Advertises and marketers mislead and exaggerate with near impunity and use legalistic language drafted by lawyers to cover their asses. It is standard practice for companies to knowingly deploy psychological trickery in order to manipulate consumers, including very young children. This is accepted because capitalism is the one cow that can not be slaughtered. Profit is always good. Caveat emptor.
But a civil liberties group informing citizens of their rights in an attention catching way is deplored as intrusive and inappropriate and not “objective” enough.
This attitude speaks volumes about a society that has lost its way and is slowly collapsing under the irreconcilable contradictions it refuses to honestly address.
Very cool article. Somewhat surprised China wasn’t included on the list as they have built a high speed rail network in the last several decades that already has more track mileage than Europe’s.
Where there is a will there is a way, as the saying goes, and America, and the UK, with their profit über alles obsession are happy to let infrastructure rot and make people use woefully underfunded and overcrowded rail systems rather than trying something “new.”
Does it also bother you that the hysteria over Russia’s “guilt” is shamefully hypocritical and misleading? Are you aware, for example, of the role the Clinton administration played in 1996 to get their man Boris Yeltsin re-elected? One reason for Putin’s popularity is he put a stop to the Yeltsin facilitated post-communist era plundering of Russia’s wealth and resources by scruple less Russians and foreigners alike, and Americans were heavily involved in that avaricious free for all.
The United States not only interferes in other countries’ elections, it also regularly orchestrates coups, finances and arms violent insurgent groups and has a history of invading and destroying countries based on false pretexts.
The United States and its NATO vassals pushed their militaries right up to the Russian border, which is like Russia, China and Iran sending their armies to the border regions of Mexico and Canada while their navies patrol the Gulf (of Mexico).
Need I say more?
Even if Russia is guilty of everything the hysterical and disingenuous Russiagate crowd alleges, it is still a lightweight when it comes to messing around in other countries’ affairs. The mythology, and ideology, of American exceptionalism says the United States has a divine right to subject the entire planet to its will. World domination has been an explicit American political goal since the 1930s. It’s a matter of public record.
Russia with Putin as its leader stands in the way of American domination of Eurasia. Hence, the military encirclement of Russia and the belligerent anti-Russian rhetoric from American leaders.
If there is one thing American exceptionalists can’t abide, it is a country that wants to chart its own path free of American domination. The United States is threatening Russia, not the other way around, and the Russian state’s alleged actions are a response to that.
Really, Americans don’t have a leg to stand on here. The 24/7 nonstop anti-Russian hysteria whipped up by the media and Democrats who can’t accept they lost an election is overloading the emotional circuits of millions of Americans and shorting out their critical thinking abilities. It’s rather disconcerting.
We know that America has a very bad track record when it comes to intervention in the democratic processes of other states.
We also know that Russia is a cynical, kleptocratic regime that has its fair share of moral and tangible crimes.
Your response does not acknowledge the last (and most important, imo) point in Sideloader's reply.
That is: The Russophobia can plausibly be seen as a cynical ploy to divert attention from the lack of proposals to solve a whole slew of domestic issues.
> Russia with Putin as its leader stands in the way of American domination of Eurasia. Hence, the military encirclement of Russia and the belligerent anti-Russian rhetoric from American leaders.
Is the US really dominating Europe and if so, is that not better than being dominated by Russia? Why did the Ukrainian civil war break out, wasn't it the desire of ethnic Ukrainians to break away from Russia? "Greater Russia" is a thing that many ethnic Russians want and Putin would take it if he believed he could get away with it.
Historically, if your nation bets against the US, you end up on the losing side. We're not going to be ever living in a world without major superpowers and the US - imperfect as it may be - is by far the best such "regime" that has ever existed in history. I'm worried about a world where the US retreats from that position, leaving it up to autocrats to divide the spoils among them.
Of course, if you're an international leftist, you're knee-deep in denial and resentment about the abject failure of every regime that ever challenged US hegemony. You crave some sort of justice that history will never deliver to you, defending some of the most oppressive countries in the world while maximizing and exaggerating the oppression at home. Cognitive Dissonance at work!
Having said that, the Democrats really need to move on from whining about the Russians interfering in the elections, it's just not effective.
