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TWeaK

@TWeaK@lemm.ee

This profile is from a federated server and may be incomplete. Browse more on the original instance.

TWeaK ,

Sad that the company was able to declare bankruptcy, rather than the directors being held criminally liable.

TWeaK ,

That's a start, but on its own pretty meaningless. A suspended sentence means he does not go to prison, so long as he behaves himself for a year or however long.

The article doesn't go into it, but I hope he was also fined heavily. All we have is "the court determined it could not be resolve through fines, a prison sentence is warranted".

TWeaK ,

It may be a 6 month sentence with an early release after 120 days, followed by 3 years supervision. However, perhaps if he served the full 6 months he wouldn't have the supervised release.

I don't know, I'm just guessing.

TWeaK ,

sudo stop telemetry

TWeaK ,

That's not Goth, that's emo!

Who am I kidding, they're basically the same thing.

TWeaK ,

I'm sure Israel did question the use of The Gospel in developing targets. The trouble is they liked the answer.

TWeaK ,

Plus, both companies have been experiencing local talent shortages.

It's not that there is a shortage of talent in the US, it's that they want to pay half as much as the US industry.

TWeaK ,

The goal is to answer them just well enough to convince it you're human, but wrong enough that you spoil the data.

TWeaK ,

You can’t evacuate people. I mean, you can if you want, but that's not what you want to say here.

A building can be evacuated. To evacuate a person is to give that person an enema.

TWeaK ,

Brave is not a business that should be supported. Also, I'm pretty sure they just use Bing for a back end.

There are also a few paid search engines that people say are good.

TWeaK ,

They've had a history of controversy over their life, ranging from replacing ads with their own affiliate links to bundling an opt-out crypto miner. Every time something like this happened, the CEO went on a marketing campaign across social media, effectively drowning out the controversial story with an influx of new users. The CEO meanwhile has got in trouble for his comments on same-sex marriage and covid-19.

In general, it's always seemed like it would take a very small sack of money for Brave to sell out its users. Also, their browser is Chromium based, so it's still contributing to Google's market dominance and dictatorial position over web technologies.

TWeaK ,

Paywall

TWeaK ,

One of the final nails in the coffin for me was when I tried to specify the delivery date to a day I would actually be in, and they completely ignored the instruction and delivered immediately. Like, I pay for that option, and you're not delivering the service.

I've also been getting free trials for Prime every so often, so I still get the benefits when I might need them (eg before Christmas). They did make it very hard to cancel, though, half the links didn't work and the instructions were out of date and didn't match the pages.

TWeaK ,

No idea whether or not it was a branded truck (it was a while ago), but it wasn't under any other sort of brand - Amazon deliveries are done by people employed by or directly contracted for Amazon.

TWeaK ,

In the UK it's either Amazon vans or unmarked vans (eg a self employed person who is contracted by Amazon and uses their own vehicle).

TWeaK ,

I don't think that's really what this is. This sounds like an additional warning screen, on top of the warning screen you already get when you manually install apps from anything other than the Play Store. I expect you'll still get the same old warning screen even after you pass this screen the one time.

FYI, if you have root there is a Magisk module that gives FDroid the privilege to install apps without the popup.

TWeaK ,

I didn't have that issue, I think uMatrix gobbled up the thing.

There are an awful lot of 3rd party scripts from many domains.

https://lemm.ee/pictrs/image/94f38398-8777-4a71-89ea-569d6b220c2c.png

https://lemm.ee/pictrs/image/8bb08f92-5107-491b-901b-9471f22cd7a5.png

https://lemm.ee/pictrs/image/870fa7fb-606b-4f85-ae42-73c23e46f74e.png

TWeaK ,

Sure, that's never going. Why would we want to lose our technological connection to Abraham Lincoln and samurai?

TWeaK ,

We need as much relevant oglaf as there are relevant xkcd's.

TWeaK ,

That is the solution though, always has been. Vote with your wallet.

TWeaK ,

Because then Apple fanbois will complain and tarnish Mozilla's/Firefox's reputation

TWeaK ,

"My actions mean nothing because everyone else won't do it" is exactly what everyone else is thinking.

You're making excuses. Be the change you know should happen. Don't be a sheep.

Don't buy puffa jackets. Seriously. They're fucking everywhere now. Don't do it, you don't need it, they're cheap and overpriced.

TWeaK ,

Lol for a moment there I thought I was going off the rails with my puffa jacket rant above, but your segway into "free market feefees" is far more unhinged.

TWeaK ,

Android was a victim of the NSO's Pegasus because of WhatsApp, and possibly that only worked because Facebook negotiated with phone manufacturers to bundle dodgy pre-installed system apps outside the Google Play Store.

Apple's iOS was a victim of the NSO's Pegasus because of iMessages.

For me, that's enough to completely steer clear of iOS altogether. I mean, the lack of customisation and control over my device was already enough, but that kind of vindicated it for me.

TWeaK ,

Lol that's basically the Brave attitude, drown out the controversy with a marketing campaign and pull in more new unsuspecting users than the ones you lose.

TWeaK ,

it’s Apple the one they should complain to.

Or walk away from.

TWeaK ,

Ditto! No Google needed, and Facebook apps are prohibited on my phone. I can even get banking apps working with a bit of Magisk, working in Zygisk domain with a deny list hiding it from the apps. Apparently proper SafetyNet checks aren't that common anymore.

For browsers, I'd recommend Mull and Mulch. Mull is a privacy fork of Firefox, Mulch is a hardened version of Android System Webview (the backend browser that lots of apps use). Both come pre-installed with DivestOS.

