what if ram buyout is part of a greater attack on personal computing
any other indicators?
the pattern would be: make personal computing expensive, complicated, and unnecessary while making cloud dependence cheap, simple, and required. whether coordinated or emergent, the trajectory is similar - computing power migrating from personal ownership to rental access.
possible indicators:
hardware consolidation:
* RAM concentrated in data centers, not consumer hands
* repair parts increasingly scarce or locked down (right-to-repair battles)
* custom silicon (M-series, Snapdragon X) that's harder to upgrade or swap
* soldered components becoming standard even in "pro" machines
software centralization:
* operating systems pushing cloud dependencies (win 11's ms account requirements, ChromeOS model)
* Adobe, Microsoft, AutoCAD all shifted to subscription models requiring internet validation
* local AI models possible but corporations pushing API-dependent solutions
* progressive web apps replacing locally-run software
knowledge degradation:
* fewer people learning to build PCs or understand their machines
* tech education shifting from "how computers work" to "how to use apps"
* repair culture dying as devices become unrepairable black boxes
* documentation and schematics increasingly proprietary
economic pressure:
* hobbyist computing priced out (current RAM situation)
* home servers becoming impractical vs cloud services
* development tools increasingly cloud-based (GitHub codespaces, cloud IDEs)
honestly, all fairly weak and circumnavigable indicators, but also possibly a death by a thousand cuts.
on the other hand, videogames. a lot more going on for PC. valve's healing influence. is cloud gaming a serious force by now? doubtful.
possible deliberate future attack vectors:
SSD controller chips - a "sudden shortage" would be catastrophic. if NAND controllers became scarce or prohibitively expensive, it would force cloud storage dependence overnight. people couldn't even backup locally anymore.
PSUs - capacitor or transformer supply "disruption" would halt all PC building.
BIOS/UEFI firmware - a "security crisis" requiring signed firmware. approved vendors only or nothing boots
SecureBoot is indeed one of those pretend-solutions, that do not really increase security of the machine, nor the customer, but only benefit the vendors.
There's only one good part, and only that one in the SecureBoot chain, and that is measured boot, i.e. checksum-chaining each subsequent piece of software before it's executed. Combine this with verity checked RO filesystems, that are linked to boot measures using a owner supplied key (=passphrase) and you're good.
@datenwolf @lritter and that isn't worth #Microsoft being in charge of what can boot on all PCs
