Enshittification

[Fuzzy1975]

Capitalism has a miraculous way breaking up monopolies for the benefit of consumers.

If you consider $3000.00 a gallon for ink as being cheap, and a benefit to society.

 

[BabyBoomer50s]

If you consider $3000.00 a gallon for ink as being cheap, and a benefit to society.

If all you need is ink, $3K per gallon is obviously insane. But if you want to print a color page at home, it takes more than a gallon of ink. You also need hardware and paper.

The relevant metric is cost per page. Today it’s about 12 to 15 cents. That’s remarkable. Especially when the need to do that is increasingly rare.

In the 1970s monochromatic dot matrix printers were the predominant way people printed, (and usually at work, not home.) Monochromatic laser printers came along at around $4K just for the device. Toner and paper extra. The first inkjet printers in the early 80s cost over $1,000.

Today you can buy a wireless color HP DeskJet at Walmart for $54. Or you simply use an app on your phone to avoid the need to print anything.

BTW, if you adjust for inflation, the per page cost reductions are even more dramatic. Capitalism has a miraculous way fostering competition and innovation for the benefit of consumers, and making monopolies irrelevant and obsolete.

 

[desecration]

Google has a horrible history of developing products and then just shelving them for no reason.

https://killedbygoogle.com/

This is not atypical of giant monopolies. Microsoft, Apple, Oracle, IBM, etc have done the same thing.

 

[desecration]

If you consider $3000.00 a gallon for ink as being cheap, and a benefit to society.

A quick word on printers:

If you want to "save money" by buying the cheapest printer, then you get locked in to the ink supply.

There are other options that do not involve this, and the free market provides them, but instead of a $50 printer it is a $300 printer (but the ink costs $20/year and comes in a bottle that anyone can refill).

 

[LLCox]

My library charges me five cents to print per page. I don't use a printer much.

 

[desecration]

Recently coined by Cory Doctorow, the term describes the movement by companies to make their products and services LESS useful to consumers, while locking them into continuing to use them through monopolies.

Doctorow is a lunatic, and what he describes is what happens when taxes eat up too much income and force companies to cut corners. He blames monopolies, which is sort of like Biden blaming grocery stores for the currency's devaluation. I dislike and distrust monopolies, but "enshittification" (what an illiterate) is the result of government action.

 

[desecration]

My library charges me five cents to print per page. I don't use a printer much.

This is also the most environmentally sound decision. Big printers tend to last longer than little consumer bits of plastic like your average HP printer.

 

[Fuzzy1975]

If all you need is ink, $3K per gallon is obviously insane. But if you want to print a color page at home, it takes more than a gallon of ink. You also need hardware and paper.

The relevant metric is cost per page. Today it’s about 12 to 15 cents. That’s remarkable. Especially when the need to do that is increasingly rare.

In the 1970s monochromatic dot matrix printers were the predominant way people printed, (and usually at work, not home.) Monochromatic laser printers came along at around $4K just for the device. Toner and paper extra. The first inkjet printers in the early 80s cost over $1,000.

Today you can buy a wireless color HP DeskJet at Walmart for $54. Or you simply use an app on your phone to avoid the need to print anything.

BTW, if you adjust for inflation, the per page cost reductions are even more dramatic. Capitalism has a miraculous way fostering competition and innovation for the benefit of consumers, and making monopolies irrelevant and obsolete.

The price of ink in cartridges has not decreased over time, and if you think printing pages at .12 to .15 cents is cheap, well I guess you never print a couple thousand a day...

 

[Fuzzy1975]

A quick word on printers:

If you want to "save money" by buying the cheapest printer, then you get locked in to the ink supply.

There are other options that do not involve this, and the free market provides them, but instead of a $50 printer it is a $300 printer (but the ink costs $20/year and comes in a bottle that anyone can refill).

I did buy an Epson Tank, but the quality is still not nearly as good as my HP 7740. Also the Tank doesn't fit Tabloid or ANSI D.

 

[BabyBoomer50s]

The price of ink in cartridges has not decreased over time, and if you think printing pages at .12 to .15 cents is cheap, well I guess you never print a couple thousand a day...

As I explained, ink is a tiny part of cost per print. Printer, paper, cartridges or tanks, computing devices, internet, etc. In fact ink is not even the most expensive part of a cartridge. The idea of printing laser quality images at home in about 20 seconds for 12 to 15 cents was unimaginable in the 80s.

If you’re printing a couple thousand copies per day on an inkjet printer, you’re burning money. Wrong technology. Get a laser printer or use a local print service. Way faster, way cheaper, way more automated and reliable.