> One reason for Putin’s popularity is he put a stop to the Yeltsin facilitated post-communist era plundering of Russia’s wealth and resources by scruple less Russians and foreigners alike
What an absurd claim. That is exactly what Putin is doing. He's just better at messaging to hide his kleptocracy.
> Russia with Putin as its leader stands in the way of American domination of Eurasia.
Morality aside...
Russia's 2017 GDP is roughly equal to South Korea, or slightly less than Canada, or about one third of Japan. It wields a disproportional influence because of past history and having a larger military, but barring miraculous economic reform, it's not sustainable in the long term.
Russia isn't what stands before "American domination of Eurasia", whatever that means. If anything, that would be China.
Moreover, regarding "Russian hacking" and given things like the OPM hack and a loss (including executions) of intelligence assets in China, it is strange there is no equal or greater worry about China hacking.
There's plenty of worry over China's hacking, but it takes a back seat to the weight of the allegations against Russia and their influence in US politics.
> Even if Russia is guilty of everything the hysterical and disingenuous Russiagate crowd alleges, it is still a lightweight when it comes to messing around in other countries’ affairs.
Oh really? Let's see: The Warsaw Pact. Crushing the uprisings in Hungary, Czechoslovakia, and Poland. Even after the fall of Communism, there was Georgia and the Ukraine. That's just off the top of my head.
No, Russia is not a lightweight at foreign interference.
> Does it also bother you that the hysteria over Russia’s “guilt” is shamefully hypocritical and misleading?
No. I don't like US imperialism and am ashamed of much of its actions. I also don't like your condescending and leading manner.
> Even if Russia is guilty of everything the hysterical and disingenuous Russiagate crowd alleges
What is alleged is that the President of the United States and the GOP is effectively owned by Putin. We don't have all the evidence in front of us, but what has been laid out is compelling to those that are willing to consider the known facts.
> Need I say more?
No. There's plenty more there but you seem to be bent on distraction rather than dialogue.
> It’s rather disconcerting
Yes, it's very disconcerting to be dealing with the possible coup of the my country and be told "you lost, get over it". It's beyond insulting and I won't waste your time further in making you read something you have no intention of hearing.
Did Putin "post-communist era plundering of Russia’s wealth and resources" or simply rationalize it, in such a fashion that those doing the plundering were under his thumb, and could not challenge the state?
Convoluted piece that uses a lot of words to say very little and ends up being (yet another) defense of “social” media and its billionaire owners.
It matters little if Facebook users, their attention-span or their data trail and the content they churn out are the “product”....Facebook’s business model (data, data and more data) requires the company to maximize the time users spend browsing, reading and clicking through its network.
As we have seen, the company has no problem with using people’s psychology against them to achieve this. And the company’s devious and underhanded tricks (like its data mining “security app”) designed to Hoover up as much information as possible are legendary.
Multiple studies show “social” media use is detrimental to people’s psychological wellbeing and these companies not only own the channels billions use to communicate daily, they own the CONTENT of those communications. With FB and Google/Alphabet cozying up to the DoS, DoD and intelligence services...and deploying algorithms to limit “fake news” (i.e. any and all information that challenges the status quo) these companies have way too much power.
They are a menace to our societies and need to be busted up and regulated.
> the company has no problem with using people’s psychology against them to achieve this
I'm playing devil's advocate, but the same could be said of most companies. It's the basis of marketing. Using people's psychology to sell them products or ads, which most of the time aren't really good (or even harmful, like sodas, tobacco, junk food) for them.
The same research findings exist for television. Shall the studios be busted and up and regulated into the ground, or are you just an apologist for Big Media and its billionaire owners? (What an awful rhetorical tactic...)
.... what? This is patently false. The instagram feed is no longer sorted chronologically, and hasn't been for some time. The ads they show you also definitely depend on "smart algorithms". The follow suggestions they give you, the content that populates the explore feed... all definitely derived by "smart algorithms".
Compared to FB the algorithms are not even close to being smart and thats the point. Even when it was sorted chronologically Instagram was known for being a kind of depression factory and if you look at all the studies done about social media and it's effect it's not which item the algorithms show but the fact that everyone is posting "perfect lives" and have been known for some time now.
I am shocked, truly shocked at this development. An app that collects user data and passes it on to third parties without users’ consent? Unprecedented!
