I want to be left alone (2024)

I feel this so, so much. The internet was so much better before it got commercialized and polluted with non-stop politics, hype, influencer crap, etc. I just want to be left alone, I know what I want, I don't want you to try and force it on me, trick me into it, etc. I want to have a functioning email account my friends can use where the messages won't get drowned in a sea of spam. I want a phone that only rings when someone I know calls.

We've created such a shithole, a perfect mirror of society I guess.

> The internet was so much better before it got commercialized

I wonder if we can say the same about our streets (billboards, neon signs, etc etc) compared to, say, streets 200 years ago?

I'm not quite that old - but back that far, there was far less pavement. Far more dust and mud. And far more excrement from horses and other livestock.

However obnoxious it might look, today's streetscape pollution lacks the odor, flies, and infectious disease hazards of yesteryear.