[telgareith]

Theres a HN post not very old (less than a year. Maybe less than 6mo.) of this concept... it was even a "public benefit corporation," but it quickly went off the rails into a bad imitation.

The reality is- real users won't pay for these services and the only entities that will pay.

Well, they're paying for ads with the knockoffs because (ironically) instagram et. al. won't run their ads because they're "bad for users."

[wintermutestwin]

I would shift a lot of charitable giving to a non-profit privacy first site that is Facebook or Instagram which is focused only on sharing photos and text with friends, family and my local community. That excludes news, celebs, influencers, et al

I can't imagine that there wouldn't be enough people like me to support an inexpensive (compared to FB, etc) endeavor like this. If it still isn't enough, have local only ads that are not tracked and are served right from the site (and give users control over the type of ads they want to see). I wouldn't mind a couple unobtrusive ads for local restaurants, services, etc.

Maybe I am underestimating the cost here, but I also think that HN generally underestimates the social angst over the massive invasion of privacy by corporations. 90% of my non-tech friends and family have asked me how bad it is and how they can avoid it. Of course I just shrug and say you can't...

p.s. can you please link the HN discussion you referenced?