The Internet Doesn't Want Readers. It Wants Livestock.
Gareth's been in a mood all week.
Turns out it started with a hosting bill.
Not his own, mind. He doesn't have a website. Gareth thinks websites are for people who've run out of pub to shout in. But he heard about someone switching platforms, and it set him off on one of his tangents, the kind that starts with "you know what really gets me" and ends forty minutes later with him accusing a cookie banner of moral cowardice.
Apparently someone had moved from a platform that wanted to squeeze money out of their audience to one that just let them publish words on a page, and Gareth treated this as evidence that civilisation might not be completely dead after all.
So here's Gareth, unedited, more or less.
They Don't Want Readers. They Want Leads.
"Right," he says, "so you go onto a website. Doesn't matter what for. Recipe. News story. Some bloke's opinion on lawnmowers. And before you've read a single word, there's a pop-up. Subscribe to our newsletter. Then a cookie banner the size of a shipping container. 'We value your privacy,' which is corporate for 'we are about to do something to your privacy and we need you to click a button so it's legally your fault.'"
He's not wrong.
He's rarely wrong, which is the annoying thing about Gareth.
"And here's what gets me. It's not even hidden any more. They say it. 'Convert your audience.' 'Optimise your funnel.' 'Capture leads.' You're not a reader. You're livestock. They're not writing for you, they're farming you."
The Swiss Army Knife Nobody Asked For
Gareth's next complaint is about tools that do everything, which he blames, somewhat unfairly, on WordPress, Amazon, his smart TV, and the self-checkout at the Co-op.
"Everything wants to be everything now. You want to write a blog post, you end up needing a plugin, three widgets, and a decision about whether you're building a 'brand.' You wanted a blade. They sold you a multi-tool with forty-seven attachments, thirty of which exist to track what you do with the other seventeen."
This is, Gareth insists, not really about software.
It's about a way of thinking that's eaten the internet whole: the idea that nothing exists unless it's growing, and nothing grows unless it's measured, and nothing gets measured without someone, somewhere, harvesting your attention like it's a crop.
"Engagement," he says, spitting the word out like it's gone off. "Everything's about engagement now. Not whether it's good. Not whether it's true. Whether it engages. You can engage someone by setting their house on fire, mind. Doesn't make it a good idea."
The Radical Act of Not Being a Pest
Here Gareth brightens slightly, which for Gareth means he stops shouting and starts merely muttering with intent.
"But here's the thing. People are getting tired of it. There's a whole lot of them now, quietly building websites that don't do any of that.
No tracking.
No pop-ups.
No 'sign up before you leave!'
No cookies, because they've got nothing to put in the cookie.
Just writing.
Just reading.
Revolutionary stuff, apparently, in 2026."
He's talking, without quite knowing the word for it, about what people call "enshittification." Platforms start out useful. Then they reorganise themselves to squeeze every last drop out of you, until using them feels like walking through a car park full of clamps.
"You know what the actual radical act is now?" Gareth asks, entirely rhetorically, because he's not going to let anyone else answer.
"Building something that doesn't immediately try to pick your pocket, raid your inbox, or rifle through your browser history.
No email.
No data.
No 'we value your privacy' while nicking it out of your back pocket.
Just here's a thing I wrote, read it if you like, off you go."
Gareth's Verdict
"They spent twenty years building an internet that wants to sell you something before you've finished the first sentence.
And now the biggest insult you can pay it is to build a page that just... doesn't.
No funnel.
No leads.
No growth hacking.
Just a bloke, typing, hoping someone reads it because they wanted to, not because a pop-up cornered them into it."
He pauses, looking vaguely proud of himself.
"Anyway. That's not a business model, is it?
That's just manners."
He pauses again, a beat of false modesty.
"...mind you, no one's ever paid me for my manners either."
No, Gareth. It isn't a business model.
It's just manners.
Shame there's so little of it left.
First Published on GrumpyWelshman.com