# [social media] Community-driven, open (source) alternatives for "FresseBuch", TW;TR, WhatsApe etc.



## Mjölnir (Aug 31, 2020)

AFAIC, good(?) alternatives for the notorious commercial social media sites exist:

[social network] _FresseBuch, InstaGrab_ --> ???
[microblogging] TW;TR --> identi.ca, mastodon sites, sites driven by GNU social
[blog] TM;BLR --> ???
[music] Tune.fm --> libre.fm
[Instant-Messaging] _What'sApe_ --> numerous; many clients support cross-posting
what have I missed? Please complete the list!
Are the commercial services in fact better than the ones driven by community (poll above)?  The latter have at least one big plus: they respect _privacy_.  IMHO the main reasons that so many sheep do not use the community-driven, open services are

_avarice_ when it comes to money -- even small amounts -- & _false generosity_ concerning privacy
peer pressure: _"all my friends are there, so what shall I do..._"
What can be done to enhance the publicity of these alternatives?
EDIT the cacography of names in this post is intentional.  _FresseBuch_ (ger.)=facebook, _InstaGrab_=Instagram, _TW;TR_=twitter, _TM;BLR_=tumblr, _What'sApe_=you got it


----------



## a6h (Aug 31, 2020)

I've tried a few alternative project/media/etc in the past, for different reason: being non mainstream, libre, open, non commercial, less-bias, non-propaganda, etc. For example Mastodon, Gab, Bitchute, LBRY, Signal messenger, etc. There's a fundamental problem with these form of technologies as a whole:

They eventually will become mainstream. They should do stuff to keep their supporter happy: donners, contributes, USERS!
Growth need capital, they ultimately need some form of big money and fundraising, i.e. big donners, advertisement, big tech and promoters.
I'm categorically against concept of social media. Yes I know I'm on this forum right now, men know yoga is good but they watch and play soccer!
Instant messaging is a bad form of communication. I'm not supposed to be 24/7 available to my contact list. There're some needy creeps out there.
I think privacy is a new phenomenon, tied to capital growth and technological advancement of modern life. Think about life of people in the past, in small community like villages and small towns. Living on those community literally means no privacy. I'm still not (may!) clear on privacy issue, as I'm not clear on similar subjects, for example Liberty. In the past I upheld the idea of: _Franklin's Liberty Safety_. But now, [...] Does groups of people should have the right and freedom, to systematically trash culture and destroy civilization, in the name of freedom of speech or liberty. To be honest I've formed my thoughts around these subject long time ago, but I choose to keep my thoughts to myself!
I choose the "Don't know / don't care" option. Frankly I hope the whole thing go down the toilet. I systematically choose to live an isolate life (to some extend!) and I'm happy with my decision. I'm literally living near mountain! But evidently most people are getting sick and loosing their mind, esp in large cities, engaging with these virtual/network things. I don't think homo sapiens are evolve to cope with these form of OVER-socialization.


----------



## judd (Aug 31, 2020)

Don't know / don't care
Social networks should only exist for occasional cases, especially in the case of catastrophes, searches for people, etc.
As far as I'm concerned, I don't have Facebook or Twitter, I don't like to expose my life at the door of a public toilet.


----------



## ekvz (Sep 1, 2020)

Regarding instant messaging: There is XMPP (aka. Jabber) and in theory it should be quite good. Open, Decentralized, clients for pretty much any major platform (often multiple for different tastes), a seemingly trustworthy encryption standard, multi user chat, even voice messages. Pretty much anything i'd want (or not want in case of voice messages) from an instant messaging protocol short of a widely supported VOIP implementation. Sadly in practice the protocol is an overengineered abomination (why on earth XML...) that should have never been dragged on for so long and a lot of the functionality feels clunky for various reasons (missing client support, half hearted implementations, overcomplicated design, ...).

Clients like Conversations (Android) and Chatsecure (IOS) are very much a step in the right direction (directly competing with all the proprietary fly traps) but what good are they when the protocol makes them into something that feels like it's in pre alpha stage by design and adding an actual "killer feature" like VOIP is being talked about for years with literally zero results since actually writing a working XMPP client is bad enough (really just read the protocol and assume you want to implement even just a simple chat bot - have fun...) but adding a feature is even way way worse.

I really wish there was a common messaging standard worth using but XMPP is sadly not that standard. Every non technical user i tried to stir into using it has rejected/dropped it because it felt subpar/unreliable and the worst part about it is that i understand them. I've really tried overlooking all the rough edges but by now i have uninstalled it myself too as none of my friends will ever use it (or even try to again) and i don't really do private chats with random persons from the internet so whats the point?

In my opinion XMPP for the most part does exactly two things: Take away much needed resources from projects that might actually build a useful open instant messaging standard and also mask the fact that said standard is missing. I bet the competition is quite pleased with XMPP.

[/rant]


----------



## Mjölnir (Sep 1, 2020)

_Chat & Instant Messaging_ seems to be the best supported realm when it comes to Open Source: Comparison of Instant Messaging Protocols.  Since many user-friendly clients support cross-posting, as a user I do not care much about the flaws of the underlying protocol.  Most important is that it's an _open_ protocol, and the networks I use respect _privacy_ (don't sell metadata) & do not harass me with annoying advertisements.  Still your experience with XMPP is valuable, thank you.
I did not invest much time to research & I'm still searching _free_ (as in _freedom_) alternatives for _blogs & general social network_ à la _FresseBuch/InstaGrab_, based on open protocols.  These does not neccessarily have to be non-commercial, I'm ok when the service providers get a reasonable, fair fee for their work, effort & hardware/network expenses.
A week ago I talked about social networks with a young guy (mid 30).  The naiveté of the young generation concerning their usage of social media p*ses me off & scares me, but I felt ashamed I could not provide _free & open_ alternatives.


----------



## 20-100-2fe (Sep 1, 2020)

I agree with vigole.
As long as hosting is not free, there can't be any difference: you have to pay the bills, so you have to get the money somewhere.
And the more successful, the more money you have to find.

That said, I don't care.
Not being into SM (sadomasochism), I've closed my Facebook and Twitter long ago and don't use SM (social media) other than 2 BSD forums. 
I also have a LinkedIn account, but it hasn't proven useful yet and I don't use it any longer, I even contemplate closing it too.


----------



## 20-100-2fe (Sep 1, 2020)

mjollnir said:


> A week ago I talked about social networks with a young guy (mid 30). The naiveté of the young generation concerning their usage of social media p*ses me off & scares me



Not all of them are like this.
Furthermore, every single person has a unique life path.
This means they cannot know what it took us decades to wholly and deeply understand, and also that what we deem an absolute bad can be a relative good to them.

Life in 2020 is harder than it has ever been and there is no way for this to improve, all the opposite.
Alcohol is a legal drug in many countries, cannabis is being gradually legalized, TV/VOD is yet another universally available drug.
Why not social media, if it helps some people going an extra mile on their life path?


