[gonehome]

That’s pretty bad. I think TikTok’s risks are higher than people think. It’s better to avoid it.

https://stratechery.com/2020/the-tiktok-war/

Any company running out of mainland China is going to have serious privacy problems due to CCP influence and their need to comply with both local laws and the government’s interest in influencing public sentiment.

[madeofpalk]

As a non-american, we don't really have a choice of using a "native" social network that only has interference from our own government.

[gonehome]

That doesn’t make the two equivalent.

Also, hopefully soon you will: https://urbit.org/

[bb010g]

Digital land ownership! Just what the internet desperately needed. /s

[h0p3]

I will not defend Urbit, though I count myself lucky to read fossuser's posts where I find them. I would argue about digital land ownership and what the internet's users (and possible future users) need though. I'm interested in what the internet is for (like everything else). Would you like to have a serious conversation about that? That does seem a worthy topic, even if Urbit does not address it effectively enough (I'm still not convinced it won't centralize power). I suggest the workers must own the means of production. What do you think?

[gonehome]

These knee-jerk responses are lame.

- IDs stop the spam problem and give people control over something that keeps its reputation (and they're cheap).

- Federated systems normally suck because administering the servers and keeping decentralized versions in sync is hard. Urbit's design fixes this.

- Encrypted by default, ability to be as easy to run as FB (eventually, not right now). Peer to peer with the address space and key issues solved from first principles.

- Stability over long time horizons due to design (goal being indefinite), the urbit abstraction layer doesn't change and state can always be recomputed - changing pieces are implemented via jets to communicate with whatever underlying OS is doing the normal stuff.

It's a clever design and solves a lot of problems with modern computing, people often dismiss it out of hand because Yarvin's politics are stupid (he's no longer involved in the project and hasn't been for some time). Peter Thiel's Trump support was stupid too, but that doesn't mean he doesn't get a lot of other stuff right.

https://urbit.org/blog/the-understanding-urbit-podcast/

[earthboundkid]

LOL, if you don't like a social network run by communists or capitalists, try the one run by don't-call-them-fascists.

[Siira]

Still, it’s obvious that the CCP is more competent in executing centralized, longterm plans, and has much less cultural/institutional pressure not to seriously screw over people.

[smnrchrds]

It also has much less ability to screw over people unless they live in China. China cannot project power the way US can.

[Teever]

This isn't totally accurate.

You are correct that China cannot project power in the sense that they can't easily invade a country or level shattering economic sanctions but they have proven themselves quite capable of targetting individuals in other nations both online and in the real world.

Either way, there is a moral imperative to prevent China from gaining the ability to project power the way the US can. The US being able to project that kind of power is shitty, and the two entities being able to do that is even shittier.

[jrochkind1]

I appreciate that you recognize the US being able to do it is shitty.

I wonder how many non-Americans think two entities being able to do it is better than one, because at least they can counter-balance each other.

Not just with force; I was recently thinking about how the US during the cold war tried to be "nice" to the "third world" to keep them out of the "sphere of influence" of the Soviet Union. Currently China is trying to project it's "soft power" that way too to get less developed countries into it's patronage, but the US isn't really doing that at the moment (see for instance approaches to distributing covid vaccine...).

I (who is a usa citizen) personally am not really sure which is preferable, only one super-power, or two. Either way the world is in for a rough ride.

[artificialLimbs]

Let me assure you, Chinese power is BAD. And I personally hate using that word, but here it is warranted.

At least in the U.S., we have the intent of moral fiber permeating through our founding document, and probably at least half the population still fervently believes in these principles or tries to behave as though they matter.

China doesn't give a fuck. Their government is a communist dictatorship, and their sole concern is the expansion of their power through force.

[k12sosse]

When it's just the US, AXIS powers lose. When it's China too, the world loses.

[djhn]

Cannot for now.

[fsflover]

Have a look at Mastodon, PeerTube, PixelFed etc.

