clara

op, it’s not just you, i promise. 🙂

i encourage you to watch this in it’s entirety. while it covers a different life story, it explores some avenues of what you are possibly feeling when you ask this question.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=HmI_VBp9QU0

google tries not to kill one of it’s products challenge (impossible)

the current solution for that would be similar to the current “sponsor block” plugins, here’s an example

crowdsourced start and endpoints for embedded sponsorships

something like this tool, but for future embedded google adverts

good bot

the “open source hackers” are always going to win this one, for a simple reason. if the data of the youtube video is handed to a user at any point, then the information it contains can be scrubbed and cleaned of ads. no exceptions.

if google somehow solves all ad-blocking techniques within browser, then new plugins will be developed on the operating system side to put a black square of pixels and selectively mute audio over the advert each time. if they solve that too? then people will hack the display signal going out at the graphics card level so that it is cleaned before it hits the monitor. if they beat that using some stupid encryption trick? well, then people will develop usb plugin tools that physically plug into the monitors at the display end, that artificially add the black boxes and audio mutes at the monitor display side.

if they beat that? someone, someone will jerry rig a literal black square of paper on some servos and wires, and physical audio switch to do the same thing, an actual, physical advert blocker. i’m sure once someone works that out, a mass produced version would be quite popular as a monitor attachment (in a timeline that gets so fucked that we would need this).

if that doesn’t work? like, google starts coding malware to seek and destroy physical adblockers? then close your eyes and mute your headphones for 30 seconds, lol. the only way google is solving that one is with hitsquads and armed drones to make viewers RESUME VIEWING

as long as a youtube video is available to access without restriction, then google cannot dictate how the consumer experiences that video. google cannot win this.

if you’re serious, then here’s two places i recommend to make a start on that train of thought

https://www.oecdbetterlifeindex.org should clue you in on which “advanced economies” might skew towards the life factors that interest you

and https://www.hofstede-insights.com/country-comparison-tool might help you narrow down which of these will be a better cultural fit

i’m aware there’s a lot of subjectivity in these two links but, it could help you make a start.

many people are great at saying “get me out of here” online, but not many people follow up that thought, and ask themselves “but where to?”

be one of those who answers the second question. start working on your escape today! 💪

you’re right, and i think that the thing that is being called out in the screenshot is not the money making per se, but the doom loop that everyone is forced to experience when trying to perform any basic information lookup using the internet in 2023. it goes something like this.

1. google “enshittification” to find that neat article you read a few months ago to post in a lemmy comment
2. first three or four results aren’t what you wanted, so keep scrolling.
3. click the result you want (beginning of doom loop)
4. “we value your privacy - so please click all the individual opt-outs, because GDPR didn’t say we can’t harass you with opt-outs to beat you into submission”
5. “subcribe to our newsletter! we definitely won’t leak this email to a third party”
6. “do you want to enable desktop notifications for this site?”
7. “this page would like to know your location (so we can serve you geo-targeted adverts)”
8. “get full access to our platform for xxx yyy price!” despite fake discounting being illegal in many countries
9. scroll down to start reading the first paragraph.
10. “…this is your 1st of 3 free articles this month. to receive 10 free articles a month, please register today!”
11. after dismissing all of this, you then scroll 2 paragraphs in, and find out actually, this wasn’t the article you needed.
12. press back on your browser a few times to wade back through all the privacy spam
13. scroll 2 more results down on google, maybe this next one was it?
14. goto 3. (you now repeat the doom loop)

this doom loop has to stop. yes, people and businesses need to make money under the current economic system we live in. but it doesn’t have to be like this.

but you know something? we all know where this is going.

some ““visionary”” san fran tech bro startup will have the “genius” idea of offering an interface between journo websites and customers, by offering a one-stop subscription shop. pay the tech bros once, they grant you access to all sites.

not unlike how uber operates as an interface between taxi drivers and customers, or how airbnb offers an interface between short term lets and customers, or how amazon offers an interface between cheap plastic vendors and customers, or how netflix operates as an interface between media content and customers, or how…

…the wheel turns.

yeah this is exactly the point lol. 😅

it’s so hard to escape out of the walled ecosystems because so much of our content is already written in these places, and so even if fediverse grows exponentially, it will still take at least a decade of content creation for “free/libre” content to outpace the old silos.