I’ve only read the abstract (will read the full paper when I get home) and I think the authors are on to something. Our society with its emphasis on cold, mathematical calculation and material gain as the only valid measure of success, which proponents erroneously term "objective", while shunning the emotional "subjective" needs of people and leaving very little room for error, is becoming increasingly dehumanized.
The humanities = waste of time, STEM + markets = useful and objective [sic] ideology is bleeding the life force out of society. But people are not cold, hyper-rational machines. The academic Wendy Brown defined this system (which she calls neoliberalism) as follows:
What distinguishes neoliberalism is not simply a commitment to capitalism or to markets, but an effort to transform all spheres of human life in ways that render them amendable to economic calculation.
I think she is spot on. I am looking forward to reading this paper which seems to complement Brown's point. Thanks for posting it!
waterfox has been doing since firefox stopped doing it, actually waterfox is doing right everything firefox does wrong:
Disabled Encrypted Media Extensions (EME)
Disabled Web Runtime (deprecated as of 2015)
Removed Pocket
Removed Telemetry
Removed data collection
Removed startup profiling
Allow running of all 64-Bit NPAPI plugins
Allow running of unsigned extensions
Removal of Sponsored Tiles on New Tab Page
Addition of Duplicate Tab option
Locale selector in about:preferences > General
Firefox has been my daily driver for 2-3 years now. I’d switched to Chrome several years before that but when FF fixed its lag issues I went back right away.
Mozilla overplay the “not for profit” card but with Google you can be sure they are collecting and archiving absolutely everything that passes through their servers.
Firefox is fast but I'm using several profiles (one for programming websites, one for sysadmin accounts, one for personal, one for politics) and running ~3 instances is sluggish. Chrome has built-in profile management so it's just as fast with 1 or 3 instances. I don't believe it's such an unusual usecase, even my parents ask me all the time how to protect their privacy. A good idea that Ted Cruz might have missed.
This is the major roadblock for me to leave Chrome. The Firefox containers are close, but don't quite hit the mark in the same way as Chrome's profiles.
Yeah I'd really like built in profile support. Tab containers aren't the same thing for me. Neither is the round about way of using profiles currently in Firefox.
Now that I've used tab containers quite a bit they do require much more cognitive work than profiles. Having to always be aware of which tab container you are on rather than which browser window profile.
Assuming that one switches to Google as the default search engine (I'd love to know how many do - additionally I beleive Google is the default outside the US anyway), there's effectively no difference. Neither browser does anything special wrt privacy, the same resources and scripts are loaded in both. Safari are the only browser brave enough to try anythng more exciting in this area. (OK, Brave are also in this area, but they're not of much significance right now.)
Sure, Firefox's private browsing does offer tracking protection. But most "normal" users don't seem to use that. And some would argue there's little value in blocking tracking in a session that will be wiped anyway.
One can assume Google is tracking a ton of data beyond just what Google searches users do.
Firefox users who pick Google as the search engine are still giving a lot of info to Google, but less info than Google would have had if the user was using Chrome.
Google Analytcs and ads are so widely that most of your browsing will be tracked regardless of browser, even regardless of your search engine (but the search engine is also quite major since they can track what you were trying to search for before jumping into the web).
A company known for tracking the ever-loving shit out of everyone across the Internet distributes a best-in-class web browser absolutely for free. If that's not enough, I really hope you're able to hold on to that innocence as you start using the Internet more and more in the future.
Chromium has been found to phone home on a regular basis. The data (or metadata) that is sent back is most likely beneficial for Google.
I have Google Analytics on my startup's SPA when it can't even be crawled by Google due to the framework we use. The only logical explanation is that Chrome sends data back on the sites you visit.
Just because there are legitimate reasons for sending all that data doesn't mean it's not also usable to track you or whatever. In fact, having all that data in the first place lowers the barrier to start using it for other things. We've seen that happen countless times.
What it comes down to is that Chrome sends a whole bunch of information about me to a company who's main product is serving ads. I don't know exactly what data they send or how they use it, and that in and of itself is a major problem.
In the end, sure, Firefox does the same things. But Mozilla's core business isn't selling my personal information to the highest bidder, so I trust them more than I do Google.
How many times with Google though? Of course, there are different kinds of data that may be sent too. Safe Browsing is very different from telemetry for example.
You've described perfectly valid use cases for a browser to request additional information. But I think we can both agree that collecting data for the purpose of improving a specific product that Google owns (outside of Chrome itself) is wrong.
