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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

#151

Post by snikeris »

darkerside wrote: post #28
decasia wrote: post #7

The thing I keep thinking is that I want to have social software built on a co-operative model (like a food co-op): you all pay some nominal membership fee (could you fund servers and developers on $5/year/user?), and the software would then be developed to fit the agreed-upon needs of the community, without dark patterns or behavior modification projects, openly, and with some kind of community governance (which nee…

I'm not a big government advocate, generally speaking, but enacting this at a federal level, would be akin to a modern day postal service. Social media communication without the bells and whistles--or the obsession with engagement. I'd be all for it.

The NSA would build it for us, free of charge!

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

#152

Post by discreteevent »

OedipusRex wrote: post #142
osrec wrote: post #136

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Sounds like a reasonable description of pretty much every communication/social platform since the 90s.

So what's the alternative? Even if we roll our own software we still utilize ISP lines.

Well we're communicating here and it's not financed by people who want to manipulate us. There's the odd job ad but that's completely up front. When I bought Byte magazine I bought it partly for the ads. My choice - not really manipulation.

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

#153

Post by ArrayList »

simulate wrote: post #17
gavinpc wrote: post #13

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Or be from MIT? Not sure which debate you saw, but I recently watched an Intelligence Squared about "the promise of AI" in which he made a similar argument, along with many others. His team jumped 29% percent audience agreement in the post-poll. I don't know how many in the audience would know the reference, but the fact that he worked directly with Minsky made it a pretty lopsided debate, in terms of credentials.

Thanks for describing this. I wanted to see this debate myself. For others who might want to watch it, it's available on YouTube: https://youtu.be/yC_dfbxQqRI

Absolutely phenomenal. I hadn't actually heard of Jaron Lanier until today but now I'm a big fan.

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

#154

Post by znpy »

OedipusRex wrote: post #142
osrec wrote: post #136

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Sounds like a reasonable description of pretty much every communication/social platform since the 90s.

So what's the alternative? Even if we roll our own software we still utilize ISP lines.

You can use a self-hosted federated solution.

Examples are:

- e-mail (effectively a federated system, before it was cool)

- Mastodon

- a social network instance like Diaspora

- Matrix (matrix.org - "An open network for secure, decentralized communication.")

- XMPP / Jabber

- IRC (not federated, but self-hostable)

----

I've been on Mastodon for the last 3-4 months and it's been awesome so far. It's basically Twitter without all the drama and toxicity. Also, while I don't run my own instance, I've seen many people running one.

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

#155

Post by izzydata »

icebraining wrote: post #116
izzydata wrote: post #111

Earlier quoted context omitted.

How can someone write a book about the benefits of leaving social media if they have never experienced them or the process of leaving them?

Does one have to get shot to know it hurts? Is a male doctor incapable of advising a pregnant woman?

You need to get shot to know what getting shot actually feels like and you need to be a pregnant woman to know what being a pregnant woman feels like. Obviously you can make some assumptions based on an observers perspective, but that doesn't seem as relevant in a discussion that is subjective like leaving social media as a lifestyle change.

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

#156

Post by znpy »

ams6110 wrote: post #139
Maximus9000 wrote: post #30

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> $5/year/user I think facebook has each user valued at about $200USD/year. A 2016 article from the Guardian puts it at $60/year... so I'm not sure which number to believe. https://www.kqed.org/news/11661387/heres-how-much-you-are-wo... https://www.theguardian.com/technology/2016/jan/28/how-much-...

At the same time, how many Facebook users would pay even $1/month to use the platform? I bet less than half.

Whatsapp users were paying $1/year and they were doing pretty good.

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

#157

Post by ChristianBundy »

znpy wrote: post #154
OedipusRex wrote: post #142

Earlier quoted context omitted.

So what's the alternative? Even if we roll our own software we still utilize ISP lines.

You can use a self-hosted federated solution. Examples are: - e-mail (effectively a federated system, before it was cool) - Mastodon - a social network instance like Diaspora - Matrix (matrix.org - "An open network for secure, decentralized communication.") - XMPP / Jabber - IRC (not federated, but self-hostable) ---- I've been on Mastodon for the last 3-4 months and it's been awesome so far. It's basically Twitter w…

If you like Mastodon, I'd recommend checking out SSB. It's completely peer-to-peer, you own your own data, you host the data of people you follow, and it's one of the best communities I've ever been a part of. Plus we have other sub-protocols like secret sharding for social password management and chess and other fun stuff. Super neat, I can't recommend it enough.

https://scuttlebutt.nz

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

#158

Post by znpy »

leephillips wrote: post #53
NeedMoreTea wrote: post #20

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Before everyone had to be on Facebook, a few friends and relatives used a hidden forum on someone's spare domain, and it worked really nicely. A co-op social network sounds an interesting idea. Doubly so if it gave only the sort of features early Facebook had - i.e. the ones useful to the users, before it became about the algorithm, engagement and so on. Wouldn't be surprised if there's something along those lines on…

I'm not on Facebook. I know plenty of other adults who don't have an account. My daughter tells me that the young folks have completely abandoned it, a good while ago.

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.

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

#159

Post by darkerside »

snikeris wrote: post #151
darkerside wrote: post #28

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I'm not a big government advocate, generally speaking, but enacting this at a federal level, would be akin to a modern day postal service. Social media communication without the bells and whistles--or the obsession with engagement. I'd be all for it.

The NSA would build it for us, free of charge!

I know you're joking, but there needn't be anything private to be hidden on this network. That would seem to make this of limited use to the NSA.

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

#160

Post by aeturnum »

TeMPOraL wrote: post #29
narrator wrote: post #8

I saw an absolutely epic debate between Jaron and a Singulatarian. He totally called them out on being religious in that they were just trying to make a geek version of the Christian rapture. I agree that the guy is like RMS in that he is an original thinker who works from first principles and that tends to give him an understanding that is unique and worth listening to. BTW, Speaking of RMS and Jaron, is there some…

Thinking singularity is geek rapture isn't really original thinking, it's just regurgitation of a cliché. Now dead blog by Steven Kaas had a nice article, listing reasons why this comparison is not valid. http://web.archive.org/web/20110718031848/http://www.acceler... I won't quote the long list of arguments, just a tangential remark: "It’s also interesting to think about what would happen if we applied “Rapture of t…

I may be misreading this blog post, but it seems like the author believes that calling the singularity the "geek rapture" is saying the singularity is unlikely to happen (presumably what the author believes about the the non-geek rapture). That is...not the critique I believe anyone is making when they call the singularity the "geek rapture."

I believe the phrase is used to critique the singularity for the way it is used to hand-wave away a huge set of problems. It's pointing out that, even if you believe in the singularity, its time horizons are uncertain at best. Bringing it up as a response to problems that exist in there here and now is textbook "apocalyptic thinking" and should be called out.

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