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Delete Your Account Now: A Conversation with Jaron Lanier

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Re: Delete Your Account Now: A Conversation with Jaron Lanier

#201

Post by TheRealDunkirk »

gambler wrote: post #72
magwa101 wrote: post #68

I do feel like I'm a sysadmin for my life. I don't know how non tech people deal with it. Some of the BUMMER platforms I dislike (unnamed) are ones I rely on to make money, and they constantly prod you to engage with the platform to fix their bugs. Examples are they allow phishing attacks but then force you to reply or your "ranking" score goes down. Super irritating. I do notice the most engaged communities are the…

>I don't know how non tech people deal with it. They silently suffer, develop coping mechanisms and time-intensive workarounds. Most don't even understand how things could be better. This is part of the reason so many interfaces are horrible. This isn't even specific to social media platforms. People adapt to crap. Sounds like this is what Jaron is talking about. Design thinking should be taught in schools or as Gen…

> People adapt to crap.

And these are not trivial adaptations.

I'm 49. I got my first computer at 10. I've been dealing with family, friends, coworkers, and church congregants ever since about how to use computers and software and web sites. What I've just come to realize is how much effort normal users put into getting their stuff to work, because, when it finally comes time for them to ask for help, they are resistant to changing anything about their behavior. That tells me that they have SIGNIFICANT investment into getting to the place they already are.

Perfect, ready example: It's telling that my wife and kids struggle to find files they've saved on a MacBook, which should be the KING of usability. I mean, this is a problem we should have solved 20 years ago, right? Yet, any time I suggest ways to search or sort in Spotlight or Finder, I get pushback about not having time to learn how to do it better.

I think about all the stupid crap I put up with from computers and web sites on a daily basis -- as a full-time programmer/sysadmin/devop -- and I despair. I just had to register an account to download Docker to my work computer. And wait for the confirmation email. And fish it out of my spam folder. And fish the saved password out of Firefox's password manager, which had saved it under a different domain. You and I, as people who read this site, deal with this crap all. day. long. I'm totally with Jaron: How do normal people deal with this world WE have created?

Re: Delete Your Account Now: A Conversation with Jaron Lanier

#202

Post by professorgerm »

darkerside wrote: post #198
template3 wrote: post #149

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Lol postal mail has a long history of moderation. A lot of first amendment case law with respect to obscenity and fraud comes from postal cases.

Do you have some examples of what you're talking about?

The Comstock Laws [1] are probably the most famous US example, which made it illegal to use the USPS to send any obscene materials, including personal letters with sexual content.

[1]:https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Comstock_laws

Re: Delete Your Account Now: A Conversation with Jaron Lanier

#203

Post by AstralStorm »

zAy0LfpBZLC8mAC wrote: post #194
AndrewKemendo wrote: post #184

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Since forever. Newspaper, books, TV, Radio, postal services etc... all have a cost associated and all are selective in how, where and what they publish or deliver. Everyone is trying to influence everyone else. The question is simply what degree and magnitude you are willing to accept.

You have a strange postal service. Where I live, the norm is that you put your letter in an envelope and it would be illegal for the postal service to open the envelope. If you pay the postage, your letter will be delivered, no matter what the content, and without any changes to the content.

There are a few exceptions, nevertheless, the postage itself is kept unopened. They're usually detected by specialized test equipment with very low false positive rates.

1) Explosives and biological agents. Likely detected by sniffers.

2) Radiological materials.

3) Heavy packages or letters may be opened and inspected, especially for customs purposes. Depends on the postal service.

4) Potentially xray may be applied.

None of this is really an obstacle to communication. By the way, phone service is not censored or modified in most countries either. Including cellphones.

Re: Delete Your Account Now: A Conversation with Jaron Lanier

#204

Post by AnarchoYeasty »

stinky613 wrote: post #148
lifeformed wrote: post #145

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It's the "wishes to manipulate them" part that's the problem.

ISPs injecting ads sounds like a wish to manipulate https://arstechnica.com/tech-policy/2014/09/why-comcasts-jav...

And no one here is suggesting that's a good thing. A well run isp doesn't do that.

Re: Delete Your Account Now: A Conversation with Jaron Lanier

#205

Post by zAy0LfpBZLC8mAC »

AstralStorm wrote: post #203
zAy0LfpBZLC8mAC wrote: post #194

Earlier quoted context omitted.

You have a strange postal service. Where I live, the norm is that you put your letter in an envelope and it would be illegal for the postal service to open the envelope. If you pay the postage, your letter will be delivered, no matter what the content, and without any changes to the content.

