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by uwydr 2416 days ago
It's really a shame that we are all forced by law to sign up to Facebook/Twitter/etc and check the feed constantly
3 comments

I feel like this is a false choice.

Let's add one actor to this. Google. Are you free not to use Google?

What does that 'choice' mean? I don't mean 'I use duck duck go'. I mean, you don't use or touch anything that Google provides.

How much of the internet just disappeared for you? Are you 'free' not to use Google in this context?

Your comment also dismisses the very real reality that you have very smart people, tricking you into playing with these services all day. Do you not accept this? Do you also believe that advertising doesn't work on you?

Like most modern problems, the issue isn't simple and the solution isn't simple.

Before you reply, I predict your response will include some form of 'I don't use these, never have and never will'. Great! I applaud this.

How many people in your life do? Is it a majority? Are the majority of people in your life participating in something that you are now 'blacked' out from? Is removing yourself from the experience the best way to engage in the solution?

I don’t use any of them.

Every one I know is being bombarded by their paid speech though.

So even non-users have a legit argument to regulation.

I can politically assert my right to a world that isn’t bent towards paid speech.

The most important bias we don’t discuss in our algorithms: they’re all designed by paid workers. They’re designing to improve their pay.

I don’t owe Facebook, Zuckerberg, or anyone on this forum my deference to the economic ideas of dead men next November :shrug:

When you say you don't use any of them, I think you're being fairly narrow with your definition.

It's pretty hard to dodge Amazon and Google on today's internet. Are you prepared to shut yourself off entirely from those services?

Would you be willing to block the Amazon and Google blocks of IPs? You're free to do this. Is it really a choice though?

No because I don’t have to take ownership for choices I have no control over.

I don’t have to block them because some site will still funnel it to them as a middle man. All blocking indirect access to my data will achieve is me wasting time thinking I can.

I can directly avoid their services and personally generate no emotional buy in, staying indifferent to their literal existence, and politically flexible then on Sanders or whoever taxing them billions.

The only framework that has social merit/weight, IMO is the legislative one. Not a corporations interest in gaming our agency for their feudal trade schemes.

I don’t believe in any of this or whatever obligations others say I have. I’ll politically support ones that seem sensible: m4a, education, engineering at scale to support those initiatives.

Outside that the reasons for providing institutional support of trade seem contrived. The ideology of long dead men exported into the limbic systems of the living.

You're making my point for me when you say this.

> I don’t have to block them because some site will still funnel it to them as a middle man. All blocking indirect access to my data will achieve is me wasting time thinking I can.

These tools and services are everywhere. It's simply not true that you can live outside of them in a modern internet.

If you do somehow escape entirely, the people in your life still haven't.

In what sense have you made a choice here? Or are you living outside of the zeitgeist entirely? The conversations and politics of the day are happening on Twitter with or without you. Very real policy is happening in 240 characters.

> I don’t believe in any of this or whatever obligations others say I have.

Ok... But the culture is shifting. POTUS has Tweeted every single day since announcing that he'll be running for office. Twitter has an effect on your life.

Not having a twitter account doesn't change that. Not using Facebook directly doesn't change the fact that their tracking pixels are all over the internet. Not using gmail doesn't mean your email isn't being mined on the back end.

Putting your head in the sand and saying "it doesn't effect me" isn't true.

>The only framework that has social merit/weight, IMO is the legislative one. Not a corporations interest in gaming our agency for their feudal trade schemes.

Ok?

>I don’t believe in any of this or whatever obligations others say I have. I’ll politically support ones that seem sensible: m4a, education, engineering at scale to support those initiatives.

Ok.. But you are still playing in the same sandbox as the rest of us. And this sandbox is very influenced by FAANG companies and the policies they offer.

> Outside that the reasons for providing institutional support of trade seem contrived. The ideology of long dead men exported into the limbic systems of the living.

Ok?

Wait what? I don't have any of these. Sarcasm? :)
Let's pull back a bit from the FB/Twitter.

Are you _free_ not to use javascript in your browser? Of course you are free to do it. What do you lose by turning off javascript?

Now, go back to FB/Twitter/Google/Amazon/Microsoft/Apple/etc... are you free to not use them? Yes. What do you lose?

Is it practical to throw the baby out with the bath water in this context?