At first, the collector in me was titillated. Nice packaging & all that. Plus, maybe a new digital format that could have Hi-Res audio, etc.!
So what’s the catch?
This piece of trash is granting only temporary, non-permanent access to music rather than true ownership. The format uses a physical cartridge that acts as a digital key, unlocking the album via a proprietary app for 24-hour intervals. Once the period ends, the user must reconnect the cartridge, and if the app is discontinued or the hardware fails, the music becomes inaccessible.
So yes, more paying for things you’ll never own and for which access can be removed at any time, as soon as the company changes their terms or goes under.
With Sony’s recent removal of Studio Canal’s movies from their platform + the same Sony’s announcement that games on discs are soon to be a thing of the past + Rockstar games letting folks know that buying a physical copy of Grand Theft Auto VI basically means buying a plastic box (no disc inside, just a d/l code), 2026 has already been a new landmark in the Enshittification of Everything.
First off, wow. This is fucking brazen. I’d think this was an Onion article if I didn’t know better.
Second, who does this appeal to? Are people actually buying these things? I’m not in any way a physical item sort of fellow, but the people I know who collect do so because of the perceived benefits of the physical items, whether it’s the “vinyl sounds better” mindset or large and well-done album art or just having a shelf full of “things”, this doesn’t seem to really check any of those boxes as a replacement, and has some pretty blatant downsides (none of which are immediately apparent from their website). That said, I’m completely out of touch with the yoots these days, maybe this is exactly what Gen Z wants - album in Tamagotchi form?
The kids would call me a doomer, but I can’t think of a single part of modern culture that’s better than it was 10 years ago.
On top of all that, CA just signed into law a tax on digital software purchases, which would cover stuff like PSN, tax prep software, VSTs, etc. So add 10% to the cost of all software starting 2027.
According to the website, over 10 million copies have been sold so far. for ~1k titles released. That’s an average of 10,000 copies sold per title. Mind-boggling, I know.
Kids will learn in time, as they grow old. Unfortunately for them, they’ve mostly known the worst of the last 50 years or so but they don’t know that, because they weren’t there before.
Note that I am not a grandpa who thinks “everything was better before/in my day”. There are MANY things that are better in 2026.
I’m only highlighting this now widespread strange trend, which feels like progress going backwards, just to screw over people as much as possible for maximum profit. See also: out of control planned obsolescence, subscription everything, AI everything, etc.
The tide is not turning, nothing’s going to change for the average consumer, this likely only happened (finally, after 11 years) because it’s agri-related, but damn if I won’t take it. At the very least I hope the news emboldens more people to try and claim ownership of their property. A tiny crack in the wall of enshittification.
I was thinking about this yesterday a bit more and what feels bad isn’t so much that business is being shitty, it’s that they’re being allowed to get away with it. Like, if my taxes were going up BUT the government was doing things that actually helped me then that would be one thing. But no, they seem to ignore the real problems, glad hand their way through another term, and things just keep getting worse.
Housing is as unaffordable as ever. Cars are as unaffordable as ever (and not great IF you could afford to buy something new from a long-term ownership perspective). Computers are just… well I’ve been saying for a bit now that we let the nerds take over the world and they are being just as much dickheads as any jock ever was. Personally, I am on board to go back to treating nerds like shit (not people who hang out online, but the people who make their entire personality computers and other nerd shit). Give 'em the wedgies, the offices in closets, and the ignorance of the masses.
In case you couldn’t tell I’m pissed. From head to toe I just want to punch someone in the throat a lot of days. I try to distract myself. I try to push that down and better my own life in the little ways that I can. But it’s always there simmering in the background, and the more bullshit I see the harder it gets to put that feeling away.
That’s the monster that Citizens United created. Corporations write the laws, the bought politicians and Supreme Court implement them, the people constantly lose.
And we can at least thank the EU for standardizing USB-C. I mean, my family and girlfriend still all have lightning phones, but them all getting on USB-C when they upgrade is one thing I can look forward to.
I’m of two minds about this. I wholeheartedly give props to the EU on their right to repair laws and holding companies to account to their customers. I also think it’s a great thing that Apple complied and made the Mac Neo actually serviceable (no glue, no funky ‘security’ screws) and provide common parts, and hope that trend continues and expands to other companies.
On the other hand, Apple did the bare minimum, as expected in today’s consumer climate. I don’t see anything about setting reasonable limits for the cost of said parts and tools. AFAIK it’s still impossible to get a legit board schematic from Apple and they still actively litigate people that try to distribute them. You not only cannot buy individual ICs and board components for repair, Apple ferociously protects their supply chain from outside sales through their legal department under the banner of intellectual property.
The real problem is there’s nothing in the EU laws that define what a component is. You’ve always been able to get a Mac repaired - take it to the Apple store, they’ll tell you there’s liquid damage (because they have what amounts to rigged moisture sensors that turn if you breath on them wrong), deny any warranty claim and then offer to replace the whole motherboard for 3/4 the cost of a new laptop, and then try to upsell you a new laptop. Because the whole board is a ‘component’- even if it’s a 5 cent failed resistor. I don’t see any of that changing. If something other than a screen or battery or whatever limited ‘parts’ they offer is busted, you’re in the same old boat and they get to ship another unit.
I get it - most people aren’t going to do that fix. Hell, most repair shops aren’t going to do that fix. But the fact that we’re blatantly discouraged from even trying means the companies still hold most of the cards and can exact high prices for parts and service. I also understand there’s a limit to all this and we get into “go collect sand to extract silicon to make chips” sort of silliness at some point, but nobody’s asking for the proprietary code, nobody at home is trying to reverse engineer a Macbook and make their own, they just want to be able to fix the thing they were sold, and companies are going to do everything under whatever law to make sure we can’t.
I guess my whole point of that screed is that while this is good, at least on the surface, no amount of legal wrangling is going to save us from Board of Directors demanding profit at all cost. It’s baked into the system and whatever laws are put in place will be conformed to in the best way to make the most money for the people holding the reigns to the detriment of the customer.
Right. It’s more about celebrating small victories while building bigger ones and reminding corporations that they can’t, in fact, do whatever the fuck they want (outside of the US at least).
Additionally, some European countries’ pushback - ditching of specific software - is another step in the right direction.
For sure. It’s amazing the stark difference from what’s happening in the US - attempts at mandating “age verification” in Linux (to protect all the 11 year olds bootstrapping Arch), the hoopla over 3d printing, data centers and AI being given carte blanche both federally and in a lot of states and on and on, all by our governing bodies. And of course the jingoistic rallying cry of “China can’t have AI like us!” mirroring McCarthy-era “The Russians can’t have a bomb like ours” to get the masses on board. Pretty insane how the US government treats rampant enshittification as a feature and not a bug. Even more insane how most people grumble about it and then go back to watching Love Island.
In the meantime, the EU get to look like the only sane governing body in the world, unless the right-wing fear mongers start to grab power. I really hope they stay the course. Like you, I’ll take any hope I can get right now.
Sadly, we have been constantly getting closer to that for decades and even the “Trump experience” didn’t result in any kind of retardation moment so far…
(I could talk a lot about BS in EU politics, but I gotta say it pales in comparison atm…)
I don’t know, man. I’ve been buying less shit that I don’t need, going in deeper on the shit I already have, rejecting DRM bullshittery (most of the time - Udemy is pretty bitchin’), embracing the FOSS ecosystem and just sort of grooving in my own little bubble. Obviously I don’t like when things intentionally get shittier, either (or more expensive), but I’ve turned a lot of people in my personal life onto Linux (I let them ask first, I’m not religious) and they also seem happier with what they’ve already got once switching over, and especially happier not to have to shell out more money for a lackluster experience for a few years before they’re forced to upgrade again.
Grabbing old books from the IA / Goodwill never felt so good, and past knowledge has never felt so important / sacred. These are purely selfish points, of course, and there are real issues that are way bigger than any of this, but I love having people ask me about computers again and being genuinely interested in reflecting a little on their relationship with technology because, well, I live for this shit, and I get to learn way more about things along the way, too.
I see this as the main issue, really. Nothing is going to change until the lowest common denominator cancels their subscriptions and decides it’s just not worth it anymore. Unfortunately that means we have a really, really long way to go.
This was the best unexpected chuckle I’ve had in a while
On the old books front, there’s Gutenberg lib .org. They have all public domain books you can read online or download for free in a bunch of formats. I read War and Peace and Tale of Genji that way.
