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I'm not typically one for conspiracy theories but this thread got tanked at the weekend [0] and I'm not seeing much in the news about the actual story [1]. I'll certainly be watching the company I pay a premium for privacy for with great interest.

[0] - https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=20054289

[1] - https://9to5mac.com/2019/05/25/apple-itunes-lawsuit/

I agree with the second point emphatically. I enjoy that the barrier to entry with places like IRC are higher because it's directly correlated with the quality of discussion, in my experience at least.

Regarding the other points, we may well look back at things like Myspace as Halcyon days of somewhat pure Social Media usage. It's a pity we can't still have a social media platform that isn't mined to hell for analytics, ads and GPS stalking but it seems that the tide is turning and people in the Western world are getting over the hype cycle and caring less about being a part of it. Tellingly I had cause to listen to a focus group this week that had privacy concerns about Facebook; before then I assumed it was only the HN crowd who thought that! I look forward to the next 5 years in tech but if I were to lay odds, I wouldn't bet on Facebook weathering well.

Tangentially related: it's a pity there aren't more websites like this one: [0]

It's nice to compare different translations in-line. The last line of section 3 is an excellent example of how different translations can be: [1]

Enchiridion is well worth a read (I gather Carter has the best translation but I've gleaned this from places like Reddit so pinch of salt!), and I also enjoyed Derren Brown's Happy [0] which draws heavily on stoicism, summarising a lot of famous works on it as he goes.

[0] - https://enchiridion.tasuki.org/display:Code:ec,twh,pem,sw/se... [1] - https://enchiridion.tasuki.org/display:Code:ec,twh,pem,sw/se... [2] - https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/30142270-happy

This is so dumb if it's true. We're witnessing a huge shift towards a privacy-conscious climate and a major competitive advantage for Apple is that they ostensibly respect it; to act against that interest is inviting trouble.

I agree with this - it's there (annoyingly, phrased exactly the same way I wrote my comment but I swear I didn't know and I haven't been on that page in months!) but they're not exactly leading with it. uBlock Origin has a strong brand and it's a bit myopic not to leverage that in a more prominent way. Still, I'm glad it's getting noticed and I'm sure their install base went up a fair bit from this thread alone!

Also I upvoted you - I'm not sure why you're being downvoted without explanation since you've axiomatically added an interesting viewpoint to the discussion.

A couple of quick points:

- Your ad profile will be built based on pages you visit as you indeed note, not just things that you click. Any noise you can introduce surely has to be a win for obfuscation? Would be interested in your thoughts here because you have more experience than I do!

- I'm not certain that paying for content makes any difference from a data mining perspective. Loading a NYT article causes uBlock Origin to deny 14 requests; I don't currently have a subscription but I imagine those assets are still loaded even if I'm signed in (with much clearer markers towards my identity!)

- Fighting back is a fine way to effect change. It's clearly working or Google wouldn't be banning this extension from their store or limiting their API.

I'm very comfortable with this so it's interesting to speak with someone who isn't. If adblocking is on the rise, I wonder what the next step will be towards monetizing content? Micropayments didn't take off (perhaps unsurprisingly) and subscription models seem to not have the return that people had hoped. There's huge amounts of money on the table but a lot of very smart people don't seem to have hit upon anything yet!

I used this for some time and it's great; built atop ublock origin and does exactly what it purports to. The only downside is that it is used by such a comparatively small market-share that it's harder to blend in, but I imagine modern browser fingerprinting negates this concern anyway. Also it's (tellingly) banned from the Chrome store last I used Chrome, and you had to install it via a zip file. There is (or at least was) a user-hostile nag each time you start Chrome (or Chromium) about allowing an unidentified extension but I guess that's now moot if Chrome now doesn't permit sanctioned ad-blockers.

I don't dare ask why you can't just change the A/C!

I'd agree with this. I can't stand prolix documentation when I'm just trying to get something done (I'll never understand why people extol the Python docs!). I used bropages [0] for a while but it isn't as expansive as it should be, presumably on account of a lack of traffic.

I'm happy to read more expansive pages in my own time but when I'm 'in the zone' as it were, the last thing I want to do is read through why something works. Perhaps it's a gap in the market? Or more likely I'm in the minority!

