Will

javi, 1 month ago (edited 1 month ago) to random

offf, this story about how Google made google search into a pile of seagull shit hits me hard:

https://www.wheresyoured.at/the-men-who-killed-google/

Around the time of this story, I was living through a similar situation in my work life (on a much smaller scope, of course, WordPress.com first, Tumblr later).

Back in 2019, working on WordPress, I started finding myself, almost weekly, arguing against people who wanted to take the product we were working at and made it worse if that mean they could squeeze 0.1% more revenue from it

The 0.1% figure is not even a random number: I remember this speciffic A/B test on WordPress.com that was declared a success and shipped to 100% of the users because it increased the free-to-paid conversion by 0.1%. Soon after it was released, I found out that as a side effect, it increased the churn of free users by 20 something %,so I called for an urgent rollback and removal of the change. So I was promptly explained that we didn't care about free-users churn, because finance had calculated the average long-term value of the free users to be something like $2 per year, and the increase in conversion was bigger than what we could get from them.

Everything became about growth hacking. Everything became thinly-veiled dark patterns. In our private dev slack channels, we joked that since it was impossible to make it smaller or less conspicuous, the next thing the growth team was going to ask us to do was to make the 'free plan' button flee away from the mouse pointer when the user tried to click it. We kept making our product worse, we kept consciously crippling the cheaper versions so we could force people to move to the more expensive options.

Back then I was the lead of one of the two dev divisions working on WordPress.com, so my job was mainly to discuss what we were going to be doing, when and how. And I was getting drained by a constant state of fight against a constant wave of shit they wanted us to build. So much than by the end of 2020, the CEO quietly told me to follow the growth team plans and shut up or step down.

So I requested to move to tumblr, because I thought the pastures were greener over there. But it was all the same: Adding login walls to what we were pretending to be "the last bastion of the free internet", cramping in embarrasingly obvious money-making schemes disguised as features, and making them silently opt-out instead of opt-in so the less people the possible would deactivate them, having to fend off the pressure from the CEO to make everything algorithmic timelines because, you know, tiktok makes a lot of money and why aren't we, etc etc.

I found myself in a place where building something good that people enjoy using was no longer a priority, but tricking people into generating more money for the company was. And when I looked around me, I could see that happening everywhere else, not only in my company. Experiencing the start of the enshittification years from inside wasn't easy.

And, as in the article, the people who decided to turn the shit-metter up to 200%, have a name, in every case. And these people, no matter if they are called Sundar and Prabhakar or Matt and Mark, are destroying the internet. These people are milllionaires, or billionaries, and are destroying our shared, common spaces to squeeze some extra cash from us.

That's why the fediverse and its principles are important. Because that's how we take back internet from their dirty hands. That's how we make internet resilient against them. That's how we build the commons.

Will, 2 months ago to random

Sometimes I see people in real life #BikeSummit @bikepedantic

Will, 3 months ago to random

#SOTU big announcements on housing, 2 year term $400/months tax credit on new mortgages! no title insurance required on federal loans

BenRossTransit, 3 months ago to random

Do road diets really cost what DOTs say they do?
Because a Baltimore streetscape project was changed in midstream, we know the price of the road diet part. Converting the 4-lane road to 2 car lanes + 2 bike lanes cost $182,432 out of a total project cost of $61,200,000.
https://baltimorebrew.com/2024/03/06/after-8-years-of-construction-and-31-over-budget-the-central-avenue-streetscape-is-almost-done/?mc_cid=0fb958e257

Will, 4 months ago to Bluey

Parents probably already know, but in case you don't, the "Faceytalk" episode of Bluey is legitimately the funniest thing I've watched in I can't remember how long?

Everything about it is perfect.

@bikepedantic #Bluey

Will, 4 months ago to cycling

I picked up my first Grant Petersen bike, a 1992 Bridgestone XO-4. At 32 years old, it still shifts and rides perfectly. Frame is great, although paint has faded to rose hue. Should I give it moustache bars and knobbies to make it more like the famed XO-1? It rides very well, a testament to good design and components. #BikeDC #Cycling #gravel

image/png
image/png
image/png

Will, 5 months ago to random

Apparently I'm a traffic engineer now, according to my agency's new org chart. Please don't blame me, I didn't do anything to deserve this title. 😅

Will, 5 months ago to random

Once again, #TreeByBike . This is probably my 13th consecutive year getting a tree this way. I have about 1 mile to travel like this.

Will, 6 months ago to random

On another car note, I just returned from a 4 day wedding trip to my former home of L.A. Drove pretty much everywhere, but walked a lot in Downtown. It really drives home a couple things; 1) drivers there are very polite and kind in general, and it emphasizes to me that the avg Maryland driver is a lunatic by comparison. It's so pronounced when you are in thick/deep LA traffic, no one is honking, zipper moves flow easily, and no one tailgates you. What can explain this?

