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WhatsApp has removed answer to “how do I choose not to share data with FB”

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31–40 of 178 posts

Re: WhatsApp has removed answer to “how do I choose not to share data with FB”

#31
post #2

Old habits and mindsets never seem to change despite corporate pronouncements and PR puff pieces written by stenographers. The regulators (and legislators) are either the biggest dupes, or much more likely in on it. Let’s not forget the FTC hookup for Netflix by Obama and the eventual payout when he left office. Or Ajit Pai who came from Verizon to run the FTC and undid the Obama era changes favorable to Netflix and…

I sometimes wonder whether there is any purpose to it in the long term. If/when Signal becomes big enough to be used by a lot of people, they will want to monetize too and the governments will become interested in monitoring messages there too. It just feels futile. As long as companies need to turn a profit and governments can surreptitiously surveil their citizens there's no long-term solution. We can move to the n…

Signal is developed by a non-profit and is open source, they have a higher chance of staying independent. With the cost of cloud services dropping hopefully there is less of the back-pressure to monetise

Re: WhatsApp has removed answer to “how do I choose not to share data with FB”

#32

Good news - you should be using Signal anyway

Centralized services will all suffer the same fate. XMPP was the correct answer 20 years ago, and (with an encryption layer) it's the correct answer now. Matrix and activitypub are also valid answers.

I'm not sure what makes you the authority of valid answers in this topic but as someone who has tried movie their extended family to Matrix, I'd take that option with a grain of salt. It's a lot more complicated than choosing the objectively best product.

Re: WhatsApp has removed answer to “how do I choose not to share data with FB”

#34
post #21
post #19

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Except Signal is shit for groups

is it? I found it to be good enough for most purposes. What is shit about it?

Not op but the worst thing about groups is how you can't properly mute them. It would be fine if you could have more than 4 pinned conversations but that's oddly not a thing yet: https://community.signalusers.org/t/allow-for-more-than-4-pi...

Re: WhatsApp has removed answer to “how do I choose not to share data with FB”

#35

Good news - you should be using Signal anyway

There are much better alternatives. XMPP, Matrix (Element), Wire, Briar, Ricochet, whatever.

Good luck onboarding one's grandma to any of those.

Re: WhatsApp has removed answer to “how do I choose not to share data with FB”

#36

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I sometimes wonder whether there is any purpose to it in the long term. If/when Signal becomes big enough to be used by a lot of people, they will want to monetize too and the governments will become interested in monitoring messages there too. It just feels futile. As long as companies need to turn a profit and governments can surreptitiously surveil their citizens there's no long-term solution. We can move to the n…

Signal is developed by a non-profit and is open source, they have a higher chance of staying independent. With the cost of cloud services dropping hopefully there is less of the back-pressure to monetise

BTW I just learned that you can setup Amazon Smile to pay Signal - .5% of your purchases goes to them as a donation. https://smile.amazon.com/ch/82-4506840

Re: WhatsApp has removed answer to “how do I choose not to share data with FB”

#37
post #2

Old habits and mindsets never seem to change despite corporate pronouncements and PR puff pieces written by stenographers. The regulators (and legislators) are either the biggest dupes, or much more likely in on it. Let’s not forget the FTC hookup for Netflix by Obama and the eventual payout when he left office. Or Ajit Pai who came from Verizon to run the FTC and undid the Obama era changes favorable to Netflix and…

Ajit also undid the new tariffs that were about to be implemented for jails and prisons to avoid some inmates paying $50 for a 15 minute call to their family. Fuck Ajit.

I'm all for hating on Ajit, but from a cursory look at the prison case, the FCC just never really had the jurisdiction to regulate intrastate calls and repeatedly lost in court on that question. There was already a 50 cent cap on interstate calls under Pai, and this year under Rosenworcel it's been lowered to 14-21 cents[1].

Am I missing something?

[0] https://arstechnica.com/tech-policy/2020/07/ajit-pai-urges-s...

[1] https://www.prisonlegalnews.org/news/2021/sep/1/fcc-takes-fu...

Re: WhatsApp has removed answer to “how do I choose not to share data with FB”

#38

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Centralized services will all suffer the same fate. XMPP was the correct answer 20 years ago, and (with an encryption layer) it's the correct answer now. Matrix and activitypub are also valid answers.

I'm not sure what makes you the authority of valid answers in this topic but as someone who has tried movie their extended family to Matrix, I'd take that option with a grain of salt. It's a lot more complicated than choosing the objectively best product.

I'm curious why I frequently hear that Matrix/Element are more difficult to use than Signal, Telegram, Whatsapp, etc.

I set it up for my elderly parents who just got their first smartphone a few months ago, and it's been going very smoothly.

What are the complications that others seem to be having?

Re: WhatsApp has removed answer to “how do I choose not to share data with FB”

#40

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I'm not sure what makes you the authority of valid answers in this topic but as someone who has tried movie their extended family to Matrix, I'd take that option with a grain of salt. It's a lot more complicated than choosing the objectively best product.

I'm curious why I frequently hear that Matrix/Element are more difficult to use than Signal, Telegram, Whatsapp, etc. I set it up for my elderly parents who just got their first smartphone a few months ago, and it's been going very smoothly. What are the complications that others seem to be having?

The more technical people in our group tried to register accounts but we were never able to "find" or message each other. It was orders of magnitude more difficult than getting started with telegram or signal. Don't get me wrong, I do want to use Matrix, it was just not feasible at the time. I do know that it's technically the more sustainable choice.
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