privacy — tallship

Uh, Oh! We've Ratcheted up to a threat now on Adblock and UblockOrigin...

Sat, 21 Oct 2023 08:51:15 +0000

Soft landings usually mean it doesn't hurt very much at first, then perhaps the event becomes more frequent and escalates to something that looks like the attached screenie...

When this happens, you may wish to avail yourself of some of the alternatives below.

Once you get here you're faced with trying options or even becoming disenfranchised. Switching to another browser is a prudent test, some have suggested pasting links into Incognito Mode tabs or logging out, while others have claimed that stock Brave Browser seems to humming along for them; and third party utils from among the list that follows:

Web based:

Android (both are available at F-Droid):

Desktop:

FreeTube ( Linux | UNIX | Windows):

Browser extension (a native, local, cross-platform solution):

AdNauseam This last option is a simple browser extension that is apparently quite popular with folks, levying its own ethical pressure upon those who would force-feed you with data mined ad generation. The README file has some great information on the methodology incorporated.

On #Android, I haven't been presented with any of these foreboding pop ups warning me about blockers. I typically use #Brave or #Vivaldi Browser, they're stock, but I use the YouTube app more than I do any one of my browsers on my phones.

I also run the #DuckDuckGo “App Tracking Protection service”. This is NOT #FOSS, so your choices are either installing from the #Aurora or Google Playstore, yet there's no requirement to use the #DDG browser to enable this protection – it's not for your browsers though (even DDG), it is designed to work with pretty much everything on your Android EXCEPT browsers; i.e., almost all of your installed apps, seamlessly, and since most folks stream YouTube videos through the Google YouTube Android app, I surmise that it targets and obliterates ads in the app (I haven't confirmed the veracity of that, it's merely supposition, but it blocks zillions of attempts by installed apps to phone home).

I'm Looking forward to hearing your thoughts, personal observations, and concerns; other toolsets or applications that meet your needs, and why you may have chosen those particular types of tools.

I hope that helps!

I can be reached on Matrix at:

@tallship:matrix.org

via XMPP at:

tallship@jabber.org

and in the Fediverse at: @tallship@public.mitra.social

#tallship #privacy #Adblock

Two Dixie Cups and a piece of string

Sat, 24 Dec 2022 17:24:08 +0000

Two Dixie Cups and a piece of string

Oh my goodness!

Okay first of all, I use #Matrix and #Jabber – #XMPP w/ #OMEMO, primarily.

I typically don't even regularly give out my email address nowadays, and more and more over the past four years or so, find myself publishing a #Fediverse address for myself too as a contact point.

Most often, if you ask me for my #email address I'll give you my Matrix address.

If someone wants to email me then I figure they can get that from my #PGP fingerprint or #Keyoxide.

If they don't know what a #keyserver is or where any of them are located then I just figure they're to dumb to use email.

Yes. As a technologist, I'm at times, rather arrogant, opinionated, discriminatory, and condescending... But only sometimes. The rest of the time I'm patient, attentive, empathetic, and accommodating.

Basically, if i know you don't know shit I'm a nice guy, yet if you pretend to be an all that jazz hipster know it all, then it's quite likely you'll find that I'm pretty much a full on dikhed. Spelled just like that too.

Beginning in the later eighties I think, and then the nineties they called us #BOFH. That's an acronym for someone who might already have forgotten more than you will ever know. I knew a few old Mainframe engineers with Honeywell and IBM when I was a young programmer – those guys were Gods and could tell you how many wraps of copper to make around a toroid if you had an emergency and needed to make an in the field replacement of your memory – Gods. #SuperFreakyGeeks, having already, back then, forgotten more than you or I will ever know.

They called me #Whizkid, coz I was learning shit that they were never gonna bother with – they're gonna retire soon in Mexico with boats, babes, and beers.

But I digress. I do that.

Back to secure communications...

When it comes to Signal, I know a lot of you really like it. I have little use for it. It bleeds my DID and farms everyone's contact databases – “bing! Ex stalker bitch girlfriend just joined signal. Say hello!” What the fuck?

