low-background information

It's funny because techies love to tell people that common sense is the best antivirus, don't click suspicious links, etc. only to download and execute a laundry list of unvetted dependencies with a keystroke.

But.. but... we're all friends here!

That subreddit is disturbing

I'm torn. I don't want backdoors but I do think police with a warrant from a judge should be able to access your phone.

There's a top tier DEFCON talk by the Lavabit email guy. He explains where the line is for access to phones and other encrypted information. I'll try to summarize -

1 - Law enforcement have actual information about the probable contents of your phone (like an incriminating filename will do). They can reasonably expect to get a warrant and access to your stuff.

2 - They don't know what's there at all, and have no probable indication of the contents, and in this case they cannot expect access because they would just be going fishing.

Having said that - backdoors are bad.

I assume if they were fishing the judge wouldn't sign a warrant.

Then you must provide access to your phone or be held in jail indefinitely / until you comply for violating that court order.

I'm reminded of Mr. Fart's Favorite Colors here - is it even possible to provide warranted exception, protected from abuse?

It sucks because they could be pocket-sized bicycles for the mind rather than addicting ad-driven bullshit surveillance slot machines that maximize attention. Humanity had a choice and chose poorly.

I'm still on DDR3 :)

Perl is great and I'm sad that Python "won."

sour grapes

Well, sometimes the grapes actually are sour...

I wish I had more control over what the app stores show me. I should be able to block or hide apps on the storefront. Stop showing me TikTok Temu or Shein.

How come Henry Ford could do this but modern companies cannot?

I've only seen Electric Boat do this (defense contractor) and it's likely because the govt pays for it!

Because it takes a lot more education to work at a modern factory than what it took in 1930.

The rest of the world has kept up. Even if you could hypothetically cram 12 years of education into six months of training, the kind of mental effort required to go through that training would be quite impossible for the average person.

But why do that when it’s so much easier to blame AI or immigration, or whatever the new boogeyman of the day is.

"Can't" and "Won't" are two different things.