Anything by Meta (Facebook, Instagram, WhatsApp). Facebook literally got people killed by volunteering their location data to a tyrannical government in a third world country. Don’t think they won’t do that to Americans.

Android (the mobile OS) kind of is. The only reason Google bought the hobby project to put Linux on smartphones was because they could collect more data with it than they could with Gmail. You can get a Pixel device and install GrapheneOS on it, but not even 1% of Android users are turning off telemetry (which only anonymises it), let alone installing custom firmware that doesn’t have it. I’m not saying iOS isn’t — because it’s not open source, we don’t know — but I am saying Android definitely is. And I don’t just mean Pixels — to use the Android brand, Google requires certain things of OEMs like Samsung, from having Gmail and/or Chrome on the main home screen, to having Google Play Services, which does the data collecting, installed. (I’m pretty sure the Play Store actually requires it. Forks that don’t use the Android branding, like Amazon’s Fire OS, don’t have this restriction, but Amazon probably has plenty of other crap in theirs.)

Now, I never said Android was a honeypot, and it may not be. But Google was just sued for antitrust, and they made a deal to keep Chrome and Android under their banner. We don’t know what the terms of that deal are. I would consider both of them to be compromised by bad actors (potentially they always were since Google was selling the data). Don’t think so much about who you call (though that can be valuable) but like, your Maps data, anything you put in Health (like if you’re female, like if you miss two or more periods but not eight or nine and then start back up again, I’m sure the GOP would love to know that — for the dense fellas, it could mean she got pregnant and then terminated it, or the pregnancy failed somehow). Tim Cook’s advice of “get your mom an iPhone” doesn’t sound so far fetched now. Your sister, too. Heck, specifically regarding Health, Samsung put out an update last year, maybe the year before — that is, before the current administration — saying if you keep using Health, they can sell your information to whoever they want. Either agree and keep using it, or disagree and they delete your data. At this point, no stock Android phone can be trusted to keep your information private. It’s different if you use GrapheneOS, but that requires buying a Pixel, putting money in Google’s pocket. The Pixel 10 is what, about as powerful as an iPhone 11? A 12 maybe? And it costs the same as an iPhone 16. You decide. Personally I don’t think it looks like a very good deal.

Replies are more valuable, but I’m finding the replies to be not much higher quality than Reddit, which is a bit disappointing.

That said, for every 10 replies, you may get a good one, and that one is worth sorting through the rest.

There’s a community here on Lemmy that I used to follow, something like “share anime art.” It’s all AI generated. Or at least, the user who is keeping it going is just posting that. They are not being disingenuous; while they don’t tag it as AI (that I have seen), they DO include the prompt, which is pretty transparent in my book. Nothing against that user at all.

In fact, the art looks pretty official. That said… it maybe looks too perfect? Official art usually has copyright tags in the lower right corner. The prompt specifically avoids any kind of copyright or artist tags. Fan art typically does have tags of some kind.

If someone were trying to fool me, they probably could. AI art has gotten to that point. But at this point, my old ass just doesn’t trust anything without verifying. I was among the first on the Web and we didn’t trust it then. There was a time when we grew to trust the Web. Now we can’t trust it again and that’s fine with me. I’ve always tried to be genuine, but I also wouldn’t recommend anyone blindly trust me, either. Just take everything with a grain of salt and it’s fine.

That’s 2 different questions.

I believe VLC can open m3u links (playlists). Not sure about m3u8.

As far as downloading videos from an app, good luck with that. Or if you mean using an app (say, to download from a website), you could probably do it with Firefox?

If you have access to a computer, jdownloader2 is super easy to download from most websites.

I got Macs and an iPhone and I can download stuff so I know you can with Android. (I can also send videos easily between Android and iPhone.)

Thoughtcrime issues? You have thoughts about harming someone, you get punished for it even if you don’t take action?

I suppose the upshot is it could be used to detect and diagnose mental illnesses?

Furthermore, going into the future, it could ostensibly be used to control parts of the body that are damaged or otherwise not working, or emulate their function. For example, someone with damaged vocal cords could use it to speak through connected speakers. Someone who is paralysed could use it to walk with a mechanical exoskeleton.

The problem with something like that is, it would have to be privacy focused. Samsung, one of the most popular smartphone makers, updated their Health app a year or two ago to where you had to agree to allow them to sell or give away your medical information if you want to continue to use Samsung Health. And that’s a Korean company. Apple Health is still private, but Apple is an American company, so the question is begged, “but for how long?”.

So, the question is, are the powers that be/fascists in charge going to use it to weed out LGBTQ+ and put them in concentration camps, or what?

Nice — I absolutely use SponsorBlock on desktop (/laptop). Did not know it was on mobile.

It’s the other way around, it’s down to GrapheneOS to support other hardware. They simply choose to focus on Pixels.

You’re onto something with the AirTags but you haven’t got it quite right. Every Apple device participates in the Find My network, which means any Apple device marked as lost will have its location reported, anonymously, by every other Apple device it can communicate with. This is a good thing, unless you’re being stalked via an AirTag placed on your person, but Apple has taken pains to mitigate this issue. One shoe company recently released shoes with AirTag compartments so parents could track their kids, and the placement should mitigate the beeping they can emit. Honestly the AirTags and Find My network do more good than harm, the impact to devices participating in the Find My network is minimal, and if it’s your device that’s lost, you don’t want people opting out so thieves can get away with stealing your stuff.

