Unrelated, but I just found out there’s a .youtube TLD. Not sure how to feel about this.

Some features of premium actually sound really interesting, but I find myself struggling to reconcile my interest in both those features and the general idea of an internet that isn’t built upon ads with my strong dislike of Google and a sincere wish to give them as little money as possible.

We need to get our politicians to do a lot more, a lot faster.

So we’re still doomed, then? I’m sorry, I’m sure lots of this is meant to be incredibly uplifting, but it reads an awful lot like “green is cheaper, trust the market! Numbers go up, up, up!” when you consider that:

• Climate change is impacting countless people in horrible ways
• Climate change is still getting worse

The important thing to note here being that, even if a brighter future awaits beyond, the worst is yet to come. I’ll get back to this in a moment.

Yes, that the science to save the human race exists is nice. Really nice. There was a period in which I genuinely wondered if there was any chance humans wouldn’t extinct themselves. But that was years ago. I’ve since learned that “saving the human species” is a terrible, disgusting metric. The future of what I consider humanity remains grim.

Now, if the worst is yet to come, and we can’t yet even accurately predict how much worse the worst really will be, take a moment to reflect on this: which part of humanity is better prepared to weather the incoming changes, and which part is more likely to be labeled “climate change refugees?”

Humanity isn’t only the richest. It’s not merely the wealthiest and most developed nations. Humanity is also a lot of people who will suffer, people who I’m unconvinced will receive the aid and support they need and deserve.

Because the root cause of these issues, the systems that govern our society, have led us here and are unlikely to go away anytime soon. Because these systems have shown incredible prowess at protecting select groups of people from certain issues, while failing at completely fixing them, despite not struggling due to a lack of resources and continuous technological advances. If the pattern holds…

Then humans will survive. Many will live well.

Humanity is still pretty screwed.

TL;DR:

“The tools are here, we’ll be alright, just need political will!”

Who’s we? And if getting politicians to do what’s right was that simple, we wouldn’t be in this mess.

P.S. I’m not advocating for doom here, I just wish more people understood that Americans buying cheap Chinese electric cars won’t save the people living nearby the mine in Africa where the cobalt for those batteries was extracted.

“The elephant in the room – and the opportunity – is how to solve for the industry-created problem that people don’t like and don’t trust advertising,” said Garcia. “Privacy-enhancing tech doesn’t make creepy and disruptive ads less creepy or disruptive in the eyes of the average user.”

Emphasis mine.

Betting on your reputation that users will trust you to adequately handle an issue that really seems like it’d end up with a conflict of interest seems like a fancier manner of saying you’re risking taking a dump on your reputation.

No way through but forwards now, eh. Not feeling particularly optimistic, but I’m cheering for them all the same. Their concerns and observations about the direction the industry is headed in are valid.

Am I missing something?

Firefox is Mozilla’s most profitable product. Its millions of users enable Mozilla to make deals for sponsored content (e.g. shortcuts), integrations, and biggest of all: the default search option with Google.

I stand corrected, I see your argument about the comparative difficulty and effect of banning a browser vs an extension. The discoverability of the extension alone is a big point.

Not sure I agree with how you seemingly downplay the damage banning the browser could cause and fail to consider consider other ways people could organize to distribute extensions (even as you mention various ways to get Firefox, I’m a bit confused on this one). Others have already talked about this in the thread, so I won’t repeat it here.

With all that said, it appears we were both fools. Mozilla has returned the extensions already. It was neither about protecting Firefox in Russia, nor a case of “Fuck Mozilla.”

Would you be happier if they ignored the demands and possibly got Firefox banned in Russia? Because if so, it’s not that we disagree over our views of the Russian government. Probably neither do Mozilla.

We have different priorities. I want the average Russian to be easily able to use Firefox, even if it takes more work to load some extensions. From where I’m sitting, you seem to want to cut off your nose to spite your face.

I’m genuinely curious why.