 

[Fuzzy1975]

As I explained, ink is a tiny part of cost per print. Printer, paper, cartridges or tanks, computing devices, internet, etc. In fact ink is not even the most expensive part of a cartridge. The idea of printing laser quality images at home in about 20 seconds for 12 to 15 cents was unimaginable in the 80s.

If you’re printing a couple thousand copies per day on an inkjet printer, you’re burning money. Wrong technology. Get a laser printer or use a local print service. Way faster, way cheaper, way more automated and reliable.

Yes you explained that you print a page or two. Laser printers work for blueprints, or a lot of other documents but not a practical printer for home users. Again if you're a home printer then a couple bucks once a month is not overly costly. But that doesn't take away from the point, which was printer ink is vastly over priced and sold at a mark-up that makes the mark-up on glass frames look reasonable.

 

[BabyBoomer50s]

Yes you explained that you print a page or two. Laser printers work for blueprints, or a lot of other documents but not a practical printer for home users. Again if you're a home printer then a couple bucks once a month is not overly costly. But that doesn't take away from the point, which was printer ink is vastly over priced and sold at a mark-up that makes the mark-up on glass frames look reasonable.

Dude. You can buy a monochrome Brother laser printer for about $160 on Amazon. 36 pages per minute. You can buy a full color HP Laserjet for about $540. For low volume home printing you can buy an HP DeskJet for $60.

 

[Fuzzy1975]

Dude. You can buy a monochrome Brother laser printer for about $160 on Amazon. 36 pages per minute. You can buy a full color HP Laserjet for about $540. For low volume home printing you can buy an HP DeskJet for $60.

Which doesn't change the point; printer ink is over priced, has always been over priced and competition hasn't changed that fact.

 

[PaxNurgle]

I see this phenomena, more than anywhere else, with software.

Think back to browsers: Netscape, which was around in the early 2000's, was the best search engine out there. It ALWAYS gave you the best and most relevant results and you didn't have to filter through a bunch of ads or commercial sites. But it went away when Windows wouldn't support it anymore. Then there was Internet Explorer. Maybe not quite as good as Netscape, but Superior browser in every way to google Chrome or firefox- always gave you plenty of relevant results, easy to find what you are looking for. But it, too gradually got phased out. With Chrome, you get more third-party tracking, less relevant and more commercial/advertising related results, tons of annoying features (e.g. "See results closer to you?") and it's just not a good search engine, but it's probably the "best of what's left."

And with Windows: XP was the best. Windows 7 was still decent but not quite as good or as powerful, and windows 10 and 11 are just terrible in comparison- at this rate by the time Windows 12 comes out, we will probably be back to basic key-entry DOS style commands!

For design software, my company uses AutoCad. Every release up until the 2022 version was decent, though it's functionality may have peaked back in 2010. But they force you to upgrade at least every two years, and companies are forced to pay a fee to the company every year or they will disable the software (yeah, that's a thing!) But when AutoCad 2022 came out- it was the worst release, in terms of functionality, since the 1996 release #14. Things are harder to do, requiring more mouse clicks to execute, many shortcuts and commands went away, many more functions were weakened and made less powerful.

The issue with all these companies (MicroSoft, Google and AutoDesk Inc) is that they are basically monopolies- you have to take what they give, or your computer and your ability to use it will dissappear. It makes no sense to me why they feel the need to enshittify their products with each newer release, other than to make people crave the older ones. Sort of imagine of they took away your 2020 Corvette and gave you a "brand new" Chevrolet Sonic- all 22 horse power of it- because it's "Brand New." Except you can always just choose to buy a 2024 Porsche. With software, such choice doesn't always exist.

 

[desecration]

I did buy an Epson Tank, but the quality is still not nearly as good as my HP 7740.

I haven't used any photoprinters; those are professional jobs for me still. The Epson Tank is only one of the options. Some others are lasers, and those tend to be more expensive at outlay but cheaper per page.

 

[desecration]

Netscape, which was around in the early 2000's, was the best search engine out there. It ALWAYS gave you the best and most relevant results and you didn't have to filter through a bunch of ads or commercial sites.

Forgive me here, but you mean Alta Vista.

https://www.vice.com/en/article/y3gn5v/whatever-happened-to-altavista-our-first-good-search-engine

Netscape is a browser. It lives on remotely through Firefox.

Then there was Internet Explorer. Maybe not quite as good as Netscape, but Superior browser in every way to google Chrome or firefox- always gave you plenty of relevant results, easy to find what you are looking for.