----------



## roper (Sep 1, 2020)

Hosting a web server, using a web browser, running a mail server, using a mail client, using an irc client and owning a flip phone meet my social media needs. I don't think this is ludditism.


----------



## Hakaba (Sep 1, 2020)

Do not know vote here.
Why ?
Social media is just a marketing word for IRC, forums and blogs.
Why the hell I will open a Facebook account ?

The only «social media» that I use is for buisness (LinkedIn).


----------



## Mjölnir (Sep 1, 2020)

As the principal of the survey (poll), I have already answered some of getopt's questions:

Purpose: I want to be able to point others to reasonable _free, open source_-based social media platforms, because of the aforementioned reasons; getopt explained these more detailed.
Long story short, I'm scared by the amount of power these SM platform gained in a very short time; misuse of metadata has been reported numerous times.
Another example: in 2008, _blogspot.com_ was the world's biggest spreader of malware.
I found alternatives for some widely used social media domains, but not for all, i.e. general purpose/all-in-one plattforms like _FresseBuch_, and blogs (beyond micro-blogging).
My list of social media domains might be lacking some categories, thus I asked to complete it.
If there are no good _free & open source_-based alternatives for these two missing realms, maybe a group of committed FreeBSD enthusiasts will make contact here to create such platform(s).  It's Corona time, some people have plenty of time   IMHO it's urgent to not let our society drift towards science fiction horror scenarios even more than it already happened.
The young people's need for social media is real & can neither be denied nor ignored.



> And the question deserves to be answered also by fair means because one cannot assume that the question is suggestive in any way.  Hey, no kids around here. And of course here are no peers expecting wanted answers. Isn't it?


Yes to all three!
Hakaba, a forum _is_ social media, so you're using it here... and no, I hope you do not open a _FresseBuch_ account, obviously.  EDIT AFAIK the term _social media_ was not invented by marketing people, but to be honest I don't know where it comes from or who "invented" it.  IMHO it's very straightforward to combine the two parts to describe the subject.  Probably it was used by sociologists 1st?


----------



## 20-100-2fe (Sep 1, 2020)

mjollnir said:


> IMHO it's urgent to not let our society drift towards science fiction horror scenarios



Let me kindly challenge you. 

Why is it urgent?
Why would it even be necessary?
Are the several billions Facebook users incapable of reasoning, of making wise choices?
Shouldn't someone else decide what is good for them in their place?
Shouldn't this extend to other areas as well, then?
After all, if they are not capable of choosing a social medium, they're surely incapable of doing more important things.
The next question arising is: how to decide someone shouldn't be allowed to make choices himself?
And who should make that decision?

On a practical point of view, migrating to another social medium is impossible: all your contacts are on the current one, you can't make them change with you because they in turn have the same problem. However, I deem the questions raised above much more worth being discussed.


----------



## getopt (Sep 1, 2020)

I'm not convinced that platforms should be promoted. They are centralist by design and perfect for exploiting and dominating. 

I'd prefer a federated design. That would distribute costs of operation and keep other risks low.


----------



## Deleted member 63539 (Sep 2, 2020)

I use what my friends use to communicate with them. If my friends are not there, what's the point of using these services at all?


----------



## wolffnx (Sep 2, 2020)

I dont use any of them....in the past I try mastodon,that is already a music band


----------



## ekvz (Sep 2, 2020)

mjollnir said:


> _Chat & Instant Messaging_ seems to be the best supported realm when it comes to Open Source: Comparison of Instant Messaging Protocols.  Since many user-friendly clients support cross-posting, as a user I do not care much about the flaws of the underlying protocol.  Most important is that it's an _open_ protocol, and the networks I use respect _privacy_ (don't sell metadata) & do not harass me with annoying advertisements.



While i can see where you are coming from i wouldn't discount the protocols itself as something other persons have to deal with. The missing features and sporadic integration resulting from a bad protocol is going to hit the users quite directly. I also don't see fragmentation and multiprotocol clients as a solution. The way i look at it is that there is a vacuum left by IRC becoming/having become outdated and this vacuum needs to be filled with another more modern standard becoming widely used/accepted.

I think looking at IRC and it's success is quite interesting. In theory it should have long been replaced by something more fitting in with modern requirements but it wasn't and it just keeps going (or at least not declining nearly fast enough to be going anywhere soon) even while it misses features or had them tucked on as an afterthought in an often times not exactly elegant manner. A lot of it comes down to IRC being easy to integrate with unrelated 3rd party applications or having services added in form of bots. The results might not be pretty but they are easy to archive and quite functional. Don't get me wrong i don't want to paint IRC as a stellar example of a protocol done well (it really isn't) but (despite it's age and ton of rough edges) it still beats something like XMPP without even trying. There is a whole universe between dated and a bit annoying to parse and XMPP level of awkwardness.

A new protocol ironing out the shortcomings of IRC is in my opinion generally not a bad idea but if the result is something like XMPP it would have been better to build upon IRC. As in keeping the upsides while trying to eliminate the pitfalls and also define standards for whatever is missing right now (i.e. protocol level authentication, E2E encryption, VOIP, maybe internetwork communication, ...).

In regards to the protocol list: At least from my point of view there isn't as much reasonable entries as a first impression might suggest. Mumble for example is really just a VOIP protocol (if that is considered an instant messaging protocol where is Teamspeak or Ventrillo?). One might compare it to IRC but a Mumble server (there is no concept of a Mumble network) is nowhere the size of an IRC network and i really don't see how it would be useful for general instant messaging. Then there is protocols like MTProto. It might be open but i just really wouldn't want to support the company behind Telegram. The others are for the most part niche solutions with no measurable user base and after crossing those out too there isn't much left besides Matrix and Tox.

Now i haven't really tested those but from what i hear Matrix seems to be rather wide reaching feature wise (some might say overreaching) and resource hungry while Tox is quite radical with it's P2P architecture (which is interesting but i think the classic client-server model is a better fit for a reliable instant messaging solution).



mjollnir said:


> These does not neccessarily have to be non-commercial, I'm ok when the service providers get a reasonable, fair fee for their work, effort & hardware/network expenses.



I am not opposed to paying for such a service either. My concern would mainly be about having a convenient private payment option. I sadly life in a country where it's not possible to just walk into a gas station and buy crypto coins with cash so that would be a point to consider. Cash in mail is obviously a possibility but sadly it's not exactly elegant.

On a site note: I've actually been toying a bit with a concept that's more or less a hybrid between Usenet and a crypto coin on top of onion network (Tor, I2P, ...). There every post would cost "money" (depending on how the group is set up likely a very tiny amount but still) and creating groups might even be somewhat expensive. It's less about generating revenue but more about preventing spam though and would for the most part automatically go to the group owners/moderators anyways but i really don't think good privacy solutions have to be free (of charge) by design.



mjollnir said:


> A week ago I talked about social networks with a young guy (mid 30).  The naiveté of the young generation concerning their usage of social media p*ses me off & scares me, but I felt ashamed I could not provide _free & open_ alternatives.



