• Blizzard@lemmy.zip
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    9 months ago

    Which is illegal in the EU and about to be illegal in Australia ¯\_(ツ)_/¯

    • Dasnap@lemmy.world
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      9 months ago

      The company said that it will still have opt-out controls in “select countries” without specifying which ones.

      • a4ng3l@lemmy.world
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        9 months ago

        Opt-out is still illegal in many cases… a lot must be opt-in based. Typically consent must be freely given.

        • jmcs@discuss.tchncs.de
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          9 months ago

          It depends if someone bothers to sue them or not. In the EU court decisions until now point that profiling for advertising should be opt-in not opt-out but companies keep trying to find loopholes or at least hoping to not attract too much attention with their defaults.

          • IsoKiero@sopuli.xyz
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            9 months ago

            In EU no one individual needs to sue them. The what-ever-the-office-might-be-responsible at EU burecracy will just send them an nicely worded letter that says “play by the book or we’ll give you fine big enough to bankrupt you no matter how much money you think you have”. The fine is based on company revenue (or sales, I don’t remember what it spesifically was) and there’s no way you’ll weasel yourself out of that no matter how many american lawyers you can hire. The same folks forced Apple to adapt usb-c, so good luck Spez if you try to challenge that.

            • BlueBockser@programming.dev
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              9 months ago

              One small correction: There is no EU office responsible for GDPR enforcement, the EU member states are responsible for handling GDPR breaches within their jurisdiction (Art. 51 GDPR). As an individual you can also file a complaint against offenders (Art. 77 GDPR).

      • library_napper@monyet.cc
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        9 months ago

        OK but next year it will be illegal in the EU under thr DMA. It’s illegal regardless of opt-in or opt-out.

    • YⓄ乙 @aussie.zone
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      9 months ago

      Australia? How ? Isn’t Australia one of the five eyes country? Like more the data these companies collect its better for Australia.

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        9 months ago

        This may or may not be illegal, depending on what the “this” is you’re agreeing to. As a simple example, if it is “you agree to functional cookies by continuing to use the site”, that’s fine. If it is “you agree to us scraping your computer and selling everything we find to China”, that is most definitely not legal, nor is refusing service if you don’t agree.

  • archchan@lemmy.ml
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    9 months ago

    Oh nooooo who could have seen this coming… anyway continues using Lemmy

  • Voyager@psychedelia.ink
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    9 months ago

    Is reddit owned and operated by a malicious entity? I used to be addicted to that platform, but now I can’t stand it.

    • zero_gravitas@aussie.zone
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      9 months ago

      Here is how platforms die: first, they are good to their users; then they abuse their users to make things better for their business customers; finally, they abuse those business customers to claw back all the value for themselves. Then, they die.

      I call this enshittification, and it is a seemingly inevitable consequence arising from the combination of the ease of changing how a platform allocates value, combined with the nature of a “two sided market,” where a platform sits between buyers and sellers, holding each hostage to the other, raking off an ever-larger share of the value that passes between them.

      From https://pluralistic.net/2023/01/21/potemkin-ai/#hey-guys

      • ilikecoffee@lemmy.world
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        9 months ago

        Do you think maybe it’ll be different with a federated and thus less centralized platform like Lemmy? Or do you think it will just delay this process? Cause right now lemmy and kbin seem to be pretty good.

        • zero_gravitas@aussie.zone
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          9 months ago

          I think that the FOSS Fediverse platforms are significantly resistant to enshittification.

          That same article explores what enables enshittification and what precludes it:

          The Netheads wanted to build diverse networks with lots of offers, lots of competition, and easy, low-cost switching between competitors (thanks to interoperability).

          Fediverse platforms:

          • are highly interoperable - e.g. you can use Lemmy or Kbin and still see the same posts
          • mostly FOSS, so anyone can fork them whenever they want if they don’t like some particular change
          • most instances currently aren’t operated for profit - certainly if your instance started displaying ads you could switch to another instance (or set one up) and still access all the same content as you did previously
        • yacht_boy@lemmy.world
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          9 months ago

          There’s no business platform here. So it will go a different path. Buy eventually the mods and instance admins who are volunteering their time and money to keep this going will wish to spend their time and money elsewhere. What happens after the first round of people who really work to make a free platform like this succeed go away? If there’s not a good deal of planning and acculturation for new people, there’s a high likelihood that a second generation of mods takes over who have different motives and reasons for running the place and the platform sees noticeable changes. Or nobody steps up at all and individual sections just end.

          • jmp242@sopuli.xyz
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            9 months ago

            I honestly think the only way this could work is like email. So you either take the gmail like privacy destruction and ads, or you pay for a service. Back in the day it was bundled by the ISP, but now I think it’s way more likely to end up being some bundled ‘online service’ company that for a monthly fee provided a swath of federated content and services. But that it hasn’t sprung up implies that it’s not a workable model.

          • ilikecoffee@lemmy.world
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            9 months ago

            I mean the mods and admins won’t all go away at once, right? It’s probably gonna be gradual, so maybe the existing mods can keep any new/replacing mods in check? I dunno…

            Plus, do you think maybe a donation model could be viable for platforms like this? It’s split over multiple instances so surely at least the smaller ones could be ran off of donation money?