TWeaK ,

Most people not caring isn't a concern of mine. Apple being wealthy isn't a concern of mine. What concerns me is that the products I use flourish and develop in ways that I like. I don't use Apple, so I don't particularly care about them - I just watch the drama from the sidelines.

You're not bursting my bubble in any way, but you are being a little pretentious.

TWeaK ,

The solution is to realise that Apple aren't the company for you and move away from them. Support products that fit your ethos. Don't worry about the ones that don't and leave them behind.

TWeaK ,

Noooooooooooo

TWeaK ,

Is it filled with nitrogen?

TWeaK ,

I'm more thinking about Microsoft's experiment with an underwater data centre off the shores in Scotland, powered by tidal. The main takeaway was basically "nitrogen filled data centres have significantly lower part failures" due to the lack of oxygen meaning no sparks.

TWeaK ,

Because various departments of US governments have been customers of the NSO, exploiting the very bug that Apple are suing over.

TWeaK ,

Well so is China and anyone with the capability (which is an ever-growing group).

TWeaK ,
  • The exodus of advertisers, partially due to Elon Musk's controversial behavior, has left X with a growing revenue gap.

The main reason Twitter has a revenue gap is that Musk saddled it with $13bn of debt with his leveraged buyout. The business isn't failing because of Musk's management since then, it's failing because that was the purpose derived from the purchase.

TWeaK ,

They're only liable for the debt so long as the business is operational, though. If the business folds, all the debt goes with it.

The point I'm making is that, while the decisions Musk has made since buying it have only made the business worse, ultimately the reason it's going to fail is the huge amount of debt, which is primarily from the leveraged buyout. If anything, Musk's antics are nothing but those of a clown trying to distract from and give plausible deniability against the real evil that's happening.

TWeaK , (edited )

Also people from Fujitsu committed perjury in court.

TWeaK ,

Fujitsu aren't blameless, not at all. They were going into user's accounts and fiddling figures, correcting the errors the software made.

Then when a sub-postmaster went to their office and saw this, they retaliated by setting his account to debit and erased records of him being there. It may well be that many of the victims were targeted for complaining that the system was flawed.

TWeaK ,

Oof, yeah.

TWeaK , (edited )

Any lemmy instances included in this breach?

Edit: Doesn't appear to be the case. At least, when I checked mine they were fine.

TWeaK ,

Yeah there’s no question: your data is not safe.

Is that really a question when companies like Facebook, Google, Microsoft, your bank, etc. all claim your data as their property then sell it for profit, while offering no consideration in return?

TWeaK ,

Many do sell data, actually. I just literally made a post about this, with real figures instead of numbers I've previously pulled out my ass. If you click my profile it should be high up there (otherwise it will be difficult for me to find it in your own instance). This is my instance's version of the post: https://lemm.ee/post/21285233

The main source stated that the "legal" data brokerage industry, that is companies who simply buy and sell user data, was worth $319 billion in 2021.^1

The global data broker market was valued at US$319.030 billion in 2021 and is expected to grow at a CAGR of 7.96% over the forecast period to reach US$545.431 billion in 2028.

Data brokers are the companies that collect the information of users through the internet legally and further, provide this data to various companies

You are right though, some companies (eg Google) simply collect user data and use it for themselves, they don't really sell much of what they have. This means that my figure where your average user is owed $40 per year would be an underestimation, possibly a very large one.

We could maybe add the value of Google to the industry value, however even then Google's value is offset by their various loss-leading ventures - the true value of the data Google holds is completely obscured. In any case, I need to go to bed! XD

TWeaK ,

Well, they do also sell data access to governments. The argument when the government requested data from them was "we aren't set up for this, it will incur significant expenses, we'll have to develop solutions then set up and staff a department to handle requests", which the government paid for. It's not directly purchasing the data, but it is effectively.

TWeaK ,

I'll be honest, I'm still tired from last night lol, too much so to go digging. We're also talking about something that has been the norm for more than a decade now - Google have long since established their processes for dealing with government requests. This may have started sometime around 2012, perhaps even earlier. I probably read it in an Ars Technica article, at a guess, but it could also have been something I stumbled upon on reddit.

TWeaK ,

Yes they do have to fund their defense to begin with, however there has to be some balance struck. Until the court proceedings are concluded it isn't known which side is in the right.

I think most countries' public funding for legal representation is limited to criminal matters, and even then you have to qualify (eg have a very low income or be unemployed). With civil matters, it's up to you to find a lawyer you can afford, or one who will take it on pro bono.

If the defendent is obviously in the right, then it should be more likely that they can find a lawyer who will work pro bono.

TWeaK ,

I was thinking more about the occassions where there is no news article whatsoever, but you make a good point also.

TWeaK , (edited )

Before the trial happens, it could really go either way, even if the defendant is obviously in the right - there could be some procedural slip up that causes them to lose anyway.

However, a lawyer isn't going to assume that they will make some slip up, so if it is obviously in the defendant's favour they will work pro bono. There is still some risk for them, because if they lose they don't get paid, but they're confident they'll win.

Edit: wrote the reply thinking this was a conversation about awarding costs to the defendant, that was a different thread. The first paragraph remains unchanged though.

I wish Lemmy showed you more of the context than just the last reply.

TWeaK ,

Yeah I know, however when you reply to someone from a notification you just want to reply.

Also, when you move up the context on a Lemmy thread you see each comment and all its other comments. If the comment chain you're replying on isn't the top thread, then you get cluttered up with all the others. On reddit, context meant you only saw the comments that directly lead to the comment you were deriving context from. Furthermore, context was derived from the comment URL with a ?context=3 suffix, so you could easily specify how far up the chain you wanted to go.

Lemmy does context differently, but I prefer reddit's method.

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