While i agree that there is some kind of a visible trend across generations it depends a lot on the person itself. I like to pretend that i still fall into the mid thirties category myself which is more or less the last generation not entirely growing up with social media being omnipresent and while i see a lot of people around me not giving the least amount thought to the consequences of their social media use there is also a visible portion that's quite reluctant or outright rejecting it.

Actually my neighbors (a mid 20s couple) don't have any social media presence so even this generation isn't fully contaminated yet but from there on i agree about it becoming somewhat scary. Those are the generations that basically grew up on facebook/instagram/snapchat and see this behavior as perfectly normal. Not only would it be very hard to convince them to critically question it but abstaining would also seriously complicated for them due it basically being an accepted norm in their peer circles.


----------



## ekvz (Sep 2, 2020)

20-100-2fe said:


> Let me kindly challenge you.
> 
> Why is it urgent?
> Why would it even be necessary?
> ...



I very much agree that the problem goes way deeper and having superior alternatives available to sway peoples opinion in a certain direction is basically sidestepping it. It's probably more practical to go at it this way than trying to address ignorance, laziness and herd mentality though.

As for being urgent: Well, it's probably always urgent to have good solutions available and a good solution won't automatically be a bad one tomorrow but sometimes there is just this moment where having something available would have more of an impact than at another point in time. For example if XMPP would have by now managed to have VOIP working at least among the major clients usage statistics would likely look way different. This would be a point where an open solution might not just compete but downright beat the mainstream alternatives so having such a feature first makes a huge difference.


----------



## a6h (Sep 2, 2020)

mjollnir said:


> The young people's need for social media is real & can neither be denied nor ignored.


Some/most of them need harsh Zen discipline in a very traditional way. It works.


----------



## getopt (Sep 2, 2020)

ekvz as always there is no one fits for all solution. Different people do have different needs. 

Regarding your lengthy talk on XMPP I wonder whether this is hearsay or if it is based on personal experience. When did you try XMPP last time? Must have been long time ago?

If anyone wants to contact me via XMPP, Matrix or Tox just mention your preferred address in a forum PN (aka "conversation").


----------



## Mjölnir (Sep 2, 2020)

vigole said:


> Some/most of them need harsh Zen discipline in a very traditional way. It works.


If I were the _King of Germany_ I'd enact a directive to teach yoga for all children in school... But I'm not. I'm an average nerd with some limited knowledge in computer science & programming skills (both limited). IMHO we (older) can not convince the young generation to avoid commercial social media platforms. They want/need alternatives. So I came up with this thread. I don't have a facebook account (obviously, neither on any other mainstream SM platform), so I can't judge what makes them so great that justifies billions of users. Brainstorming about alternatives - maybe alternative open protocols as well - is my escape from the dilemma that some of my buddies are around 30 and when it comes to their communication manners I feel like an alien. They don't write e-mails, neiter some of them like to phone (except the females ), instead SMS go back and forth multiple times a day...


----------



## a6h (Sep 2, 2020)

mjollnir said:


> If I were the _King of Germany_ I'd enact a directive to teach yoga for all children in school


You have my vote.


----------



## ekvz (Sep 2, 2020)

getopt said:


> ekvz as always there is no one fits for all solution. Different people do have different needs.



Of course but there should at least be a one fits most solution, don't you think?



getopt said:


> Regarding your lengthy talk on XMPP I wonder whether this is hearsay or if it is based on personal experience. When did you try XMPP last time? Must have been long time ago?



I used to run a server and looked into writing clients for different specialized use cases (scratched that fast after realizing what kind of trainwreck i was dealing with). I guess i've probably finally uninstalled it (both server and client) like 1,5 years ago which i feel is not exactly a long time considering how old XMPP is. Even if it was it wouldn't make much of a difference. XMPP is BAD (yes, in all capital letters). It's rotten from the core because of the choices made during it's design and no amount of work will ever fix that. I mean seriously, there is a reason why it didn't gain any kind of noteworthy adoption during the last 20 years. It was even briefly used by Google and it didn't help. The only thing XMPP needs to do is finally make space for something worthwhile. The idea of promoting a failed protocol from the late 90s as something to compete with modern messaging services is almost mental.


----------



## getopt (Sep 2, 2020)

ekvz said:


> i've probably finally uninstalled it (both server and client) like 1,5 years ago which i feel is not exactly a long time considering how old XMPP is. Even if it was it wouldn't make much of a difference. XMPP is BAD (yes, in all capital letters). It's rotten from the core because of the choices made during it's design and no amount of work will ever fix that. I mean seriously, there is a reason why it didn't gain any kind of noteworthy adoption during the last 20 years.


1,5 years were a long time in the sixties of the last century. All I could read is opinion without giving any reason.

I've seen some people trying Prosody and going back to ejabberd. OMEMO has become a choice next to OTR and both have different usecases. Some clients improved nicely.


----------



## Mjölnir (Sep 2, 2020)

20-100-2fe said:


> Why is it urgent? Why would it even be necessary?


Are you serious?  Read the news from all over the world!  Clowns (literally, look at Italy *****) are doing political campaigning through TW;TR, remember the _Cambridge Analytica_ scandal, fake news are spreading through SM platforms, I'm surrounded by 75% autistic people, and the mentally healthy ones are declared to be ill...


> Are the several billions Facebook users incapable of reasoning, of making wise choices?


They are capable of reasoning, but they have no reasonable alternatives...


> Shouldn't someone else decide what is good for them in their place?
> Shouldn't this extend to other areas as well, then?


Obviously not.  See below on suggestive quenstioning.


> After all, if they are not capable of choosing a social medium, they're surely incapable of doing more important things. The next question arising is: how to decide someone shouldn't be allowed to make choices himself? And who should make that decision?


You can freely decide to stop posting suggestive questions & stay on-topic.


> On a practical point of view, migrating to another social medium is impossible: all your contacts are on the current one, you can't make them change with you because they in turn have the same problem.


This is 100% hypothetic as long as there are no reasonable alternatives.  Once there are, some users will change, and for those who are _influencers_, others will follow.


> However, I deem the questions raised above much more worth being discussed.


Then create another thread?  Maybe in a forum dedicated to philosophics & sociologic topics?  The one I created here is at least related to IT/computer application & it's impact on society...


----------



## a6h (Sep 2, 2020)

I'm really not a right person to suggest an alternative to mainstream social media, but as far a messaging systems goes, I strongly recommend to use Signal messenger. Its protocol passed formal security analysis: Cryptology ePrint Archive: Report 2016/1013 and it became European Commission’s messaging app of choice.


----------



## getopt (Sep 2, 2020)

20-100-2fe and mjollnir 
Trying to make the world a better place is a good thing as long as you are keeping to hack yourself. We are responsible on what we decide to do. We do have a choice. And we are free not to choose.


----------



## getopt (Sep 2, 2020)

vigole said:


> I strongly recommend to use Signal messenger.


Only for those who are willing to give a phone number. 
Has this changed recently?


----------



## a6h (Sep 2, 2020)

getopt said:


> Has this changed recently?


