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I was really pro open internet. I remember the old internet and feel nostalgia about it that probably won't ever completely fade. I am Ukrainian, and when some

I was really pro open internet. I remember the old internet and feel nostalgia about it that probably won't ever completely fade. I am Ukrainian, and when some years ago my government banned the most popular social network at our country - Russian-made VK, I felt strange about it. I kind of understood some of the security concerns, but didn't feel like they were enough to turn off my open internet fantasies and free-speech absolutism. Now I totally get it and am happy that it happened sooner that later. Turns out that the security concern was as real as it gets. Russia gets info from VK to jail hundreds of people, and at least they one less weapon to use against Ukrainians. And I have to admit that I've used VK and probably wouldn't stop doing it if my government didn't ban it. Now I am kind of hoping that they will do the same with TikTok. With all of this experience I still have no strength to quit it by myself.

8f2ab37a-ed6c 4y ago
> I still have no strength to quit it by myself. This sounds like addiction? Just delete the app from your phone and move on? You'd be surprised by perfectly fine life goes on without Twitter / Facebook / TikTok / Instagram.
- canadaduane 4y ago
  "addiction" and "just ___" are kind of mutually opposing forces. It can be difficult to understand addiction from the outside, as the solution seems obvious, but the internal world is not straight forward to navigate.
  - 8f2ab37a-ed6c 4y ago
    If the only way the poster is going to cure their social media addiction is through government intervention, I would suggest finding alternative means of addressing the issue.
    - hakre 4y ago
      Yes, this calling for the strong man looks really desperate and dangerous.
  - papito 4y ago
    I think even those who came into contact with addiction and substance abuse may fail to realize that social media dependence is a very similar thing. We can get technical - drugs and booze are psychoactive, while social media is behavioral addiction. Even so, the habit-building loop and the compulsion that stems from it is effectively the same. So, I don't think it's condescending to say "just quit it". I suspend my Twitter account from time to time when I realize I built a habit loop again, and the "urge" just goes away.
- Schroedingersat 4y ago
  This is massively underselling the difficulty. If you delete your facebook and twitter accounts you lose access to the only customer support channel in many places. If you delete faceboom you lose access to local second hand markets, you lose access to information about community events, you cannot participate in group chats, you get harangued at every social event if you try to share another contact channel.
  - midoridensha 4y ago
    >If you delete faceboom... Is this a Freudian slip? I'll have to start using this term when referring to Facebook in the future.
  - 8f2ab37a-ed6c 4y ago
    I agree. How does that apply to TikTok though?
  - nanidin 4y ago
    I haven’t found ostracism for using channels outside of Facebook. I have plenty of friends and acquaintances that I keep in touch with via Snapchat, email, and text.
    - posguy 4y ago
      I certainly feel ostracized for not having a Facebook account. Chambers of Commerce, Community Groups, and it feels like most queer people expect you to be on Facebook, and if you aren't your on the outside. Its very similar to not being a blue bubble in some regards, but Facebook has a much broader scope than just being a messenger platform. Excited for the EU to fix the closed messenger issue, then I can have 3rd party clients to bridge all my communications securely into one unified view, just gotta make sure that these large companies don't try and open up these platforms by hiding your end to end encryption keys on their servers :D
      - autoexec 4y ago
        I'm very much okay with being ostracized by people who don't care enough about me to stay in touch outside of social media. I actually prefer to be ostracized by anyone who'd judge me for bubble color.
nier 4y ago
It was surprising to me seeing the news with Ukrainian soldiers using TikTok out in the field.
- jbigelow76 4y ago
  It's value as a morale/propaganda tool might out weigh the security concerns
  - rtkwe 4y ago
    There's also just the fact that soldiers are often a bit crap at opsec it just doesn't always get them killed. I have doubts anyways that China would be feeding Russia strike targets based on tiktok usage anyways so they'd be stuck to using the videos to guide strikes based on the nation-state equivalent of GeoGuesser. That can be fantastically accurate but it's much slower generally.
  - autoexec 4y ago
    What does tiktok offer in that respect that youtube or just about any other social media platform supporting video couldn't also provide?
    - monocasa 4y ago
      It's something that GenZ actually uses that is run by a friendly state.
      - philwelch 4y ago
        China is a “friendly state”?
        deleted 4y ago
        [deleted]
        sterlind 4y ago
