[re-al]

I'm totally fine personally with other people doing what they want to do. Buy a phone knowing you are being spied on.

But do you forget that we did not know we were being spied on. Some of us suspected perhaps, but this only became blatant with the Snowden revelations. The point is that this is not an open, free-sharing system - it is plainly deceitful, designed to extract our most personal information, to provide it to a corporation/governance structure whether we want it or not.

And now we see the long path we are on coming to fruition - we will have to have a phone, a vax passport to simply get into shops. We are facing a world like East Germany, but on techno-steroids.

So, fine, choose what you like. But do you not think a line is crossed when the techno-snooping becomes mandatory, with smart phones, smart tvs, smart meters, etc? Must I hand over all of my information to what is shaping up to be a fascist (government+corporate) governance structure?

Most people around here would say yes.

[darkerside]

Actually, most people around here wouldn't say anything because this topic isn't important enough to them. They glance at the comment and move on.

Is this more unacceptable than people dying in a building collapse in Miami, or children starving to death in third world countries, or a loved one passing away, or someone being rude to someone else?

It's truly in the eye of the beholder.

[re-al]

There are bad things all over the world, deaths, crashes, collapses, etc.

But what does that have to do with technologists working hard to eliminate freedoms and privacy, not just for themselves but for everyone? Do technologists have the truth, do they really know what is better for everyone else?

[darkerside]

I don't disagree with your general point, just nitpicking on this particularly, because I think it might be eye opening to consider

> Most people around here would say yes.