For a few years in the late nineties and early 00s, it was the better browser.

And with Windows: XP was the best. Windows 7 was still decent but not quite as good or as powerful, and windows 10 and 11 are just terrible in comparison- at this rate by the time Windows 12 comes out, we will probably be back to basic key-entry DOS style commands!

XP was limited because it was still in the 1980s model and totally insecure. Win2k peaked. Then they started adding on lots of stupid stuff in order to justify jobs for fat MBAs and H-1Bs.

For design software, my company uses AutoCad. Every release up until the 2022 version was decent, though it's functionality may have peaked back in 2010. But they force you to upgrade at least every two years, and companies are forced to pay a fee to the company every year or they will disable the software (yeah, that's a thing!) But when AutoCad 2022 came out- it was the worst release, in terms of functionality, since the 1996 release #14.

This is very common in software: a product beats out the others, hits its peak, and then becomes a cash cow, mostly because the type of people you can hire to maintain software are lesser men than the people you hire to create software.

The issue with all these companies (MicroSoft, Google and AutoDesk Inc) is that they are basically monopolies- you have to take what they give, or your computer and your ability to use it will dissappear.

Yes, and they have to keep 35k employees at their jobs for some reason or the shareholders panic. The DOJ took its best shot in the 1990s and screwed up so hard that they have refused to do anything until very recently.

 

[desecration]

Which doesn't change the point; printer ink is over priced, has always been over priced and competition hasn't changed that fact.

No, not at all.

What did a laser printer cost in 1989 versus 1999?

 

[Rightguide]

About 8 years ago I purchased a "deluxe" version of the MyFitnessPal app that had calorie tracking, fitness tracking and all the bells and whistles. Lifetime one-time purchase. Used it for 3-4 years, stopped using it, decided to pick it up again for a 2023 New Year resolution. Surprise surprise surprise, the "new" version required an annual subscription of $80 per year for the previous "lifetime one-time purchase" features.

Geeze, you must have been a desperate undisciplined fat body. Most healthy men know how to stay in shape without having to purchase a friggin' app. It's called "roadwork," being "sensible" with food, and mental discipline. Take it from a pro, power walk, or run two miles out and two miles back every goddamn day, or at least every other day if you're ass is broken. Stay away from bread and sugar. Learn how to think or say the word no. Be a lion and get on with it. If you have the non-hackers blues or need further motivation send me a private message.

 

[RobDownSouth]

Geeze, you must have been a desperate undisciplined fat body. Most healthy men know how to stay in shape without having to purchase a friggin' app. It's called "roadwork," being "sensible" with food, and mental discipline. Take it from a pro, power walk, or run two miles out and two miles back every goddamn day, or at least every other day if you're ass is broken. Stay away from bread and sugar. Learn how to think or say the word no. Be a lion and get on with it. If you have the non-hackers blues or need further motivation send me a private message.

The guy who failed the USMC PT test three times and was kicked out of the Marines after 10 years lecturing others on fitness. And a side dish of "Rob Is Fat!" to boot.

How much can you bench press, Gunny Shitpants? Do you even llft?

 

[Rightguide]

Doctorow is a lunatic, and what he describes is what happens when taxes eat up too much income and force companies to cut corners. He blames monopolies, which is sort of like Biden blaming grocery stores for the currency's devaluation. I dislike and distrust monopolies, but "enshittification" (what an illiterate) is the result of government action.

One can always identify a product of the left.

 

[Rightguide]

The guy who failed the USMC PT test three times and was kicked out of the Marines after 10 years lecturing others on fitness. And a side dish of "Rob Is Fat!" to boot.

How much can you bench press, Gunny Shitpants? Do you even llft?

I was never in the USMC so all of the above is a projection based on lies or superstition. I've told you this from the beginning but you insist on this retarded fantasy. In fact, at this point, it's become a persistent delusional disorder on your part that prevents you from being able to discern what’s real from what is imagined.

I don't lift weights for the record but I know I can bench press my weight. I have never failed a physical test in my life. As a boy, I lettered in four high school sports. I've hunted or hiked the San Gabriel, Sierra, Wasatch, Bitteroots, Madison, Gravelly, Absaroka, Crazy, Bighorn, Beartooth, and White mountain ranges. All of which has kept me in pretty fair shape. How many of those have you challenged yourself in?

 

[Fuzzy1975]

No, not at all.

What did a laser printer cost in 1989 versus 1999?

We're discussing ink.