Coming to terms with no longer having privacy and control over my technology

I miss the days of VHS and DVD shelfs in homes, for example. If you bought the tapes and had them in your home, no corporate entity could alter those tapes without your consent, monitor how many times you watch them, sell your data to whomever they please without your knowledge, roll out new mandatory conditions to a ‘user agreement,’ or remove them from your library if/when they like.

I noticed some dumb change in how Dictionary definitions are shown in the Spotlight (ie, overall search my computer function) in MacOS this week. I’ve turned off all auto-updates, and I didn’t make that change or consent to it. But despite paying the full price all by myself for this machine, I clearly don’t have 100% control over it. It seems very clearly to me that consumers having control and privacy over their Internet-connected devices is a bygone era.

After Blizzard, the video game company, replaced copies of Warcraft 3 that I and others had paid for in full and installed on our computers that we could play without connecting to the Internet with a lower-quality copy that prohibited offline play - I swore I’d never pay for a video game again*, and 3 years later I haven’t backslid on that. I felt so angry, cheated, and robbed by that. (*Edit: my criticism and frustration is really more with larger developers/companies/creators - I appreciate and am happy to support smaller, more independent and libre ones.)

Many people probably won’t be bothered by these things, but I am. I don’t want to pay full price for something that I don’t truly own. I miss the familiarity. I miss the reliability. I miss feeling like it’s mine. Dependable. Trustworthy.

Picking my old guitar up again has never looked so appealing. I think I want to go back to investing more time, money, and energy into things that aren’t connected to the internet

xilona, (edited )

Well said!

“Many people probably won’t be bothered by these things, but I am.”

You are not alone! There are still many knowledgeable people who understand what you mentioned.

Thank you for bringing up this topic!

Enjoy playing the guitar! 🙂

Emmie, (edited )

GOG game releases are nice for that feeling I guess or they were in the past maybe it enshittificated too

Allero, (edited )

If some piece of media is unavailable without DRM/Internet connection - feel free to pirate it.

Often times, this is the only way to restore control over your media. And it’s a sign that we’re only able to tolerate it so far.

Then, your pirated media can be placed wherever you like - and taken offline if you want to.

Also, Linux is your best friend. No, seriously. No one proposes to insert any form of DRM in there, and everyone is free to fork unwanted changes, so it never has to come. You decide what you want.

Rediphile,

Yep. And I’d argue it’s an almost ethical responsibility for those aware of all this to preserve a media archive via piracy. Sort of like those monks that would repeatedly copy old scrolls before they would degrade or whatever.

utopiah, (edited )

Yes it’s a pain … but it’s because your are considering a state compared to an ideal state, e.g feeling trapped with devices you don’t trust versus running in an empty field. It’s simplistic and it’s not now versus then. Instead consider where you were, where you are now, and how it is a succession of decisions. Nobody forced you to buy a smartphone. Nobody forced you to install a chat app made by an ad company. Nobody forced you to have a free email.

Instead, for years, you made terrible decisions and now you are “waking up” to it and it sucks.

How do I know? Well, I did the same.

I even felt terrible about it and it felt impossible to change. I also discovered the concept of learned helplessness. How I was convinced that not only it was bad but I could do nothing about it.

Then I changed. I made a ProtonMail account (which I paid for, still am), moved my data from GMail. In fact I downloaded ALL my data from Google, and moved away from it, e.g from YouTube I installed on my own server PeerTube. I warned family, friends and colleagues I wasn’t using WhatsApp anymore but they could reach me with email, SMS, phone, Signal, Telegram, Matrix, etc. I then deleted Instagram, WhatsApp, Facebook, etc.

I could go on but hopefully you get the idea : it sucked, I realized it sucks, I tried to change, it was hard requiring a lot of effort but, step by step, I removed a lot (not all!) of those terrible behaviors from my life.

