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Counterculture? Do you think you have to be counterculture not to know who Paul Graham is? What the fuck lol. Ask anyone outside of your little bubble and they won't have a fucking clue.

Edit: The above was needlessly confrontational. I don't know you and it was uncalled for. I just fucking despise Silicon Valley.

This is like praising an "author" who self-publishes hundreds of AI-ghostwritten novels a day and then preemptively defending against criticism by going "He's not naive. These aren't books of typo-filled, grammatically incorrect crap".

good for you. you're still supporting google by using a chromium-based browser

It's worth being careful with broad characterizations like this. Attributing complex policy opposition to fringe beliefs or bad faith motives oversimplifies the issue and shuts down good faith discussion. Whatever one’s views, that kind of framing isn’t helpful.

I don't have to be "interested" in seeing something on steam to disagree with nkrisc. I don't care about 99.9%+ of the games on steam, that doesn't mean I want them gone.

The issues you're talking about (surveillance capitalism, the attention economy) aren’t just browser problems. They're systemic societal and economic forces that go far beyond what a browser can fix. People accept surveillance and attention-hacking in every part of their lives: phones, smart TVs, credit cards, physical store visits. Thinking a better browser setup will meaningfully push back against that feels..... extremely optimistic at best. And that's me being quite charitable in my choice of words.

Also, I think it’s worth noting that you seem to be arguing against points no one here is actually making. Most people in this thread — myself included — aren’t claiming Gemini is a replacement for the entire web, or that it can dismantle surveillance capitalism. We’re just discussing a tool that works well for certain use cases.

As bayindirh pointed out in another reply to you:

> Again for the third and last time: I and other people replying to you didn't say Gemini is a replacement to HTTP. It's a neat little protocol which does some things well and used for some use cases, which happens to my main use cases for the thingy called web. > I have no qualms with your choices with views, but to try to portray your confirmation bias as what I and others say is stuffing words to others' mouth and is an insult to people's intelligence.

A conversation only works when people respond to what’s actually being said — not to imagined arguments. I’d really appreciate it if you could take a step back and engage with the points people are making, rather than framing everyone as advocating for something they’re not.

Quoting you:

> Problem: you are looking for a way to get rid of the annoying issues of the modern www. What is the solution that solves this with the least amount of work?

Talk about shifting the goalposts! If the idea is to dismantle surveillance capitalism and the attention economy, sure, Gemini won't get us there. But neither will Firefox or browser extensions.

You're talking a major political, societal and cultural revolution here, and for that I don't think "least amount of work" is something to be aiming for.

A large C file isn't inherently wrong if it's all part of the same thing.

Why do you hope it gets removed? Personally I'd prefer to keep it - removing it would be another (small, but still) step in the corporate homogenization of everything.

You're still trying to invalidate my experience because it doesn’t align with your criteria for what's “necessary.” But I'm not trying to solve your problems. I'm solving mine, in a way that works for me. Your browser ideas wouldn't solve anything for me.

You seem to keep asking for some airtight, utilitarian justification, but not everything people build or use needs to pass through that filter. Some things exist because they offer a different perspective, and that difference can be meaningful even if it doesn't optimize for mainstream efficiency or convenience.

No one's asking you to switch protocols. Most Gemini users don't "switch" protocols, they still use the web alongside Gemini. No one's asking you to even keep replying to any of this. Just leave the thread and forget that Gemini ever existed for all I care. But insisting that the only valid solutions are the ones you’ve pre-approved is a great way to miss the value in approaches that don’t look like yours. And that's exactly what you keep doing.

Seriously, you're the one who's been out of line here: dismissive, condescending, and acting like curiosity itself needs to justify its existence to you. It doesn’t. If you don't like Gemini, all you have to do is look away.

That's not up to you to say. If it solves the issues I have with the modern web, it is an actual solution for me. And if changing my browser or installing extensions does nothing to solve the issues I have with the modern web, then that's not even on the table.

A solution that works for a niche... works for that niche. It's not like your solution of switching your browser or installing extensions universally solves anything. I absolutely despise the user experience of Firefox (which you suggested elsewhere) and ads aren't even close to the top of the list of my issues with the modern web.

Once again, what annoys you may or may not annoy me and what annoys me may or may not annoy you.

You're framing this whole conversation as if there's a single, universally agreed-upon set of "problems with the modern web." You're also treating it as though the only valid solutions are the ones that address your version of those problems in the most efficient way possible.

But your original suggestion (installing a handful of browser extensions) doesn’t do much for someone whose interests go beyond tracking scripts, ads, or page weight. For someone who values different aesthetics, a slower pace of change, or the creative possibilities of working within tight constraints, then Gemini might feel like a very practical solution. It may not solve your problems, but it might solve theirs.

As I mentioned earlier, I still use the web. Gemini is not a replacement for me. But using it changes the way I experience the web. Gemini’s minimalism helps me notice and appreciate different aspects of modern web technologies. Likewise, the complexity and richness of the web always makes coming back to Gemini feel like a breath of fresh air. These perspectives can coexist without being contradictory. Not every tool needs to solve every problem. Sometimes I want to spend hours cooking something elaborate. Other times I just want to eat a banana.

Enjoyment is also a valid reason to use a tool. You can take something seriously and still appreciate it for what it is, not only for what it reacts against.

That “alcoholic” metaphor? Seriously, what the hell. You don’t have to like Gemini, but reducing the people who use it to self-loathing addicts is ridiculous.

I use Gemini because I enjoy it. That’s it. It’s fun. It’s weird. It scratches an itch that the modern web doesn’t. Maybe that’s not your thing — fine. But why does someone’s personal enjoyment of a simpler protocol have to be pathologized?

Not everything needs to be justified by some grand ideological framework. Sometimes people just like stuff — and that’s enough. You claim to want to understand different perspectives, but this kind of framing makes it pretty clear you’ve already decided which ones are valid.

If you're really trying to steelman Gemini, maybe start by recognizing that people can engage with technology for all kinds of reasons — curiosity, aesthetics, nostalgia, minimalism, fun — and they don’t owe you a manifesto to justify it.

It's worth remembering that people are drawn to projects like Gemini for a range of reasons. That's not a weakness, it's a feature. One person might use it as a minimalist publishing platform. Another might enjoy the simplicity or find it a helpful alternative to today's web. Others might engage with it as a space for experimentation. These aren't contradictory; they’re just different use cases reflecting different priorities.

Saying that "better user agents exist" may be true for some people’s needs, but not everyone shares the same definition of "better." You're welcome to recommend user agents you think are worth trying — many of us are curious and open-minded — but it’s not really about convincing everyone to see things your way. Preferences aren’t problems to be solved.

And honestly, for a lot of us, Gemini isn’t some war we're waging. It’s a community project, a space to build and share things that resonate with us. If it doesn’t click for you, that’s fine. But calling it "masturbatory" or "playing with miniature soldiers" doesn’t add anything meaningful to the conversation. It just makes it harder for others to engage in good faith — and that’s unfortunate, because thoughtful disagreement is welcome. Dismissiveness isn't.

Your use of "they" here is misleading. Many, if not most, people in the Gemini community see no need for Titan. The existence of a new protocol doesn’t imply that Gemini is somehow lacking. A Gemini client that doesn’t support Titan is still a fully-featured Gemini client.

Additionally, your description of Spartan is simply incorrect. There are several significant differences between it and Gemini - the most obvious being that Spartan doesn’t use TLS at all!