171–180 of 185 posts
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I'm in college right now and oscillate between having one and not having one, but most of the social life is organized through Facebook and I end up looking very odd for ritualistically avoiding it (well and Google Docs but that's a different kettle of fish).
Could you elaborate on avoiding Google Docs?
I've been thinking of closing my Facebook account, but I'd lose contact with so many friends and family. They don't use email or any kind of instant messenger any more, and nobody makes phone calls any more. If you're not on Facebook you might as well not exist.
Convince them to install Whatsapp? If they have a phone its an easy way to keep in contact and send text/image/videos without all the FB BS. I wished I used it sooner!
At the very least move to something that's not owned by facebook. Preferably not an app on a pocket-computer that can be used as a phone.
The original, open, non-privacy-invading web is still there. There are many sites sharing and hyperlinking academic research and relevant practitioner information that do not have advertising and do not track you. We are the ones who voted with our clicks to use the likes of LinkedIn, Facebook, and Google.
Is there some kind of search engine that limits itself to the "ancient"-style web, as it existed from its beginning to ~10-12 years ago, though not necessarily confined to older sites when newer ones fit the style and content of that period? I'd use the hell out of something like that. I'd take enthusiastic amateurs with their web-rings and guest books, and academic sites over the modern advertising-centric web any d…
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I still exist without Facebook. The people in my life I care about know that they can email me (to a non-Gmail account). It's not that impossible to be "off the grid" so to speak. The vast majority of Facebook interaction I see is pretty banal anyway. I don't feel like I'm missing out on anything.
> (to a non-Gmail account) What email provider do you use?
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I agree with you and the grandparent to this (my) post. So: I think the way to go is in some server-side OS suitable for daily-use by ordinary folk.
Several projects are trying to achieve this: freedombox, yunohost, cozy cloud, sandstorm.io, ...
FB did steal the web and your social network. Remember how FB grew? If not, let me remind you: "See which of your friends are also on FB! Just give us your Google and Yahoo contacts". Yes, you gave FB permission to check your contacts, but FB omitted to tell us that they would be HOLDING ON to your contacts forever and ever. FB then sent those contacts, without your permission and not per your request, an email sayin…
They asked for them, and you gave them, and annoyed all of them.
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Given the amount of people deeply involved in the tech industry who read hn probably my opinion will not be very popular. But I feel obliged to add a few lines about WhatsApp. In a worrying technological landscape, it has been for a long time an application with a good tradeoff between privacy and convenience. I have always respected and praised this application, due to its philosophy: Acton and Koum made millions of…
> Like me, many people I know do not use social media (...) but virtually all of us use WhatsApp to keep in touch, share photos, locations, media, and even to create groups to discuss, meet, organize events. >(...) > The reason we use wa, is because wa is not a social media. It seems you are confused about what social media is. Social media is whatever you use to socialize. Email is the long standing king of social m…
A simple "that's the wrong word" would have made your point: I've always found HN a great website, please say "sorry if I burst you bubble" someone else. Quoting as another user replies to your inflammatory tone > Phew lad. You're a bit far gone aren't you.
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Sounds like just-world fallacy. There's plenty of examples of people who take actions that do not lead to desirable outcomes. The idea that people choosing something in itself proves its value is nonsense.
I should have been clearer. I'm terrified of the power corporation's have amassed through surveillance, but no one I know outside of the tech community sees a problem. Most see Google and Facebook as "benevolent overlords"[0]. How can we convince people that danger lurks in the future given their love affair with the free, life-changing services of the "benevolent?" [0]: Quote from my roommate at Duke: "I, for one, w…
I agree with the sentiment of this article, but only to a degree. I recommend anyone interested in this to read Open Standards and the Digital Age, by Andrew Russel. The book is a partial refutation of the idea of an 'open web' using historical examples, the most shocking being the failure of open and democratic methods to build an open Internet standard versus the success of Serf and Kahn inventing TCP/IP in a close…
You agree with the sentiment of the article but then you're muddying the waters and shifting the discussion from Big Data companies like Google and Facebook to some abstract ideal of freedom and openness. The only "misleading language" that I see here belongs to you. The author is very clear about what disease has infected software development and the internet. I don't remember many spyware as a service and data coll…
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You agree with the sentiment of the article but then you're muddying the waters and shifting the discussion from Big Data companies like Google and Facebook to some abstract ideal of freedom and openness. The only "misleading language" that I see here belongs to you. The author is very clear about what disease has infected software development and the internet. I don't remember many spyware as a service and data coll…
I remember extended discussions on Usenet etc about commercialization of the Internet. Not long after Eternal September, as I recall. The rest, as they say, is history. The Internet of Tim's dreams still exists. Several of them, really. But they're tiny, with relatively few users. What people now call the Internet is a horrorshow of predators and prey. So it goes. Natural selection rules.
Balance is the gist of the article.
I can't possibly stay sane _and_ write something if I have to account for every possible reception by every possible buyer of that data. There are too many variables in play, and the data is too easily bought and sold. If we don't regulate, the least scrupulous agent will overtake the competition and it's Thunderdome beyond that.
Do you want to joust for your supper, because I don't.