[feanaro]

> The 'freedom' to inspect the code that runs on your computer is useless without both the freedom to see what happens upstream, and also some level of trust or confidence that the service you're using really isnt doing something nefarious.

How is such freedom useless? I keep hearing this argument, yet I still run a significant portion of software locally and have no plans of replacing that with services, given they are a far worse option, precisely due to the loss of freedom and autonomy for not much additional gain.

Sure, if you accept that all your software are belong to them, then clearly the freedom to run libre stuff is useless, tautologically. But maybe you shouldn't be ready to give away that freedom just yet?

That you cannot be sure what someone else is running "over there", on a machine you don't control, is a fact of nature. Trading away your freedom for a foolish attempt to control that is misguided and shortsighted.

[Jarwain]

It's not freedom in general that's useless, but specifically freedom when that software relies on an upstream service to do things.

Your argument sounds like it is against the use of software that requires such an upstream service in the first place, which is a fair stance to take. The Problem is when that upstream service is Necessary for whatever you are trying to do. Like in circumstances where interaction and collaboration with other users is the goal.

[car_analogy]

> It's not freedom in general that's useless, but specifically freedom when that software relies on an upstream service to do things.

Until that service (such as a bank) decides that your rooted, user-controlled phone is no good, and forces you to use one controlled by the manufacturer, if you want access to your bank account.

[simonh]

If you want access from an app on your phone yes, not just to have access.

The fact is it’s not just us that are stakeholders in the devices we carry. Our mobile network provider is a stakeholder, the manufacturer is a stakeholder, our bank is a stakeholder. This is why e.g. we don’t have unlimited rights over the bank cards or those access code generator devices some banks used to issue.

If you want to use your phone for some of the functions of a bank card, then some of your banks interests in the functioning and management of that card roll over into your phone. If you want to play a social online game on your device, then now the games company and the wider community of gamers playing that game with you has an interest in the management of your device. If you don't like that, that's fine you should be able to have as much control over your device as you want ideally, but you wont be playing those games or using those services.

Cory Doctorow is one of the few people in the techie public space that seems to have a really good grip on these issues and some practical ideas on how to solve these problems, through chains of trust based on users owning the keys to the chain of trust on their devices. It’s a really hard complex problem though.

[car_analogy]

> If you want access from an app on your phone yes, not just to have access.

Ah, you mean in the case where you have a different computer available to you, that has not (yet) been locked against its user like your phone has. But we are so certain that this locking of compute won't spread, that we treat all other computers (that are locked), as an exotic exception, and the only remaining class of devices not yet locked (PCs) as the norm.

> Our mobile network provider is a stakeholder, the manufacturer is a stakeholder, our bank is a stakeholder. [..] some of your banks interests in the functioning and management of that card roll over into your phone.

Having an interest does not imply exercising that interest is legitimate. Especially when freedom-respecting options are nearly absent from the market, and one cannot in good faith argue that consumers choose locked products among equivalent unlocked ones.

But most importantly, there's one item missing in your list of interests: the interests of a free society, that needs a populace able to use software other than only what is approved by giant corporations. What use is free software if none but a handful of hobbyists can run it?

[simonh]

There are a few online only banks, but beyond those you don’t have to have access to any computer at all to get access to your bank account at most banks.

> Having an interest does not imply exercising that interest is legitimate.

Whether that interest is legitimate and acceptable is a decision for the user. If I decide to accept the terms for my banking app, what’s that got to do with you?

> one cannot in good faith argue that consumers choose locked products among equivalent unlocked ones

I refer you to the market share enjoyed by the iPhone relative to Android (when it was moderately ‘free’). Clearly a lot of people, myself included, are in fact making that choice.

> the interests of a free society, that needs a populace able to use software other than only what is approved by giant corporations

How valuable can a fundamental, essential freedom actually be when hardly anyone understand what it is or cares a fig about it, and most of those who do understand it still don’t care?

[car_analogy]

> Whether that interest is legitimate and acceptable is a decision for the user. If I decide to accept the terms for my banking app, what’s that got to do with you?

Whether you accept those terms has nothing to do with me. What has something to do with me is that there is no bank that allows me to access my account with my phone, without requiring me to relinquish control of that phone to its manufacturer.

But you're right, I can always use my PC for access, and, when that option too is removed, go to the bank in person, to one of their increasingly scarce physical offices, and slowly get locked out of more and more modern society. Alternatively, I can try to proselytize free software, to be met with "Sorry I can't install that, if I unlock my PC I won't be able to use my bank".

> I refer you to the market share enjoyed by the iPhone relative to Android (when it was moderately ‘free’). Clearly a lot of people, myself included, are in fact making that choice.

Sorry, I expressed myself poorly - what I meant was that one cannot argue almost all consumers are making that choice. As you point out, many people chose the moderately free Android. That freedom is growing more moderated by the day.

> How valuable can a fundamental, essential freedom actually be when hardly anyone understand what it is or cares a fig about it, and most of those who do understand it still don’t care?

Extremely:

Apple Removes App That Helps Hong Kong Protesters Track the Police - https://www.nytimes.com/2019/10/09/technology/apple-hong-kon...

Of 3,200 apps missing from the China App Store, almost a third relate to hot button human rights topics targeted by China’s censors, such as privacy tools, Tibetan Buddhism, Hong Kong protests and LGBTQ issues. Porn and gambling apps made up less than 5 percent. - https://www.techtransparencyproject.org/articles/apple-censo...

Apple orders Telegram to block some Belarus protest channels [..] Among all the things that the Telegram CEO revealed, here is what’s most concerning: Apple apparently restricts app developers from informing their users that some content from their app has been hidden on request by Apple. - https://reclaimthenet.org/apple-orders-telegram-to-block-som...

Cattle that waits until the day of slaughter to attempt escape does not fare well.

(I don't mean to single out Apple - they get the most coverage, but I'm not sure if/how much better the situation is with Google's Play store. Which locked phones cannot escape.)

[feanaro]

The bank and the game are far less important than me retaining full control of a general-purpose computing device and sensor that I keep by my side for a majority of the time and trust in the most intimate parts of my home. This is also a fact.

If the bank and the game cannot function in this reality, then the only solution is for them to provide separate devices for me to interface with them.

[feanaro]

That is partially my argument, but not entirely. I'm rather arguing that even if you're using upstream services, you still want to have full and total control and ownership of the device you're using the upstream service from.

In fact, I find it a total jump in logic and a fallacy to conclude that I don't want or need freedom on my own device just because I'm a heavy user of upstream services. How does that even remotely follow?

[Jarwain]

I think the idea isn't about whether you would Want or Need freedom/control/ownership of your device; it's about the value of that freedom when an application depends on a closed upstream service versus if all the functionality is captured by the app running locally.

I personally think that its important to have that control and freedom for its own sake, but I understand the sentiment that "if my data is getting shipped off Anyways to some unfree system then why bother? I can't make the same guarantees around privacy and security as I can with a fully libre application"