I remember when the internet was first becoming a thing.

There was a great Qwest commercial shortly thereafter about the future of society with something like the internet in it. It had a woman (if I remember right) standing at a concierge counter asking what movies were available at the hotel.

The conceit I believe was that this future hotel had the internet so the person at the counter said, “We have every movie ever made in any language – ever.”

That’s the future that very much could’ve been but that we’ll never get.

In fact due to copyright and greed, we’re likely only to be able to access tiny and uncontroversial parts of our culture in the future.

Note that this is already occurring.

The difference between what could’ve been and what will occur is so vast it’s almost painful.

I can’t use streaming because 90% of the movies I want to watch just aren’t there. And it’s getting worse, not better.

I had better selection at a crap VHS rental store in a hick town in 1988.

The goal of corporations now is to pillage and pilfer our shared culture and rent it back to us at exorbitant and ever-increasing prices.

And they are doing so with nary a protest from us.

Perhaps in that respect we deserve what we get.