It is evident that we cannot have free things and lately, it just got hella more costly to navigate the digital space.
Some believe that the Internet was free and that this “free and open Internet” is currently coming to an end, surely I wouldn't need to buy a smartphone, buy a sim card and also pay for Internet subscription if it was indeed free.
It's crazy that this is all coming when “blockchain” , a public ledger with open source code, is hitting the market.
The Internet was never free but I totally understand the angle of the debate - the fact that “social media” which some largely considered the “Internet” even though it's just a piece of it is becoming a “pay to play” environment.
The delusion of having more
On the Internet having more really just means having less, people just don't get it.
The ability to hide ads isn't a “having more” feature that is supposed to be a right by default, neither is gaining priority on feeds because at the end of the day, you don't own the account nor the data you put out there.
But I guess the Internet is not my father's house or mine so I can't make the rules.
So it's like paying to work for a company that is just going to make money off your labor and still charge you all over again.
Guess what the X(formerly Twitter) Premium terms states?
X reserves the right without notice to remove your blue checkmark at any time in its sole discretion without offering you a refund, including if you violate our Terms of Service or if your account is suspended.
Unless the law requires them to give you a refund but who's really going to take them to court over $3 - $16?
That's right, no one.
No ads, No tracking as a premium feature
People that pay for premium+ don't get ads in their for you and following feed but guess what? They get ads on profile pages and within the comments of tweets.
Is that really a “having more feature?”
Of course it isn't, it's just an illusion. Even if twitter told you it wouldn't track you, it still would because it is a social network and thrives on having these usage data.
How else would they be able to entize advertisers without mining your interest and feeding to them?
At the end of the day, you're still as everyone else, just paying more.
Am I mad about this?
Of course not, Twitter is a company offering a niche service to the world, it has to make money at the end of the day to continue offering these services.
But the problem here is the risk to users.
Users on social networks are like laborers from Africa and some parts of Asia, every big company tends to exploit them.
When fast fashion needs workers it goes to Africa, picks them, sucks the life out of them for pennies and makes a bank from their labor.
This is what social networks are turning into. Users are no longer a product, but a product that is paying to remain a product.
Blockchain-based alternatives are essential at this point. With that, we can at the very least guarantee account and data ownership and security.