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Tusky has been removed from the Play Store

chaos.social

141–150 of 255 posts

Re: Tusky has been removed from the Play Store

#141

If they ban a client for the content it can access, why don't they ban web browsers entirely ? Google Chrome allows access to illegal and hateful content too.

For the same reasons Khamenei can tweet that an entire country is a malign tumor and needs to be removed and eradicated and Twitter is still in the stores.

For the same reasons silly places like Parler get nuked on Jan 6th pretenses when most of the planning happened on Facebook but Facebook's still there.

Power's power, and Lenin's question of who/whom is always relevant.

Re: Tusky has been removed from the Play Store

#142

Earlier quoted context omitted.

There is a framework for this that was created over 100 years ago when the same problem happened with railroads. They did they same thing and used their monopoly power to discriminate on who could ship goods by rail. Society said that was wrong and we have the idea of a common carrier that must treat all customers the same. We should declare all app stores to be the same, common carries that may not discriminate. Bot…

People love to talk about great the web of the 90's was, and I miss it myself, but what made it work was "the price of admission" which elevated the level of both the posters (who had to understand how to make, and pay for, a web site), and the readers (who had to pay for an internet connection, and understand how to configure the connection). I think categorizing social media services as common carriers is half of i…

Does anyone remember the Something Awful forums? One thing that set them apart was charging $10 for an account. People balked at the idea of paying to post on an internet forum but it kept out the spam and crap other forums were inundated with.

Edit: I doubt perma-banning via CC number would be as effective a tool now that things like Apple Pay and virtual credit card numbers exist.

Re: Tusky has been removed from the Play Store

#144

This brave new era of censorship is going to have some really horrible long-term effects that are not so apparent yet to its proponents. The echo-chambers and divisiveness will only get stronger as the edges slowly get squeezed out of the population. "I don't agree with a word you say, but I will fight to the death for your right to say it."

This new era of censorship is a reaction to the now obvious long-term effects of lack of censorship. As with most reactions it will probably swing too far the other way for a while.

I disagree. AI banning an app on content violation grounds is just a terrible and shameful dystopian reality. If not a lazy excuse for absolving big tech as they get away with cutting corners and other costs.

I don't know about you but I expect a human to be on the other hand of the switch when decisions like banning have to be taken.

Re: Tusky has been removed from the Play Store

#145
post #73

Earlier quoted context omitted.

f-droid banned Gab. So they cannot be trusted to run an impartial service.

That is true. You cannot trust Google. They will point to their policies and even if you critique this they will lock and ignore your request. You can't use F-droid as an example of supporting 'Free software' or FLOSS if it is restricting distribution of its list of apps to certain people they don't like in the default repository, which goes against the point of branding yourself as 'free software' in the first place…

They can just as easily stand up their own repository for F-Droid. It's not like they've blacklisted the app from ever being installed.

Edit: https://www.f-droid.org/en/tutorials/create-repo/

Re: Tusky has been removed from the Play Store

#146
post #31

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The problem with that argument is that the developers of the application are making the choices not the people that are "building their own service" This goes to the core of the debate, I am in favor of giving users the ability to block anyone they want, even the ability to subscribe to and distribute block lists However it is step to far to hardcode or build in unchangeable block lists into the very foundation of th…

When I build something, I alone get to decide what my labor enables and what it does not. If you disagree with my choices, you’re free to use a tool built by someone whose values better align with yours.

Just don't call it free software.

https://www.gnu.org/philosophy/free-sw.en.html

"The freedom to run the program as you wish, for any purpose (freedom 0)."

Re: Tusky has been removed from the Play Store

#147
post #91

Earlier quoted context omitted.

That is fine, just do not market it as a "Free Speech" service / tool / platform like the fediverse try's to do. The entire marketing of the fediverse software is freedom from censorship. if you want to build "Authoritarianverse" and place yourself as emperor for life, then you are free do to do just be open with your marketing so people know to avoid your software

I don’t actually think that’s accurate. I don’t see the term “free speech” or any obvious variation on https://tusky.app or even on https://joinmastodon.org . As I understand it, their main goal is escaping corporate control, and any freedom from censorship they provide is incidental. See too Mastodon’s “server covenant”, which seeks to quarantine instances that allow hateful content: https://joinmastodon.org/covenan…

[deleted]

Re: Tusky has been removed from the Play Store

#148
post #85

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> But the key difference with “dictator companies” is that I decide what I don't see and whom I enclose with. But you don't. The app decides for you and blocks what you shall not see.

There is a dozen apps, and most of these are opensource. Not to count that the protocol and the federation are open. Once again, “free speech” is not “spoon-feed you a way to reach millions of people in an eyeblink”, it's “don't prevent you from doing it”.

> There is a dozen apps, and most of these are opensource.

And some of them work in tandem, apparently.

> Not to count that the protocol and the federation are open.

HTTP is open. Would you not consider it problematic if Google blocked accessing websites because some engineer doesn't like the opinions published on those websites?

Re: Tusky has been removed from the Play Store

#149

This brave new era of censorship is going to have some really horrible long-term effects that are not so apparent yet to its proponents. The echo-chambers and divisiveness will only get stronger as the edges slowly get squeezed out of the population. "I don't agree with a word you say, but I will fight to the death for your right to say it."

The best places online I've seen really allow for all kinds, but hold norms for civil discourse. Weirdly, they also often actually manage civil discussion, even if people also row a bit. And what they succeed in from what I've seen is people understanding each other, finding humans instead of political cartoons on the other side of the nickname.

I find Ars Technica seems to mostly strike this balance reasonably well in their comments. It can frequently get heated without actually descending into Reddit levels. Their moderation appearts to do a reasonable job.

Re: Tusky has been removed from the Play Store

#150

Earlier quoted context omitted.

There is a framework for this that was created over 100 years ago when the same problem happened with railroads. They did they same thing and used their monopoly power to discriminate on who could ship goods by rail. Society said that was wrong and we have the idea of a common carrier that must treat all customers the same. We should declare all app stores to be the same, common carries that may not discriminate. Bot…

I get this concern, but the hate speech bit is not BS. People using platforms to plan insurrections or other violence are not gonna be protected, whether by private companies or the government.

You mean like those evil resurrecting revolutionists in myanmar, hongkong and russia?
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