> The computer. The Internet. Artificial intelligence. These are military technologies, first and foremost... [0]

If you look at analytics or the internet or military-born technologies as applied to people in capitalism, you are but cattle to be utilized for your full value. In that way you can easily be mathematically whittled down to a statistic. More importantly so that these technologies are a way to control cattle in their currently applied capitalistic state. A tool of capitalism in brief.

As tools of capitalism, analytics are needed if you're trying to run a business. I believe the popularity of analytics on blogs is a conflation between old ideas (guest books/visitor counters) and an effort to make your blog a passive income earner. Analytics allow you to turn your site into a business which you optimize for your visitors. However this totally shifts a website owner's focus from hobby and interest sharing to blog post output optimization.

But the current state is that society values any increase in income as smart and savvy. Even if the entire indie web shuts down analytics, what about the people stuck on Facebook (et al), TikTok, and Twitter being subsumed by analytics? Someone will build a new "cool place" to hang out that will be the next cutting edge marketing platform for media culture, entertainment, etc. I'm not entirely convinced this change will snip at the root in a meaningful way.

[0] https://2ndbreakfast.audreywatters.com/swords-into-plowshare...

(btw that quote and blog post is very beautiful explanation of the root)