TL;DR move away from learned helplessness by DOING things, taking a single step in the right direction makes a world of difference.

utopiah,

PS: something fun I did a while ago, and still repeat whenever I can, is offline holiday. I still take a bunch of devices, e.g phone, RPi, SteamDeck, etc but I do NOT go online. Instead the RPi becomes a hotspot and I can code or enjoy content on any of my devices, but still within the privacy of my own network, without any notification. It’s a very fun and empowering experience

utopiah,

PS2: I also notice you start with content. Well for that at home I have a RPi with minidlna, serving videos to any device on my network.

fiercekitten,

My university forced me to have a free email through microsoft. They also forced me to other privacy-invasive services and store my coursework on insecure servers. Sure, I could refuse to go to college and get a degree, but the reality is that if someone doesn’t participate in higher education, or own a smartphone, or avoids any newer car that spies on you (at least in most of the US), being part of society and life in general is more difficult.

utopiah, (edited )

Indeed which is why I was honest saying “it was hard requiring a lot of effort but, step by step, I removed a lot (not all!) of those terrible behaviors from my life.” (bold added)

Namely I don’t even aim for perfection, just pragmatism. I have to use Windows at work (sometimes) and I hate it. Still, I do my very best to compartmentalize, namely I do not install such work related tools on my personal or even professional computers or phones.

In your specific case I would argue that have the free email from Microsoft but not using it for anything else and deleting it as soon as it’s not absolutely needed is an acceptable compromise. I would also do my best to understand what “leaks” via this email or how you use it. Anyway my overall point being to be pragmatic because perfection leads to inaction.

untorquer,

Like your points and generally agree, but companies deranging their products and adding post-hoc internet reliant licensing is one core message of OP. This has been forced on people on many platforms. Blizzard and WC3 was given as an example by OP. Microsoft is probably the most flagrant example as many people need to use windows for various software, and you need to rip the system apart to kill forced updates or shutdown invasive services.

utopiah,

Yes, which is why I bought Baldur’s Gate 3 and not other games. It’s not “just” because it’s an amazing game, it’s also because IMHO the way it has been produced respect its content creator but also the way it’s been delivered, respect players.

So when I say be pragmatic I also don’t mean to imply to accept any kind of behaviors from software publishers and rather when you can, do pick the good ones, obviously.

utopiah,

PS: I’m also morally perfectly fine with cracking and pirating software trying limit your freedoms assuming you did properly pay for it once, even if it’s illegal. I’m wary of enshitification overall.

untorquer,

Yes, 100%. If company is awful enough to the creator then I’d even be ethically in agreement without purchase but just donate direct to creator or whatever. Though risk varies more with legality in the latter case.

untorquer,

Ofc. Always good to choose the source that treats the consumer well. FOSS alternatives are also becoming competitive for lots of things which is great to see.

But where you used to be able to purchase physical media it’s practically impossible now. Even physical cases of games or audio-visual are usually just packaging for an access key to stream it. It sucks that we have to rely on market force through user-based action (e.g. Helldivers vs sony). These forces simply don’t work against market caps like Microsoft or practically any commercial software (cad, sim, business management) or media service (streaming, music, etc…) where companies can leverage nigh infinite debt to overcome the user base action in favor of market growth.

KISSmyOSFeddit,

You can still buy movies on physical media.
You can use an OS that doesn’t pull this shit.
And you can buy your games from GOG which has no DRM.
All your issues have pretty solutions.

adonkeystomple,

This same sentiment is what’s driven me to pirating all the movies and tv shows I own. I want total control over the things I’ve bought and paid for with my money. I also think this is crucial for the preservation of media.

Allero,

I straight up refuse to legally purchase any media that is officially unavailable for DRM-free download.

Such behavior on the side of creators and publishers cannot be tolerated.

Pirate it. They deserved it with such policies.

Ilandar,

I understand and relate to how you feel and I hope these changes feel positive to you and not forced. Please remember that these values do not have to be absolutist in their implementation and that there is a place for “hypocrisy”. No human is perfect and it’s okay to make concessions if you are struggling with a complete lifestyle transformation. Too often I see people start down this path of full on zealotry only to rubber-band weeks or months later because it was just too difficult for them to maintain that level of commitment to whatever their cause was. Instead of readjusting to find a better balance, they give up entirely and then feel really miserable about the experience because it seems like the things they valued in life were completely unattainable. This is all just a long way of saying take care of yourself on the journey.

streetfestival,
@streetfestival@lemmy.ca avatar

Great advice, thank you!! What you said applies to me quite a bit

eramseth,

This probably factors into the resurgence of vinyl.

