[Video] 2024 Will Continue a Lessened Focus on the World Wide Web and HTTPS (a Steadily Perishing Protocol)
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Diversifying Online
Creative Commons Attribution-No Derivative Works 4.0
TODAY'S first video speaks about Techrights not only as a site (on the shrinking World Wide Web) but a capsule in Gemini, an IRC community, IPFS and so on. It has been a long time since we last did a video on these sorts of topics and we now have built-in redundancy (multi-location) to make us more robust in case of hardware issues, network outages etc.
We had a strong year in 2023 (so did GNU/Linux, whose usage is surging), partly because I left my job at the end of last year. Throughout the year we witnessed loads of Microsoft layoffs and wrote over 3,000 posts/articles - highest since 2010!
Those publications received plenty of views (new audience) and fortunately used protocols other than HTTP/S, yet the video complains about insane "bloat" in IPFS (using up power and bandwidth like crazy) and likewise in the "modern" Web. We try to introduce readers to new protocols, alternative routes. We need to get back to "basics".
To avoid this article covering the same points as the video, let's consider what causes Microsoft's demise and what comes next. Microsoft forged alliances with hardware companies/OEMs that want to sell as many computers as possible rather than make a robust product that lowers the demand for future products (sales). This demonstrates that technology can intentionally be hostile towards its users. Bloat is, to these companies, highly desirable. Optimisation is not.
One possible reason for the AI bubble which was discussed already was that Microsoft has unviably large amount of overprovisioned and underutilized Azure services which it can burn on LLMs, someone has explained. Another possible reason could be that Microsoft software bloat has not kept up with x86 advances. Remember the Wintel duopoly used to play off each other to keep businesses buying new hardware and software in alternation. Even as bloated as Vista 10 and Vista 11 are, they are not going to strain. Thus a second reason for forcing TPM dependencies, but perhaps mostly by adding LLMs to the OS it can be that Microsoft has found a way to bloat out the software enough to require new more powerful hardware, independent of the DRM / TPM problem.
When it comes to browsers, making the Web more bloated and complex is a way to weed out competition. Microsoft did what with MSIE (e.g. ActiveX) and Google does does the same in collaboration with Mozilla, which it controls if not practically owns.
When it comes to the hardware required, "psydroid" (in IRC) asks, "is there anything to say about how Microsoft is scrambling to come to terms with RISC-V (partnerships), which is being portrayed as a China thing that is meant for China due to sanctions imposed on Chinese companies, so they can't use x86 and arm? The world of technology is looking increasingly scary and polarised - more about "national security" than the best technology to get things done. [...] I had a discussion on a website these past few days and the arguments used don't look sincere, but are used more to justify the status quo."
As we originally planned 1.5 years ago, this site was converted in full to static pages, lowering the load on the server by orders of magnitude and making it viable to serve even from a very low-end machine. This is not good for hardware companies. But it is very good for the planet. █