No but you don't have to give your real number. Create a pseudonymous Google account and Voice VoIP and use that in signal to receive confirmation SMS.


----------



## getopt (Sep 2, 2020)

vigole said:


> Google account


My ZEN work is a living without Google.


----------



## a6h (Sep 2, 2020)

getopt said:


> My ZEN work is a living without Google.


I trust in math too, thus I agree with you.


----------



## Mjölnir (Sep 2, 2020)

The decision makers, managers & shareholders of social media platforms & associated companies do trust in math, too, and unfortunately their employees know how to handle it...


----------



## Sevendogsbsd (Sep 2, 2020)

I used to use Facebook (wife wanted me to, enough said...) but I found it to be useless and the "friends" I had were anything but so I deleted the account. I have had a couple of Twitter accounts but the posts become so caustic (politics), I just get angry at them and I don't want to be angry all the time so I no longer have a Twitter account either.

I also used to have a LinkedIn account but since I am in InfoSec and used to work for the US. government, having those 2 things in my LinkedIn profile caused a large number of entities from adversarial nations to reach out to me. Too many contact attempts to list, and I am sure all of them were social engineering attempts to glean information from me. Needless to say I also no longer have a LinkedIn account.

Having said all of this, I am fairly anonymous on the Internet. Not completely because using Internet services makes complete anonymity nearly impossible or at least too difficult to be worth it. It's a question of balancing risk. I am more concerned about privacy than anything else so that is one of the major drivers for me to shun social media. I do love being able to communicate with others in forums like this though so appreciate that mediums like this exist.

I do have some people I communicate with on chat mediums (Telegram) and that is done anonymously as well. 

Agree with others that although I do like open source variants of commercial social media, running them requires capital so as they get more popular, some get taken over by commercial entities.


----------



## ralphbsz (Sep 2, 2020)

Alternatives? There is a german idiomatic expression: Du musst die Menschen da abholen, wo sie stehen. In English: You have to collect (or pick up) the people where they stand. Think of a bus: If a bus wants to transport people, it has to go to the bus stop, because that's where the people stand and wait for the bus.



mjollnir said:


> AFAIC, good(?) alternatives for the notorious commercial social media sites exist:
> 
> [social network] _FresseBuch, InstaGrab_ --> ???



First, insulting Facebook (and its subsidiary Instagram) by misrepresenting its name doesn't change the facts.

I use Facebook to communicate with people. There is a relatively small set of people whose posts I actually see (many dozens, perhaps low 100, plus a few "community" groups that are defined by neighborhood, plus a few "interest" groups that are defined by hobbies (orchestral percussion playing). Those people happen to post on Facebook, and they expect my posts on there too. If I looked for their posts elsewhere, they wouldn't be there, and if I posted my updates elsewhere, nobody would see them.

This is an example of the "network effect": The efficiency of Facebook comes from the fact that a very large fraction of all people use it for the same purpose, which is open-ended social chatter, plus some highly targeted special interest groups. If 1% of all people were to use a different site, that site simply wouldn't work: nobody would use it because you won't find the people you're interested in there. Since I'm looking for a site where I can efficiently and quickly see updates from most of my friends, this requires a monopoly-like solution, so it's no wonder Facebook has a monopoly there. Or what I'm really saying: From my viewpoint, there is no alternative to Facebook for efficient quick checking of what my friends are saying or doing.

The interesting thing is that Facebook groups are making significant inroads into the area that used to be served by forums, such as this one. 

I use LinkedIn, but only because lots of former and current colleagues use it as a sort of "address book": If I need to find my old buddy Adam Bob, with whom I used to work at Yoyodyne 15 years ago, I look on LinkedIn. LinkedIn is also vitally needed when job hunting these days, as many recruiters use it as their only communication tool. I never post anything on LinkedIn, nor do I spend much time looking at what other people post theree.



> [microblogging] TW;TR --> identi.ca, mastodon sites, sites driven by GNU social
> [blog] TM;BLR --> ???



I don't generally blog. If I want to publish something, I use my own web site (which is just a simple publicly visible server running Apache), but it usually doesn't have long texts on it (sometimes it does). If I want to blog on a particular topic (for example as part of a political campaign), I set up a dedicated web site; I own maybe a half dozen of those.



> [music] Tune.fm --> libre.fm


For listening to free music, I simply use youtube. Sometimes I add soundcloud and other free music-sharing services. I've also been known to occasionally pay for subscription music services, when they have something specific that I want to listen to and can't find elsewhere. Most of the paid music I listen to on physical CDs that I rip myself.



> [Instant-Messaging] _What'sApe_ --> numerous; many clients support cross-posting


Again, I pick up people where they stand. This depends strongly on context and geography.

For work-related IM, I use whatever my employer provides. Every employer has provided a full-function IM service using internal servers, they typically are very well integrated with e-mail and the employee directory, and they have policies that prohibit using outside IM services for discussing internal matters (for reasons of information security).

For personal IM, I use whatever my communication partners want to use. I think in order that would be

WhatsApp, which is very good, highly reliable, good user interface, has excellent integration with audio and video calls, which tend to be very high quality even at reasonably low bandwidth, and the integration with my personal address book works well, since the cell phone number is the identifier. A nice feature is that I can use it both on my desktop machine and on my tablets and cell phones, completely interchangeably.
Facebook Messenger, similar to WhatsApp, although the audio/video quality tends to be worse, and using Facebook user names as identifiers causes some confusion. Same seamless portability between multiple distinct devices.
Skype. Some people strongly prefer Skype for message chatting. Which is strange, because its user interface is a bit clumsy. And in spite of the fact that Skype was the pioneer in IP-based phone calls, the voice quality on Skype audio calls tends to be atrocious. So I only use it if I have someone who has a strong preference for it.
SMS and voice phone calls (usually cell phone to cell phone), for those people who prefer not using dedicated IM applications but instead SMS. Fortunately, I can do SMS from my desktop machine too.
Google Hangouts and Apple Messages, but the number of people using those is relatively small. The big drawback of those is that they are device-specific: Hangouts only works on my Android phone, not the iOS tablet. Apple Messages only works on my Mac desktop (I have it disabled on my iOS tablet, it would work there, but I'm not interested).
Absolutely nobody I communicate with uses any IM service that's based on open protocols.



> Are the commercial services in fact better than the ones driven by community (poll above)?  The latter have at least one big plus: they respect _privacy_.


Do you have any evidence that Facebook (owner of Messenger and WhatsApp), Microsoft (owner of Skype), OS vendors (Android, Apple) for SMS, or Google and Apple (for Hangouts and Messages) look at the content of my IM chats? On the contrary, there is strong evidence that they do not.



> IMHO the main reasons that so many sheep ...


I do very much object to being called "sheep". I do understand pretty well how privacy works, and how these services are implemented, and I don't use them because I'm a sheep. I use them because they are convenient and useful, and I understand the privacy implications. For example, when I post something on Facebook, I expect exactly zero privacy, after all I just posted it for the world to read.