You’re right, regarding Mastodon. I won’t edit my other comment, though, both to preserve the original chain of thought and because that brings up another discussion.

To quote the EFF:

We feel that the intended usage of the feature will not determine people’s expectation of privacy while using it.

Offering people a feature with preexisting expectations, similar to other things that fulfill those expectations, then telling people “We know it looks like a duck but don’t expect it to quack!”

…It begs the question: was the feature really a good idea?

And it’s also damming for private messaging on mastodon.

I once read vague complaints about it being a rushed implementation. While I won’t trust those without evidence, I for sure wouldn’t trust mastodon with my PMs. At least, not until how this was allowed to happen is figured out and fixed if necessary.

P.S. I’m still not sure I believe in PMs in the fediverse. If I need to share something and care about keeping it private, I’d rather move the conversation elsewhere.

Wrong Conway.

I won’t know if any of the linked resources are any good until I have time to look them over, but if nothing else I appreciate you taking the time to answer.

Re: whitewashing, fair point. I’d already read about the issue, but maybe I still need to rethink how I look at computing history.

If you’re serious, please elaborate on your points. I genuinely don’t understand.

Going by Wikipedia here,

She was a huge part

Please define huge part. She was a “key architect” in the starting years of a project that fell short of its goals.

her entire work has to be viewed through that lens

Why? It was, relatively speaking, an almost small part of her career. She didn’t stay until the end of the project. You even admit that her contributions to the field were many and meaningful.

is every explicit way connected to modern conflicts where military misuses AI to murder children

This feels like such a huge leap, that I don’t even know where to begin tackling it. Is Tim Berners Lee in every explicit way connected to the modern privacy hellscape that is the modern internet?

Make no mistake, if she really did want to help develop artificial intelligence for the military’s sake, fuck her. I can respect someone’s achievements while also thinking they’re trash as a person.

But I don’t think that’s the case here, and I’m lost as to what point, exactly, you’re trying to make.

It seems less anti-theft and more “data protection in case of theft.”

I’m not sure that’s a fair assessment (after all, what should a proper anti-theft measure even look like, then?), but that’s the best way I can describe it. From what I can tell, it’s more tech that attempts to lock the screen when it believes your phone isn’t safe.

More data protection is always nice, provided it works. Was AI the best way to do it? No idea. Don’t know if it’ll help with the actual theft any, since I believe the stolen phones are usually factory reset and then resold all over. User data was never the main appeal.

It’s mildly funny that this will be tested in Brazil. Something that is a bit fitting, a bit sad, yet I can’t help snorting at.

Honestly, that strategy feels like the most sensible one, since the real world often does not (or can not afford to) care to wait for v1.0.0 before using software. It’s no wonder so many programming ecosystems have adopted it.

I find it a bit of a shame it’s not part of the semver specification itself, which only states:

4. (paraphrased) do whatever you want haha

My point is, I don’t think that’s “your bad.” It’s just how it is, and the best there currently is. Unless you think there’s something that could’ve been done better, in which case I’m curious as to what, if you’re willing to share.

I assume pirates will get the better service, again. The AAA game industry’s evolution is a frustrating, pitiful joke. Really glad for the indie scene we have today.

Don’t feel too jelly though, the actual profile manager has been in need of some care for a while, now…

…and it’s apparently getting it soon! No way they’ll hide the button after they polish it up, right? Happy times to come for all, I hope :⁠^⁠)

That’s unnecessarily dismissive. Unfortunately, even the best extensions have their downsides. Some used a browser that suited their preferences better instead, which is a shame for both Firefox and the user, in my opinion.

Mozilla recognizes this and is finally taking action to integrate highly requested features into Firefox. Many “who really care” are glad for this, because it is a good thing.

That’s a shame, thank you for the input. I guess I could try Bluesky instead.

Not sure how up to date you are on Bluesky’s situation, but it might interest you to know they’ve recently started doing early-access federation. It’s… not ideal (opinion), but it’s moving along (fact).

