Here, I’m talking FinTech specifically, but this applies to most other industries, too…
There’s a (very large, publicly-owned) transaction platform and online payment provider shutting down in Australia, next month. It started in 2006, and was useful because it allowed you to avoid card surcharges and bank fees. It was particularly useful for large, instant payments like for flights.
Why is it shutting down? Not because of a security breach, or any issues within the product itself, but because the Big 4 banks here want to kill off their competition, and have forcibly removed the ability for their customers to use the service. They then followed this up with relentless paid propaganda around “security” and how the system is “outdated, so use our in-house product instead”.
I encountered something similar from my bank, recently, while looking at overseas travel cards…
Yet millennials and zoomers lap up the propaganda, just like they do against cash, and think that anyone who still uses these products is a “tech illiterate boomer”. They actively called for the banning of the service I mention, because their banks told them “It bad. Trust us instead.”
Yet these same stupid fucks will happily sign all their private info and banking over to social media companies and shitty crypto exchanges, because “tech”, and shiny new thing, so must be good…
The Kool Aid sure is strong, with my generation and younger, smh… 😑
Can’t wait until we all get de-banked for not being woke enough, and then have no alternatives because we allowed them to develop monopolies on our finances, lol…
Meanwhile I'm over here as a millenial ass deep in technology as my goddamn profession and the only reason I jettisoned my original flip phone for a stripped down flip phone that can't access the internet is because they literally took away the 3G network.
New technology is shit on a number of levels. I was discussing this with my coworker today and he was telling me how people actually seek out farm equipment that's 40 years old because it runs better and lasts longer than anything you can buy brand new on the market right now. I'm sure that problem is more widespread than we're aware of and it doesn't sit well with me.
Old farm equipment can also be repaired. Modern shit has every part with a unique identifier and if you so much as replace a belt the whole thing will refuse to fucking work because you didn't go to an approved repair shop that'll gouge you.
is that what the hoopla around John Deere is?
Basically. John Deere isn't the only company that does it, but they're the best known. They also use proprietary tools and fasteners that require specialized tools to undo.
Isn't this the primary reason to get older farm equipment? It doesn't run better, or lasts longer, it's just repairable without an IT degree. :')
Australia is currently trying to ban (the purchase of) old farm equipment (40/50+ years old), under the guise of “accidents”, so that’s an appropriate point!
When people actively choose not to buy the new, centrally-controlled, all-digital shit..? Then they just ban you from being able to buy and use the alternative, old stuff, lol…
I hear the Australia is like that, always trying to ban shit for 'your own good'. It's so interfering and condescending. Whatever happened to individuals willingly assuming risk on their own behalf? Or does the Australian government think you're its property?
(I was going to fix 'the Australia' but I decided to leave it in because it's funny)
I've said this in another post but my grandfather still uses the Farmall tractor his father bought in the 50's. There is absolutely incredible stuff to be found at farm auctions these days, mostly stuff from a, sadly, bygone age.
I'm also a millennial ass deep in technology as my goddamn profession and agree. Tech sucks. So much time and resources are spent on UI/UX (I fucking hate that "UX" is even a thing) these days hat no one really knows how to do anything other than what is explicitly presented. No one is hacking anymore, no one seems to be curious, everything just werks. Until it doesn't.
As for cell phones, you can put one together yourself with off the shelf stuff, at least in the US. It's going to be a very simple device but they do work.
I had a kid come into my work for "work placement" Got told their password didn't work. Tried myself, worked fine. Logged out, asked them to log in. They proceeded to attempt to use the shift key on a keyboard like a toggle button from a smart phone or tablet. Kid had never even used a PC in their life.
I disagree about UX design. I think it is important but can admit that it has allowed the filthy unwashed masses in which has lead to catastrophic ruin.
Git is my go-to example of why UX design is important. That tool is an abomination of interface design and I will fight anyone who tries to tell me different.
For my own tool building, I make a conscious effort to make things work in a way that will encourage users (other sysadmins in this case) to adopt the tools because they're straight forward and easy to use. There is no excuse for an interface to be as badly designed as Git. Absolutely none.
There is one, potentially unintended, benefit. Gatekeeping. In a public access platform that benefits from preemptively filtering out some of the junk, an interface that is unfriendly to novices is an easy way to ensure only the capable and motivated stick around to use your resources.
If only idiots got filtered! Then you wouldn't have the commie infestation changing the default branch name from master to main.
I've got one old tool I still occasionally use at work that's an old text-based terminal system. Love it. Once you spend the couple hours learning to use it it works flawlessly. Every time. It brings up what I need to know in seconds.
All the new stuff is a jumbled assortment of bad Javascript and 30 different backend systems that never work right. Oh crap, I have to clear my cookies because I'm getting a spinny circle instead of the info I'm looking for. Oh that one particular cloud system is having issues somehow sorry you can't get those little icons you need to click on to do work until we fix it. It's all so fucking slow too. I could never be a developer, because I just couldn't make that shit.
Older kitchen appliances as well. Pressure cookers, blenders and others were called dangerous while the designs changed to cheaper parts.
I'm a tech guy who specifically uses new tech for figuring out how to use it for stories. Quite often I deal with people who think that something existing means everything changes tomorrow. It's not as easy as they think and it's a good idea to have experience in the field already to work with it. I can get concept art from AI, but I have to know what I need and how to set it up before I get the art I want. I don't just sit down and the AI faeries print it out in perfect order that even a child could understand.