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Big brother is here, and his name is Facebook

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Re: Big brother is here, and his name is Facebook

#291

Post by earenndil »

darrmit wrote: post #97

I don't find Facebook useful for much and find that it brings the worst out in people, therefore I don't use it. I do find Google useful but choose to use it very sparingly - no search, no mail, no maps. I do use Drive, Docs, and Photos (for now). The problem I'm running into is some of Google's services are so exceptional compared to alternatives that it's becoming problematic to use alternatives. Maps is an example…

> I do use Drive, Docs, and Photos (for now).

Docs is the most egregious item on this list. Just use libreoffice. And the syncing capability? Kill two birds with one stone, host your own cloud storage (raspberry pi hooked up to a 1tb hdd) sync your documents AND your photos to it.

Re: Big brother is here, and his name is Facebook

#292

Post by ionised »

aphextron wrote: post #30
Deimorz wrote: post #9

Personally, I think Google is just as terrifying, possibly more. As an example, just take a fairly normal life situation like going out for dinner with some friends, and think about how much of it goes "through" Google: --- One of your friends sends an email to 6 others, to ask if everyone's free for dinner on Friday. 5 of the 7 people involved use gmail or a google apps address. You've never heard of the restaurant…

The conclusion I've come to regarding Google is that you just have to accept it for now. The services that they provide are so above and beyond anything from any other provider that to not use them puts you at a great disadvantage. Google search is an order of magnitude above the competition. There is no serious alternative to Google maps. The level of integration that Google Calendar has with practically everything…

> The conclusion I've come to regarding Google is that you just have to accept it for now. The services that they provide are so above and beyond anything from any other provider that to not use them puts you at a great disadvantage.

Dear lord this isn't even remotely true.

I haven't used any Google services save Maps for nearly 5 years now and I only used Maps a few times when I first learned to drive before realising that OSMand and HERE Maps were actually better.

That's just one example. There are alternatives to pretty much everything Google offers, some even better.

The only thing Google offers that isn't matched is seamless integration between its various services, but if you are not heavily invested in the Google ecosystem to begin with, or are not resistant to change then its not an issue at all to move away from it.

Honestly the most dofficult part of stopping using Google is switching all your email addresses over for the various online services you use. That takes a few hours at most.

Re: Big brother is here, and his name is Facebook

#293

Post by ionised »

imaginenore wrote: post #150
Deimorz wrote: post #9

Personally, I think Google is just as terrifying, possibly more. As an example, just take a fairly normal life situation like going out for dinner with some friends, and think about how much of it goes "through" Google: --- One of your friends sends an email to 6 others, to ask if everyone's free for dinner on Friday. 5 of the 7 people involved use gmail or a google apps address. You've never heard of the restaurant…

What exactly is scary in that scenario? So Google knows that you went somewhere and who your friends are. I don't see a problem. The actually bad thing would be something like - you watch alt-right YouTube videos, and Google doesn't hire you because of that if you apply for a job. But even that isn't remotely close to the totalitarian government level of oppression, where you get executed for disagreeing with the par…

Nobody is important until they suddenly are.

The Nazis used highly in-depth Dutch census data during WW2 to hunt down and murder Jews and undsesirables in the country.

That data was considered harmless, even useful by the population to that point. Things changed, and that data became very useful to evil people.

This is why people in Germany and many eastern European countries are not sold on government surveillance for their own good, they lived under pervasive Soviet surveillance.

That kind of power can and likely will end up in the wrong hands eventually, so it is always best to keep it in check or just not have it at all.

Re: Big brother is here, and his name is Facebook

#294

Post by [deleted] »

cisanti wrote: post #4

The authoritarian regimes' secret police would be delighted at something like this. People actually (well, not all of us) give them information themselves, and those who don't, sure do get tracked across the web. "Thoughts control" is very much a real problem, as the Google Memo scandal showed us. People dug out the irrelevant donation of Brendan Eich. Think about the power FB has, they know exactly who is the enemy…

[deleted]

Re: Big brother is here, and his name is Facebook

#295

Post by ionised »

cisanti wrote: post #48
abootstrapper wrote: post #39

Earlier quoted context omitted.

