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> I thought this was a safe space for hackers to express enthusiasm about pushing their own hardware and software further (and in this case even in a comparativ
by dylan604 7mo ago
> I thought this was a safe space for hackers to express enthusiasm about pushing their own hardware and software further (and in this case even in a comparatively safe way).
Nothing is preventing said experimentation nor discussion of it. I am merely offering my more conservative views of the situation as a contrast to the echo chamber gungho nature of the experimentation. Just because we can doesn't mean we should is often left out of the conversation. At some point, the net negative that comes from the use of something "cool" is never contemplated by those creating the something "cool" simply because they would never fathom using the "cool" for "uncool" purposes. Sadly, someone else will and weaponize it in an uncontrollable manner. If the creators can't think of how it can happen, it is vital that those not so involved in the creation speak up when there are potential issues.
- leptons 7mo ago>Sadly, someone else will and weaponize it in an uncontrollable manner. Except it isn't "uncontrollable". You have to explicitly allow every single website to use WebUSB. Without that explicit allowance, the website can't access anything. Plenty of things can be weaponized, even household utensils. Should we ban all forks? The sky is not falling, and WebUSB is not going to cause it to fall.
- bcjdjsndon 7mo ago> The sky is not falling, and WebUSB is not going to cause it to fall. You could always write a native app. It's always been possible that way.
- leptons 6mo agoSorry, no, I am not supporting Windows, MacOS, iOS, Android or multiple other platforms when I could just target one single platform - the web browser.
- bcjdjsndon 6mo ago> the web browser Which one? Your page looks the same on all major browsers does it? Didn't think so.
- bcjdjsndon 6mo agoAnd you have one page for both mobie and desktop?
- concinds 7mo agoI wouldn't describe it as "conservative" but as "pro-native-apps and anti-web-apps", which seems irrational in this day and age where "native apps" means platform lock-in by monopolies, less sandboxing and user-control than on the web, much more gatekeeping and control over published binaries, and these days the web app is usually a more private/secure alternative to the native app (which also bundles a marketing SDK, now, and fingerprints you invisibly via iCloud Keychain, tracks you with various identifiers, and more). If native platforms removed USB or Bluetooth, the "control over my own hardware" crowd would flip a table. I just wish they also understood the benefits of the web compared to native. The Chrome/Project Fugu team's dream of making the web platform as powerful as native platforms is the correct one from a user freedom standpoint, or at bare minimum a "user choice" standpoint.
- dylan604 7mo agoI'm not saying pro-native-apps outright even if that might be what it gets boiled down as. I'm saying I do not trust anything that runs in a browser. I actively block as much nonsense as possible. I do not trust devs that write code to run in browsers. There's a lot of devs getting taken out in the blast radius, but the only way to be sure is to take off and nuke it from orbit. There are devs out there hell bent on writing malicious code. I am willing to take a stand and refuse to use things when the net result is negative. I do not use social media. I do not shop at Walmart. These are the decisions I'm willing to live with even if it makes life slightly less "easy" because I've made a moral decision to not open myself up to nonsense just to later ask "what happened...".
- lxgr 7mo agoSure, you do what works for you. But why advocate for even more limits to how other people use their computers? One person's nonsense is another person's treasured hobby. Yes, bad actors exist, but why concede every single nice thing to them?
- dylan604 7mo agoagain, net negative is being glossed over. whatever good and nice things there might be, if it is being used more for negative purposes, you need to consider is it worth it at all or was it rushed and needing more thought before the PoC was pushed to prod
- lxgr 7mo ago> those creating the something "cool" simply because they would never fathom using the "cool" for "uncool" purposes I can definitely imagine a ton of things going wrong with Web USB, and I think the spec authors did a pretty good job at bolting everything down that can be, while still shipping something actually capable at providing USB access. And that's my point: Sure, fewer capabilities are always safer than more capabilities. But some capabilities are nice and arguably worth the risk, especially if the obvious alternative (blindly installing native applications) isn't much safer.
- DANmode 7mo agoHonest question, dude: have you used the thing in the wild? Much like the Location API, it’s explicitly opt-in, and isolated. How is it going to be weaponized? That’s what to talk about here. I’d love to take part.
- albuic 6mo agoMost people accept without reading and thinking about the consequences. Firefox refused WebUSB to protect those people.