How is that relevant? Astroturfers etc have been buying old well-historied accounts for ages now, so it's not a very reliable method of distinguishing shills anymore. It's only useful for sockpuppets and amateur shills.
This kind of personal attacking is totally uncalled for here. Either their statement is correct or it is not, either Chrome is doing tracking on the sly or it is not.
Either there is proof, or there is not. The burden of proof is on the one making the argument.
I'm just curious why HN highlights new users. Why do you think they do? HN already tries to take action against "aggressive" accounts or astroturfing with ghosting them, so it seems possible because of that, that they highlight new accounts for similar possible reasons.
Privacy is a tricky thing and a bit of a spectrum.
I will happily give up some information in exchange for a service that I like. I'll happily give Google my search history, including typos in the search bar, in exchange for them tailoring my responses.
Why? The difference in results is huge. I don't need to specific that I'm looking for Linux answers, math functions, or scientific results. Google knows this, it has learned it from the many years of data that I have given them. Searching anonymously makes my search much less productive and less efficient.
At the same time, I don't want Google watching me poop. I'm okay with then knowing some things, but not others. I've been pretty open with Google, knowingly so, just to get these tailored responses and, to me, they are worth it.
There's still lots of things I don't tell Google. There are still lots of companies that don't give me anything I value, so I don't willingly give them information. It's a sliding scale and needs recipricocity from the business entity, I expect a return from my giving up information.
It's also a very individual choice and best decided at the individual level. I give Google info, but I'd never say someone else should have to. I think it possible to optimize for just that.
> that I'm looking for Linux answers, math functions, or scientific results. Google knows this, it has learned it
FYI, I've been using an anonymized front-end (startpage.com) to Google for the last year and I'm not noticing any degradation in the quality of the search results. Startpage doesn't even set a cookie, so I doubt it is tracking me and learning what interests me.
I have tested, numerous times and over a period of years, and I get very different results when I'm logged in and when I'm not logged in. I have the option enabled to track me and personalize my results. I have checked the differences with use of alternative browsers and devices, while using a VPN and not, and even just using alternative profiles.
I also have a media box (well, a series of them over the years) that uses an entirely separate profile. That profile does a lot of YouTube and music. It had learned that I prefer documentaries - though not much more than that. It has also seemed to learn that I prefer isolated guitar tracks and classical guitar. It will now preferentially offer me the isolated guitar track in the top few links, even without including it in my search query. It used to offer different versions, covers, and live versions of the track. I can't get it to offer the isolated track as the primary result, at least not at this time.
I've been monitoring this for quite a while and have watched the improvements. I've even set up the second account, the one mentioned for media, just because I'd observed the effect.
To see the effect, you need to be logged in AND tell them to personalize your results. I'm not sure if that is enabled by default.
I admit this is just anecdotal, but I've made it a point to monitor this since about 2010, which is when I first noticed the option in the settings. I've checked it against being logged out, with different IP addresses, with alternative browsers, and on computers that do not belong to me. The results are remarkably different, though they are pretty generic after the first 20 listed results.
So, in this case, I've given information (privacy) in exchange for results that are more suitable for my personal needs.
I do wish I could select profiles. I'd like to be able to search with my 'generic' profile, my 'tech' profile, my 'music' profile, and my 'entertainment' profile. I think it'd give me more precision and would help me weed out my more generic searches.
Unless you have it blocked, Google also uses a tracking URL on their results. It will say, even if you mouse over it, example.com. But, when you click on it, it actually uses a URL like google.com/tracking/some numbers/example.com. So, they know what links you clicked. I suspect they also log which one you clicked last, so they have an indicator as to which result you found the most helpful.
I should note that links open in a new tab automatically, so they can also track browser session and see when I've completed my searching and can infer more from that information.
I used to also have a developer profile but I haven't really done any development for a few years. That was pretty refined and seemed to learn the languages that I was most interested in.
In each case, the profiles were made by using different email addresses. I have a different email address for the different accounts. I try to avoid cross-pollination between them but I haven't been as good with that as I'd like to have been. I can only speculate that the results would be even more precise if I had done so. As I mentioned above, I did use a third email account but I've not logged into that one in quite a while. It seemed to pick up that I was into PHP, JavaScript, HTML, and was using Wordpress or SMF. I don't know how effective it would be with other languages.