> do not use the community-driven, open services are
> 
> _avarice_ when it comes to money -- even small amounts -- & _false generosity_ concerning privacy
> peer pressure: _"all my friends are there, so what shall I do..._"


It's not peer pressure. It's practicality. When I need or want to communicate with someone, I ask them how I can reach them. If they tell me "write to me on WhatsApp", I will do that. If they ping me on Facebook messenger, I will reply there. If they say "send me a paper letter in the mail", I would do that too (except that nobody has said that in about 10 years). Given that the two or three largest IM services (including SMS and the voice phone call network) all have very large market share, it simply makes sense to use them.


----------



## Jose (Sep 2, 2020)

I'm occasionally forced to participate in the "social" media circus because work. I always create a new account, use it only for the job at hand, and abandon it thereafter. I'm not interested in having a for-profit corporation control my identity and censor my communications over the Internet.

I flatly refuse to use anything besides email and SMS in my personal life, and the latter grudgingly. Yes, this has cut down on the number of people I communicate with, but not so much as to make me regret the tradeoff.

I do not use my personal phone for any work related communications. I urge you to do the same if you live in the US. Your personal phone could be subpoenaed and searched if whomever you work for is involved in litigation.



ekvz said:


> ...I really wish there was a common messaging standard worth using but XMPP is sadly not that standard...


You mean like SMTP?


----------



## ralphbsz (Sep 2, 2020)

Jose said:


> I do not use my personal phone for any work related communications. I urge you to do the same if you live in the US. Your personal phone could be subpoenaed and searched if whomever you work for is involved in litigation.


Excellent advice. Applies worldwide, not just in the US, and it particularly applies in Russia and China. Even if it means carrying two phones in the pocket most of the day.

The opposite is also true: If you use your work phone or computer for personal stuff, make sure that you do it in a fashion that leaves no traces. For example, if the keyboard on my work laptop breaks, I would just hand it to the service people, and they would give me a replacement laptop, and eventually get around to fixing it, and giving it to someone else who needs one. And while I'm sure they would wipe it, I don't want the service desk to see all the cat pictures I stored on the laptop, or the printouts of my bank account. So what I do is to do personal stuff through either browser windows to password-protected web servers, or via VNC-like technology (ssh to a personal server, run VNC to a personal machine, and so on).

By the way, we no longer have a cat (it was sadly eaten by a pack of coyotes), so I don't actually have cat pictures. And my bank account is boring (most of what is in there is the salary I get from my employer, which they know about), so the above examples are hypothetical.



> I flatly refuse to use anything besides email and SMS in my personal life, and the latter grudgingly.


What makes you think that e-mail and SMS are any more or less secure than message systems such as WhatsApp? If you listen to what the national security apparatus can do and does, you would not think for a moment that SMS, voice calls, or e-mail is particularly secure.


----------



## Jose (Sep 2, 2020)

ralphbsz said:


> Do you have any evidence that Facebook (owner of Messenger and WhatsApp), Microsoft (owner of Skype), OS vendors (Android, Apple) for SMS, or Google and Apple (for Hangouts and Messages) look at the content of my IM chats? On the contrary, there is strong evidence that they do not.


Well Google certainly has in the past. I'm not willing to bet they'll continue to be "good".



ralphbsz said:


> The opposite is also true: If you use your work phone or computer for personal stuff, make sure that you do it in a fashion that leaves no traces.


I avoid doing anything that could be considered personal business on any equipment provided by a client or an employer. I do occasionally have to field an email from wife, but we immediately negotiate another mode of communication and switch.

You should assume any activity you perform on corporate equipment is available to any employee of that corporation.



ralphbsz said:


> By the way, we no longer have a cat (it was sadly eaten by a pack of coyotes), so I don't actually have cat pictures.


Heck of a way to go. I'm sorry.



ralphbsz said:


> What makes you think that e-mail and SMS are any more or less secure than message systems such as WhatsApp? If you listen to what the national security apparatus can do and does, you would not think for a moment that SMS, voice calls, or e-mail is particularly secure.


I'm not worried about the national security apparatus. They certainly have the resources to get at my information should they want it. I'm worried about Tom, Dick, and Harry with a subpoena. All of the online providers will comply with subpoenas immediately. It'll take a search warrant to get to my server, and a court order to force me to hand over passwords. This is a much higher bar.

The privacy of telephone communications has typically enjoyed stronger legal protection than stored written communications. I would guess that SMS is a gray area. I did say I use it only grudgingly.


----------



## getopt (Sep 2, 2020)

Why is it so painful for people to negotiate an appropriate communication channel? Latest clients usually find protocol and a common encryption after initial hello even with a crappy server. Humans fail on this because of emotions and beliefs.

Looks like there is a need for a human buddy-RFC procedure for finding a common ground to proceed with a communication. Sad - but obviously we deserve the world in what we are living.


----------



## ekvz (Sep 2, 2020)

getopt said:


> 1,5 years were a long time in the sixties of the last century. All I could read is opinion without giving any reason.
> 
> I've seen some people trying Prosody and going back to ejabberd. OMEMO has become a choice next to OTR and both have different usecases. Some clients improved nicely.



I don't question that there probably has been some improvement and i fully agree that OMEMO is nice but it's more of a base requirement to even be considered on par with something as miserable as Whatsapp than any real selling point. Also as with pretty much anything in relation to XMPP it's just an extension. Who knows if your conversation partner supports it, one of the other 2 encryption standards or maybe nothing at all. At least it doesn't also depend on the extensions supported by the involved servers (i think)... As a side effect there is also no way to make it an enforced default (yes, i'd rather have a sane default that actually gets used on a broad scale than X super specific choices used by about 5 techies while being ignored by endusers since "it already works without it") .

Regarding not giving a reason: Well, what kind of reason do you want? In my opinion i've already stated my reasons. I just didn't go into much detail and to be honest i don't see a point in doing so but how about we just start with how that monstrosity is based on XML which is about as bad as it gets in terms of parsing and also pretty awkward when dealing with binary data? Or we could discuss how much abstraction is to much abstraction when your primarily goal is practically nothing more than transfer data between clients in an orderly fashion. Complexity also has a very real cost even if it happens to work and having each client/server basically define it's own standard in terms of supported extensions leaves you with something that will only work if the stars are aligned right.

I could also go on to give examples from practice where XMPP (or rather the servers and clients involved since what does XMPP even mean?) failed badly but that's not the point anyways. Even if it worked perfectly it would still be technical dept. Sure you can keep it but until you get rid of it you will always have to pay interest.


----------



## ekvz (Sep 2, 2020)

Jose said:


> You mean like SMTP?



I am sorry i left out the "instant". I hope you can forgive me.

In case you just wanted to see me rant some more: SMTP is also horrible. It's stoneage stuff held together by tons duct tape because it's to big to replace. In that case i am actually happy about dragging it on though. Whatever it would be replaced by is sure to be 100% scary bad so i'd rather keep it.


----------



## ekvz (Sep 2, 2020)

vigole said:


> No but you don't have to give your real number. Create a pseudonymous Google account and Voice VoIP and use that in signal to receive confirmation SMS.



