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This is just really sad. Apple used to be the beacon of hope. Maybe it was false hope all along. We must go full FOSS from hardware to software to preserve hum

by Geee 5y ago

This is just really sad. Apple used to be the beacon of hope. Maybe it was false hope all along. We must go full FOSS from hardware to software to preserve humanity. Everyone needs to get on board, not just the savvy minority. That's the goal.

pm90 5y ago
I agree with you. Ultimately though, we can’t rely on Technology companies to make the right decisions. Businesses exist to make profits, if there aren’t regulations against doing this someone was ultimately going to come up with a way to do it. Even with regulations many corporations fail to be compliant. I feel like we almost need a “Constitution for the Digital Age”, which would eg guarantee privacy rights.
mindslight 5y ago
I never thought of Apple as a beacon of hope, but I was willing to give them the benefit of the doubt that perhaps they could succeed at giving non-technical people the majority of their digital rights. Build systems that are secure from everybody-but-Apple, use top-down control to police bad actors, and allow privacy/security/freedom to flourish within their walled garden. Sticking government spyware onto people's phones is a direct repudiation of this philosophy. I'm not surprised this would happen eventually, but I am surprised it has happened this quickly. It has been what, a mere 5 years since the San Bernardino affair? The authoritarian delusion is a strong siren call, but I had expected it to result in ever more App Store restrictions and perhaps a few breaks where the government compelled signing trojan horse targeted updates - not a full rejection of the very idea of user privacy by placing a government agent in every phone. With this development, Free Software is once again the only option if you'd like to preserve your own digital rights. Its story for mobile historically kind of sucks (Android with varying amount of bad bits stripped out), but that is changing with things like PinePhone. IMO inexpensive devices are a necessity to get iterations into many people's hands, as opposed to the waterfall-feeling model of OpenMoko (etc).

by Geee 5y ago

pm90 5y ago

I agree with you. Ultimately though, we can’t rely on Technology companies to make the right decisions. Businesses exist to make profits, if there aren’t regulations against doing this someone was ultimately going to come up with a way to do it. Even with regulations many corporations fail to be compliant. I feel like we almost need a “Constitution for the Digital Age”, which would eg guarantee privacy rights.

mindslight 5y ago

I never thought of Apple as a beacon of hope, but I was willing to give them the benefit of the doubt that perhaps they could succeed at giving non-technical people the majority of their digital rights. Build systems that are secure from everybody-but-Apple, use top-down control to police bad actors, and allow privacy/security/freedom to flourish within their walled garden. Sticking government spyware onto people's phones is a direct repudiation of this philosophy. I'm not surprised this would happen eventually, but I am surprised it has happened this quickly. It has been what, a mere 5 years since the San Bernardino affair? The authoritarian delusion is a strong siren call, but I had expected it to result in ever more App Store restrictions and perhaps a few breaks where the government compelled signing trojan horse targeted updates - not a full rejection of the very idea of user privacy by placing a government agent in every phone. With this development, Free Software is once again the only option if you'd like to preserve your own digital rights. Its story for mobile historically kind of sucks (Android with varying amount of bad bits stripped out), but that is changing with things like PinePhone. IMO inexpensive devices are a necessity to get iterations into many people's hands, as opposed to the waterfall-feeling model of OpenMoko (etc).