anymore to ask users to open a different browser for one of the few interesting sites left?

Agreed, many of the existing KF userbase would probably have no issue switching to TOR if forced to, me included, but that isn't really a solution to the core problem if you apply it to the Internet as a whole — you would essentially just capitulate and self-segregate. Sure, you can host your 'free speech alternative' on TOR, and say whatever you want on there, but how many average people will use it when the media, government, and other authorities tell them how "evil and harmful" your site is?

Think about all the people that believe the Farms is some far-right, Stormfront-esque, trolling forum, and never visit once to confirm if that assumption holds any water. They just don't give a fuck when in their mind; any website that isn't run by a "trust worthy" mega-corporation — and approved by authority — is scary and evil. They have no need for TOR, because they don't care or see any issue with big tech stripping away their privacy. Most of them don't even have controversial opinions, because they have never been truly confronted with a different point of view.

In the end, you just create your own virtual little ghetto where you are able to speak freely, and that's definitely better than no alternative at all, but what's the point if you and your website are irrelevant and big tech has a stranglehold on mainstream discourse? Or in other words; we shouldn't have to "build our own Internet".

Edit: Spelling.

 

[Anti_furri3]

Yeah, it's the sad sad truth and I would think that Null is asking himself regularly "Is it worth all this money and time if the result still will be the same in the end?". I think if you are hoping that companies are gonna do the right thing, you will be massively disappointed. And the same goes for hope in governments. I have a hard time seeing a free speech Internet in the future or seeing that people will fight against Internet censoring in any noticeable numbers. Most people are lazy and think it's somebody else's problem to fix.

 

[Slap47]

That was an informative article on stuff you've already explained here and on your podcast quite abit.

Your belief that corporate men growing a spine is the only way out of this is worrying though...