How would i even go about doing this? As soon as i try to sign up for anything google they ask for a number.


----------



## a6h (Sep 2, 2020)

ekvz said:


> How would i even go about doing this? As soon as i try to sign up for anything google they ask for a number.


i haven't opened a google account for a long time.  I can't help you on this subject, but I'm sure there's online tutorial on the net. Also I'm not a google consumer. I hate Google and Apple. I can't provide you some rational. It just my feeling and instinct. I don't have similar feeling toward Microsoft or Amazon. For whatever reason everything about google disgust me. Its CEO and their policies, its API's (Angular, etc) and products UI/UX (Drive, etc) and *Google Thumpers*.


----------



## ekvz (Sep 2, 2020)

vigole said:


> i haven't opened a google account for a long time.  I can't help you on this subject, but I'm sure there's online tutorial on the net. Also I'm not a google consumer. I hate Google and Apple. I can't provide you some rational. It just my feeling and instinct. I don't have similar feeling toward Microsoft or Amazon. For whatever reason everything about google disgust me. Its CEO and their policies, its API's (Angular, etc) and products UI/UX (Drive, etc) and *Google Thumpers*.



I see. I also remember it being possible to just skip entering a phone number but it seems this is no longer the case. Maybe it is depending on client IP but even looking around the web for howtos just resulted in outdated material. It's not like i really want a google account anyways. It's just stuff like their Voice numbers that would be handy now and then to use for throwaway purposes.

I was a Google user for about one day though. I had made an account because i wanted to upload some videos to youtube. My first action was trying to upload a single test video (30 seconds of black screen with "THIS IS A TEST" written on it). It failed. The next day Google told me they had detected "suspicious activity" and blocked my account... I have nothing more to add when it comes to Google.


----------



## unitrunker (Sep 3, 2020)

Sevendogsbsd said:


> Too many contact attempts to list, and I am sure all of them were social engineering attempts to glean information from me. Needless to say I also no longer have a LinkedIn account.


You should have created an account for a fictitious co-worker named "Honey Potts".


----------



## Jose (Sep 3, 2020)

ekvz said:


> I am sorry i left out the "instant". I hope you can forgive me.


If "instant" means "reasonably fast" (and it does for me), SMTP is more than adequate most of the time in my experience. Notable exceptions are when you run afoul of my SPAM mitigation measures. This is a feature.



ekvz said:


> In case you just wanted to see me rant some more: SMTP is also horrible. It's stoneage stuff held together by tons duct tape because it's to big to replace. In that case i am actually happy about dragging it on though. Whatever it would be replaced by is sure to be 100% scary bad so i'd rather keep it.


That's one way to look at it. Another is that nothing better has emerged in 48 years. Many have tried. Personally I think that no one has matched the decentralized, federated nature of the SMTP protocol. Sure, naive assumptions about who would use the protocol led to the SPAM nightmare, but again, SMTP has been there done that. I feel like a lot of the problems XMPP is experiencing right now are SMTP in the early part of this century.

There are no presence  features in SMTP. I don't miss them, and they could be added if anyone really cared. The only thing SMTP needs is a modern client that does away with the outmoded metaphors of 20th-century desktops. How many people alive today have actually seen a physical inbox? Why are we needlessly bound by the idea that messages live in folders?


----------



## getopt (Sep 3, 2020)

Jose said:


> Personally I think that no one has matched the decentralized, federated nature of the SMTP protocol. Sure, naive assumptions about *who* *would use the protocol* led to the SPAM nightmare, but again, SMTP has been there done that. *I feel like* a lot of the problems XMPP is experiencing right now are SMTP in the early part of this century.


Decentralized and federated designs of infrastructure are known to be the most robust. Other protocols than SMTP do utilize this as well. And yes I'd prefer this design for any communication. And yes SMTP cannot be fixed anymore (i.e metadata problem) and should be abandoned.

'Naive assumptions about *who*' would use a protocol *should* not affect it's reliability. Can you give an example please?

Spam is both a result of _user behavior_ and bad _server security_. I use email addresses with zero spam in a decade. No need for spam filters here.

'Experiencing a *feeling*' is an upmost personal arousal. What's the purpose of talking of 'a lot of problems' and not listing at least a few of them?

Opinion talk without reasoning is at best low level entertainment.


----------



## Sevendogsbsd (Sep 3, 2020)

Definitely not a lack of education or ignorance on my part. I just don't CARE about social media, which is why I answered that way.


----------



## Sevendogsbsd (Sep 3, 2020)

Statistics as a whole is largely misunderstood...trying to derive any sort of statistic from an Internet forum without a controlled population is pretty useless but I think most people in this situation just want a "gut feel", which is obviously not scientific...I don't mind polls and actually enjoy answering them.


----------



## ekvz (Sep 3, 2020)

getopt said:


> Decentralized and federated designs of infrastructure are known to be the most robust. Other protocols than SMTP do utilize this as well. And yes I'd prefer this design for any communication. And yes SMTP cannot be fixed anymore (i.e metadata problem) and should be abandoned.



I agree, decentralization and federation are very much desirable features for communication protocols but in the case of SMTP it won't help much.

https://blog.filippo.io/the-sad-state-of-smtp-encryption/ has a nice write up on how the STARTTLS duct tape never was exactly tight and now is waiting for another layer of DNSSEC duct tape after 20 years of being semi lose... Like the author says: It's a sad state.


----------



## mickey (Sep 3, 2020)

getopt said:


> Looking at the interim result of the poll:
> 
> An overwhelmingly *Don't know / don't care *reflects either a lack of education or ignorance. Quod erat demonstrandum?


Or a lack of interest in social media in it's entirety...


----------



## Mjölnir (Sep 3, 2020)

Well, it's pretty obvious that the answers in this forum are by no means representative.  I enabled the poll because... it's there, why not use it?! 


ralphbsz said:


> First, insulting Facebook (and its subsidiary Instagram) by misrepresenting its name doesn't change the facts.


of course not, but given the number & consequences of all the commonly well known affairs & scandals with facebook, twitter, google etc.pp. I took the freedom to express my disapproval through cocophony and I commented that.


> [...] Those people happen to post on Facebook, and they expect my posts on there too. If I looked for their posts elsewhere, they wouldn't be there, and if I posted my updates elsewhere, nobody would see them.


Modern clients support cross-posting to several platforms, and once influencers start to use alternative platforms, they will convince others to follow.


> [...] Do you have any evidence that Facebook (owner of Messenger and WhatsApp), Microsoft (owner of Skype), OS vendors (Android, Apple) for SMS, or Google and Apple (for Hangouts and Messages) look at the content of my IM chats? On the contrary, there is strong evidence that they do not.


_Are you serious???_  It's well known that they do, with linguistic AI software, and "human resources" read the posts where some flags go up, and censor where their policy is violated.  In some cases, this is good, in some it's bad.  Additionally, they're much after the metadata (who knows whom and such), that's their business model, there have been and will be numerous misuses of metadata, and you know it.  Don't play dumb, please.