There are a few exceptions, nevertheless, the postage itself is kept unopened. They're usually detected by specialized test equipment with very low false positive rates. 1) Explosives and biological agents. Likely detected by sniffers. 2) Radiological materials. 3) Heavy packages or letters may be opened and inspected, especially for customs purposes. Depends on the postal service. 4) Potentially xray may be applied.…

(1) and (2) do not really apply to letters (i.e., communication), (3) only applies when crossing borders, and then it's not the postal/delivery service that is opening the package, but customs, and (4) at least over here would be illegal, too, if it can be used to read the mail. Both opening/reading the mail that you are supposed to deliver as well as listening to phone calls going through your network is a criminal offence.

Re: Delete Your Account Now: A Conversation with Jaron Lanier

#206

Post by vel0city »

efields wrote: post #169
athenot wrote: post #57

Earlier quoted context omitted.

This is all summed up in one word: friction. What the big platforms have done is eliminate friction at all the critical parts, to make it easy for users to onboard, easy to share, easy to grow within the platform, and of course hard to leave. I've been thinking about a low cost but not free platform too. If it ever happens, it will have to be AT LEAST as frictionless and enticing as the existing platforms. The table…

Craigslist is an interesting comparison for friction/UX. Still looks like it's from the early 00's, but has stayed just usable enough on all contemporary devices that it never went out of style. The only friction to the end-user is the same email/password request every other service makes, but you want to use CL because it's the de facto place for listing your apartment or whatever.

I'm not sure if its true of every area, but in the cities where I've used craigslist it does not require a username or password to create or reply to a listing. It will confirm an email address when generating the listing. The link in the email contains the token allowing modification and deletion of the posting.

Re: Delete Your Account Now: A Conversation with Jaron Lanier

#207

Post by Applejinx »

obscurantist wrote: post #190
Applejinx wrote: post #161

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Is he? To me he comes off as the quintessential rich Silicon Valley outsider nerd. His path has been so singular and so rewarding that he gives the impression of someone who doesn't need to be the least bit concerned about how he expresses himself. From a street hobo, that gets you instantly dismissed, but there's a counter-intuitive aspect where if you're a Jaron Lanier, it just further underscores that you're Jaron…

> From a street hobo, that gets you instantly dismissed, but there's a counter-intuitive aspect where if you're a Jaron Lanier, it just further underscores that you're Jaron Lanier and can do as you like. Because he is not trying to maximize trust in any way, he comes off as plausible even when expressing stuff that's unusual. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Countersignaling

Absolutely. That's exactly it.

Re: Delete Your Account Now: A Conversation with Jaron Lanier

#208

Post by martinmin »

wyclif wrote: post #195
znpy wrote: post #158

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Indeed, and I quite understand this: once relatives (parents and grandparents) joined the Facebook bandwagon, the fun was over. What once was some youngsters'-inner-circle has become the new sons-and-daughters-surveillance service. And as with all the forms of surveillance, kids are escaping it.

Parental or familial surveillance isn't the reason at all. I'm in SE Asia right now, in a country where Facebook Zero makes it available to everyone regardless of income, and guess what? Not only does everybody have a Facebook account, many women have at least three: one for friends, one for family, and one that is anonymous to hide their activity from their friends and family. I know it's against Facebook's TOS, but…

Hey, can I contact you somehow? I got some questions to ask about a comment you made about your remote work arrangement? I work in tech in SF and am wondering how you managed to get to work from the Ph where my Fiance recently had to move back to. Thanks!

Re: Delete Your Account Now: A Conversation with Jaron Lanier

#209

Post by paulgrant999 »

zAy0LfpBZLC8mAC wrote: post #194
AndrewKemendo wrote: post #184

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Since forever. Newspaper, books, TV, Radio, postal services etc... all have a cost associated and all are selective in how, where and what they publish or deliver. Everyone is trying to influence everyone else. The question is simply what degree and magnitude you are willing to accept.

You have a strange postal service. Where I live, the norm is that you put your letter in an envelope and it would be illegal for the postal service to open the envelope. If you pay the postage, your letter will be delivered, no matter what the content, and without any changes to the content.

good luck with that one. check out the "postal wiretap"; don't think the government decided to build a "national" communications network for the fuck of it.

they wanted to tap the comms.

same with the telegraph.

and every other means of comms.

Re: Delete Your Account Now: A Conversation with Jaron Lanier

#210

Post by wyclif »

martinmin wrote: post #208
wyclif wrote: post #195

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Parental or familial surveillance isn't the reason at all. I'm in SE Asia right now, in a country where Facebook Zero makes it available to everyone regardless of income, and guess what? Not only does everybody have a Facebook account, many women have at least three: one for friends, one for family, and one that is anonymous to hide their activity from their friends and family. I know it's against Facebook's TOS, but…

Hey, can I contact you somehow? I got some questions to ask about a comment you made about your remote work arrangement? I work in tech in SF and am wondering how you managed to get to work from the Ph where my Fiance recently had to move back to. Thanks!

Sure! My email is in my profile.
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