WolfLink, (edited )

Buy CD’s and DvDs. Check if a game has DRM before buying it (or just buy from GoG where DRM is banned). Run some flavor of Linux.

mbfalzar,

But if you buy from GOG, make sure it doesn’t have DRM, because GOG has been selling a few games that have DRM for a few years now

WolfLink,

Oof I haven’t heard of this. That’s like the whole selling point of GoG. What games have DRM?

mbfalzar,

www.gog.com/forum/general/…/page1

This is a pretty maintained list, and even if I disagree with the inclusion of some things because all you’re missing is cosmetics, it is pretty easy to argue that “complete game offline” should include all content of that game, so I’m not gonna start a fight about it

WolfLink,

Yeah I see the argument that any content behind an internet connection is DRM, but I think that stance is a bit extreme.

There are a handful of real problems on that list, but it’s like 3/20.

It’s important to maintain this list and call them out though. If I can’t expect GoG games to be DRM free I might as well just use Steam where plenty of games are still DRM free but other features of the platform are a bit better.

Tick_Dracy,
@Tick_Dracy@lemm.ee avatar

Thanks for sharing. I (wrongly) assumed all games were entirely 100% DRM free.

DmMacniel, (edited )

Hey Choom, privacy, security and the ability to be in control is worth fighting for.

I hate how short term profits ruin good things for everyone but stakeholders. But there are independent developers, musicians, creator in generel or those who sell their stuff DRM free. Those actual humans are worth supporting and following.

Also having a hobby, like learning and or playing guitar, besides computing seems like a really good ide.

GlenRambo,

Just looked up some of the latest Movies. You can still get DVDs of that’s what you want. Even in a store with cash.

Is that what you want?

How are you leaning guitar? YouTube, apps, enshitification sites full of ads? Or buying a book?

streetfestival,
@streetfestival@lemmy.ca avatar

Thanks for the info! I general sail the seven seas for that suff but thought it was a pretty good example of the larger trend.

I played guitar for 5+ years, never really learning properly, but being able to jam okay. I can’t do that any more, but I have a pretty good knowledge base to start from. It’s probably a matter of I should just do whatever’s fun until I’m picking up the guitar a few times a week regularly - then I can get more focused. For easy-starting fun, that’s probably strumming and singing through songs on a less ad and malware-bloated website. To get serious, I’d like to work with a metronome, maybe finally feel confident with a 12-bar blues, transcribe some solos perhaps. Very old school 😎. Do you play or want to learn?

qjkxbmwvz,

For the Spotlight issue, was this certainly a local change without consent, or was it a change in the way the query is processed on Apple’s servers?

There is functionally no difference but it’s a big philosphical difference.

streetfestival,
@streetfestival@lemmy.ca avatar

It’s a little beyond me, but I was under the impression that the dictionary lookup feature is purely local. Saying that out loud I’m now not so sure lol

rottingleaf,

It’s fine. Connectivity allows subscription services, but doesn’t necessitate them. It’s a power to connect your machine to those of other people in many parts of the world.

It’s like starting to do your dishes in time because of the cockroach problem. Perfectly normal going “underground” when the cockroaches have occupied the kitchen and make laws there.

helenslunch,

They’re not gone, you just have to be more selective.

First, many of us have turned to piracy for this reason. I don’t like piracy. I don’t want to steal. But I will if they don’t provide me with a legitimate and respectful purchase process.

I miss the days of VHS and DVD

You can still buy whatever you want on Blu-Ray.

I’ve turned off all auto-updates, and I didn’t make that change or consent to it.

Bit of a double-edged sword there. Mac can make improvements and they can make things worse. The difference is often a matter of personal preference.

I have much bigger axes to grind with Apple, but I digress. Yes the overarching theme is “control” that Apple wants to maintain.

I clearly don’t have 100% control over it.

Linux gives you all the control you could ever want.

replaced copies of Warcraft 3 that I and others had paid for in full and installed on our computers that we could play without connecting to the Internet

Pirate it. You have every right, far as I’m concerned.

I think I want to go back to investing more time, money, and energy into things that aren’t connected to the internet

WHY DON’T YOU WANT PERSONALIZED ADVERTISEMENTS?

streetfestival,
@streetfestival@lemmy.ca avatar

I appreciate your comments and good points!

WHY DON’T YOU WANT PERSONALIZED ADVERTISEMENTS?