People on the right dangerously remind me the fanatic pioneers, who only think one way is right and preach false tolerance. Some are even so stupid that they hold a bible in one hand and a rebel flag in another. Knowing the possibility of the power and the capabilities these people would have if in power. I would say we live in dangerous times.

I'm not from the United States, it's ignorant to think labeling everyone who doesn't agree with you having a rebel flag in their hand. It has nothing to do with me. Outside of the land of free, there are more possibilities than just being liberal or conservative. It's not a binary system. I tend to lean left according to your politics, but the stunts American left is lately pulling are disgusting, especially the labe…

And yet your original post was an overly simplistic left- versus-right ideological rant.

Re: Big brother is here, and his name is Facebook

#296

Post by rmc »

aphextron wrote: post #30
Deimorz wrote: post #9

Personally, I think Google is just as terrifying, possibly more. As an example, just take a fairly normal life situation like going out for dinner with some friends, and think about how much of it goes "through" Google: --- One of your friends sends an email to 6 others, to ask if everyone's free for dinner on Friday. 5 of the 7 people involved use gmail or a google apps address. You've never heard of the restaurant…

The conclusion I've come to regarding Google is that you just have to accept it for now. The services that they provide are so above and beyond anything from any other provider that to not use them puts you at a great disadvantage. Google search is an order of magnitude above the competition. There is no serious alternative to Google maps. The level of integration that Google Calendar has with practically everything…

> There is no serious alternative to Google maps.

Depends a lot on the region, but in many places, OpenStreetMap is better than Google Maps.

Re: Big brother is here, and his name is Facebook

#297

Post by StavrosK »

tu6 wrote: post #268
stinos wrote: post #225

Earlier quoted context omitted.

SO "answers" That is also laughable and more than a bit insulting: - most of the answers (I encountered) are in fact proper and correct answers because bascially it's a peer-reviewed environment, so no need for those snarky quatation marks. I, and many others, have spent hours and hours writing down good answers, and learning quite a bit while doing so. - DDG/Google/... know about SO so it is often possible to get th…

I have been using zealdocs for a couple months now. Which is basically offline official docs/tutorials/examples my Google and SO usage has dropped quite a bit. If you read the Stackoverflow post on why they discontinued their documentation feature - one of the reasons was official docs aren't as broken as ppl think.

Damn, thank you for that! Zealdocs is fantastic, I've been looking for something like that for a while, mostly for coding on flights!

Re: Big brother is here, and his name is Facebook

#298

Post by darrmit »

earenndil wrote: post #291
darrmit wrote: post #97

I don't find Facebook useful for much and find that it brings the worst out in people, therefore I don't use it. I do find Google useful but choose to use it very sparingly - no search, no mail, no maps. I do use Drive, Docs, and Photos (for now). The problem I'm running into is some of Google's services are so exceptional compared to alternatives that it's becoming problematic to use alternatives. Maps is an example…

> I do use Drive, Docs, and Photos (for now). Docs is the most egregious item on this list. Just use libreoffice. And the syncing capability? Kill two birds with one stone, host your own cloud storage (raspberry pi hooked up to a 1tb hdd) sync your documents AND your photos to it.

I already have Syncthing running, just haven't moved off to it.

The biggest offender is Photos. I just haven't found a good self-hosted photo solution.

Re: Big brother is here, and his name is Facebook

#300

Post by ibn_ibid »

hyperdunc wrote: post #284
ibn_ibid wrote: post #263

Earlier quoted context omitted.

>At the moment the left is more of a threat Nazis are literally holding rallies in downtown Charlottesville with torches and yelling kill jews. One just ran over people counter-demonstrating in the streets. But yea it's the left who are a threat. We have a president who refuses to condemn white nationalism. He has repeatedly issued calls to violence and wants to rough up journalists. But yes, it is the left who are e…

The president hasn't directly condemned black supremacy or Antifa either. Does that also concern you? You're observing a response to authoritarianism on the left. We can expect increased conflict between ideologues on both sides of the political spectrum.

Yep, the Nazis are just upset about authoritarianism on the left. They don't actually want to kill jews or black people or anything. They just want to peacefully protest the fact they can't say such things right? Maybe we should try appeasing these fascists, because that worked so well last time?
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