Post AxS72ANDTqOHPm0fPk by brettm@swarm.coiloptic.org
(DIR) More posts by brettm@swarm.coiloptic.org
(DIR) Post #AxS721yogg7TNmX4Gu by ity@estradiol.city
2025-08-23T05:13:41Z
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I find it finny how the little things that I keep doing that others give me shit for actually end up saving my ass in dealing with enshittification that I then hear them complain about and I just tell them well, glad I don't have to deal with that because I predicted this kinda thing happening way in advance!
(DIR) Post #AxS723egSVCgZv81AW by ity@estradiol.city
2025-08-23T05:15:49Z
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"Go and apologize to your local schizo" is certainly one of my favorite phrases since someone shared it with me lol.I do end up being right about tech more often than I am wrong.
(DIR) Post #AxS724oe8wlcB6nUKu by ity@estradiol.city
2025-08-23T05:18:26Z
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If anyone is interested I can write down some of the stuff I do to minimize the amount of bullshit I have to deal with in advance.
(DIR) Post #AxS725arFhKcadLzU0 by jilotta@mastodon.ml
2025-08-23T05:18:50Z
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@ity I'm very interested :3
(DIR) Post #AxS726S23zrlFYESMi by ity@estradiol.city
2025-08-23T05:20:37Z
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@jilotta avoiding proprietary softwareAvoiding software with red flagsAvoiding using commodities controlled by corporations where possible (phone numbers, debit cards...)
(DIR) Post #AxS727HmxZGZq4Rn2O by jilotta@mastodon.ml
2025-08-23T05:22:07Z
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@ity red flags like what? :33
(DIR) Post #AxS728BRcdmmcgUEmu by ity@estradiol.city
2025-08-23T05:22:38Z
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@jilotta this one is harder to concisely explainIt's patterns you learn to look out for
(DIR) Post #AxS729CXq2GBmO0d8q by ity@estradiol.city
2025-08-23T05:32:49Z
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@jilotta to name a few more examplesI refuse to use mobile apps for things that don't need to be apps. I refuse to use a banking app. I always carry cash around. I prefer payments in Monero over fiat transfers. I refuse to use stock Android distros. I refuse to yield to "convenience" that would lock me in a company's grasp.I don't actually care about "software freedom" or w/e. I am a code cursewitch. I can make the code do what I want whether they want me to or not. It's just that proprietary software just breaks more. It's almost never tested. It is almost always a nightmare to debug. The devs are usually impossible to contact.And oftentimes, the extra effort of having to use a payment processor simply just makes me use something else that's less effort.
(DIR) Post #AxS72ANDTqOHPm0fPk by brettm@swarm.coiloptic.org
2025-08-23T06:06:49Z
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@ity@estradiol.city @jilotta@mastodon.ml I'm thinking i will soon need to get a burner phone for the android stuff im forced to use, eg whatsapp and tax office signin app, then have a linux phone for all the useful stuff actually wanted.In Australia, almost everyone pays with credit or debit card. I try to use cash, and notice:- shop owners are so grateful to be paid in cash- shop employees are terrible at working out how much change to give, often count it wrong even when the register or tablet tells them the amount. Due to never getting any practice.
(DIR) Post #AxS72FEtODheVP9adM by ity@estradiol.city
2025-08-23T05:21:35Z
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@jilotta eg. I predicted SimpleX Chat being an insecure Nazi psyop before they even made it obvious cuz of their reaction to a vuln me and a few others discovered independently
(DIR) Post #AxS72ImgD3VpV3z7DM by ity@estradiol.city
2025-08-23T05:42:54Z
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@jilotta this conscious awareness of exactly what I rely on and making explicit choices while knowing the tradeoffs is what makes sure that I don't end up locked in or exploited by some company. When Google and YouTube started enshittifying, I just got rid if my Google account and started watching YouTube less. I simply do not rely on any of their products.Now, the enshittification of the Google search engine is a problem, and while it does not impact me too badly, since most of the software things I do I just figure out myself without looking them up since oftentimes it's easier and faster and less error-prone, and for other fields I usually have fedi & friends, but there are problems it is causing me. Just, to a lesser degree.What is concerning is that I did start using ChatGPT mostly as a search engine now, which annoys me. There are certain things that are much easier to delve into if I get a surface overview of things that are hard to find. This is an actual problem, and I know it will bite me in the ass if I don't figure out a proper solution soon. ChatGPT is a temporary solution and I expect it to stop being viable for this in the coming months or years. I have been working on an alternative search engine, but been lacking the spoons.I don't use Google Maps, I use OpenStreetMap. My phone doesn't have any of the proprietary Google services or apps. The only proprietary stuff it has are the qcom etc driver blobs, and Discord.Discord is another funsie. I am in the process of working on and migrating to probably XMPP or something else (maybe DeltaChat) if Discord rolls out something even worse than it already has. And Discord is not even the primary way to contact me, hasn't been the past 4 or so years. I even just entirely dipped for 2 years at one point. And I can pretty easily dip now, too. Most beings I care about I have other means of contact to.So, it's about evaluating the benefit of staying as well as the cost of quitting a given service, and making sure that the cost remains as low as possible.
(DIR) Post #AxS8deeVxz93zZXZi4 by jilotta@mastodon.ml
2025-08-23T06:14:26Z
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@brettm here in Russia shop owners hate cashfor some reason, the self-checkout system doesn't accept cash, so they need to have a cashier that does nothing most of the time (because everyone uses self-checkout)some smaller shops just don't accept cash entirely
(DIR) Post #AxS8dfo7fkQPZf2lKC by brettm@swarm.coiloptic.org
2025-08-23T06:24:59Z
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@jilotta@mastodon.ml I think the shop owners like it cause- the bank does not get a %- they can pocket the money and not pay tax- avoid big brother
(DIR) Post #AxSECh6VLMHpV99zI8 by jilotta@mastodon.ml
2025-08-23T06:32:01Z
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@brettm in Russia, the bank doesn't get a percent anyway (afaik),the government is way more invasive so not paying tax is more difficult,and most don't care about the big brother that much (so what if they spy on me? I've got nothing to hide! do *you* have something to hide from the government???? what are you, a fascist?)so none of the points apply, and credit/debit cards win because of conveniencesberbank (the biggest bank in Russia) also has this thing where you can "pay with your face". the bank literally collects your biometric data and connects it to your bank account. not like they have all of your personal data and all sorts of ID anyway. not like its a huge security hole
(DIR) Post #AxSECiSWIzUVhiT5FI by brettm@swarm.coiloptic.org
2025-08-23T07:27:19Z
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@jilotta@mastodon.ml :-o just like China! I think in Australia it will soon be illegal for banks to charge the buying customer a fee. So probably thebanks will charge the business instead. Hopefully that will mean more cash discounts 🙂