Rant blog

The app for everything (cr)app-ification!

What's not to like?? Surely apps just make everything easier, right? Er, no. For a start never relax around apps - there is function creep...

Well, today I tried to park in order to go get a coffee. My first actual sitdown coffee in a coffee shop in quite a while. This was not that simple it turned out. In order to park I had to install another damn APP! Yes, the local authorities have decided that paying using a couple of coins, getting a printed ticket, sticking it on my dashboard - all taking a couple of minutes at most - is FAR TOO EASY!

This local council used to use UK-based RingGo but have ditched that in favour of the USA's PayandGo because everything changes all the time. PayByPhone, JustPark and Ringo cover most of London - a mere three apps to give scammers a chance to rip you off. Travel somewhere exotic such as Weston-Super-Mare* to park in the open air 'car park' next to the seafront Premier Inn. The coin payment machine has a bag over it (it was previouly £2/day reflecting the fact it was just a glorified piece of waste ground with no security) and you now need to use MiPermit. ^{*or Barnet}

When I tried logging in to my local council account recently I was told I have to make a new account because they had changed the company they had outsourced to. This is ridiculous. This is for the same council account one uses to obtain parking permits including visitors permits etc.

To return to the parking meter situation, I was now faced with a piece of board stuck on the parking meter telling me I had to:

• download an app to use it. Which assumes I have a smartphone with me.
• Or ring and pay over the phone, which assumes I have a mobile phone with me; that it's charged, had credit etc.
• Or I can text the location number to a number and it will text back the location of the nearest PayPoint shop which I have to walk to and buy a ticket to walk back and stick on the dashboard... There are no nearby shops so it's going to be a bit of a walk. And of course I might get a ticket meanwhile. Also assumes I have a mobile phone with me, that it's charged, has credit etc.

(cr)app-ification - crappification , the process of turning something , such as parking , into the need for an app when it didn't need it; in turn making the process overly complicated and deteriorating the overall experience. In the process of crappification , parking is now not only not private but allows the authorities to charge more to park certain cars.
~Hereward Warwick

Crappification is an example of a solution looking for a problem. Before the crappification of parking, all the parkee needed was a couple of coins to put in the parking meter thingy and they're good to go. But now if someone wanting to park doesn't have a working mobile phone with them, there is no way to park right across this borough. Fantastic.

Update: I first wrote this blog more than two years ago...but the app fatigue is spreading.
_{(Also, I no longer use NordVPN or ElementaryOS. Librebooted X230 still going strong :) )}

I don't want to "download the app" to pay for parking. I don't want to "create an account" to see a menu. I don't want to "provide feedback" on a 30-second interaction. I just want to exist in the physical world without a digital leash.
Vidxn_ on TwitterX Aug 6th 2026

Annoyances:

• I forgot how LOUD coffee shops are
• I forgot how LONG it takes to actually GET A COFFEE in these places
• Nordvpn has ceased to work on ElementaryOS on my Thinkpad X230 (so no using Cafe WiFi)