[chmod775]

Many countries have their own domestic social networks with varying popularity - some are way more active than FB, others are more or less dead. Russia is an example of the former.

Other countries don't use social media much, because they are culturally just not as interested in it.

There's a few countries where you can't really avoid being on any social network and that social network is not domestic, but those you can probably count on one hand. Off the top of my head I can just come up with Australia, India and Indonesia.

[absove]

Curious in which category you think the majority of European countries fall into? The domestic social network one, or the don't use social media one? Because as far as I can tell US social networks are the norm there and there very much is a social expectation that you are reachable on them, even if it's not government mandated.

[chmod775]

> there very much is a social expectation that you are reachable on them

I disagree. People will (somewhat) expect you to have a WhatsApp in many European countries, but hardly anyone will expect you to use Facebook.

At least in my circles Facebook is a wasteland. Many people haven't even posted anything in years, and if I was trying to reach anyone via Facebook I'd settle in for a long wait - until they check it in a month or two.

You won't notice it if you just open Facebook, because Facebook will fill your feeds with people who are active, but when I go through my list of contacts there it's obvious less than one in five are still actively using it.

I don't claim total knowledge of the situation everywhere, but I do keep in contact with people of a lot of different countries.

[MomoXenosaga]

Europe has been deeply colonised by US tech companies.

I do not agree with Chinese stance on democracy or human rights but I admire their willingness to play by their own rules. Not opening their markets and rolling out the red carpet for Silicon valley was wise.

[jrochkind1]

I wonder how many of those are in fact infiltrated by the NSA, the Chinese equivalent, or both though. :(

[calvinmorrison]

Any company running out of mainland USA is going to have serious privacy problems due to USA influence and their need to comply with both local laws and the government’s interest in influencing public sentiment.

[wongarsu]

Yes, if you care about privacy both the large Chinese services and the large American services are bad.

If you use Facebook or Instagram assume that the NSA has all your data, and that someone might try to manipulate you. If you use TikTok assume that China has all your data, and someone might try to manipulate you. You either choose your poison, or you stay on services that aren't in the limelight

[gonehome]

One big difference is in the US the companies are not required to manipulate content to serve USG interests. TikTok may downrank or censor HongKong videos because the government forces them to - the same does not happen at American companies.

I think the 'assume they have all of your data' is paranoid (particularly for encrypted stuff like whatsapp), but people should probably more careful about this kind of thing than they are anyway. The US has laws and rules around access, you may not agree with them - but they are far and away better than the CCP's approach.

The CCP is running concentration camps for a minority population of their own citizens, invading and taking over neighboring countries (HK with an eye towards Taiwan), and censoring pooh bear from the internet because of a light hearted comparison to Xi. The police call foreign students in the US to threaten them over their internet activity: https://www.vice.com/en/article/jgxdv7/chinese-police-are-vi...

The comparisons are not valid.

[wongarsu]

> particularly for encrypted stuff like whatsapp

End-To-End encryption is useless if like in the case of WhatsApp you don't control the client, but a company beholden to US secret courts does. "“For the past decade, N.S.A. has led an aggressive, multipronged effort to break widely used Internet encryption technologies,” said a 2010 memo describing a briefing about N.S.A. accomplishments" [1]

> The US has laws and rules around access

I'm not a US citizen and reside outside the US, which from my limited legal understanding means that the US law doesn't give a crap about me

I agree that in recent decades China has a worse human rights record, which is a major factor when you "choose your poison".

1: https://www.propublica.org/article/the-nsas-secret-campaign-...

[gonehome]

All reasonable points, though I think whatsapp is secure - I think for most people the best choice is Signal for general messaging and assuming everything else is largely public.

Even in Signal people can and do take screenshots, so really probably just best to be cautious of anything in writing that you wouldn't want published.

This is one reason I'm excited about Urbit - I think it'll be cool to get out of the dependence on centralized services.

