How do you know? Statistics reported by websites… which are recording user agent strings?

If you randomly stopped people in the streets and asked them what a user agent was, you’d get a certain percentage of folks that give you the correct answer. That percentage is the upper ceiling for any possible error margin that websites recording user agent strings have in attributing those strings to actual browsers, since nobody unaware of that term will know how or be interested in changing their user agent.

Do you think it likely that this percentage is going to be in any way, shape or form… impactful, considering that most people won’t be able to tell you what a browser is? 😜

Enshittification is inevitable for all free services (services as in with a server component).

No, it is not that bleak. It is only inevitable when there is an active push for a short-term maximization of user base monetization (which is very much in the nature of VC). It can usually be avoided with products that are wholly under the ownership of all users (such as a cooperative or a government-provided service) or - only if one is lucky - with products of financially independent private enterprises under vaguely benevolent and unhurried leadership (such as Steam, to some extent)

I used to have a (high-ranking and well-educated) foreign colleague who used to think that the “Main” indeed signified that this was the bigger and more significant of multiple Frankfurts.
I honestly can’t blame him, it was a deceptivley plausible misconception.