Unpopular opinion: The missing business model for websites is killing the web. If there was a platform that would distribute a monthly fee to the websites we visit, the web would be much better.

50% could be allocated through traffic, 50% by choice. I could pay 20€ a month for example. Some would go to lemmy, some to my local newspaper, some to my favorite YouTube channels, authors or bloggers.

If enough people did this, investigative journalism would be funded, product testers wouldn't be reliant on sponsoring and hobbyists could gain serious funding without selling out.

Unpopular opinion: The missing business model for websites is killing the web. If there was a platform that would distribute a monthly fee to the websites we visit, the web would be much better.

50% could be allocated through traffic, 50% by choice. I could pay 20€ a month for example. Some would go to lemmy, some to my local newspaper, some to my favorite YouTube channels, authors or bloggers.

If enough people did this, investigative journalism would be funded, product testers wouldn't be reliant on sponsoring and hobbyists could gain serious funding without selling out.

We're soon going to end up back in the early/mid 90s where the only way to find something is via a internet yellowpages.. only this time, not because search engines dont exist yet, but because they are completely worthless garbage.

Don't forget to put your website on a webring!
https://.ws/

Man I miss the old internet..

I would love a if there was a standard websites would use to receive donations. An integrated browser addon that track what you visit and gives you a review before distributing funds after each month would be great. It should accumulate money to avoid transaction fees for tiny amounts.

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

I'm not a huge fan of Ed Zitron generally, he leans towards histrionic too much for my tastes, but he makes a compelling case here.

Listen man, if thats what you think is best, you keep using them and try to effect change, good luck, im just not going to use services like that and have the problem solved for myself. Let me know when you've made something happen and I'll even apologise.

As another commenter put it, the approaches are not mutually exclusive. I've ditched most of Googles services over the past 5 years:

• Pixel --> Pixel w/ Graphene (If Graphene ever makes their own hardware, I will drop my Pixel in an instant)
• Gmail --> ProtonMail
• Google Calendar --> Proton Calendar
• Google.com --> Duckduckgo.com
• Google PlayStore --> FDroid
• Google Docs/Sheets --> Libre Office
• Google Keep --> Obsidian w/ sync
• Google Maps --> Organic Maps
• Google Home (never had this shit to begin with) --> Self-hosted Home Assistant

And I plan to continue that trend. I've personally gotten many of my friends and family to make these switches as well.

I don't need (or want) your weird, hypothetical, backhanded apology. However, I think you inadvertently carry water for Google when you muster up this false sense of superiority and blame everyone else for the problems that greedy tech bros create. But hey, if you simply can't stop yourself, then maybe adopt a more positive approach to getting people to switch, rather than assuming that everyone is dumber than you. Good luck!

I'm not butthurt. Just trying to help you.

Idk man, really seems like you have a hurt butt, try icing it maybe.

Unpopular opinion: The missing business model for websites is killing the web. If there was a platform that would distribute a monthly fee to the websites we visit, the web would be much better.

50% could be allocated through traffic, 50% by choice. I could pay 20€ a month for example. Some would go to lemmy, some to my local newspaper, some to my favorite YouTube channels, authors or bloggers.

If enough people did this, investigative journalism would be funded, product testers wouldn't be reliant on sponsoring and hobbyists could gain serious funding without selling out.

mostly shit already. ymmv

More time per click is such a useless metric for the end user.

Where do monopolies get their money?

Beep boop butthurt.

mostly shit already. ymmv

From the consumers of necessary services that they have wholly captured...?

Sounds like you want to nationalise the internet and all its services.

If only we could pay for a worthwhile internet via taxes.