“Perfection is only achieved when there is nothing left to take away.”
I have done okay at keeping unnecessary crapware from creeping into my life, but there is the occasional second hand smoke from the masses who will bend over for literally anything.
And also the second hand smoke phenomenon: When you use big tech, you softly compel those around you to also use big tech. The more people that give in and acquiesce, the harder it becomes for the hold outs to continue to resist.
I’ve been living this life for a while. I initially was holding out for a FOSS smartphone but, by the time anything libre came to market, I had been living without a smartphone for so long that it made me realize how pleasant life is without carrying a mobile device around.
will I see any quality of life improvements (or perhaps the opposite)?
This depends on your outlook. If quality of life to you means integrating with society and not being the odd girl out, then expect decline. But the Kaczinski life can be pretty great… sans the bombs, of course.
Idea scratchpad:
These aren’t my own ideas. I’m just borrowing them from some experts in the field.
I’m so glad I grew up when I did and got to experience video games before they began injecting overt political messaging into games.
The New Yorker launched a redesigned home page in late 2023, having reached a similar conclusion.
Oh boy let’s check it out.
newyorker.com attempts to load js and frames from eight third party domains. Among them;
“conde.digital” – I am assuming that means conde as in conde nast AKA reddit DNA… and we all know what happens to anything reddit touches.
“condenast.digital” above confirmed. I can almost feel the bile welling in my throat.
“cookielaw.org” - probably to serve cookie consent notices to the plebs who fail to block cookies and other trash.
“doubleclick.net” - known malware
“googletagmanager.com” - so that google can keep track of all their cattle.
And yet all of their articles are perfectly readable in plain HTML formatting, as expected. Not that I would ever spend any time reading articles from whatever this place is.
Block both javascript and CSS. Most of those nags are implemented via some combination of the two.
Google workspace
Dystopia is real
Only a few more steps until “Google Government”
I stubbed my toe on climate change this morning. Somebody stop this climate violence!
There are four lights
Removed by mod
This would accelerate the fediverse to becoming a monoculture of thought.
People keep paying for them. The industry will keep on selling that way. Keep rewarding bad behavior.
Big halo matches and custom game modes. Flying out to areas normally out of reach on maps in Halo 2 using a beam sword exploit.
Search against duplicates and upload anything that isn’t already on Internet Archive.
The unfortunate thing about older relatives prying to get to know you when you are young, is that hardly any kid has yet had the life experience to become the interesting person their relatives want the to be. Even by college age most, myself included, can hardly offer more than “I’m fine”, “nothing particularly new going on”.
And sure as hell we know that pre-internet relatives don’t want to just hear you say “I’ve just been browsing/playing vidya/binging shows”, which is sadly the norm. So they receive safe canned responses instead.
The fix:
Take risks and go do interesting things. You don’t need anybody’s permission to start a new chapter in your life. I have accomplished things that I only wish I had done years earlier, when those curious old relatives were still alive. Don’t become like me. Don’t wait until it’s too late.
For anything new that enters my life, I want 100% for it to not be anything at all to do with digital technology.
And if it absolutely must be digital technology it non-negotiably must be:
Anything mobile is a total lost cause. I have ZERO interest in “smart” phones. Fuck that noise.