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by simonh
1519 days ago
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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? |
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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.)