[leephillips]

You're right about Chinese government behavior. But “the same does not happen at American companies.” --- no, but they censor the internet in obedience to Pakistani demands.

[gonehome]

You're right, and I think that's wrong: https://zalberico.com/essay/2020/06/13/zoom-in-china.html

[leephillips]

That was excellent. Especially the dialog, totally on point. The horrible thing is that it is barely an exaggeration. US companies are in bed with a government that is conducting an actual genocide, as you point out. And then there is the middle east....

But as far as Google and Pakistan goes, most people who have an inkling of this think that the censorship only affects results served within Pakistan. But, in fact, the censorship affects search results served within the US. Google has allowed the Pakistani government, as well as various pressure groups and other governments, to influence what US people see within the US.

[lurkerasdfh8]

Not sure why you think those are exclusive. All companies mentioned have offices and comply with law on both regions.

[ebruchez]

If you think the two are actually comparable in degree, you are seriously misled.

[gonehome]

Whataboutism style arguments (which are always the knee-jerk reactions that show up) are wrong.

I wrote about this at length here: https://zalberico.com/essay/2020/06/13/zoom-in-china.html and won’t rehash it again in the comments.

[imiric]

It's really frustrating how often whataboutism is used whenever China is criticized, particularly towards the US.

Yes, we know other countries have similar issues, but we can't excuse the blatant wrongdoings of the CCP by pointing the finger elsewhere.

It often feels like the work of bots or government shills anytime it happens, but good luck getting to the bottom of that.

[brabel]

Why is it frustrating when others point out that the most popular services, which are usually from the USA, also have the same kind of problem of being under the influence of the respective government, but nobody seems to be as worried about it? The criticism almost always comes up whenever a service provided by a Chinese company is mentioned in any context. China has shown no interest that I know of in spying on non-Chinese citizens, so I feel like it's probably less problematic to use a chinese service than an American one if your only worry is that someone is spying on you, specially considering how there's plenty of evidence of the USA spying on the whole bloody planet, including heads of state of allied countries, for f'sake...

>It often feels like the work of bots or government shills

Do you think I'm a bot because I disagree with you? Maybe you are the bot... how can we verify you're not? :D good luck getting to the bottom of that.

[Teever]

> China has shown no interest that I know of in spying on non-Chinese citizens

Assuming that this assertion is true what motivates China to be so authoritarian towards their citizens but not so to the rest of the world? Is it altruism or inability?

Does China only spy on their own citizens but not the rest of the world because they like the rest of the world more than their own citizens and they want the rest of the world to have rights and freedoms that they believe their own citizens don't deserve?

If it comes down to an inability to spy on the rest of the world what do you think will happen when China does develop the ability to spy on the rest of the world?

[shard]

> China has shown no interest that I know of in spying on non-Chinese citizens

I believe China has kept tabs on 2 groups of non-Chinese citizens: 1. foreign nationals within China borders, and 2. foreign nationals who are ethnically Chinese.

[imiric]

It's frustrating because it's not the topic of conversation, and it only serves to derail it as we're doing now.

If we're discussing the high cost of apples and someone brings up oranges, it doesn't change the fact that apples are expensive.

> Do you think I'm a bot because I disagree with you?

No, but a lazy comment doing s/China/USA/ certainly reads like it. And if you've seen some of the threads on Reddit or Twitter it becomes pretty clear some accounts search for any negative discussion about China and interject with whataboutism, which would be pretty easy to automate.

[krageon]

> it's not the topic of conversation

Yes it is, because the topic invariably includes "alternatives" or things that are "better". Those things are nearly always things the US has made. They are not better. Yes, it's bad. Everyone knows this. Adding value to that conversation is giving alternatives or offering some new insight into the nature of badness and how it's different flavours should be looked upon.

[sm4rk0]

> Why is it frustrating when others point out

Because it's painful to be awaken from the "American dream".