While I agree with you, I just want to mention that not necessarily all fediverse users have a formed opinion (at least at first) about open platforms, sharing content with other websites, and so on.

Some people just suffered from platforms like ex-Twitter, Facebook, Instagram, Tumblr, etc. enshittifying, heard that other victims were trying to build something better, and (generously, might I add) decided to give it a chance.

That doesn’t excuse any horrible behavior they might’ve engaged in. But remember that just because someone is surprised and reacts negatively at how their content is handled on the fediverse, that doesn’t mean they were in the wrong to join.

Folks can jump into things without fully understanding them, and sometimes it’s nice to, circumstances allowing, take that as an opportunity to inform, rather than question “Why are you even here?”

There’s quite a bit to unpack in this article, even if some of it is only mentioned.

It’s a saddening read. There are issues with Fediverse culture and surrounding technical discussion at wide, but also with interactions between law and new technologies like ActivityPub—and that’s on top of the law, on it’s own, already doing a horrible job way too often, in my opinion. None of this is news, but it always hurts a little to be reminded so.

I’ve been thinking about trying to get into mastodon, to form my own opinion on several topics it intersects with. I’m a little uncomfortable with how popular it is compared to other fediverse software, considering how poorly they seem to integrate. I hoped some time on mastodon would dispell this feeling, or at least give me insights I could work with. To be honest, every day it gets a little harder to justify that idea.

But that’s just a personal thing. Maybe I’m simply not fit for micro-blogging. Really, I don’t care which software is the most popular, I literally just wish they’d integrate better. Despite my misgivings, I’m grateful for the positive impact mastodon has made in the social/tech circles, changing how many people see social media and their relationship with it.

The us-versus-them mentality is unreal. The only valid them, to me, is proprietary closed platforms. We should strive for more decentralized networks that shift control over user experience back to its users, because we need and deserve safer, healthier social networks. This is not it. I can only hope culture will improve, because I’m not sure how you’d tackle a problem on this scale.

And if mastodon can’t fix itself? Screw it, and keep an eye on what comes next.

It’s not a competition, we’re in a team effort to build a part of the internet that can resist enshittification inevitable in closed platforms; so long as the platform is open, I’ll keep my mind open as well. If my lemmy instance decides to migrate to Sublinks, that’s fine. Worst case, I’ll migrate elsewhere. Assuming Bluesky turns out OK as a company, even atproto taking the lead over ActivityPub might be fine. Hell, some of the original AP creators are still experimenting with new ideas.

I fully agree with the point that too many people act like the fediverse, or their specific brand of it, is more open-minded and kinder than what they’re trying to replace. I hope it’s possible to make that true, one day.

P.S. Sorry, brevity is the soul of wit, and I’m an idiot. This ended up as an outlet for issues that have been frustrating me for a while.

I used to enjoy fireship, but a particularly disappointing video soured the channel to me significantly.

It was about something bad Google was doing to the web/chrome (the list’s so big at this point that I can’t recall what) and it hit me how, despite the humorous nature of the content, that video was how many people were being seriously introduced to the issue… and it neglected to even mention Firefox. Imagine informing people of a looming threat, yet forgetting to mention one of the best tools against it. Genuinely baffling.

There’s more to it, but it’s been a while and my memory was never the best. All that remains now is a general feeling of “Oh darn, this guy’s videos can be irresponsibly superficial, sometimes.” Maybe that’s just par for the course with such content creators, which race to be the first out the door with the news™, but mistakes, however small, had long been adding up over time and eroding my trust in the source. That video just happened to be the last straw.

I don’t mean to criticize you or others who enjoy the videos, though. Just wanted to remind folks to be careful with where and how they get their info. Hopefully, this uncalled for rant will inspire passersby to be a bit more mindful of the content they consume.

P.S. obligatory screw nintendo :^(