Lol. I prefer the terms user-preferred advertisements or user-centric advertisements /s. Whenever I see targeted ads, I just think it’s creepy

verdigris,

Piracy isn’t stealing, that’s just internalized corporate propaganda. No one should feel guilty about piracy, if anything be proud! Not only are you contributing to the preservation of media in an increasingly disposable age, but it also frees up your disposable income so you can actually donate it directly to independent content creators instead of sending it into the coffers of a faceless multinational.

DeaDvey,

The only things I’d feel guilty pirating are small indie pieces of media.

verdigris,

Even then, if you don’t have the desire or means to pay for it, it’s not a “lost sale”. If you’re well off, yes, please support indie creators, but even a pirated indie title can lead to more sales of that title through word of mouth.

DeaDvey,

Yeah, I agree.

helenslunch,

Everything you just said is bullshit entitlement

verdigris,

Please, explain to me why piracy is in any way morally or ethically wrong?

helenslunch, (edited )

If you really need me to explain it, there’s no hope for you. Even a child understands why stealing is bad.

CatZoomies,
@CatZoomies@lemmy.world avatar

If you pirate from a company worth billions, it’s stealing and you should be ashamed of yourself you greedy thief degenerate leech.

If a company steals from you, well… uh, I guess you deserved it. Why are you so entitled, that thing you bought you should be grateful for what little time you had with it. Even though you paid for it, it’s not yours it’s theirs. What’s wrong with you?

helenslunch,

LOL why do you people fabricate these stories and then act like they have absolutely anything to do with what I’ve said?

Oh right, because you don’t have any legitimate arguments.

verdigris,

Oh, sorry, I meant software or media piracy, not, like, actual piracy.

streetfestival,
@streetfestival@lemmy.ca avatar

What would a child say if they were asked whether they would steal a loaf of bread to feed their starving family if they had no other way of saving them? What would you say? Does context matter in moral judgements?

helenslunch,

LOL WTF dude? You are not stealing food, you’re stealing entertainment.

verdigris, (edited )

I actually think the ethics of media piracy are even less debatable than those of stealing food. If you’re stealing food, you are depriving someone of it. If you copy a song or a movie or a game, literally no one loses anything.

To be clear, I absolutely support people stealing food to survive, especially from stores and double especially from large corporations.

helenslunch,

If you copy a song or a movie or a game, literally no one loses anything.

You’re depriving the creator of that content from compensation for their work. You know this, you just don’t care.

verdigris,

… no, you literally are not. For that to be the case, you would have to already be planning to purchase the good, and then decide to pirate it instead. Even if that is the case (which in the vast majority of cases it is not), it still requires absurd mental gymnastics to reframe not paying someone money as stealing money from that person. You haven’t signed a contract. The entire concept of a “lost sale” is a lie. If someone pirating a movie is a lost sale, so is someone deciding not to see that movie because the ticket is too expensive, or the reviews are too bad. This is why I said it’s internalized corporate propaganda, because it places the onus for fairly compensating artists on the audience instead of the industry.

Additionally, the economics of almost every media distribution solution in existence means that purchasing a piece of media puts only a miniscule fraction of that price into the hands of the artist. Which is why I mentioned direct donation: giving a music artist you like $10 directly is a better way to support them than paying for Spotify Premium or even buying their discography on CD.

helenslunch,

For that to be the case, you would have to already be planning to purchase the good, and then decide to pirate it instead.

The mental gymnastics you people go through to justify theft is honestly just astonishing, that you’re able to delude yourself in this way. It’s fascinating from a psychological perspective.

it still requires absurd mental gymnastics to reframe not paying someone money as stealing money from that person.

I agree. No one said that though. You’re not stealing money, you’re stealing intellectual property. Something someone, or more likely multiple or hundreds of someones dedicated time and money to create, with the expectation of compensation from it’s consumer.

it places the onus for fairly compensating artists on the audience instead of the industry.

It places it on the consumer. You know, the person who benefits from the project’s creation?

Which is why I mentioned direct donation:

LOL oh please, go on, where are you submitting your “donations” to? Does Brad Pitt have a Patreon page now?

It must be so nice to live in a fictional utopia where everyone is fairly compensated and no one tries to take from others, which is, ironically, exactly what you’re doing.

ganymede, (edited )

the mental gymnastics you go through to parrot corporate propaganda is honestly just astonishing

verdigris, (edited )

Oh, you believe in intellectual property. I don’t, and I find the concept an affront to human creativity.

