Why do we care so much about closed platform Discord around here?
Discord just killed anonymity
21–30 of 157 posts
Re: Discord just killed anonymity
#22I’m going to do a video on this soon, but I was able to get Ergo IRCd and TheLounge up and running pretty quickly; https://chat.crilly.au/ I’ll be building a new platform on these two technologies and using Zoom or something else like Jitsi on the side for video/audio sharing. It’s time accept the loss of “features” and go back to something simpler but also something that can still be here in 38 years — like IRC has…
I still use a few niche IRC channels and run my own internal IRC network as a home automation message bus, so I'm a fan of IRC for its simplicity, but honestly: IRC really does need a modernization.
Things like image embeds, "markdown lite" formatting, and cross-device synchronization are now considered table stakes. There are always going to be some EFnet-type grognards who resist progress because reasons, but they should be ignored.
IRCv3 and Ergo support some of what's needed already (and in a backwards-compatible way!) but client support just isn't there yet, particularly on mobile.
Re: Discord just killed anonymity
#23> Discord dropped the hammer: mandatory age verification for all users is rolling out next month. The era of anonymous gaming chats is officially over. This isn't really accurate. Age verification is not mandatory for all accounts. You will be able to join a Discord with your friends, chat, and do voice without age verification. Here's the exact list of what's restricted if you don't verify: > Content Filters: Discor…
This. We've gotten really bad at headline bangin.
Re: Discord just killed anonymity
#24Why do we care so much about closed platform Discord around here?
Default platform for general gaming related real-time chatting. Steam is only for PCs and is not real-time.
Re: Discord just killed anonymity
#25Whatever happened to TorChat? Hopefully we are entering another golden age of "dissident" tech that seems to have culturally stagnated for at least a decade now.
During the haydays of WhatsApp updating their privacy terms, there was a month long battle where people kept saying how everyone will quit. The reality is, most people just don’t care about these things if their network is highly entrenched in one app. What happens is, some communities “partially move” the sensitive stuff to like Signal and others.
Honestly, all of these are documented probabilities at this point. SNS owners can do very decent predictions on what will happen if they introduce certain kind of friction. Also, it’s not 2005 anymore, people are used to upload their IDs everywhere. I mentioned it before as well, if you’ve used any large app, the chances are you’ve uploaded your ID (AirBnB, Tinder, and etc.)
Re: Discord just killed anonymity
#26Whatever happened to TorChat? Hopefully we are entering another golden age of "dissident" tech that seems to have culturally stagnated for at least a decade now.
In reality, we are likely about to get yet another data point on where the lines for the average person really lie in the dimensions of functionality, friction, network effect and privacy. There are those that will stay on Discord because the benefits of the first three outweigh the degradation of privacy. Then there are those that will leave because the first three aren't important enough to outweigh the privacy los…
The imprecision of this mandatory KYC tech will shatter network effects and cause entire groups to switch apps.
Back when I played games one friend in our group was banned from LoL arbitrarily so the whole group switched to Dota 2.
Re: Discord just killed anonymity
#27This is a speed-run pre-IPO enshitification phase for Discord and needs to be ready for Wall Street and this also happened with Reddit. Image what will happen post-IPO.
It may be related to legislation, which is not specifically tied to an IPO plan.
Re: Discord just killed anonymity
#28> Discord dropped the hammer: mandatory age verification for all users is rolling out next month. The era of anonymous gaming chats is officially over. This isn't really accurate. Age verification is not mandatory for all accounts. You will be able to join a Discord with your friends, chat, and do voice without age verification. Here's the exact list of what's restricted if you don't verify: > Content Filters: Discor…
Discord says they'll use some AI garbage tool. Those are prone to mistakes over a large enough userbase. It will not be a rare occurrence for an adult to be labelled a child until they debase themselves with a scan of their face or a copy of their government ID.
For children - this mandate also still makes the decision on behalf of the parents that a child must submit a scan of their face to a third party. Moving to Persona for age verification involves verification data being sent outside of the user's phone - in direct contradiction to Discord's initial promise of keeping facial scan data solely on the phone. Third parties that we've been given no reason to trust will delete the data without using it for an improper purpose such as creating derivative info from the ID or facial scan itself unrelated to the sole purpose of verifying that an individual is an adult.
While we're at it - is there any legitimate reason why Discord is associating a person's actual or estimated age with their account as opposed to storing a value that states if they are or are not an adult? That sort of granularity seems unrelated to the stated purpose.
Re: Discord just killed anonymity
#29> Discord dropped the hammer: mandatory age verification for all users is rolling out next month. The era of anonymous gaming chats is officially over. This isn't really accurate. Age verification is not mandatory for all accounts. You will be able to join a Discord with your friends, chat, and do voice without age verification. Here's the exact list of what's restricted if you don't verify: > Content Filters: Discor…
> This is false. Age verification is not mandatory for all accounts. You will be able to join a Discord with your friends, chat, and do voice without age verification.
You are correct. For now. But why would they stop there?
Supposedly this is to protect teens. If that's true, why would they continue letting teens chat with anonymous users? What if they get tricked into sharing sensitive images or video of themselves? Surely we need to know everyone's ID to ensure teens aren't unwittingly chatting with a known predator. It's for their safety. But for now that's a bridge too far. For now.
And why should we believe this even has anything to do with protecting teens? That's valuable data. Discord says they're not holding onto it... for now. But Discord is offering quite a lot to users for free. Why let such an obvious revenue source go unmonetized? They're doing this now because they're going public soon. Investors want an ROI and this action is sure to invite some competition. The people leaving want an alternative, so a competitor could get a foothold. Discord needs to stay ahead. And the users Discord keeps after this stunt are going to be the most resilient to leaving - the most exploitable. Surely they wouldn't care if the policy changes in the future.
The sky isn't falling. But the frog is boiling.
Re: Discord just killed anonymity
#30> Discord dropped the hammer: mandatory age verification for all users is rolling out next month. The era of anonymous gaming chats is officially over. This isn't really accurate. Age verification is not mandatory for all accounts. You will be able to join a Discord with your friends, chat, and do voice without age verification. Here's the exact list of what's restricted if you don't verify: > Content Filters: Discor…
Let's call this what it is:
1. A way for politicians and the state to track porn habits to US citizens and use that information against them in the future. Blackmail for the future politicians, business leaders, and wealthy to coerce them into doing what those in power want.
2. A way for conservatives to tighten the noose around non-chaste materials and begin to purge them from the internet. And if that works, that's hardly the last thing that will go. Next will be LGBT content, women's rights content, atheist content, pro-labor content, and more. (Or if you're on the other side of the political spectrum, consider that the powers could be used to remove Christian content, 2nd Amendment content, etc. It doesn't really matter what is being removed, just that the mechanisms are in place and that powers can put a lid on the populace.)
We aren't screaming loudly enough.
Do not try to sugar coat this with a pedantic mistake.
This is far worse.
It's a first step down a path the Big Brother state wants.
Yell.
Scream.
Protest.