Have we forgotten how to build ethical things for the web? – Nic Chan
February 19, 2024
But is that really the case? Every day, I get to work with people who do good work, who care about things like privacy, ethics and accessibility. We exist. We just are drowning, drowning in algorithmically-guarded walled gardens that are nothing more than quagmires of enshittification, of AI-generated content, of snake-oil solutions. It’s like a walking into a jets pray of bullshit, so much so that even those with good intentions get easily overwhelmed.
Source: Have we forgotten how to build ethical things for the web? – Nic Chan
I think a lot about this in the context of building Conffab–from the business model the the features. From seemingly little things like only having thumbs up and not thumbs down ratings, to having moments only available for paying subscribers.
But some of the largest companies (and not just tech–look up Enron, or ‘Unsafe at any speed’), and many smaller, some successful, some not, are built on behaviours and features that are far from ethical, and often not even legal.
But many of us care deeply about the ethics of what we do. So what are we to do?
Nic Chan doesn’t have answers, but he has thoughts.
