Advertising and Proprietary Software

Before i start, this is just my opinion, i dont think im overreacting on this either. When will we stop being the product? Every day we're being spied by various companies, on our computers, phones, anything that has a connection is a potential risk. Most of the software that casual people use is proprietary, i dont even feel safe on an opensource Linux distro, soon it's gonna turn from GNU/Linux to SYSTEMD/GNU/Linux, since systemd is growing so fast with its millions of lines of code. I wouldnt be surprised if it does have a backdoor somewhere in the code, its too big to analyze for the community, but thats not my point. Windows users, even the system they use is proprietary, most if not all software is not opensource. Anything we do online is followed, spied and then sold to the advertisers so they can advertise they're soykaf to us. Maybe and just maybe im overthinking and overreacting this, but im sure that one day we wont even have the option to try and dodge this Triangle of Spyware and Advertising. Right now, at least we can use opensource browsers or search engines that ARE NOT google. So dont tell me: > we cant stop the spying and i dont hide anything But one day, we might not be able to do soykaf about it. Enjoy the "freedom" that we have now, i guarantee the word "freedom" won't be used in a decade or so...

>>52861 But we can't stop being spied. Not only in Internet but also irl too. Systemd can be considered as an bloated software which started developing by redhat who need to make their own eco system, and it's gonna be a part of it. Plus, systemd is not really good for me who want more light and simple init system, but it's better than proprietary softwares. Anyway, we can't be free. but we can do our best. Maybe it's not helpful, but using GNU/Linux and many opensource programs or donating many projects can make this situation better. I won't talk about offline privacy though. I think the moment when we stop being treat like the product is when corps and govs or people stop treat us as products.

>>52862 Oh dont even mention the governments helping each other, authorities logging literally everything everythere on IRC and stuff like that, i think the authorities are even worse than any hackers, the authoritiess basically do the same thing, just legally, or even if its illegal they wont be punished anyways

>>52861 >When will we stop being the product? When that's no longer a viable business model. The obvious solution is to vote with your wallet (or in this case cease engagement with proprietary platforms). However the issue with the effectiveness of this method is the uncritical actions of the vast majority of users. The truth is that whilst your average person may agree with you that these practices are unethical, their own ability to act on moral principles is compromised (perhaps deliberately by the society they exist in). As soon as there's even a hint of inconvenience to taking an ethical stance against something, that's when your typical user will fail to do so. It's much easier for them to rely on what's comfortable and familiar than to make things more complex for themselves in service of the greater good. You can see examples of this in relation to environmental issues for instance, it could also be said that systems of governance and law enforcement are designed to make following the rules the path of least resistance. This isn't to say that you can't overcome this intrinsic apathy and convince people to change but it's a big mountain to climb and the way forward isn't obvious.

Hehe, just wait 10-15 years, and see how free public 6G long-range network access points will be mounted literally everywhere. And then your TV, fridge, toaster, or even a light bulb will be equipped with microphones and wireless antennas. You'll no longer be able to cut out the transfer of the outgoing data, because you'll be no longer in charge of the network, a network that's sponsored and managed by some fat corps, and "given" for free to everyone. Currently, it's baby steps with all these smart TVs and Amazon/Google voice assistants, and you're sort of expected to install them into your own network. But as the time passes, and corps becoming more and more insolent, things are gonna be catastrophic.

>>52872 If its the case then either we have to change the culture of users(really hard but possible) or choose to live apart from the mainstream and stay in irrelevance.

>>52872 >The obvious solution is to vote with your wallet This is not really true. The woke AAA video game devs are an example of that. They have enough money and they only care about their message, not if the game sells enough. If their funds ever goes to 0, they can just ask the government for more money.

>>52898 ...except that a lot of those "woke" AAA games are best sellers...

>>52875 we already have this with cars. It is impossible to find a car that doesn't have some bluetooth bullshit built in. People who think that this is not coming are idiots.

>>52861 If I don't see the ads blocked with ad blocking software and apply critical thinking when choosing product to buy, am I affected by what you describe? Are you?