Will, 6 months ago to random

I went on a deep dive to look for an under-sink water filter system, and having read deeply on the topic, I am no closer to selecting a system. Does anyone have one they like which doesn’t reduce your flow rate and replacement filters don’t cost more than $40/$50?

Will, 7 months ago to random

Huge policy/management failure by DC Gov, Cap Riverfront BID, and Yards Park. Coordinating with private tech world bathroom vendor instead of just managing the public bathrooms which are plumbed and built into the park… those remain locked. These are within 50 yds of each other. There could not be a clearer case of our collective inability to manage public spaces than to farm out bathrooms in a park to the private sector in this way.

Locked public bathroom

Will, 8 months ago to random

As a new person steps into the role, let’s all remember that the American profession with the highest confirmed rate of child sexual abuse/assault is Republican speaker of the House of Representatives . #ushouseofreps

Will, 8 months ago to random

To get over hump day, just remember your working conditions are vastly superior to the trades of yore. Check out Mayhew's amazing work documenting some of the trades of London immediately prior to the industrial revolution: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/London_Labour_and_the_London_Poor#:~:text=Alongside%20these%20relatively%20familiar%20forms,collected%20dog%20dung%20for%20tanneries)%2C

Will, 9 months ago to random

It occurred to me that the MID-Atlantic is the perfect description for the region, as it is very MID on just about any metric you can think of: culture, skiing, bars, climate/weather, topography, outdoor activities, indoor activities etc., etc.
Am I wrong?

Will, 9 months ago to random

I read the WaPo OpEd by Larry Summers and Bono so you don’t have to. Three ideas, loan guarantees for developing nations, restructure African national debts to be less crippling, disburse seized Russian assets to Ukraine. None bad ideas, but I could barely stomach clicking on a link attributed to those two.

Will, 9 months ago to random

I grew up in a time where there was music broadly understood to be for nerds (They Might Be Giants, Weird Al). What is the equivalent today? There have been some groups I thought were contenders that have gone on to broader appeal (OK Go, Tenacious D), but I’m curious if this is still a thing.

Will, 9 months ago to random

Add to the things I’m thankful for, my genes allow me to metabolize booze efficiently: https://www.washingtonpost.com/wellness/2023/08/15/asian-glow-alcohol-gene-mutation-cancer-risk/ For those who can’t, I’m sorry, and on the bright side, at least weed is legal in all the places where it is decent to live, so blaze away, or grab a pack of gummies if you need to be discreet.

Will, 9 months ago to random

Related to all the #MetroBranchTrail content, I finally went to Oppenheimer last night at Alamo, and was quickly able to enlist 7 adult friends to go, 5 of whom rode bikes to get there and back (one as a passenger). These are not my crazy bike fanatic friends, but folks who have gravitated to bikes because we have a safe & growing bike network with lots of stuff to do that is accessible by 2 wheels. A better future is possible! @srepetsk @peter @bikepedantic

Will, 10 months ago to random

@peter I’m seeing Barbie with my kids RN, and we had to go to a 2nd theater (E Street!) b/c all seats at Chinatown were sold out for the day! We got last 5 seats here right against the screen. This movie is a phenomenon. It will restructure how films get greenlit in Hollywood, thankfully. Last year’s big summer movie was Thor 4, this year it’s a fuscia film about a girl’s toy and a near black & white biopic about the bomb. Maybe this ends the era of endless sequels & comic book films.

Will, 10 months ago to random

We had a thread a while back about the most dangerous vehicles based on how they are marketed and who buys them. Well, the list is out, and it is exactly what you'd expect, large trucks and muscle cars lead the way in lethality, followed by the cars that are easiest to steal:
https://www.iihs.org/news/detail/latest-driver-death-rates-highlight-dangers-of-muscle-cars

@peter @BenRossTransit @Alon @BarbChamberlain

Will, 10 months ago to random

Big heavy storm just passed, meaning it’s currently GREAT rainbow weather in DC 🌈

Will, 11 months ago to Ukraine

My intent was to get a good night sleep prior to my trip today, but there is a whole Russian civil war unfolding in real-time, and only place to get news has been social media. So much for sleep. #ukraine #russia I’ll admit a minor amount of PTSD seeing some of the images; scoff if you will, but on J6th, columns of Natl Guard armor rolled past my house on the way to the Capitol, and in that moment, we really didn’t know what was going on. It’s not great being a civilian in a domestic conflict.

Will, 11 months ago to random

You know its jumped the shark when the New York Times gets around to reporting on it:

https://www.nytimes.com/2022/09/14/well/move/gravel-biking.html

Will, 1 year ago to random

When it's slow on this site, my mental state: