While I agree that #1 and #2 are the biggest drivers for acquiring Roomba, I find it hard to imagine Amazon executives not actively discussing in-home robotics as a vector for increased data collection. It might be a few years out, but it will happen.
There are a lot of strange spots in Russia. I was looking at a spot south of the Pechora Sea on the light pollution map, then comparing it with Google Maps/Earth. I can't see anything that would correlate with that much light.
I thought the exact same thing about the web as being a library. It's nice hearing someone else say it, it's validating.
However, I feel like it's moved more in the direction of being like broadcast television: lots of content that's designed to be consumed once and then forgotten. Maybe the television analogy oversimplifies the matter. Still, I think the more that content creators view their content as going into a permanent library, the better the quality.
I disabled my Facebook account 4 years or so ago and didn't miss it. That said, I now have a daughter with an extremely rare genetic disorder. Although there are a number of databases out there specifically to help parents find other families with rare genetic disorders, we didn't find anyone until we resorted to Facebook. This is only one anecdote, but from my personal experience thus far, Facebook is still unfortunately the best place to find a needle in a haystack.
This is my same experience. Son has JIA. There is a JIA-specific website that connects you to JIA-specific support groups.... but there are none active near me, and I live in a very big city. I expressed this frustration to my wife who uses Facebook often, and she joined an active JIA community in moments.
I guess now we have two anecdotes. That makes us a statistic, I think?
(edit: typo) FB has completely swallowed the Groups space. We are new parents and my wife connects with other new parents in a local group specific to our son's age cohort. FB Marketplace is also very useful, as other people have mentioned. I got off FB services a few months ago, but would join again if they had a standalone Groups app.
My theory is that every book written about the fall of the Roman Empire is more about the political climate of the time it was written and the political perspective of the author writing it.
In the mid- to late-00s when sentiment against the Iraq was its peak, I remember seeing the claim that Rome fell because of military overreach and being in a constant state of war. On the more right-leaning side, I remember seeing the claim that Rome fell because Rome became a weakened, welfare state.
Obviously there are real reasons why Rome fell, it just seems to me that more often than not the explanation for its fall is a reflection of the times in which it was written.
edit The word "every" in the first sentence is too strong. I stand by the general sentiment, though.
I've always thought of technology as being the sole driver behind the fragmentation of communities into small niche communities. It's interesting seeing that comments appear to be one aspect of technological change that drive people to seek niche communities (going off of another comment that it's better to frequent smaller subreddits rather than the larger, default ones).