Yes, ironically I just read another article about how Facebook/Meta has gotten around the ATT (App Tracking thing, I forget what the other T stands for) with in-app browsers. The article’s point was that all the beef between Apple and Meta is just for show and that they need each other like Apple and Google, Apple and Samsung, et al. So yeah, with you on that.

Not on Android. People love to stan for Android because “it’s open source,” but Android would have gone nowhere if Google didn’t buy it, and Google wouldn’t have bought it if they weren’t convinced it would let them scrape more personal data than Gmail. (And Andy Rubin made Android because he heard Steve Jobs say the iPhone would run OS X, and he thought he could probably whip up a Linux distro to run on a phone.)

You could get an iPhone and not run any apps by Google, Meta, Microsoft, X, or any of the other privacy-opposed companies. You’d also better change the default search off of Google. DuckDuckGo is an option. Ecosia might be. Not sure. The issue is, while Apple says they’re all about privacy, that’s based on them being a computer/hardware company first (and Google being a data company first). However, Apple is heavily leaning into services now — Apple Music, Apple TV+, Apple News+, and more — and there are rumors they want their own search engine. So while Apple may be privacy strong now, you don’t know what they’ll be a year from now, or three, or five.

It’s like Tim Cook (Apple CEO) said about Facebook when they introduced the tracking limiter. “You can still give Facebook permission to track you all over the web, they just gotta get your permission first.” That’s true of privacy. You can still use Google, Meta, Microsoft, X, TikTok, and other privacy-violating companies’ products, but what you share is entirely up to you. You can use some of those services in Safari and block some tracking, or you can install the apps and allow it all. It’s up to you.

Or, you can buy a Pixel and reward Google’s business model, and put GrapheneOS on it. That is probably better, privacy-wise, than using an iPhone. But you’re still rewarding Google’s business model. And if they’re making so much money off your data that opting out isn’t even an option, why does the Pixel cost the same the iPhone does (and more, considering the Pixel Fold)? You are getting more RAM, but RAM is cheap. You’re not getting a better processor — Apple has won that race for years. Camera tech is about 50/50. Screen is up in the air — I think Apple’s is better, but Google et al use higher resolutions. Apple buys from the same companies but screens are made to spec which is why Apple’s are better than those by companies they buy from. Their spec is more demanding. “Good enough” is what passes in Android — it’s like how iPhones use NVMe and Androids use UFS. NVMe is more expensive, and it’s faster on paper, but in the real world? UFS is good enough. You wouldn’t see a difference, or a significant one, in real world usage. So what are you paying for in a Pixel? The lower specs plus the privacy/data factor should make the Pixel significantly cheaper… except Google is a publicly traded company, so they can’t sell it that low.

Apple may not be the best option, but they’re advertising that they are (with regards to privacy). And I think they’re trying. I’m not saying they’re saints. They are doing better than Google though. And you have to decide if that’s worth your money. And dealing with a crappy keyboard. The keyboard sucks.

Yeah, I know about Telegram’s limitations. Been using it for ages, just to chat with my wife since she uses Android and I’m on an iPhone, and I don’t do social media. It was the best way for us to message back and forth and we haven’t moved off of it.

I have Matrix, Signal, and Session as well. Nobody chats me up on them but I keep them as options because why not? My phone has 512GB. Most is music and video. Apps are nothing to me.

YouTube is trash. I was watching a cooking video, and I swear, after 60 seconds of ads, the YouTuber talked for maybe one whole minute before it went to ads again with a 60 second timer.

What resistance? It seems to me that there is not one big organised resistance that is taking members.

Find a local event and network but be careful about it. The US had that “no kings” thing early in the summer (or before?). That was just a bunch of people against tyranny. No real organisation to it. So you’d go to something like that and just talk to people.

It helps if you have an anonymous way to chat. Something like Signal or Matrix or one of the others. Even Telegram would be better than using something public or corporate-backed, like SMS for the former or WhatsApp for the latter. But be careful with Telegram, read up on it, it’s not a solid recommendation but it’s better than nothing. Fortunately there are alternatives. Even if the other person isn’t tech savvy — you probably are by being on Lemmy. So, show them the way.

Occasionally contact them through anonymous chat, just see how they’re doing, and discuss future plans.

Also, aside from demonstrations, places where like minded people meet. For the authoritarians and conservatives, that’s church, the local BBQ spot, and other, more obvious groups. I feel like they feel they can operate more openly since the US president is one of them. Used to be, these guys wore masks and were hidden, joining them wasn’t about finding them, they’d find you, that kind of thing. Nowadays it’s all out in the open. But I think liberals and progressives have meeting places, too. In response to church, for example, you should know that The Satanic Temple is not about devil worship, they’re about resisting Christian imperialism. They’re the ones fighting churches trying to get the Ten Commandments posted in every classroom. I’m religiously neutral, so they do not interest me, but they’re certainly an option. For the anti-theist/“hard atheist,” they’re a good option.

