Y’know @neil one of these days you’re going to wake up and find you’ve become a revolutionary anarchist, relatively speaking.

Same here. My opinions remain fairly constant, but the Overton Window almost keeps rushing past.

@neil There is exactly one person who gets to decide what happens in my computer. Me.

If you want to run things in my world, you play by my rules and only my rules.

Wait Shit. Am I'm turning in to a conservative, I want things to remain how they were twenty years ago... Is this is what they meant about getting more conservative when you get older?

@neil

Give the world's dangerous slide into extreme right politics, and fascism, using your computer like it's 1999 is seen as radical and anarchist.

Welcome to being radical and anarchist by being the same socialist you were in 1999 😂

Edit: If you think Windows is bad, try setting up a Mac without linking your identity to the device.

Pro Tip: Buy the device with cash and never give the salesperson your email address or mobile number. Good Luck 😁👍

@neil I have never used my full name when setting up my user on a personal Linux device.

I generally give computers hostnames that do not identify the devices type.

My email addresses to do not include my name nor parts of my name.

My online usernames are unique per site and do not contain references to my real name.

Not that this helps much with device fingerprinting as it is today but I feel I have to try to do something.

Every act of resistance counts.

@neil It is a war on general computation. Cory Doctorow observed that about 15 years ago.

Skews the balance of power even more towards platforms.

Computation is power!

@neil I just fell down the rabbit hole of #HomeLab. Actually no, I jumped in feet first and in a less than a week am having more fun with tech than since the 70's-80's.

We can do this!

@neil and I've been really disappointed by people who I generally respect coming back with the argument "you're not a parent are you? Do you know how hard it is to stop a kid from breaking out of parental controls when the goal is to join their friends on Roblox or whatever?"

I do get that. But it seems like the classic "we have a social problem here. Let's not try to fix it with tech"

@neil
I believe a distinction is necessary between using a computer as a personal tool and using it as a means of communication or for economic activity, which require adulthood and other forms of accreditation to operate in the market or in society at large

and it may be necessary to assume legal responsibility for economic activities

@neil it's sad and disturbing that this has become a radical position.

My first computer, in the early 90s, was a pizza-box Mac (LC II). It was ... alright, but it was too limiting - very little internal space and limited (expensive) options for configuration or upgrade. I had sold my game systems so I could buy it (with help from my parents - I still couldn't afford the whole thing on my own).
It was the only Apple product I've owned.

I ended up selling it later and buying a used system from family friends. An Intel 286 in a massive desktop chassis. That system saw many changes over the years to both it's hardware and OSes (dos/windows/various Linux distributions). It was certainly a PC of Theseus - only the original chassis remained.

The experimentation and learning, the tinkering, the ... magic smoke. It helped make me who I am today.

This experience should be available to everyone now. I hate that things have become so integrated, locked down, and gated.