Interesting Links for 27-02-2019

[andrewducker]

Beware The Curse of The Sweater!

(tags:clothing belief weird )

Martina Navratilova cries foul over her anti trans words being used to block LGBT rights in Montana

(tags:lgbt OhForFucksSake )

Rich getting richer while poor get poorer, official figures show

(tags:uk inequality )

Explained:What is the deal with the new Labour policy on a second Brexit referendum?

(tags:labour referendum uk europe )

No-deal Brexit panic after ministers realise the UK doesn't have the right pallets for exporting to the EU

(tags:trade eu doom fail uk )

Ah, the good old homophobic Church of England

(tags:ChurchOfEngland homophobia lgbt OhForFucksSake religion uk )

Anyone I know using Vero? The idea of an ad-free social network is good. But only if anyone I know is using it!

(tags:socialnetworking advertising )

Emma Thompson's letter to Skydance: Why I can't work for John Lasseter

(tags:animation abuse pixar movies )

What does the British government think will happen in the event of No Deal?

(tags:UK europe doom )

BBC and ITV team up to launch Netflix rival "BritBox"

(tags:uk tv streaming )

Jeremy Corbyn Wakes From 2-Year Coma

(tags:UK labour politics europe satire funny )

Strange Planet (delightful comics highlighting how odd things are)

(tags:life funny comic ViaDrCross )

Rule Thinkers In, Not Out

(tags:society science research )

Historic walkway reopens joining the Old Town and the New Town once more

(tags:edinburgh )

Arthur's Seat fire: firefighters tackle huge blaze on Salisbury Crags in Edinburgh

(tags:edinburgh fire )

The India/Pakistan situation is deteriorating

(tags:India Pakistan doom )

British shooting range using images of Shamima Begum as target practice.

(tags:OhForFucksSake uk guns islam )

Comments

Anyone I know using Vero? The idea of an ad-free social network is good. But only if anyone I know i

[jack]

I really hope some alternative social network takes off, but I'm also unfortunately cynical about many of them. It feels like any company-owned network is vulnerable, even if in theory they can make a sustainable enterprise funded by payments, it's likely that sooner or later they'll make bad decisions and then everyone will be stuck.

Re: Anyone I know using Vero? The idea of an ad-free social network is good. But only if anyone I kn

[pseudomonas]

Dreamwidth and Mastodon seem to be approximately cromulent for blog-type and short-form social networking. The main problem is that the uptake of both is small (and TBH part of the reason they're non-awful is that they're small enough to be below the radar of most bad actors).

Re: Anyone I know using Vero? The idea of an ad-free social network is good. But only if anyone I kn

[pseudomonas]

I have no idea how Vero would behave if (say) significant numbers of extremists decided that it was worth paying the fees to have a platform they could use to propose distasteful ideas.

And it would also be impossible for state-sponsored or politically motivated groups to take out advertising in the way they had done elsewhere.

Most of the Russian governmental disinformation activity on Twitter and FB has been done through fake accounts, not through paid adverts. And obviously a state-level actor can easily launder subscription payments.

Re: Anyone I know using Vero? The idea of an ad-free social network is good. But only if anyone I kn

[jack]

Oh yes, good point, that too. Or if they've decided how they handle things like fanfic.

Re: Anyone I know using Vero? The idea of an ad-free social network is good. But only if anyone I kn

[pseudomonas]

yeah, "distasteful ideas" isn't an objective concept here.

Re: Anyone I know using Vero? The idea of an ad-free social network is good. But only if anyone I kn

[ninetydegrees]

"Most of the Russian governmental disinformation activity on Twitter and FB has been done through fake accounts, not through paid adverts. And obviously a state-level actor can easily launder subscription payments."

True but Twitter and FB CEOs have also never really cared about privacy, disinformation, hatred or any other kind of unpleasantness. When you don't build tools to deal with these, don't hire staff to help and support your users and don't commit to some kind of guidelines that you actively try to outline and uphold, co-opting a platform isn't very hard. And now that they've been called out on it (and they only act when they have; I haven't seen them try very hard or go out of their way to do something) it's too little too late.


I don't know who is the Vero guy and if he will commit to what he talks about but at least he's taking a stance, which is more than most social platforms, big or small, have done. My first question for him is: where are the servers? :)

Re: Anyone I know using Vero? The idea of an ad-free social network is good. But only if anyone I kn

[jack]

Yeah, Dreamwidth seems to do fine for blogging. And is mostly immune to all the bad social network stuff so far because it doesn't have a convenient "reblog" button and you only really follow people you actively choose to follow.

I meant to try mastodon earlier. It's been around long enough now I really should!

Re: Anyone I know using Vero? The idea of an ad-free social network is good. But only if anyone I kn

[birguslatro]

I'm on MeWe, which is modeled on Facebook but with the bad removed - including adverts. And it certainly seems to be growing fast. It's a bit like Dreamwidth, in that it's free but with extra paid features. $5 a month for extra media storage and so on. There's also a MeWe business site which I assume is where they think the big money will be. It's not open-sourced though, and those who've put X-million funding into it will want their payback one day. Still, so far I'm very impressed with it.

Re: Anyone I know using Vero? The idea of an ad-free social network is good. But only if anyone I kn

[jack]

Yeah. That sounds pretty good. But I'm naturally worried about one source of failure; it's not so much open source specifically as, "if the investors decide it needs to be milked for short-term revenue, damn the privacy, can they?" which has destroyed many previous sites.

Re: Anyone I know using Vero? The idea of an ad-free social network is good. But only if anyone I kn

[birguslatro]

Privacy is their main selling point and reason for existing. The guy who started it did so with his own money - the investors came later. Whether what they've said is legally binding though, I wouldn't know. Here's an interview with him...

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=mQqitqZGpEA

That wouldn't have made me believe in it, but using it has made me think they're on the right track. For instance, sharing was obviously a hack to begin with, (the equivalent of copying and pasting by hand), but they've just introduced site-wide posts, (what they call public posts), and now sharing isn't a hack and it can only be done with public posts. Which is how I would've implemented it.

Not there yet but sort-of promised is circles, (as pined for by the G+ refugees), and Web-wide posts. We will see...

Oh, and this Q&A was interesting...

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Jzf_mcgjo_0

Re: Anyone I know using Vero? The idea of an ad-free social network is good. But only if anyone I kn

[chess]

Vero seems to be only available as an app, not a website, which immediately makes me less happy with it.

British shooting range using images of Shamima Begum as target practice.

[jack]

FUCK FUCK FUCK isn't that illegal? Somehow??

[doug]

As well as the fire on Salisbury Crags, there's a fire on Saddleworth Moor in the Peaks, and one in Ashdown Forest in East Sussex. The country is literally on fire.

As I've said elsewhere, wildfires in Britain are not unknown: we do get them occasionally at the end of a long, hot, dry ... winter?!

They always used to say that to get an English forest to burn, you had to chop it down and season it for a month or two.

Things are not the same as they used to be.