        relative to Russia, yeah? China isn't like, literally invading them. China could get ByteDance to pass location data to Russia, but it doesn't seem like China really wants to get in the middle of the war.
colechristensen 4y ago
In the US I’m not really afraid of China. There are some people who should be, but I’m not. I’m annoyed at American companies who bow to their wishes, but I’m also annoyed at American companies who censor to advertisers so nobody says “fuck” on YouTube and my level of annoyance is about the same. Some other places would do good to ban tiktok and people concerned about national secrets and the like sure should, but I’m just some dude leaking plenty of information plenty of places and china is among the least of my concerns.
- mensetmanusman 4y ago
  If you work for a company that could be punished by China, you should fear them. They can have you fired if your say the wrong thing.
  - colechristensen 4y ago
    That’s the kind of fight I’d like to have though. A good thing to stand up for. I could also probably be fired for things i say on the internet with my real name, but i think it’s worth standing against that kind of thing and not being afraid of it even though it’s entirely possible. (I do on occasion say things which are very much not well thought out, rude, just to trigger good discussion, or because I’ve had too much wine or am feeling ornery… in other words I’m not ashamed to be human)
    - mensetmanusman 4y ago
      Even billionaires like LeBron James are afraid, I doubt there is hope for the little guys.
      - fzil 4y ago
        they are afraid because their yachts are on the line
        depereo 4y ago
lannisterstark 4y ago
I mean, your govt is banning enough of the shit with some real questionable reasons(while keeping some actual questionable things/traditions alive) that being skeptical is probably still the best bet. and let's not pretend that the UA govt has had a history of transparency lol. Being better than Russia has been a low bar in the eastern bloc. -30 is better than -70 but it's still far below 0.
- Yiin 4y ago
  I see UA before Zelensky and after as two completely different countries politically. Most of the things UA gov was criticized for seems to be mostly an effect of Russia's influence.
  - ChuckNorris89 4y ago
    Out of curiosity, what has Zelensky done to improve Ukraine before the war, other than not being a Kremlin puppet? As I understood it, before the war he was sliding down in the polls, becoming unpopular because there haven't been the massive crackdowns on corruptions he was campaigning for (like in his TV show), with him also being uncovered in the Pandora papers as having various hidden assets [1] and only his resistance to the Russian making him the most popular leader ever. [1] https://www.theguardian.com/news/2021/oct/03/revealed-anti-oligarch-ukrainian-president-offshore-connections-volodymyr-zelenskiy https://www.theguardian.com/news/2021/oct/03/revealed-anti-o...
    - parineum 4y ago
      There's a ton of white washing of Ukraine since the invasion. Just as with everything else, it's not enough to just think that one side is more correct, they must be completely exemplar.
      - concordDance 4y ago
        Combination of the halo effect and allegiance signalling.
eimrine 4y ago
Actually half of Russian internets went south. Do you, Ukrainian, want to google something on your mother language? Use Tor or wait tens of years while Ukrainian-speaking folks use to speak enough for you to be able to google anything on cyrillic languages. Seems like you, English speaker, do not help your not-English speaking nation a lot.
- precommunicator 4y ago
  TBH, that applies to anyone. In any field, especially technology, googling in English gives you much better results than in native language. (except country-specific knowledge).
  - eimrine 4y ago
    Good luck searching anything about 1c database (maybe the best accounting software I have ever used). And this is only the top of my head, Russian culture used to be huge. A lot of country-specific knowledge get blocked and I very disappreciate that people who use to think that there is anything better than a free access to any information.
DoctorOetker 4y ago
It's very rare to read such honesty on the internet. While the internet has been in existence for a while, it is actually still quite young in the sense of affordable democratization of access to the internet. This does raise a lot of questions regarding long term effects of the internet. While the current threat actors were relatively predictable, I wonder how in the long run nations can protect themselves from threat actors which are currently still seen as allies? On long timescales allies can become threats and threat actors can become new allies. Does this mean the concept of international companies and services will fragment? Currently Europe is trying to organize more domestic manufacture of semiconductors. Will the future see a race of nation states to be as self-reliant as possible? On the level of individual humans the prepper who wants to make his own shoes / computer / ... is ridiculed, while blocks / nation states / ... are taking steps in such directions... Again, I thank you for your honesty, most people would just be embarassed for their past activity on foreign platforms, and not highlight it to others.

