I'm sympathetic with the point Tom Valovic makes, but the argument feels weak overall. The point, of course, is that we've lost what made the internet great, "the tremendous potential that this new communications breakthrough had for academia, science, culture, and many other fields of endeavor." But people were seeing it as a vehicle for freedom, not social control. And this is just wrongheaded: "The beginning of the 'free service' model augured a long slow downward slide in personal privacy... the temptation to use free services became the flypaper that would trap unsuspecting end users into a kind of lifelong dependency. But as the old adage goes: 'There is no free lunch.'" Hogwash. Services you pay for spy on you too, maybe even more so. And lots of stuff - including this newsletter - is free with no strings attached. It isn't 'free' that is killing the internet. It's something else entirely. Via Grant Potter.
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