I think it's a bit unfair you're being downvoted because you raise some good points. A lot of people agree POSIX is a mess and you've highlighted a fraction of reasons related to that. Would any of the downvoters care to elucidate? Maybe I'm missing something obvious.

It's interesting to see the gradual monetization of Open Source. 10 years ago this was just something you did for fun but with the proliferation of services charging for it, the landscape is shifting rapidly. Github are moving in some interesting directions and it'll be interesting to see if they can stay ahead of the competition with how trivial it is to migrate to a rival. I wouldn't bet on them personally but it'll be fun to watch either way!

This has been a long time coming and I'm surprised it's taken until 2019. A better time to have done this would have been back at the 2-3 migration; I'm not sure the community will be able to survive another transition like that, but hopefully lessons have been learned from the previous schism. A step in the right direction for sure!

I'm wildly skeptical of this. Do you have anything I could read to better understand it? From where I'm sitting, this isn't Sabermetrics, chiefly because football isn't a series of set pieces with very clearly defined plays and variance of individuals. You sound pretty confident in what you're saying though so I'd be genuinely thrilled to be shown how idiotic my supposition is!

Not seeing anyone else mention this problem so perhaps I'm an edge case but I have a 3 month old Macbook Pro (work supplied, fortunately) and I'm getting double presses on certain keys. I've managed to ameliorate it a bit with software [0] but it's still a disgrace that this is happening on a $4K machine.

[0] - https://unshaky.nestederror.com/

Not the person you're replying to but hopefully useful information: I stopped using Google services incrementally over the past year or so. I started with this distro on my 5x (but had difficulty getting updates to work) and eventually moved to an iPhone. In the last few months I've switched to DuckDuckGo for search, Firefox for browsing and offline Open Street Maps for navigation. I still have a gmail account but I only check it about once per month, if that. I suspect I'll export my data from it soon and close it.

It was tricky in places and fiddly in others, but overall I'm happy that I'm doing a reasonable amount to keep Google out of my life without being inconvenienced now. A piecemeal approach certainly worked for me, so I'd certainly recommend that to minimise impact for anyone thinking of doing the same.

It was my understanding that YouTube isn't profitable; has there been any new data on this that I've missed? Lack of similar-sized competitors in the space would certainly indicate that the margins don't really stack up and you could make an argument that the aggressive foisting of their premium offering underscores that notion, but I don't know for sure. It'd be interesting to know more about operating a site of that nature at that scale but I don't suppose that sort of data will make it out any time soon!

It's an interesting development because the amount of people who actively seek to bypass paywalls must be negligible. While it's mostly second nature to a large swathe of the HN crowd, devtools/private browsing/Google-refe[r]rer plays aren't exactly typical browsing tricks for the average person. I can only extrapolate that it's either it's either a) a bid to be seen to be doing something to higher-ups or b) an attempt to garner subscriptions from the tech crowd with the nous to bypass a paywall ue to low numbers [0]. The latter seems unlikely on account of actual conversions and the former seems myopic. I'd love to be a fly on the wall at some of these meetings!

[0] - https://www.nytimes.com/2018/11/01/business/media/new-york-t...

I've worked in a few NZ dev shops and rigor isn't in my experience, high on the agenda! I also had no idea NZ Herald even had a subscription model, so thank you.

It would be nice if there were an app like CookieAutoDelete [0] for mobile Safari (or desktop Safari if Mozilla keep misbehaving!). You can disable cookies but that's trivially detectable. I guess it's trivial to detect, but it needn't be; something akin to Mozilla's Containers [1] on mobile Safari would be a step in the right direction.

[0] - https://addons.mozilla.org/en-US/firefox/addon/cookie-autode...

[1] - https://addons.mozilla.org/en-US/firefox/addon/multi-account...

I had no idea that this was the case; thank you for highlighting it. I also have no idea what would posses the Safari team to think settings I have enabled aren't distinct from data foisted onto me by websites I visit but that is a question for keener intellects than mine.

I wish mobile browsing was as good as Desktop. It's such a shame that various restrictions don't afford the granularity of laptop browsing.

