Comment by HeckFeck | Hacker News Reader

Comment by HeckFeck | Hacker News Reader

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I genuinely miss the days of playing with DOS, Windows 9x and then all the excitement of Windows XP. All on my own hardware, which was whatever I could scrape from parents, savings, neighbours. I could do what I wanted with these old PCs.

There was an openness that existed in the world of computing. Despite all that was said of Microsoft back then, and much of the complaints about proprietary software were true then also, it wasn't anywhere near as bad as this. Back then, new releases actually did improve my experience of computing.

Every time I use Windows 10 I feel like I'm constantly in battle with the PC. Every new piece of news I read, every new feature in software and now hardware I read and shudder, thinking, how much more of my privacy will it cost? What other aspect of my life is being invaded?

And because of the network effect, I'm trapped in their clutches. I have to use these services or I can't work, can't talk to friends. All well and good saying 'use Matrix' but a chat program with no friends is just a note taker.

Such a seismic shift and it was only two decades. I just want this hostility to end. A computer is a machine, which is an elaborate tool, for Pete's sake. I don't feel the same way towards my garden hose or washing machine.

(And I increasingly wonder, were we freer back then because there was still some empathy towards customer needs at Microsoft, or because they were simply stifled from their real intentions by technological limitations?)

I have a theory that this seismic shift is the result a demographic shift of PC users. It gradually went from engineers, businessmen and hackers to a much wider audience including younger people who have trouble grasping concepts such as folders[0]

This by itself is not bad, problems arise when companies use this to justify deny control even from those who can be responsible with it.

[0]: https://www.pcgamer.com/students-dont-know-what-files-and-fo...

The problem arises when there is no way to differentiate between the user classes. And while I enjoy computing freedom, I’m not exactly proclaiming its value when I have to deal with a DDoS or hear about people getting ransomwared. I know things like Mirai also exist, and that user error isn’t the only ransomware vector, but poor computing habits absolutely fuel such problems and they cause pain for society as a whole.

I have no idea what the answer is, other than having Linux et al be the place for free computing (protected by its various barriers to entry) while the consumer OS space eventually becomes increasingly locked down. The only other ideas I have are dumb ones like requiring regular examination/certification/licensure to be able to use the “developer” version of Windows or something.

Let's pretend there is no financial interest in restricting computer access. I think the best and safest option would be to manufacture all PCs with a similar mechanism to chromebooks write protect screw that you have to remove to unlock the bootloader. But instead of just unlocking the bootloader it also gives you TrustedInstaller privilege in windows.

And while I enjoy computing freedom, I’m not exactly proclaiming its value when I have to deal with a DDoS or hear about people getting ransomwared.

"We are not truly free if we don't have the freedom to make mistakes."

It's nice to hear about cyberattacks and such continuing, because it means freedom still exists.

And I increasingly wonder, were we freer back then because there was still some empathy towards customer needs at Microsoft, or because they were simply stifled from their real intentions by technological limitations?

They've been slowly cooking the frog in the background for a while now with the "trusted computing" stuff. It's over a decade old at this point. Back then the userbase was more technical and likely to smell BS, and DRM was definitely not liked even by the general public.

https://www.cl.cam.ac.uk/~rja14/tcpa

https://www.cl.cam.ac.uk/~rja14/tcpa-faq-1.0.html

...but then they eventually found out that people could be scared into doing anything by justifications of "security" (regardless of what's being secured, who it's being secured by, and who it's being secured from), and here we are today.

> ..but then they eventually found out that people could be scared into doing anything by justifications of "security" (regardless of what's being secured, who it's being secured by, and who it's being secured from), and here we are today.

Ah, so they took a page from the politicians' handbook. The same drivel that drives the public to concede privacy and freedom to their hands in the state also applies in private industry (I am thinking of the ominous UK Online Safety Bill). Like it is all the same zeitgeist.

I completely agree with your points.

> I don't feel the same way towards my garden hose or washing machine.

We just built and furnished a remote vacation home from the ground up and the shiny new appliances and even some fixtures (mostly ordered or approved by my wife) default to stubbornly demanding cloud access, often before they will even perform their most basic functions. At the moment, internet is only via 4G hotspot as we await Starlink's rollout next year.

This of course includes the Samsung TV but extends to the Denon amplifier, all the major appliances from washing machine, refrigerator etc all the way down to the light switches, thermostats and 'smart' toilets (which I view as 'input-only' devices). Fortunately, I intercepted the light switches before installation and hacked open source firmware on them but that required opening each one and temporarily soldering to reflash the firmware (I had to draw the line somewhere).

Most of the devices can be coaxed into functioning without permanent cloud access but it's a time-consuming escape-room adventure through dark UX patterns. The rest will require blocking at the router firewall level.

Well, when the story began I though this sounds like a pleasant getaway, and I was happy to read you've acquired such a place.

Then the rest of it was just a dour decline. Man, oh man. The worst of it is that all these devices could integrate genuine 'smart' functionality, but a user-respecting way would be locally run from a central box with open and interoperable protocols across devices. Exactly how a router and server works on a LAN. It isn't impossible to design this in a consumer-friendly way either. But the will and the demand just isn't there.

I wonder how these devices will be when the remote servers are inevitably switched off. I learnt this lesson very early on with online games (think GameSpy), the servers are not forever.

What has come over the population? It wasn't that long ago that they burnt identity cards in the UK (at the end of the second world war), the public were glad to see the back of them despite the touted 'benefits' by some politicians. My grandmother shuddered at the thought of giving any financial details online. In the early days, I never used my real name anywhere on the Internet. There is just so much passivity now.

It's still going to be a pleasant getaway, just one requiring much more effort during set up to configure it in a long-term sustainable way.

> There is just so much passivity now.

For anyone interested there is a large, active online community around the open-source Home Assistant platform. I'm using it and the community has been a terrific resource for finding those still too-rare devices which both work well and are willing to work sans-cloud. There are thousands of contributors and hundreds of thousands of HA users now and together we comprise a market large enough for even low-cost Asian manufacturers to notice and start targeting products toward.

That early era also included some controversy over Windows XP requiring online activation. It was a watershed moment, soon followed by their authenticity check to install certain updates.

We are firmly in a new era of increasing DRM within the OS. As a producer I can see the desire but am saddened as a consumer with fond memories of a freer time.

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