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"Friends can be an impediment to a life off the radar." Top 1% of the super paranoid indeed. While I understand the reach of the government and the lengths the

"Friends can be an impediment to a life off the radar." Top 1% of the super paranoid indeed. While I understand the reach of the government and the lengths they'll go to gain information - this article is absolutely ridiculous to me. I like my friends, I like to travel, I like to do things. Effectively letting the government control your life because you are afraid of what they MIGHT do? Give me a fucking break.

angersock 13y ago
Bully for you that you don't perceive an issue here. The fact is beyond dispute that the social services in widest use actively turn your friends into informants on you. If that doesn't bother you, fine--but don't mock the people for whom that is an uncomfortable reality.
- rfnslyr 13y ago
  Bit off topic, but I actually just disabled all my social media, and you know what? I don't miss a single soul and I feel really good again, more energetic and enthusiastic even. I just realized I really only do have about 5 people I should keep in contact with. Everyone else was a relationship that was kept up just from virtue of existing, relationships that would never make it into real life. I feel free. For the first time I took a walk in the park yesterday, rolled a joint, went for a nice breakfast and coffee at a local diner, read the newspaper, and just sat in the park. It was amazing not feeling pressure to make everyone immediately aware of how fucking awesome of a morning I've had. It was actually unreal. I just sat there looking at a bird and I almost just broke down and cried of happiness. I felt zero pressure doing anything. It felt as though I was obligated to post everything cool I did, so when doing those things, I'd do them differently just to fit the specific paradigm that I post in just to one up others. A feeling has left me that I hadn't identified before that I mistook as depression. I was growing more apathetic, sad, and cynical due to social media because it felt like every little thing I did was in competition in some form or another to others online, and when I failed, I just felt more isolated and lonely. I'm able to do things consistently without the need to constantly check my phone and compare that specific frame of my life against others. Facebook on the toilet, while cleaning, running, on the bus, at work, on the commute home, too much. The weeks following deleting my social media I got so much shit done so fast with no distractions. Absolutely amazing. I think I'll write a blog post about this. I bought a tablet, loaded my favourite books on it, and have filled in all my pointless social media time with reading. I'm actually discovering the city alone for the first time ever and it's wonderful because I don't care what anyone else thinks of what I'm doing, I'm doing it for me. I'm going to grow my beard, cut my hair, buying some jeans, buying some chucks, and then I'm going to relax in a field somewhere and just spend time not caring.
  - moens 13y ago
    Beautiful, +1
  - pessimizer 13y ago
    Social media creates a ton of new needs that it then proceeds to only partially, and unpredictably, fill. You're just realizing again that you don't really give a shit what your mom had for breakfast, unless you're talking about it with her to pass the time over dinner:) There's absolutely nothing that anybody has to say to me that can't wait a day (except "the site's down!")
    - rfnslyr 13y ago
      I'm going to get a t-shirt saying "Don't talk to me unless the site is down" haha. Yeah, trying to fill that void with social media is like trying to put out fire with napalm.
  - pearjuice 13y ago
    Problem is that even though you visually deleted all that social stuff, the data still exists. There is no escape.
    - rfnslyr 13y ago
      You're able to "delete" your profile now, so that you have to create a new one and re-add everything if you want to go back. You have the option of deleting after two weeks of deactivation. Whether it is truly deleted on their servers is up for debate.
  - computer 13y ago
    The irony of course being that Hackernews too is social media, and you still just "bragged" about the experience you had!
    - rfnslyr 13y ago
      Not at all. It's "social media" in that there's a comments page that you can interact with others yes but not much more than that. It's just a link aggregation and I don't know any of you even remotely intimately.
- instaheat 13y ago
  I do perceive an issue here. I just refuse to let - yet another - uncomfortable reality dictate the way I live. I understand what is going on out there. I'm just not going to be a martyr. Advertisers, go ahead and try to sell me something based on what you think I like. It won't work on me. It's a hail mary play. I guess what I'm really trying to say is I'm not in position to change anything so I suppose I can be thankful for the likes of Edward Snowden and companies that fight back far reaching government requests (Like AirBnb did recently) but I'm going to live my life and live it fully, challenging authority every step of the way hinging on the fact that I believe in the Bill of Rights.
m3rc 13y ago
I think it was more proving just how far you would have to go to really be untraceable, and that it's an essentially impossible goal for a normal person.
Zikes 13y ago
I'm not sure exactly what needs to happen before you'd take the issue seriously, but enough already has happened for many of us to be very concerned.
Amadou 13y ago
I like my friends, I like to travel, I like to do things. Effectively letting the government control your life because you are afraid of what they MIGHT do? Give me a fucking break. The problem is the reverse here. The "system" (i.e. our society in general) has been co-opted. It is profoundly wrong that a normal life in the modern world requires so much disclosure to unrelated 3rd parties. It's like the argument - if you don't want to be recorded, cataloged and tracked by innumerable license plate scanners on the road by the police, DEA, etc and private data-brokers like TLO [1] then you shouldn't drive. It's completely ass-backwards, the price of driving shouldn't be a permanent record of all your movements in innumerable databases that are anonymous to you. [1] http://www.forbes.com/sites/adamtanner/2013/07/10/data-broker-offers-new-service-showing-where-they-have-spotted-your-car/ http://www.forbes.com/sites/adamtanner/2013/07/10/data-broke...
Sagat 13y ago
That's the point they are trying to make. No normal person can hope to lead a normal life whilst escaping tracking.
Nursie 13y ago
The article had examples of what they do now. It's not a stretch that the rest can happen soon. Things should not have been allowed to get here.