but we have to start now, to get to that future.

this comment is aimed at those future “just passing through” visitors, who are still on the fence with regards to the fediverse.

any internet power user will know, and be able to tell you that the internet feels wrong as of late. everything that you try to use is slightly broken for some reason. why is it becoming harder to use basic services that we took for granted 5 years ago?

unfortunately, the internet is changing once again, and it’s time to pick a side.

you can side with big corpo, stay in their walled ecosystems, and embrace enshittification.

or, you can side with the fediverse, break out of your silo, and take control of your own means of content participation.

the choice is yours.

if you like following concepts or “things” (reddit-style), then try here: https://join-lemmy.org/

or, if you prefer following individuals or “trends” (twitter-style), then try here: https://joinmastodon.org/

ahh that’s unfortunate. thanks anyway!

i do have a question, sure

for the avoidance of doubt, you are saying that a matrix bridge can copy all previous messages over from a discord server, to a matrix server, even the messages made before the creation of the bridge? i.e, transfer the entire conversation log over to the matrix server, going back all the way to the first message in a channel?

actually, phrasing this another way, i just caught myself in the XY problem. what i need really, is a copy of a given discord server’s content, onto a fresh matrix server. bridge or no bridge. is there any way to (broadly) copy and paste the content of a discord channel over to a matrix server, one time only. i know how to extract the discord content using the discord chat log tool, tokens etc. so, say i have one of those html files with the full chatlog and contents - how do i put that into a matrix server, and have it roughly readable? (if that’s possible)

thank you for your patience, i have tried search engines for months with no clear answers

this might be a good place for me to reach out into the void

i’m interested in migrating two of my servers over to a matrix server, but i also want to back-copy all the old messages to the matrix client.

does a matrix bridge do all this copying? i.e, if i was to setup a discord-matrix bridge, allow messages to sync, and then disconnect the bridge, does the matrix server then have a copy of all the old messages? it doesn’t have to match to the old users or anything, i’m just interested in having the content migrate over.

this is currently the biggest hurdle for me, because one of my servers is a private family discord, and i really don’t want to have to explain to my mum that “all the content of the last 4 years is gone” 😅

The so-called “spy clause” in the UK’s Online Safety Bill, which experts argued would have made end-to-end encryption all but impossible in the country, will no longer be enforced…

oh okay. so they’re still going to pass it into law anyway, and then pinky promise not to enforce it. right… 🤦

california is the largest “sub-national” economy in the world. if california was a country, it would have the fifth largest economy. bigger than the uk, or bigger than india.

if i had to guess, the answer is “success breeds jealousy”

thank you so much for this 🙂 i shall make sure to have soda with food from now on. and also, i can give fanta zero and coke cherry zero a go again (with full stomach) and see what happens lol. appreciate the work 💪

ah okay, i’m way out of my depth then. thanks for the advice

my specific problems are with fanta zero and coke cherry zero. if not the aspartame, then is there a possible cause that isn’t confirmation bias, or caffeine? i don’t have problems with other drinks with caffeine, and i should stress that i drink 2L of water a day regardless of whether i have a can of soda (in addition). i.e, it’s not headaches from dehydration either.

i’m willing to accept the possibility that i am an idiot and it’s just confirmation bias, but if anyone knows any other possible causes, i’d be happy to learn 🙂

another question i have regarding point #2, how much sugar is too much to cause the effects you mention (i.e in one can?). for context, i live in the UK, and most cans of soda are restricted to 16.5g of sugar for the whole can, because of a sugar tax. is 16.5g in one go enough to cause liver damage?

thank you for reading

the issue put bluntly, is that in federation, your data cannot be 100% safe. even if this instance is secure and perfectly private, if this instance is then federated, that federated data can then be copied and have anything done with it, or to it.

or, to phrase it in a way that opened my eyes to this, quoting from someone else a month ago, “what makes you think you’re in control of your data on any instance?”

oh that’s why some soda drinks give me headache 😐 i just realised all the ones that used to make my head hurt, were all zero/diet versions. i switched back to full sugar ones a while back, now i see why i did.

i guess it’s a choice between teeth rot or cancer. i’ll take the teeth rot lol

this is why

there is a very good chance that this project by meta is the thin end of the wedge

(edited to include “the blogpost”, link here)