Just to expand on this a little bit, it is contingent on ISP and as far as I know, the following websites:

- voat.co

- 4chan.org

- 8ch.net

- liveleak.com

- archive.is

- bitchute.com

- zerohedge.com

- kiwifarms.net

I think I'm right in saying that Telstra, Optus and Vodafone are the 'Big Three', and they have blocked the above.

Here in NZ, It's Vodafone, Spark and 2 Degrees, all of whom, I understand, blocked access, though I've been unable to verify this first-hand.

There are also hefty prison sentences [0] (up to 14 years) and fines for people who read/distributed the manifesto and watched/shared the original footage.

Edit: More comprehensive block-list can be found here: [1]

[0] - https://www.nytimes.com/2019/03/21/world/asia/new-zealand-at...

[1] - https://www.citizensagainstidiocracy.com/93/internet-censors...

They'll have a long way to go before outpacing London [0] but perhaps Brexit will have some value after all! I can't link to the primary source but Private Eye is one of the best oversights in the UK. The proprietor, Ian Hislop, was purportedly the most sued man in Britain at one point [1].

It's my understanding that the casino laundering scheme has been going on for decades but I can't imagine that'll go on forever. I'm not too sure where you go from there. I guess start a 'legitimate' cash business but I imagine there's much better ways.

[0] - https://www.thebureauinvestigates.com/stories/2012-08-09/lon...

[1] - https://www.independent.co.uk/news/people/profiles/ian-hislo... - "Since then, Hislop has become the most sued man in English legal history, though he says the rate of libel actions is slowing."

An interesting take on a place where they did their best to accommodate is Slate Star Codex's Culture War thread on Reddit [0]. I've wrestled with this for a while but as Youtube, Facebook and Twitter become ubiquitous, forcing views contrary to internal ones off the platforms is wildly irresponsible. On the other hand, I don't see why I, as a platform, should host content I find objectionable. I do agree it's money-driven but it doesn't work long-term; it's an interesting problem and I hope a phase of maturity comes soon because it's not as if alternative views can just set up their own platforms [1].

[0] - https://slatestarcodex.com/2019/02/22/rip-culture-war-thread...

[1] - https://www.cnet.com/news/gab-is-down-as-godaddy-paypal-pull...

It is my understanding that Fortnite precipitated a large swathe of apk installs without the Play Store [0], though I'd agree it's mostly atypical:

[0] - https://9to5google.com/2018/09/07/fortnite-android-fragmenta...

This isn't correct, at least not in the country my VPN is in [0]. What is interesting though is that the price is higher than it's been for a while: [1]. Possible skimming of consumers who won't move to Epic if they do pull it, perhaps?

0 - https://store.steampowered.com/app/8980/Borderlands_Game_of_...

1 - https://steamdb.info/app/8980/

I did the exact same thing as you around the same time-frame and with the amount of comments I see on here extolling Amazon I assumed I was an outlier. What made you tail off? I was in the UK and I started noticing that while they had originally been cheaper for most things, they were not and the convenience (or inconvenience if I was out when a package was delivered) didn't really offset that particular delta. I made the exception for about a year after I caught on to that in order to buy second hand books because typically they would retail for 1p with a ~£2.50 postage fee but I stopped that after a while for various reasons (travel, ebooks, relocation).

As well they should; it sounds objectively like an abuse of privacy. I don't much care for Google's Sensorvault DB [0] either but at least it's not (AIUI) real-time and completely unfettered. It'll be interesting to see if projects like that are considered unethical in a few years too along the same grounds.

[0] https://www.nytimes.com/interactive/2019/04/13/us/google-loc...

It's not that amazing if you think about it: a culture fostered around anything doesn't mean that something has to be particularly and objectively good. Consider Pop music for example. Also with modern technology and distribution channels, there's nothing to stop brits from getting good at critiquing tea. Full disclosure: I'm a British expat, but I know a logical fallacy when I see one!

The poor in the article though had it very different. They couldn't order a new tea online, nor trivially discuss tasting notes with people in China, Japan or Taiwan for example; I think that's worth noting.

I think you're being uncharitable towards OP's post; he doesn't make the case you're suggesting. Although I'm not sure that your broader point is too far off.