Brad Pitt doesn’t need donations. Anyone who does generally has avenues – very often Patreons, yes.

helenslunch,

I don’t, and I find the concept an affront to human creativity

I’m shocked that you don’t respect human creativity…

Brad Pitt doesn’t need donations.

And I’m shocked that you’re now moving the goalposts.

J/K I’ve heard this same bullshit justifications 38472893 times and am completely unsurprised. Goodbye.

verdigris, (edited )

Yeah, that’s totally what “an affront to” means. And if you’re seriously arguing that someone with a 9-figure net worth needs compensation to keep producing art, I don’t know what to say to you. I’m not moving any goalposts, I’ve said multiple times that you should support independent creators if you can afford to. Brad Pitt is not an “independent creator”, he’s a fixture in the movie industry who gets paid millions of dollars upfront. Your priorities are gross.

ganymede, (edited )

they’re just projecting their own tactics on you.

they’re the one moving the goalposts with that laughable brad pitt bs.

streetfestival,
@streetfestival@lemmy.ca avatar

I think I’m more or less with @verdigris. I’d get behind the position that most large corporations have bent the rules of society so much to their favour and accrued so much wealth at the expense of ordinary people that we don’t owe them anything at this point. I got mad respect for the independent creators. But I feel there’s no moral transgression with streaming a pirated show vis-a-vis the corporations missing out on making a few bucks from that, to use a example. It’s not black and white; actors and others salaries are important and related. But those “you wouldn’t steal a car, so why are you trying to a CD/DVD?” ads were clearly corporate propaganda, as another example

autonomoususer, (edited )

I swore I’d never pay for a video game again

The libre software too?

go back to investing more time, money, and energy into things that aren’t connected to the internet

They’ll obviously win when we run away. We should take the fight to them.

streetfestival,
@streetfestival@lemmy.ca avatar

I might’ve misspoke about never paying for a video game again. I do like the look of gog. I’m really out of the loop when it comes to gaming. I like more privacy- and ownership-respecting platforms, and I would (do) pay for those. What I meant was I’d caught a glimpse of the direction of the mainstream gaming industry with WC3, and I realized it wouldn’t work for me and had to get off it. I use LibreOffice. I’ll check out the libre gaming software, thanks!

They’ll obviously win when we run away. We should take the fight to them.

I appreciate your point of view. The way I see it, I think maybe 95/100 people blindly trust big tech companies and 5 of us don’t (to the willing we’ll avoid mainstream social media, for example); the proportion is debatable, but I think it’s a very uneven divide. I don’t think we have enough power to “stick it” to big tech. I also don’t think we need to. I participated in the reddit blackout last summer and then I left it altogether for here (Lemmy), which I enjoy more and want to help grow more than I did the last place. I guess I do want some people to keep big tech in check and whistle-blow, at least to help spread awareness. I guess I’m just not the person for the job, and I think that’s okay. More tech savvy people would do well in those roles :)

autonomoususer, (edited )

Target Discord first. Games are non-essentials. Discord is a tool, beyond any one game, used beyond gaming. Don’t destroy your influence, don’t leave the conversation, don’t leave Steam just yet but use it strategically (and GOG Galaxy isn’t even for Linux).

Tech savvy people aren’t going to come and join our friends and join our family. For libre software by default, we must act.

Aceticon,

You don’t need to use GOG Galaxy since you can download the offline installers for any game (including, for some, the Linux version).

Been buying from GOG for years now and never used GOG Galaxy.

autonomoususer,

It exposes their priorities.

Aceticon, (edited )

If their priorities were to track customers, incentivise game integration with their store (i.e. gamemaker lock-in) and the possibility of taking games away from customers, all like Steam does, they would not maintain that glaring backdoor for all those priorities that is letting customers download full installers that they can keep and which do not check back with the store on install.

I’m sure that they would like the advantage of tying people (both gamers and gamemakers) to their store, yet clearly they’re not forcing that as Steam does, so what they’re prioritizing (in other words, their priority) is clearly not that.

Given that their unique selling proposition is “no DRM” or more broadly “customer freedom to use the games they bought”, it makes sense that that is GOG’s overriding priority, even if they would also like all the (for a store) nice side-effects of built-in DRM and phone-home installers like Steam’s.

autonomoususer, (edited )

GOG spreads anti-libre software, like Steam, but do they contribute to libre operating system software?

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