Might be niche, but I was reading the manga for The Promised Neverland and said they should get Erica Mendez for the voice of Emma based on her performance as Konno Yuuki from Sword Art Online II. Lo and behold they cast her!

Also when Fallout 3 or maybe New Vegas was the newest Fallout, I said they should add a settlement system. I said after the main story the existing settlements should face ongoing assault from raiders, ghouls, and other enemies and you should be able to shore up the walls, add turrets, hire more guards, and outfit them with better weapons and armor. A lot of people said that would be too complicated. Then Fallout 4 came out and they did just that.

For what it’s worth — and keeping fully in mind this is a meme and therefore not serious — Starfield (crappy Xbox/PC game from the people who made Skyrim) did this. A particle accelerator experiment (albeit involving an alien artefact) caused reality to split apart. So I’m gonna say, it’s possible!

It seems to me that Intel themselves aren’t doing anything wrong here by letting the government take a stake in their business.

They never promised you privacy, they sell complex tiny calculators that add and compare ones and zeros trillions of times per second.

As a Mac user, I feel that it affirms Apple’s choice 5 years ago to design their own silicon. Apple made the right move.

Owners of current Intel chips should be fine. It’s future Intel chips I’d worry about. AMD is probably still fine. PC builders and enthusiasts still have a lot of good choices.

As for the government, I don’t really see how. 10% doesn’t give them enough clout to ask for a back door. The UK didn’t ask chip makers anyway, they went straight to Apple and asked for the encryption keys. Apparently they’ve dropped the request, but that’s not something that needs to be done at the CPU level. It’s also the government — they’re not gonna do it the best way. They’re not gonna do it the way a mad Linux geek would do it if they were a fascist dictator. Governments are still run by Boomers.

It’s more likely exactly what Donald Trump and Bernie Sanders say it is: the government is investing in Intel so their investment through the CHIPS Act pays off. It’s just good business sense. Set aside the president’s nationalism and look at it strictly as a business decision. It actually makes sense, hence why Sanders is behind it as well.

Here’s what’s wild though. At first with music streaming it was largely just American, Western, popular music. I left Spotify for Apple Music because the latter had Japanese music and I was tired of sideloading it into Spotify. Now Spotify has Japanese music too.

The Japanese music market is super weird. Anime is to Japanese music in the 2010s and 2020s what MTV was to western music in the ‘80s and ‘90s. It’s the international hit maker. So anime is bringing western eyes to all this music, not you go in YouTube and a lot of them have “YouTube edition” videos that are like half the video. Because they don’t fully trust us I guess? Sometimes the video is on Apple Music though.

I know Japanese music is more expensive than ours. I mean like the cost of a CD. So when bands would release a Japanese album, they’d add bonus tracks to help increase the value. Western bands do it too. Look up an album you know on Wikipedia and see if there’s a Japanese version with some bonus tracks.

I’m wondering how Apple Music and later Spotify more or less tamed the Japanese music market but TV and movies are so much harder.

There’s an easy solution to this. I pay for Apple Music because I get access to pretty much all the music I want. I can sideload what they don’t have, which isn’t much. They have better audio quality, and aren’t stiffing artists to pay some right wing nutjob science denier like the other streaming platform of note. I pay because I love music and want to support what I love. Why isn’t there a similar service for TV and movies? That’s the solution. Let us pay for what we love and make it easy. Apple figured it out with music. Valve figured it out with games.

I think they don’t want to solve the problem. I think they want to solve a different problem. I think they’re making this a problem so they can push legislation to protect their profits.

Some people say you can use a de-Googled Chromium browser to enjoy the fruits of Chrome without supporting Google’s ad business. I say just use Firefox.

By the same token, when some people say to buy an Android phone and deal with CFW, I say just get an iPhone.

I mean either way, Google gets your money and you contribute to Google’s market share by buying one. Not using Google Play Services as an individual does not hurt them nearly as much as their efforts to keep you from doing so implies it does.

Of course, switching phones can be costly, but if you’re in the market for a new one, I would say if you’re going to pay roughly the same price, let it be the more private one, albeit the one that is further from open source. I mean it runs iOS, which is a stripped down version of macOS, which is UNIX certified, but you can’t run a few apps that Apple doesn’t approve of. Fortnite is back and emulators are back though, so a lot of bases are covered.

That said… the keyboard sucks. Sometimes if I’m gonna be typing (e.g. using Lemmy), I’ll actually turn on my old Galaxy S10, just to use Gboard (which is on iOS but sucks there). I like my 16PM for a lot of things, but typing isn’t one of them.

So yes. You can stop rewarding Google’s bad behavior by not buying their phones. Draw a hard line between your personal data and their servers. But in doing so, consider getting in bed with a different monster rather than “the devil you know.” It’s not an easy decision. And, as a guy who’s been mainly on iPhone for almost 10 years… I kinda want a Pixel. Maybe not the newest one, but I mean, I’m using a 6-year-old Galaxy phone and it’s fine. I like both platforms. Both have their strengths. But I personally trust Apple more than Google. To each their own though.