Different parts of the government. Both existed then and now. There has for a long time been a substantial portion of the government, especially defense and intelligence, that rely on encrypted comms and storage.

Apple is historically better in terms of privacy than Microsoft. From resistance to government data requests to just their posture on data collection, it is an improvement. They rely less than Microsoft on advertisement and service based revenue and more on hardware sales which do not require the same level of invasive collection.

I don’t mean to sing their praises too loudly, but between the two I think Apple is a clear favorite. And couple that with a better, BSD-based, OS and I think you’ve got a winner. Unless of course you include alternate, clearly superior alternatives, like GNU/Linux.

But hardware alone? MacBooks can’t be beat.

The comment that was here was a bit rude, and I don’t like that. Well others didn’t either, but that just reminds me that being kind is possible while disagreeing. So I abridge to this.

I’m surprised by this take and personally feel the algorithmic density of the kernel and scope of work with hardware abstractions make it much more complex than a browser with access to system calls. But maybe that is just a crazy old man that isn’t thinking straight.

Bigger scope than a kernel? That’s a bold statement.

I guess google would pay for search on chrome too, which is extra funny.

I suspected dev tools, candidly, but this clears that right up. Just… wow!

Curves being what they are, these numbers don’t mean much. Yes twitter has more users but if bsky crosses some threshold, their user count can begin to catch up quickly.

Nothing to argue with there. I agree. Many companies will go out of business. Fortunately we’ll still have the llama3’s and mistral’s laying around that I can run locally. On the other hand cost justification is a difficult equation with many variables, so maybe it is or will be in some cases worth the cost. I’m just saying there is some merit.

I’m so baffled by this take. “Create a terraform module that implements two S3 buckets with cross-region bidirectional replication. Include standard module files like linting rules and enable precommit.” Could I write that? Yes. But does this provide an outstanding stub to start from? Also yes.

And beyond programming, it is otherwise having positive impact on science and medicine too. I mean, anybody who doesn’t see any merit has their head in the sand. That of course must be balanced with not falling for the hype, but the merits are very real.

Because in some eyes, infinite rapid growth is the only measure of success.

It could affect those things. But like I agreed with before, it should be handled carefully and this is a big reason. I distinguish simply between Facebook for example and ma’s blog. One tries to make money by gathering data and targeting advertising to people intentionally addicted to a platform. The other is, you know… a blog.

If the law outlawed the online exchange of ideas, I too would be among its biggest opponents but that is probably a strawman.

As far as me parenting? Sure. With the benefit of hindsight, I’m not sure I was fit either, but I did my best.

I agree that it is unprecedented and should be handled thoughtfully. Nevertheless a corporate website is not a social construct. There is no talk of banning socialization. Maybe you thought they meant social networks in the traditional sense (social group connections) but they are referring to websites. So cigarettes is a perfectly suitable analogy, which is why I can understand your dismissal.

So let me just clarify. Norwegian parents are bad, even though kids here are doing pretty well when compared globally. Regulating how young people interact with the world never works and is bad. So, underage drinking should be allowed, smoking, driving at 8, no age of consent? And parents can just talk to their kids to fix all the problems that happen, including psychological manipulation for financial gain? And anybody that has issues or is taken advantage of just has bad parents? Those who think society has a role to play are just virtue signaling?

Interesting. Not going to debate much further with you, but I’m always a bit envious when I run into other parents who claim they have 100% control over their kids. I don’t. My child is grown now, but I absolutely did not. They were their own person, that no matter how much I talked to them had their own life and struggles.

And prohibition does work in some cases. See, cigarettes. Smoking has been in the fall for a long time especially among the young.

But I’m glad your kid will never have any problems ever and if they do that you admit it could have been solved by you talking to them.

We don’t have to accept corporations selling ads that target young people and using algorithms to take advantage of them.

And Norwegian parents are doing what many are doing; caring for their kids to the best of their abilities. That oil money has provided good social services and these teens do have access to healthcare, including mental, but that doesn’t mean they aren’t teenagers still. They necessarily require some independence. That’s growing up, so you can’t just parent around every problem. Hence restricting some things, like cigarettes and alcohol for example.

I don’t see this much differently. It is a hazardous drug that warrants some consideration. Enforcement is fraught but that doesn’t mean we should just sit on our hands and accept it as is.

That wasn’t clear to me, but it is a pretty funny point.

Unless it doesn’t make money.

Light switch rave!

Well, there are many of us that do care about software freedom. If you don’t, I hope your software is as good as your understanding of open source.

Not anything sufficiently modern. Salted passwords should be exceedingly difficult to reverse.

Do you really use it or are you just adding an alternative to the conversation? It is an interesting concept (commutation) but not likely to supplant git.