One of the frightening things is when you notice that, as society becomes more dystopian (e.g. more totalitarian, more extremely unequal in the division of wealth etc.), there doesn't develop the strong awareness that it _is_ dystopian. It that the sense of what's normal and acceptable degrades. At best you get this weak sense of a general malaise.

So either people are clueless sheep that don't know better or they simply don't care. The first seems pretty patronizing to me and the latter means we are in minority with our definition of dystopia.

I think neither is true. It's just that people adjust and much of their - our - norms and expectations are socially constructed. And it's difficult to imagine a society conducting itself differently when you haven't lived in it.

Feeling powerless forces us to recalculate our tare weight.

I think they just don't care. I had a look at Marx's ideas of people being in a certain class and engaging in a class struggle, rising up.

But it didn't happen because people are mostly just selfish.

They don't care if they're in a certain "class", they don't care if they're being sold to, they generally don't care if they're being tracked. They just care about being able to do what they want to do.

As long as it doesn't interfere with their life too much (or even if it does, if there's no alternative), they don't do anything about it. And with the modern population, as long as it is extremely easy they will do it.

I am not sure if this is good or bad, or just an inherent part of human nature.

What’s dystopian about it, exactly? People buying and selling online seems pretty awesome and desirable to me. Small business owners able to sell and build brands without real estate overhead, and reach customers across the entire country/world without the expense of mass marketing is wonderful in my opinion.

It sounds nice but it won't be long until FB starts charging these small businesses a large percentage per transaction.

But we already have a company gobbling up all the e-commerce demand out there and charging small businesses large fees: Amazon. Having more platforms where businesses can be found by customers is a good thing, and will provide downward pressure on fees.