Overzeetop

And we know how strict these big companies are about voluntary compliance to the GDPR. ;-) I’m glad at least someone is putting in rules against this fuckery but, sadly, once that data is sold to the first outside vendor (Cambridge Analytica, Palantir, etc.) it’s out there and lives on the internet forever, even if the big boys are brought to heel by the EU.

If you’ve ever had a contact allow a service to read their contacts, you are in their database. That then gets cross-referenced with the (relatively few) online store providers the first time you use that address - or the obfuscated emailname.store@* version that was meant to serialize or identify spammers but which the simplest script can undo. Now your shipping/billing address, phone, and partial purchase history can be linked with every social media company that weird chick who did upside down keg hits with you that one night decided to allow contact access. Or your aunt Gertrude.

And it’s not even that complicated. Are you in the contacts list of anyone who has ever used the internet? Google, yahoo, or microsoft definitely know who you are in their internal databases and can create a web of contacts and likely contacts just from a couple of emails. Heck, I remember when there were “contact synchronization” websites where you could transfer your contacts between gmail addresses, or to/from other mail services. It was free, so I can just about guarantee they’re selling all of your info, which has been checked and corroborated by however many of your contacts decided to use their services.

That “not having” Facebook or [insert nearly any other major information-based corporation] means that those companies don’t have your information and profile already completed in their database.

What is the magical method we are pimping this week and what is the fatal flaw which will be revealed that makes it entirely impractical for commercial or industrial scale uses? I ask because we seem to (re-)invent various version of the solar still (oh, look - that’s what they’re doing!) every year or two and it’s revolutionary every time because the energy is free and all that’s required is a way to scale it up, prevent the scaled up version from destroying the local ecosystem through hypersalination around the plant when operated at the level needed for efficient collection and distribution to a sizable population, and figure out how to move the billions of tons of water required in a typical year for a medium sized city/population center from the desalination location to a distribution system.

Also, sorry for being shitty. I’m in an especially intolerant mood today.

I’ll say it every time: it’s their platform, their servers, their choice. However, we owe them nothing. If they want to go it alone, we need to let them. Let them hire paid moderators and we should delete our content so they have to create their own.

We built the communities there, we can do it again elsewhere. We have the expertise and the desire.

Seems unlikely. Currently it’s sitting at 4.8 stars in the Apple Store with millions of 5 star ratings. Makes you wonder if they’re cooking the books, as if Apple or someone on the Store team has VC money riding on this.

It would have been a brilliant business move if it had worked. Shysters and cheats have been mixing in expired or substandard additives to food and drug products for all of history. As long as nobody dies, and you don’t get caught, it’s just free money in your pocket. I believe it was Heintz, around the turn of the 20th century, who lobbied strongly in favor of the Pure Food and Drugs Act in the US because he felt it would give him a competitive advantage over others by requiring the additives in food be safe. Crazy concept, right?