8f2ab37a-ed6c 4y ago

> I still have no strength to quit it by myself. This sounds like addiction? Just delete the app from your phone and move on? You'd be surprised by perfectly fine life goes on without Twitter / Facebook / TikTok / Instagram.

canadaduane 4y ago
"addiction" and "just ___" are kind of mutually opposing forces. It can be difficult to understand addiction from the outside, as the solution seems obvious, but the internal world is not straight forward to navigate.
- 8f2ab37a-ed6c 4y ago
  If the only way the poster is going to cure their social media addiction is through government intervention, I would suggest finding alternative means of addressing the issue.
  - hakre 4y ago
    Yes, this calling for the strong man looks really desperate and dangerous.
- papito 4y ago
  I think even those who came into contact with addiction and substance abuse may fail to realize that social media dependence is a very similar thing. We can get technical - drugs and booze are psychoactive, while social media is behavioral addiction. Even so, the habit-building loop and the compulsion that stems from it is effectively the same. So, I don't think it's condescending to say "just quit it". I suspend my Twitter account from time to time when I realize I built a habit loop again, and the "urge" just goes away.
Schroedingersat 4y ago
This is massively underselling the difficulty. If you delete your facebook and twitter accounts you lose access to the only customer support channel in many places. If you delete faceboom you lose access to local second hand markets, you lose access to information about community events, you cannot participate in group chats, you get harangued at every social event if you try to share another contact channel.
- midoridensha 4y ago
  >If you delete faceboom... Is this a Freudian slip? I'll have to start using this term when referring to Facebook in the future.
- 8f2ab37a-ed6c 4y ago
  I agree. How does that apply to TikTok though?
- nanidin 4y ago
  I haven’t found ostracism for using channels outside of Facebook. I have plenty of friends and acquaintances that I keep in touch with via Snapchat, email, and text.
  - posguy 4y ago
    I certainly feel ostracized for not having a Facebook account. Chambers of Commerce, Community Groups, and it feels like most queer people expect you to be on Facebook, and if you aren't your on the outside. Its very similar to not being a blue bubble in some regards, but Facebook has a much broader scope than just being a messenger platform. Excited for the EU to fix the closed messenger issue, then I can have 3rd party clients to bridge all my communications securely into one unified view, just gotta make sure that these large companies don't try and open up these platforms by hiding your end to end encryption keys on their servers :D
    - autoexec 4y ago
      I'm very much okay with being ostracized by people who don't care enough about me to stay in touch outside of social media. I actually prefer to be ostracized by anyone who'd judge me for bubble color.

nier 4y ago

It was surprising to me seeing the news with Ukrainian soldiers using TikTok out in the field.

jbigelow76 4y ago
It's value as a morale/propaganda tool might out weigh the security concerns
- rtkwe 4y ago
  There's also just the fact that soldiers are often a bit crap at opsec it just doesn't always get them killed. I have doubts anyways that China would be feeding Russia strike targets based on tiktok usage anyways so they'd be stuck to using the videos to guide strikes based on the nation-state equivalent of GeoGuesser. That can be fantastically accurate but it's much slower generally.
- autoexec 4y ago
  What does tiktok offer in that respect that youtube or just about any other social media platform supporting video couldn't also provide?
  - monocasa 4y ago
    It's something that GenZ actually uses that is run by a friendly state.
    - philwelch 4y ago
      China is a “friendly state”?
      - deleted 4y ago
        [deleted]
      - sterlind 4y ago
        relative to Russia, yeah? China isn't like, literally invading them. China could get ByteDance to pass location data to Russia, but it doesn't seem like China really wants to get in the middle of the war.

