> In the 80s and 90s there was much more idealism than now.

that idealism was already fading by then, which had started much earlier in the preceding decades (see, memex/hypertext etc)

  > tech has devolved into a big money making scheme with only the minimum necessary actual technology and innovation

in the end, they are businesses, so it could be assumed that such orientation would take over in the end eventually though, no?

its the system of incentives we all live under (make more money or die)

> make more money or die

This is not true for the vast majority of people making these things. At some point, most businesses go from “make money or die” to financial security: “make line go up forever for no reason”.

I bet the vast majority of people making things also want cutting edge healthcare for themselves and loved ones, for their whole life, which is equivalent to make money or die.

i discovered the meaning of life and its name is “increasing shareholder value”

i was literally told this at $JOB once: we dont have time to think; just give us a framework to follow

it seems like thinking is a form of torture for some... but maybe its our work/lifestyle that makes it so.. idk

in the end, enshitification comes for us all

You either die a hero or become big tech.

  > Also a lot of this reeks of Sinophobia tbh

the grass is always browner on the other side...

  > they invest in retirement and pension funds, who in turn invest the money in businesses to earn a return

maybe not a popular opinion but, this is the original sin imo; putting retirement/pension on the market makes for so many perverse incentives to keep things growing at any cost...

The system is perverse per se,

you create money based on debt, and eternal growth, and devalue savings, and force people to bet in order to try to preserve savings value, then each ten or fifteen years you allow someones to harvest the rewards of the casino.

And when population start to decrease (on developed countries), you rise the alarm, "more population is needed due to the decline in the birth rate", promoting an eternal growth that would need the resources several planets if everyone had a decent standard of living.

Used to be someone had to crack the whip. Now the workers do it to themselves.

also unlike java, cocoa doesn't cause jitters

  > You can pay app developers to port their apps off of play services, you can pay developers to add support for your attestation keys.

microsoft literally tried this back in the day when android/ios was rising against windows mobile... spoiler: it didn't work

an additional anecdote from my time then: they came to where i was working at the time and proposed funding a windows mobile version of our app (quite a large sum) but our supervisor finally said no, because the upkeep of now 3 apps would be too much for too few customers

you cant just throw money at devs and expect much unless you have the user base (potential market) to back it up

I think that is pretty different than what is happening here because:

1. It doesn't require an entirely new app. You can ship the same apk on all platforms.

2. Most apps already don't have a hard dependency on play services.

Amazon and BlackBerry both tried the whole “you can upload your same APK to our AppStore approach”.

And well, when’s the last time you used the Amazon android AppStore?

idk, what does god need with a pronoun anyway?

  > Desktop OS should be as forgettable as possible, as it's about having long stints of flow, not giving a feeling of "air" or "play".

100% agree, though i wonder how much an influence casual users are having on apple's marketing of macos...

its almost as if apple doesnt want to sell "trucks" anymore (as steve would say) and would prefer to morph macos slowly into a sedan like the ipad (cause that is where the money is)

  > By 2035 I wonder if we'll be all running KDE or WindowMaker and the hell with modern OS GUI.

tbh this is probably me in 2026 or 2027 i think...

Windows IS also suffering from macosification

I call this "touchscreenification"

no, Windows is suffering from profiteering and corporate malignancy.

In modern parlance, iosification.

  > getting Japanese IME working

same issue, for me its mostly working but properly recognizing jp keyboard is still a wip for me (can't get forward-slash/yen symbol or kana keys working smh) probably i am kissing something obvious...