>>52905 Not sure about cars though. Privacy is going to be a niché within a niché sure but thing is overwhelming majority of families can't afford a new car, and only maybe can afford one used from several years ago. The moment even used cars will slip out of the range of being affordable, there will be a market for cheap car too gaping for manufacturers to ignore. Unfortunately, we are more likely to see a soykafty Chinese brand flooding the market cutting costs on the same crap new cars have by replacing it with cardboard than something like the Nano from India that just cuts said crap out altogether.

>>52905 >>52875 Unfortunately I think it's going to take a Chernobyl-scale event to roll any of this back. Like a million cars getting bricked remotely, or a million people's sex recordings getting uploaded to IPFS.

The thing about this is I believe it's just how a developed country has to work. I'm not saying I enjoy this, but I also feel it allows us a deeper view of ourselves. If we're constantly annoyed or afraid of the all knowing and tyrannical forces of technology, how would that translate to our way of being spiritually? Every time I start worrying about things like this I'm reminded how malleable and afraid of the unconscious I am. I'm afraid no matter what this concept is going to be here with us as humans both materially and immaterially. The best we can do is allow it to be a part of our lives. In places like the US it's what really keeps the machine going. At least they give us the option to be aware of the manipulation so we can be mindful of what we are exposed to and how it can affect our daily habits. It's pretty hard for us to understand why these things happen outside of our warped perception.

>>52927 Considering that omnipresent corporate surveillance is a more recent phenomenon I don't think it's a requirement for a functioning society (otherwise the world would've collapsed long ago). Even if it were, just because a machine is technically functioning doesn't mean it's fit for purpose.

Why are you against tracking and targeted advertizements? You realize corporations just want to help you get an adequate service? Offering bad goods and services is an easy way to lose ground to the Free Market. Are you some sort of communist who thinks data harvesting is somehow an immoral ill even though everyone who uses platforms which do so AGREED to a privacy policy?

>>52936 You dont get the point, windows peasant, they collect any information that is possible to get just to advertise soykaf, and 1 person is worth just a few cents on the commercials market, ever head of privacy?

>>52961 You realize that if they don't collect information microsoft workers don't get paid? Do you hate jobs? Why do you hate jobs? Why do you hate the poor? Don't you want there to be meaningful employment? You realize that the reason why FOSS software is soykaf to use is because no one is paying for it to be good? The only good software is the software you pay for, because the monetary incentive gives a reason for the devs to give a soykaf about it.

>>52965 I realize you're bating but >no one is paying for it I think that the developers of Blender, Gimp, Krita, the fuarrrking Linux kernel, etc would like to have a word with you.

Only way to have no advertising is to basically be North Korea.

>>52936 it runs deeper, have you not seen enough subliminal programming/propaganda on tv shows/ads/movies/music? they now do that with computers/browsers/internet and it is even much worse. it's not even about the propaganda/programming, now they're much more interactive due to our data as inputs and much more targeted. there's a browser that can hear you even if you have it closed due to background services from a mic blob, there's phones that literally use your microphones right now if you view /proc/asound active streams and have far field microphone to eavesdrop you and others from afar. there's proprietary long-range beacons and api like lora and many more like mls and exposure to track your very precise location. everything is spyware everything is botnet, we already live in a dystopia. it's not even about surveillance, it's about total control, removal of any opposition through cutting edge tech and backdoors, pegasus backdoors on clergymen, journalists, dissidents, good leaders. fuarrrk all fuarrrk this fuarrrk soykaf soykaf fuarrrk soykaf fuarrrk

Advertising is the strings that make the system work, always has been. Despite being spied online at all times, internet is an area where there is at least some sort of awareness about the benefits of privacy. Fairly confident we will have influencer presidents soon.

>>53016 >Fairly confident we will have influencer presidents soon Doesn't Trump count? There's been various 'road to success' books published under his name and his Twitter account was the most visited on the platform before it was derezzed.

>>53016 >>53021 Every president since at least Eisenhower has been a salesman for the military industry.

