Nothing has aged me into a decomposing wreck quite like witnessing the enshittification of google. I feel like an ancient blathering relic when I hear "what did you do before chatgpt?"
Bitch I had google. I could summon the vast expanse of human knowledge with a few choice keystrokes. I could find recipes made by real human beings, written on unknown blogs because their recipe so closely matched my search terms. I could find entire research papers based off of barely remembered tidbits of them.
But now. The search engine that taught me basic particle physics & niche baking techniques & exposed me to brilliant comic artists & bloggers and more, is now a glorified chat bot.
A thing that hallucinates when its programming indicates that inventing is more efficient than copying. A thing that will amalgamate that vast expanse of human knowledge, which it alone can access, into its ever churning soup, but will no longer take me to the sources directly.
The gateway that used to bring me knowledge is now just a fire hose that sprays bullshit. Feels like watching the Library of Alexandria burn.