Well I guess she's still got me in her contacts lolz. Fuckin' bitch.

Ummm... Yeah I'll pass.

I actually only use Signal with people who already have my #DID (phone number) anyway.

Recently, a colleague flew a cray cray route to Thailand, via #LAX to #NYC, then #Qatar. Signal works on jetliner's #WiFi too, and isn't dependant on cellular services.

Good choice, but I'm still wondering why his “safety number” changed after he departed #New_York and before arriving in #Thailand – he neither reinstalled nor switched to a new device. But that's another matter.

Sounds a little cloak & dagger fishy to me.

Anyway, I hadn't actually used #Signal in a while, and left it muted for a few months.

To my surprise... #Stories! Yay! Stories!

Wait, what are Stories? You mean like #YouTube or #InstaSPAM? And I'm assuming like they have in #Whaaaasup (never used it, never will)?

Ummm... I just tucked that little nugget of, I guess, good news away, not really knowing even how to process news of the introduction of such a useless fucking feature.

Until now.

Without further adieu, I defer to @how@ps.s10y.eu , one of our more prominently distinguished members in the Fediverse community, for his novel, clever, and appropriate recommendation:

https://ps.s10y.eu/@how/109308591992363124

#tallship #FOSS #communications #privacy #shenanigans

⛵

Making Better Use of Space

Fri, 16 Dec 2022 10:48:59 +0000

Making Better Use of Space

Moving that old white elephant in the room.

There's been a lot of talk lately, and speculation, about the #Fediverse. Yet for the most part, only with respect to a single brand of server platform.

What I find particularly odd about that, is it's a rather lackluster server platform (especially considering the hefty system requirements) with an extremely limited feature list. Mastodon servers have a hard coded default character count limit per post of only 500 characters – more than Twitter, but not often enough to get a complete thought out with a link to somewhere else, or engage in a conversational thread, and certainly nowhere near what you need to post a news article, holiday recipe, tutorial, HowTo, or movie review.

As if a paltry 500 character limit isn't bad enough for this resource hog, virtually every other Fediverse platform provides for sensible , and configurable message lengths with common defaults of 2000, 5000, or more; most support #Markdown, and other ubiquitous text formats like #LaTex or #HTML, and some even have built in #WYSIWYG editors – like #WordPress, #Hubzilla, and #Drupal, with big players like #Imgur and #Tumblr already looking forward to their official Fediverse launches soon.

When those latter two giants arrive on the scene, the world of social networking will truly be interconnected, having achieved critical mass. It will be a revolution, a juggernaut toppling the deprecated, legacy monolithic silos that have so insidiously subverted and subjugated the masses like chattel. But I digress.

Other Fediverse platforms have offered the ability for people to edit their own posts for a long time, some for years, yet mastodon enabled this capability less than a month ago. It lags behind most other Fediverse platforms in several other ways too – groups, marketplaces, federated chat, and several other often requested functions are all but ignored by that platforms' developer while other Fediverse servers enjoy active and ambitious development cycles with new feature releases.

So considering it is so lacking in basic functionality compared to the other more prominent contemporaries, I've assembled a curated list below where you can evaluate and testdrive others for yourself. I've included links to some of the most darling up and coming projects like #Foundkey and #Quanta, that scale to thousands of users, and if you truly want an even smaller, minimalist Fediverse platform I've included #MicroBlogPub too. There's a couple of web tools including databases so you can search for even more platforms, instances, and compare statistics.

Choosing from the list below, you can join existing instances, self-host your own, or even have a professional #hosting_provider do it for you – simply pick a #turnkey provider where in just a couple of clicks your new fully managed Fediverse server will be online in only a minute or two!

There are literally free and privacy respecting Fediverse platforms to replace everything from #Faceplant, #Twatter, #Reddit, #YouTube, #twitch, #InstaSPAM, #Spotify, #Quora and so very much more!