> [...] It's not peer pressure. It's practicality. When I need or want to communicate with someone, I ask them how I can reach them. If they tell me "write to me on WhatsApp", I will do that. If they ping me on Facebook messenger, I will reply there. [...]


While it's perfectly ok to act this way, I feel that persons who have more knowledge than average Joe about IT, what is possible & what not with today's computing resources & state-of-the-art AI, can take responsibility and tell about such misuses & the dangers it implies, and point others to reasonable alternatives.  EDIT: Feel free to do a quick search on the mental health issues the censors are suffering from, because they're regulary confronted with weird things like pedophile and/or overly violent topics.  IIRC, most of them live on the Phillipines.


----------



## getopt (Sep 3, 2020)

mjollnir said:


> I feel that persons who have more knowledge than average Joe about IT, what is possible & what not with today's computing resources & state-of-the-art AI, can take responsibility and tell about such misuses & the dangers it implies, and point others to reasonable alternatives.


Good boy! Seven years after Snowden my enthusiasm for educating others got to a reasonable level. That is I inform only when asked for. No more crusading.

And what is most important: No more to anyone unseen. I won't teach potential adversaries and people acting against my interests anymore. There are so many dumb people outside on the Internet that I'm thankful that they gather at places I strictly avoid. And I love it meantime that security agencies scan this places. And it is a pleasure seeing that they get commercially exploited there. At least the dumbest deserve what they get there, but if Bezos, Zuckerberg & friends do a great job on this, they have to pay their taxes on their profits like every blue-collar is forced to do so.

BTW Snowden made this ruling by the U.S. Court of Appeals possible:








						U.S. Court: Mass Surveillance Program Exposed by Snowden Was Illegal
					

Seven years after former National Security Agency contractor Edward Snowden blew the whistle on the mass surveillance of Americans' telephone records, an appeals court has found the program was unlawful - and that the U.S. intelligence leaders who publicly defended it were not telling the truth.




					www.nytimes.com
				




A satisfaction that took seven long years. If US justice finally got it, why should I care about those who still don't care?


----------



## ekvz (Sep 3, 2020)

getopt said:


> Good boy! Seven years after Snowden my enthusiasm for educating others got to a reasonable level. That is I inform only when asked for. No more crusading.
> 
> And what is most important: No more to anyone unseen. I won't teach potential adversaries and people acting against my interests anymore. There are so many dumb people outside on the Internet that I'm thankful that they gather at places I strictly avoid. And I love it meantime that security agencies scan this places. And it is a pleasure seeing that they get commercially exploited there. At least the dumbest deserve what they get there, but if Bezos, Zuckerberg & friends do a great job on this, they have to pay their taxes on their profits like every blue-collar is forced to do so.



A little cynical aren't we? Well, it's not like i can really blame you.


----------



## ralphbsz (Sep 3, 2020)

ralphbsz said:
			
		

> Do you have any evidence that Facebook (owner of Messenger and WhatsApp), Microsoft (owner of Skype), OS vendors (Android, Apple) for SMS, or Google and Apple (for Hangouts and Messages) look at the content of my IM chats? On the contrary, there is strong evidence that they do not.





mjollnir said:


> _Are you serious???_  It's well known that they do, with linguistic AI software, and "human resources" read the posts where some flags go up, and censor where their policy is violated.


I was talking about IM - it even explicitly says so in my sentence. I don't remember any case where there were credible allegations that services read instant messages. From an expectation of privacy point of view, IM is like two people standing in the park, whispering into each other's ears. And as far as I know, that expectation of privacy has been honored (with the exception of government security services, which is why WhatsApp exists).

Postings are different. Those are published, there for everyone (or at least all members of a large group, in closed groups) to read. Publish means they become public. At that point, there is an expectation that they can be read by things like administrators or moderators. The fact that publishing mechanisms such as Facebook have administrators and moderators (usually virtual ones, implemented using software) makes perfect sense, and I find nothing objectionable about that. Postings are like walking around carrying a big poster, for all to see. It shouldn't surprise anyone that people will read the poster. And it shouldn't surprise anyone that on private property, certain forms of expression are unwelcome: if you walk into a bar with a poster that says "alcohol kills, drink only water", it makes perfect sense that the barkeeper will throw you out of the bar. Similarly, Facebook suppresses certain opinions.

From a privacy point of view, e-mail is like IM: It should be private, as it goes from one sender to one or a small number of recipients, and there is an expectation of privacy there, which is (usually) well supported by laws for traditional paper mail. The fact that some e-mail services have at times inspected the content of the e-mail is troubling, and that practice in general should be stopped.


----------



## bookwormep (Sep 3, 2020)

If by commercial you mean proprietary, then it would be hard to know either way.
I would have to do a lot of research on this question to give a fair and objective answer. So, I just don't know. This has nothing to do with level of education.


----------



## Jose (Sep 3, 2020)

getopt said:


> 'Naive assumptions about *who*' would use a protocol *should* not affect it's reliability. Can you give an example please?


Sure. Everyone ran an open relay back in the '90s, and it solved more problems than it created. It was nice to know you could send your messages to your buddy's Sendmail when yours was on the fritz for whatever reason. No one thought to send thousands of unsolicited emails this way. It just wasn't done. You know what happened next.

Forging "From:" headers was (and is!) trivial. No one thought this would be used for reflection attacks. Again, you know what happened next.

Why would you want to encrypt your email? It would just waste precious CPU cycles. See later in this thread for more on this.



getopt said:


> 'Experiencing a *feeling*' is an upmost personal arousal. What's the purpose of talking of 'a lot of problems' and not listing at least a few of them?


I can experience feelings other than arousal. I'm truly sorry for you if that's the range of your feeling.

I was thinking specifically of SPAM. Here are a few links for you








						XSender: The Source of All the Recent XMPP Spam
					

In recent months, security researchers, hackers, and other dwellers of the cyber-criminal underground have noticed an uptick in XMPP (formerly Jabber) spam.




					www.bleepingcomputer.com
				







__





						Spam Reduction on yax.im - yaxim
					






					yaxim.org
				







__





						Why We DO NOT Fully Support "The Jabber Spam Fighting Manifesto" - XMPP.is
					

As it stands, XMPP.is does not support “The Jabber Spam Fighting Manifesto” for various reasons. It stands in the way of those looking for anonymity/privacy, and spam can be easily mitigated client-side. Certain measures should NOT be applied server-side. The … Continue reading →



					xmpp.is


----------



## a6h (Sep 4, 2020)

I ha[vt]e to refer to a Wikipedia, but here's a nice compiled article on phony apocalyptic events and related links to how people fell for it. STFW. Now how that related to this thread?
No matter how many times I told people, not to post their private life (part?!) on Instagram [Privacy Implications] or asked them to send me emails, instead of sending PM/DM from IM at a rate of 1 ppm (one post per minute), like a lunatic from booby house [Sanity Considerations]. So forth and so on. When it come to dumb topics, people love to hear and follow them. Just spread the message and you're good to go. But if you want to warn them, about danger of real things, good luck with that. Similar to getopt, I take the position that, I gave up!