When will we stop being the product? The ubiquitous tracking and surveillance built into the internet today is primarily a result of: 1. Surveillance capitalism - Bandwidth and server resources aren't free. Most of the world is under an economic system which is only partially socialist. Government websites are funded with tax money and charities are funded with donations. Private companies still needed a way to pay for their websites. They found one of the easiest ways to do that was provide the content for free with built in advertising rather than paywall it. The most effective advertising required invasive tracking of the user. It began with simple cookies and referral links and gradually expanded to executable code running on everyone's systems to track key presses, mouse movements and clicks. Now it has become so pervasive it is built into operating systems and pulling from an array of sensors on the user's device. 2. Government and political mass surveillance - This is a means for a society to control its citizens and keep the peace. Lasting civilizations have always had a ruling class of elite and a serving class of peasants throughout history. The police are the modern day king's guard who enforce rules and keep the peace. Without enforcers of order most civilizations have crumbled. Today a person could infect a power or water treatment plant with malware and disrupt the lives of millions, armed only with a computer and an internet connection. Governments and law enforcement agencies justify invasive tracking of citizens physical and digital lives in the name of safety and keeping of the peace. The elite members of any civilization want to maintain a status quo so they can continue to live comfortably. They have little regard for how enforcement measures affect the freedom or privacy of the serving class. Item #1 could change in the future if a better method of monetizing the internet is found. This is similar to the argument Stallman makes on free libre software. There are business models that provide paid services or support to fund their websites. However, the advertising business model is very old and well established. It was used in television and radio before the internet was around. Pay-per-view television channels existed but they probably saw much lower viewership than the channels supported by commercials. Item #2 is unlikely to change anytime soon in my opinion. It would require a drastic change in the social, political and economic order. The world is currently headed in the direction of making this worse before it gets better. I do not know if it is even possible for a civilization to sustain itself without descending into chaos when citizens have complete freedom and privacy. It may be possible in a future with more advanced technology than we have now.

>>52905 Imagine a Huawei-like brand of cars. Made of cheap parts and with cheap labor, and sold at a near loss to drive down the cost even more. Then, to make the money back, they sell all kinds of information collected from your driving and surroundings to advertisers. Maybe even link it with other online profiles from your phone, once you install its app that lets you... idk, blink the lights. I think Tesla is going to become like that in the future. AFAIK, right now, they "only" use all the collected data for training the self-driving thing now. But try to modify any of its software, and it'll refuse to move a single inch even when it's fully capable of doing so. It's no longer something you own.

>>53078 >Made of cheap parts and with cheap labor, So... an American car? >and sold at a near loss to drive down the cost even more. Ah, no, guess not. American soykafboxes are still expensive.

>>53078 It seems like we're much closer to that future than I originally thought. Scary stuff. (https://rivian.com/legal/privacy, https://web.archive.org/web/20211113194751/https://rivian.com/legal/privacy)

We will always be the product. People chose bloat and complexity over simple standards and privacy. They chose centralization and corporations over decentralization and communities (to be honest, I'd trust amazon with my deliveries more than some random stranger who could be stealing all my credit card information). Soon GTK and Wayland will become one thing, and that will bring the end of virtually every desktop environment except for GNOME. Window managers such as i3 will also end because Xorg will die and Wayland will be bundled with GTK and GNOME. They might even bundle Pipewire, Dbus, and Systemd as well. As a result of all this, almost all linux distros will cease development and users will either have to switch to OpenBSD or use GNOME+GTK+Wayland+Systemd+Linux, or simply "Linux One". Everyone will rejoice as the linux community will no longer be fragmented, and almost all apps will be written in Rust or Electron. Firefox will probably switch to blink or rewrite the entire browser in Rust. If they do the former, then all Firefox forks including LibreWolf and Pale Moon will cease development as none of them can maintain an independent browser. If they do the latter, then Firefox will likely die anyway. Soon Ungoogled Chromium will end development and the only option will be to use Google Chrome or Microsoft Edge. Enjoy your freedom of choice while it lasts, because in 10 years, we're all going to be using Google Chrome on GNOME+Systemd+Linux. Everyone, including lains, nanons from nanochan, the glitterboys on neoshitties, every tilde community and all their users, and even Richard Stallman himself (if he's still alive) will be forced to accept defeat and submit to Google + Red Hat.