Justifier

Perhaps that’s the case for now

I personally save all posts like this though because you never know when it will be needed

Same with TV cracking stuff I’ve seen even when I don’t own a TV, because there’s a high chance the things I hate about TVs will be coming to monitors next and those I do use, so I assume I’ll need as many starting reference points as possible

From some family member or otherwise who is already in the ecosystem, to the potential of GrapheneOS not surviving Google’s hostility and ending up in the same exact shoes as Apple users

In 2-3 years a post like this could be buried in age and forgotten with the people who used to talk about it jaded by indifference or opposition and significantly fewer

Plenty of things I used to be extremely enthusiastic about that I just don’t bother with any more because of those kinds of interactions

I just go full anti tech, which people find ironic since I’m in the tech industry, and they poke fun at that

No matter what you do, no matter what you think or say, people will try their darnedest to poke holes at it

But what you *don’t * do? That’s pretty hard to poke holes at.

“I don’t have a Facebook account” is a brickwall to the conversion. That way in their mind, it’s not that I don’t trust the company, it’s that I don’t even slightly value the product. I have a damn phone, I have to am required to_ pay for the damn phone. It has group chats. What is the value of Facebook again?

Marketplace? I buy everything brand new and keep it until it’s dead

Doomscrolling? Bad habit, not interested

Family connections? I cut most of them off but maybe 4, who know to call/text

Now even thermostats are getting microphones and listening devices, which will absolutely be used to collect data on people from their homes see ecobees new TOS, and the new HoneyWell/ring camera integrations frankly I’m just done with the bullshit. I’m full blown get any phone home technology the fuck out of my house levels of done

But I don’t say that when people ask why I changed my thermostat from the $400 Ecobee, which was a standout feature in my home when they walked in.

No. I say “their servers kept going down and causing issues when I needed it to work”, because people who somehow manage to live without concerning themselves of targeted pricing or snooping practices do care about slight inconveniences, and for whatever reason “they changed their TOS to get people to agree to let them spy on them without legal reprecussions, and if you don’t agree they’ll lock you out of your account barring you from using half the stuff you paid to use” is less logical to their pre-occupied brains than “I got inconvenienced twice a year from down servers”

HomeAssistant and vlans are kind of the answer to most of the issues/concerns regarding smart devices this post has

I have to say though, I find anyone who leans too far either way to be extremely silly

Well chosen devices from reputable manufacturers can drastically improve quality of life

One big one for me was window blinds on a sun timer. Because after a decade, I was swapping from nights to days permanently having spent that past time swapping from nights to days every Wednesday and had signifcant issues both waking up and staying up on those days, and even now I still do

Having my bedroom windows open in the morning on their own to use natural lighting to wake me up has been extremely helpful for that, and then using HA that could be tied into external camera systems to close the windows automatically if a person or vehicle is detected within specific parameters, or having the ability to open my son’s window if I hear him crying to be picked up from a nap but I can’t immediately respond has been wonderful

Now there’s also your Rings, your creepvacuumbots, any smart TV at all and any other host of problems with iot devices, but there are some gems that make life much better without the dark patterns we increasingly associate with connectes devices these days

Ehhh

River on FreeNet has more potential to be what people actually need if people actually develop for it

Don’t get me wrong I’ve set up shop on all of the alternatives I have found so far but they’re frankly all… Meh. That includes Fluxer

Something about Fluxer’s communications so far gives me hibijibis though I’m unable to put my finger on why exactly. I’m getting Guilded.gg vibes for whatever reason