When I announced I would be closing my communities earlier this year, a curious thing happened: a surprising number of regulars replied w...

When I announced I would be closing my communities earlier this year, a curious thing happened: a surprising number of regulars replied with some variation of “I think this is my exit.” While some were specifically talking about Matrix, claiming that mine was the only room they were really active in and therefore they saw no point to having a Matrix account anymore, at least one specifically announced they would be quitting privacy entirely, save for a few basic techniques like using a password manager and being mindful of what to post online. While I didn’t expect the number of people responding that way, I was expecting that response from one or two people. If you check any given privacy forum – especially the ones with a heavy overlap of mainstream users such as Reddit – you’ll find no shortage of people asking “is all this work worth it?” and/or announcing that they’re giving up privacy because it’s too much work. So what gives? Is privacy worth the work?

  • refalo
    111·
    6 months ago

    harmful network effect

    that’s a funny way to say marketing.

    I think most FOSS zealots simply despise capitalism in general, they want everyone else to be poor like them. Kinda like socialism.

    • TheAnonymouseJoker@lemmy.ml
      5·
      6 months ago

      Poor is a strong word. It is not about being poor, but rather the inability for corporates to have a lack of the same constraints that FOSS zealots have. Money is just one of the key constraints.

      Harmful network effect is not mere marketing, but propaganda aimed to make people deploy surveillance tools on themselves.

    • Doods@infosec.pub
      3·
      6 months ago

      I think most FOSS zealots simply despise capitalism in general

      No, my ideal economic system is capitalist in nature, I just don’t trust western powers (the enemy) with my data. I say western powers, but that includes Russia and China and other things.

    • lemmyreader@lemmy.mlEnglish
      2·
      6 months ago

      I think most FOSS zealots simply despise capitalism in general, they want everyone else to be poor like them. Kinda like socialism.

      One well known exception to your comment is Linus Torvalds. He didn’t mind moving to the USA to make some good money after being a student who could afford a whopping 386! And unlike some people believe, the GPL does not restrict a programmer to make money.

      • refalo
        2·
        6 months ago

        Indeed, his views are not quite as extreme as RMS for example, Linus specifically did not want to require GPLv3 which is probably sacrilege to Stallman.