This has been the Infinitely Unfolding Paradox of Enjoyment that we’ve been experiencing since the Industrial Revolution. And it’s only become more acute as time has gone on. Things are becoming easier to access, we have more information than ever, it’s right at our fingertips, we have endless entertainment, we expect to be enjoying 100% of endless content—but this has made us angrier than ever at content we don’t enjoy, less able to enjoy the available entertainment, always looking for something better, he information at our fingertips is making us angrier and less satisfied (also somehow more misguided and ignorant—because that information is mixed in with absurd amounts of disinformation and it’s given an equal playing field), and our ease of access comes with an endless desire to access more and more while finding less and less we actually want.

Things are technically getting better, enjoyment is becoming a pinpointed prescription…but more and better is making us lesser and worse.

We need the bad to more enjoy the good. We need the inconvenience to enjoy the convenience. We need a lack of technology to enjoy the available technology.

Really, what this all boils down to is this:

Capitalism is destroying everything. In so many words. And if anyone can’t see how everything above is linked with capitalism and its driving force of profit (and endlessly growing profit, at that), I dunno how to help you. But I assume everyone on lemmy is pretty much very, very aware of this.

Those weren’t necessarily seen as inconveniences at the time, because people had not experienced the “easier” alternatives to compare to. They were just seen as the way things were, and people made the best of them just we do with day to day activities now.

Going to the video rental place was part of the weekend routine for me, blended in with shopping etc. One of the rental places I used to go to also sold music, and tickets for local events. They also had a bunch of posters and notices up about local happenings. Customers would often bump into friends and acquaintances while browsing. The rental place also had a letter box that returns could be dropped in when the store was closed, so rentals would often be returned Monday morning on the way to school/work.

Media distribution has now changed a lot from then, and it’s become easier and more efficient. But it’s also changed how we interact with media, and with our communities, and perhaps not always for the better.

Remember when you got to choose what you watch and you had to pick up a remote and look at it on a rectangle?

-Future us, maybe

Back then it was something to do. Now we’ve gotten rid of all those things to do for the sake of laziness, but we have nothing left to do but sit around the house and watch/play downloaded movies/games. And everyone wonders why they’re bored and no longer have any friends.

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All the time and attention that digital everything saves us has been turned into ad space.

Doing something real like driving to blockbuster for instance used to be your time. Sights, sounds, someone’s hand in yours, a song on the radio. We used to own those moments, for free. Those things were your memories. Trading all that for “convenience” seems like a bum deal to me. Maybe I’m just getting old.

I wonder if there’d be any viability to a retro game rental place. You can rent an RGB-modded NES, an OSSC to hook it up to your modern TV, or even a PVM. Games on the shelf to take home, too.

Wouldn’t expect to get rich off of it, but maybe enough to pay rent on the shop and give a few people a living wage.

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That’s… not what he said at all

1. Those were obviously separate days

2. I’d date him, that sounds lovely