• Shardikprime@lemmy.world
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    6 hours ago

    Yellow pages were basically that collection.

    And at least on my country, depending on your phone company it was free to get

    But the convenience of having up to date info on a website that you could search from home won against that

    It’s not just cApItAlIsM. It’s people’s choices

    • wheeldawg@sh.itjust.works
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      2 hours ago

      Yes, that’s why I mentioned it. But now it CAN be updated constantly. We don’t need a book of phone numbers anymore, we need a directory of links to them. We need to be able to filter what we need beyond just through the alphabet and what we assume it would be filed under.

      And, most importantly, we need laws that strictly limit any commercial mention whatsoever outside of that whatever you call it. Directory sounds like a decent word, but a marketer would have a more modern term for it.

      I don’t know how it could be default sorted fairly it anytime, I’m not pretending to solve that problem. I’m just saying we would all be better off if we never had to see ads ever, at all, unless we were specifically in the market for something. Never waiting on a commercial for TV or streaming regardless of subscription tier, etc etc.

      Obviously it doesn’t cost anything to use, and the motivation for keeping it updated falls on the business trying to make sure they can be found. It’s just a win for everybody except billionaires trying to condition people with ads now.