colechristensen 4y ago

In the US I’m not really afraid of China. There are some people who should be, but I’m not. I’m annoyed at American companies who bow to their wishes, but I’m also annoyed at American companies who censor to advertisers so nobody says “fuck” on YouTube and my level of annoyance is about the same. Some other places would do good to ban tiktok and people concerned about national secrets and the like sure should, but I’m just some dude leaking plenty of information plenty of places and china is among the least of my concerns.

mensetmanusman 4y ago
If you work for a company that could be punished by China, you should fear them. They can have you fired if your say the wrong thing.
- colechristensen 4y ago
  That’s the kind of fight I’d like to have though. A good thing to stand up for. I could also probably be fired for things i say on the internet with my real name, but i think it’s worth standing against that kind of thing and not being afraid of it even though it’s entirely possible. (I do on occasion say things which are very much not well thought out, rude, just to trigger good discussion, or because I’ve had too much wine or am feeling ornery… in other words I’m not ashamed to be human)
  - mensetmanusman 4y ago
    Even billionaires like LeBron James are afraid, I doubt there is hope for the little guys.
    - fzil 4y ago
      they are afraid because their yachts are on the line
      - depereo 4y ago

lannisterstark 4y ago

I mean, your govt is banning enough of the shit with some real questionable reasons(while keeping some actual questionable things/traditions alive) that being skeptical is probably still the best bet. and let's not pretend that the UA govt has had a history of transparency lol. Being better than Russia has been a low bar in the eastern bloc. -30 is better than -70 but it's still far below 0.

Yiin 4y ago
I see UA before Zelensky and after as two completely different countries politically. Most of the things UA gov was criticized for seems to be mostly an effect of Russia's influence.
- ChuckNorris89 4y ago
  Out of curiosity, what has Zelensky done to improve Ukraine before the war, other than not being a Kremlin puppet? As I understood it, before the war he was sliding down in the polls, becoming unpopular because there haven't been the massive crackdowns on corruptions he was campaigning for (like in his TV show), with him also being uncovered in the Pandora papers as having various hidden assets [1] and only his resistance to the Russian making him the most popular leader ever. [1] https://www.theguardian.com/news/2021/oct/03/revealed-anti-oligarch-ukrainian-president-offshore-connections-volodymyr-zelenskiy https://www.theguardian.com/news/2021/oct/03/revealed-anti-o...
  - parineum 4y ago
    There's a ton of white washing of Ukraine since the invasion. Just as with everything else, it's not enough to just think that one side is more correct, they must be completely exemplar.
    - concordDance 4y ago
      Combination of the halo effect and allegiance signalling.

eimrine 4y ago

Actually half of Russian internets went south. Do you, Ukrainian, want to google something on your mother language? Use Tor or wait tens of years while Ukrainian-speaking folks use to speak enough for you to be able to google anything on cyrillic languages. Seems like you, English speaker, do not help your not-English speaking nation a lot.

precommunicator 4y ago
TBH, that applies to anyone. In any field, especially technology, googling in English gives you much better results than in native language. (except country-specific knowledge).
- eimrine 4y ago
  Good luck searching anything about 1c database (maybe the best accounting software I have ever used). And this is only the top of my head, Russian culture used to be huge. A lot of country-specific knowledge get blocked and I very disappreciate that people who use to think that there is anything better than a free access to any information.

DoctorOetker 4y ago

It's very rare to read such honesty on the internet. While the internet has been in existence for a while, it is actually still quite young in the sense of affordable democratization of access to the internet. This does raise a lot of questions regarding long term effects of the internet. While the current threat actors were relatively predictable, I wonder how in the long run nations can protect themselves from threat actors which are currently still seen as allies? On long timescales allies can become threats and threat actors can become new allies. Does this mean the concept of international companies and services will fragment? Currently Europe is trying to organize more domestic manufacture of semiconductors. Will the future see a race of nation states to be as self-reliant as possible? On the level of individual humans the prepper who wants to make his own shoes / computer / ... is ridiculed, while blocks / nation states / ... are taking steps in such directions... Again, I thank you for your honesty, most people would just be embarassed for their past activity on foreign platforms, and not highlight it to others.