Your mileage might vary, but that sums up my observations and experiences. In my case, I made a clear choice to give up some privacy in exchange for something I value - namely more efficient search results that are more effective and personal.
Again, all an anecdote but I have made it a point to test the results against non-personalized results and the difference is very noticeable and very good. I am much, much happier with the personalized results.
I slam on Google, a lot. I complain about Google - to the point where people may think I hate them and am obsessed with telling people. However, I do try to always make it clear that I'm okay with them asking for my information and that they do have some products and services that I think are done exceptionally well.
The United States and the United Kingdom are actively participating in the Saudi war against Yemen. They supplied the military hardware (for a tidy profit) and also provide advisors and intelligence personell to "help" the KSA's effort to force its will on Yemen. Africa offers business opportunities for Western companies and some areas play a starring role in strategic destruction aimed at furthering foreign policy goals, e.g. Libya.
In other words the West doesn't care about humanitarian suffering. It only becomes a problem if it threatens "our" interests or if a crisis gets heavy media attention, in which case governments may take a few token actions to show the world that they are "doing something."
In the case of Syria the Western "coalition", by arming and training the jihadists fighting the Syrian government of Bashar al-Assad , is actually prolonging the war and people's suffering. Keep in mind that we are arming al-Qaeda in Syria - the same guys who the "war on terror" was supposed to wipe out. This is a fact that can easily be verified using credible sources.
The stuff about human rights and democracy is a PR project that packages up death and destruction and sells it to the citizenry as "humanitarian" or part of a "responsibility to protect". Only a population that has never known war can easily buy into such a blatantly Orwellian "war is peace" fairytale.
The idea of an altruistic empire that spends blood and treasure not to acquire resources or territory but because its heart bleeds for "babies....innocent little babies" is the stuff of comedy. As propaganda, however, it has been very successful. But that is changing as people communicate with others thousands of miles away in the center of the action and
peruse sources offering information that does not align with the narratives presented by the Western media.
The American and European media's reporting on Syria is especially appalling. This has been noted by several journalists including respected war correspondent Patrick Cockburn. When the jihadists were defeated in Aleppo late 2016 (and bused to Idlib province with their families and even allowed to take their weapons with them) the media painted a picture of wanton slaughter and summary executions at the hand of the Syrian Arab Army and its allies that simply did not happen. The media relied exclusively on jihadi sympathizer citizen "reporters" and took their words at face value. Not once did a major Western news outlet consider that the people of Aleppo were very happy that the fighting and dying had stopped. And the vast majority stayed in Aleppo and did not the government buses to Idlib. This of course was not reported either as it does not fit the narrative of Assad as a sadistic fiend who takes delight in butchering Syrians. The plight of Christians, Shia Muslims, Druze, Alawites and moderate Sunnis in "rebel" held territory was conveniently skipped over as well.
Yeah that's how much the establishment cares. It is difficult to get ordinary people to see how one-sided and manipulative the conventional narrative is because they are used to lies, distortions and half-truths being passed off as "objective" reality in these regions. They hear that the U.S. and EU are arming and training al-Qaeda and it sounds like 911 truther nonsense to them. That there is a paper and money trail that verifies this is beside the point. A good salesman uses emotion to convince customers to buy, not an earnestly delivered list of facts and specs. Much of the art of persuasion consists of distracting the rational mind and playing with target's emotions.
But he major media outfits are simply not that important to people who came of age after the internet became ubiquitous and those who adapted to the new technology. This does not mean they are all well-informed but it does mean that many are and there is a good chance many more will begin questioning the veracity of conventional narratives.
Yeah yeah the NSA data mines everyone and their dog. Welcome to 2013. Now why doesn't the NYT investigate what other illegal skullduggery the NSA and its 16 sister agencies are involved in? Wasn't there a massive leak of intel agency info to Wikileaks a few months ago? Oh yeah I forgot...the NYT, along with the rest of the mainstream media, act as neoliberalism's propaganda department and are about as interested in truth and honesty as, say, Donald Trump.
But a civil liberties group informing citizens of their rights in an attention catching way is deplored as intrusive and inappropriate and not “objective” enough.
This attitude speaks volumes about a society that has lost its way and is slowly collapsing under the irreconcilable contradictions it refuses to honestly address.