angersock 13y ago

Bully for you that you don't perceive an issue here. The fact is beyond dispute that the social services in widest use actively turn your friends into informants on you. If that doesn't bother you, fine--but don't mock the people for whom that is an uncomfortable reality.

rfnslyr 13y ago
Bit off topic, but I actually just disabled all my social media, and you know what? I don't miss a single soul and I feel really good again, more energetic and enthusiastic even. I just realized I really only do have about 5 people I should keep in contact with. Everyone else was a relationship that was kept up just from virtue of existing, relationships that would never make it into real life. I feel free. For the first time I took a walk in the park yesterday, rolled a joint, went for a nice breakfast and coffee at a local diner, read the newspaper, and just sat in the park. It was amazing not feeling pressure to make everyone immediately aware of how fucking awesome of a morning I've had. It was actually unreal. I just sat there looking at a bird and I almost just broke down and cried of happiness. I felt zero pressure doing anything. It felt as though I was obligated to post everything cool I did, so when doing those things, I'd do them differently just to fit the specific paradigm that I post in just to one up others. A feeling has left me that I hadn't identified before that I mistook as depression. I was growing more apathetic, sad, and cynical due to social media because it felt like every little thing I did was in competition in some form or another to others online, and when I failed, I just felt more isolated and lonely. I'm able to do things consistently without the need to constantly check my phone and compare that specific frame of my life against others. Facebook on the toilet, while cleaning, running, on the bus, at work, on the commute home, too much. The weeks following deleting my social media I got so much shit done so fast with no distractions. Absolutely amazing. I think I'll write a blog post about this. I bought a tablet, loaded my favourite books on it, and have filled in all my pointless social media time with reading. I'm actually discovering the city alone for the first time ever and it's wonderful because I don't care what anyone else thinks of what I'm doing, I'm doing it for me. I'm going to grow my beard, cut my hair, buying some jeans, buying some chucks, and then I'm going to relax in a field somewhere and just spend time not caring.
- moens 13y ago
  Beautiful, +1
- pessimizer 13y ago
  Social media creates a ton of new needs that it then proceeds to only partially, and unpredictably, fill. You're just realizing again that you don't really give a shit what your mom had for breakfast, unless you're talking about it with her to pass the time over dinner:) There's absolutely nothing that anybody has to say to me that can't wait a day (except "the site's down!")
  - rfnslyr 13y ago
    I'm going to get a t-shirt saying "Don't talk to me unless the site is down" haha. Yeah, trying to fill that void with social media is like trying to put out fire with napalm.
- pearjuice 13y ago
  Problem is that even though you visually deleted all that social stuff, the data still exists. There is no escape.
  - rfnslyr 13y ago
    You're able to "delete" your profile now, so that you have to create a new one and re-add everything if you want to go back. You have the option of deleting after two weeks of deactivation. Whether it is truly deleted on their servers is up for debate.
- computer 13y ago
  The irony of course being that Hackernews too is social media, and you still just "bragged" about the experience you had!
  - rfnslyr 13y ago
    Not at all. It's "social media" in that there's a comments page that you can interact with others yes but not much more than that. It's just a link aggregation and I don't know any of you even remotely intimately.
instaheat 13y ago
I do perceive an issue here. I just refuse to let - yet another - uncomfortable reality dictate the way I live. I understand what is going on out there. I'm just not going to be a martyr. Advertisers, go ahead and try to sell me something based on what you think I like. It won't work on me. It's a hail mary play. I guess what I'm really trying to say is I'm not in position to change anything so I suppose I can be thankful for the likes of Edward Snowden and companies that fight back far reaching government requests (Like AirBnb did recently) but I'm going to live my life and live it fully, challenging authority every step of the way hinging on the fact that I believe in the Bill of Rights.

m3rc 13y ago

I think it was more proving just how far you would have to go to really be untraceable, and that it's an essentially impossible goal for a normal person.

Zikes 13y ago

I'm not sure exactly what needs to happen before you'd take the issue seriously, but enough already has happened for many of us to be very concerned.

Amadou 13y ago

I like my friends, I like to travel, I like to do things. Effectively letting the government control your life because you are afraid of what they MIGHT do? Give me a fucking break. The problem is the reverse here. The "system" (i.e. our society in general) has been co-opted. It is profoundly wrong that a normal life in the modern world requires so much disclosure to unrelated 3rd parties. It's like the argument - if you don't want to be recorded, cataloged and tracked by innumerable license plate scanners on the road by the police, DEA, etc and private data-brokers like TLO [1] then you shouldn't drive. It's completely ass-backwards, the price of driving shouldn't be a permanent record of all your movements in innumerable databases that are anonymous to you. [1] http://www.forbes.com/sites/adamtanner/2013/07/10/data-broker-offers-new-service-showing-where-they-have-spotted-your-car/ http://www.forbes.com/sites/adamtanner/2013/07/10/data-broke...

Sagat 13y ago

That's the point they are trying to make. No normal person can hope to lead a normal life whilst escaping tracking.

Nursie 13y ago

The article had examples of what they do now. It's not a stretch that the rest can happen soon. Things should not have been allowed to get here.