----------



## Mjölnir (Sep 4, 2020)

ralphbsz said:


> I was talking about IM - it even explicitly says so in my sentence. I don't remember any case where there were credible allegations that services read instant messages. From an expectation of privacy point of view, IM is like two people standing in the park, whispering into each other's ears. And as far as I know, that expectation of privacy has been honored (with the exception of government security services, which is why WhatsApp exists).


Well, IMHO it's naive to assume that user-to-user communication on a commercial instant message (not only textual, also voice) service is not scanned by AI-enhanced linguistic software & read by human censors if some lights go on.  I have no publicy known example at hand, if I stumble upon one, I will post it here.


----------



## Jose (Sep 4, 2020)

Think about how accurately Facebook's face-recognition system is going to be able to pick out your face from even the most jumbled crowd picture given how many training samples you gave it in your Instagram account. Keep playing with those funny filters, by all means. (Paraphrase of an actual conversation I had with my daughter.)


----------



## a6h (Oct 29, 2020)

DavidMarshall said:


> I'm wondering how far SM will go in the future.


Marked as 'deprecated'. Everything has an EOL.


----------



## mikethe1wheelnut (Mar 20, 2021)

ralphbsz said:


> Or what I'm really saying: From my viewpoint, there is no alternative to Facebook for efficient quick checking of what my friends are saying or doing.



..wow, I so don't believe this.  at least, that's my knee-jerk reaction.  maybe there isn't one -now-.. that's no reason not to create one!   ..but I digress.. ;-)


----------



## Deleted member 30996 (Mar 21, 2021)

getopt said:


> 20-100-2fe and mjollnir
> We do have a choice. And we are free not to choose.


That is your choice. You chose not to chose.


----------



## Mjölnir (Mar 21, 2021)

BTW where's getopt?


----------



## PMc (Mar 21, 2021)

Mjölnir said:


> What can be done to enhance the publicity of these alternatives?


Bombs. Nuclear bombs.

In fact, recently I came across a paper, about the British government having decided to buy a lot more nuclear bombs. They argue with the increasing threats imposed by (among others) internet corporations. So there appear to be chances that the Brits might just nuke Amazon an Google and Fressenheft - or did I get something wrong here?

P.S.: I bothered to look it up - so if you have difficulties to believe, here it is: 
the UK’s way of life is threatened by rogue states, terrorists and big tech firms.


----------



## wolffnx (Mar 21, 2021)

PMc said:


> Bombs. Nuclear bombs.
> 
> In fact, recently I came across a paper, about the British government having decided to buy a lot more nuclear bombs. They argue with the increasing threats imposed by (among others) internet corporations. So there appear to be chances that the Brits might just nuke Amazon an Google and Fressenheft - or did I get something wrong here?


if you or in your work have spreadsheets
in gmail download a backup now


----------



## ralphbsz (Mar 21, 2021)

PMc said:


> In fact, recently I came across a paper, about the British government having decided to buy a lot more nuclear bombs.


Did they order them from Amazon or Alibaba?

<- That's a joke. I know about the AWE.


----------



## Deleted member 30996 (Mar 22, 2021)

ralphbsz said:


> What makes you think that e-mail and SMS are any more or less secure than message systems such as WhatsApp? If you listen to what the national security apparatus can do and does, you would not think for a moment that SMS, voice calls, or e-mail is particularly secure.


Missouri, the Show Me State, is a "one party consent" state. Take note, drhowarddfine.

That means if I want to covertly record any conversation whatsoever, in person or by phone, no matter what state you live in, if I consent to the recording, that's one party. 



> Therefore, if you operate in Missouri,  you may record a conversation or phone call if you are a party to the conversation or you get prior consent from one party to the conversation.



 Agent of Chaos 101 - Wiretapping

Do you think I'm going to tell you I'm covertly recording this phone conversation while I'm recording you? Doesn't stand to logic I would, and no law says I have to. And if I'm covertly recording this call because I'm not as stupid as you think don't expect me to start getting that way by telling you, much less ask you.

When it became in what I considered my own best interest to start recording every conversation I had with Admin, then HUD too. it was the tool I used agains't them with stealth and ease in phone and personal conversations. The one thing I had going for me they could not have anticipated and made all the difference. A $60 Sony pocket digital audio recorder.

I held back in submitting into evidence, covert evidence until they had turned down what could have been settled for $1700 into a $100,000 case by waiting to submit it. I bet $100,000 I could predict what they would do in this instance as a Behaviorist and rub their nose in it for thinking I was stupid. 

I'm going to make a surprise call at 8am Eastern and guess who I'll be recording? Because, I feel let down... And I am not the one who should feel sad. ..


----------



## fjdlr (Mar 22, 2021)

Hi,
For me, Don't know / don't care
Social networks send you sociopath; isolation, madness


----------



## sidetone (May 26, 2022)

I'm now interested in Mastodon, and Identi.ca (Pump.io). Twitter was good for reading, though now, Musk is going to use it too much for influence. Some of Musk's intentions were good. At other times, his ego has gotten conflated with world events, he has used social media or a tv appearance to manipulate a market, or he is overly political. A lot of times, people take political stances that I don't agree with, but it's rare when someone makes a political statement that irks me. Good for him, that he's acquiring it. He also has free choice, as do consumers. I may go back and read Twitter feeds from time to time, though I won't as often anymore.


a6h said:


> as far a messaging systems goes, I strongly recommend to use Signal messenger. Its protocol passed formal security analysis: Cryptology ePrint Archive: Report 2016/1013 and it became European Commission’s messaging app of choice.





getopt said:


> Only for those who are willing to give a phone number.
> Has this changed recently?





a6h said:


> No but you don't have to give your real number. Create a pseudonymous Google account and Voice VoIP and use that in signal to receive confirmation SMS.


That, or Signal is only good for communicating for those you would give your phone number to. It's an upgrade for texting over SMS, and it's good for bypassing long distance charges. Signal also has an extra feature of video communicating. Because the transport is encrypted, Signal is more secure than traditional means of SMS texting, calling and video calling. It also asks for a password every week or so, which is inconvenient. Only one device can use it at a time, which can be good for the reason that, you know the messages are only going to your device, and aren't being read from another device on the same account plan. Telegram is easier to use, and while people have used it in a somewhat secure way maybe for the moment, its security is fundamentally compromised.

If not Signal, XMPP, but that takes a learning curve, and it has lacked compatibility with other XMPP applications/servers/clients/extensions/features in the past. Everyone knows a phone number isn't needed for that.


----------



## grahamperrin@ (May 27, 2022)

sidetone said:


> … interested in Mastodon, …



I recently discovered BSD Network, <https://bsd.network/about/more>. 

I created my account a week ago, it's simultaneously "fully operational" and "pending review".

In other words: not fully operational. I can't view <https://bsd.network/about> without signing out. In the absence of that page, there's no obvious link to <https://bsd.network/public>. I can't add favourites whilst signed in, and so on.


----------

