I am struggling to remember the name of this sci-fi book I had read about twenty-five years ago. Someone encounters a civilization where things are going pretty darned well for the humans, and there are these spider-aliens who make sure that the trains are running on time. It's just that a small portion of the population is abducted by the spider-aliens, for a long period of agonizing torture before being consumed. Everyone knows and accepts this. Nobody knows who is going to get snatched and tormented and eaten. But otherwise things are just great!

Omelas aside, I think of this every time I read about someone's work or life or memories or whatever just getting zapped by Google, for a reason that is probably contained in a 500kb EULA, but one you will never find. It's free! You can do all of this stuff! It's great! Except for when your stuff gets randomly eaten.