            • yacht_boy@lemmy.world
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              9 months ago

              Hard to say. My experience with people in general is that they’ll keep going even if things aren’t great, but they’ll get upset. And eventually things will come to a head and there’s a major change in a short period of time. This being a somewhat democratic platform, I would bet that we’ll have that sort of trajectory.

              As for donations, it’s just very hard to get people to donate enough and often enough to support this kind of thing. Think of the regular donation appeals on public radio, or Wikipedia, or even The Guardian. They have a whole organization and system built around soliciting donations, and even then they are always operating on a shoestring. How often do you donate? How often do your friends and family?

        • redcalcium@lemmy.institute
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          9 months ago

          In fediverse, the data is already public. You’ll just need to run an instance, start federating and the data will flow directly into your instance. Whether someone will somehow find a way to extract profit from this system is remain to be seen.

          • zero_gravitas@aussie.zone
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            9 months ago

            Whether someone will somehow find a way to extract profit from this system is remain to be seen.

            I think it’s inevitable that someone will find a way to profit, even if it’s just scraping the data for training LLMs, or for something like those shitty sites that just duplicate GitHub issues.

            The question of enshittification isn’t whether someone can find a way to profit, it’s whether someone can find a way to change the platform to increase their profit.

        • Dulusa@lemmy.world
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          9 months ago

          As long as humans are involved and we are looking at a long enough timeframe, the answer is probably always yes.

    • UlyssesT [he/him]@hexbear.net
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      9 months ago

      Is reddit owned by a malicious entity?

      Always has been.

      astronaut-2 astronaut-1

      As with many things under capitalism, the ongoing mandate is that profits must go up, and must go up at a higher rate no matter what, or investors panic and the price drops steeply which can lead to a collapse. Reddit is just another ravenous profit-seeking vehicle of the same kind and is going into the same “line must go up” death spiral.

      • Amputret@lemmy.dbzer0.com
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        9 months ago

        I wouldn’t say Reddit always has been owned by a malicious entity, Aaron Swartz was a cool guy. And if you’re telling me a man who freely distributed thousands of needlessly paywalled research papers is a some kind of arch capitalist, then there’s no helping you.

        • fox [comrade/them]@hexbear.net
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          9 months ago

          Swartz had good beliefs about freedom of information but politically was kind of a weirdo. What happened to him is an unlimited tragedy and outright criminal.

        • antonim@lemmy.dbzer0.com
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          9 months ago

          Swartz co-owned reddit for around 1 year, 2006-2007. His influence has overall probably been insignificant.

          • Amputret@lemmy.dbzer0.com
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            9 months ago

            True true, I just specifically took issue with it always having been run by bastards. (I know it’s a meme template, but I just wanted to point to evidence that there is hope that not everything we use has always been yoked with pure greed. Call it a cope, IDC.)

            • UlyssesT [he/him]@hexbear.net
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              9 months ago

              there is hope that not everything we use has always been yoked with pure greed

              If your basis for believing that is Reddit having one co-owner you liked for one year and that’s the best evidence you got, that isn’t a strong basis.

              You can do sophistic tricks like exaggerating other people’s positions to try to make yours seem more tenable so you can mine for supposed exceptions, but the reality remains that capitalism requires increasingly unsustainable profit margins over time for the lifetime of each product and that consequently results in systemic enshittification of things that were previously decent and bearable. That is an inevitable ongoing process in this present system.

        • UlyssesT [he/him]@hexbear.net
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          9 months ago

          then there’s no helping you

          That smuglord tone isn’t necessary.

          One co-owner being around for one year doesn’t absolve the skullduggery of the other that is still here to the present day, as another poster already mentioned.

        • kingthrillgore@lemmy.ml
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          9 months ago

          Honestly as a capitalist (I know, blasphemy) Aaron did the world a favor when he dropped those papers. Elsevier Wiley IEEE et al have a cartel and so many of them are NIH or DOD funded papers they should be public domain period.

          The premise of our system depends on controls to avoid instilled entries extorting capital. Capitalism isn’t: it’s feudalism with extra steps

          • UlyssesT [he/him]@hexbear.net
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            9 months ago

            Honestly as a capitalist (I know, blasphemy)

            Before you congratulate yourself again for internet bravery, do you actually own capital? Do you own the means of production? If not, you’re not a capitalist even if you wave pompoms and otherwise do apologia for capitalism.

    • saigot@lemmy.ca
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      9 months ago

      they are preparing for IPO, the most inherently malicious owner there is!

    • amio@kbin.social
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      9 months ago

      Certainly by a greedy one. Greed and stupidity are often better explanations than outright malice, but… yeah, they’re a bunch of assholes, too.

      • Kill_John_Lennon@lemmy.world
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        9 months ago

        I mean, I’m not denying they’re making wrong choices, and I’ve left Reddit myself, but given that they’re losing money I don’t understand how it’s considered ”greedy” to try and change that.

    • Bluefold@sh.itjust.works
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      9 months ago

      The largest owners are Advance Publications and Tencent. Advance also own Condé Nasty (Reddit even used to be under the Condé Nast banner). Weirdly they also own everyone’s favorite plagiarism detection service Turnitin.

      • ilikecoffee@lemmy.world
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        9 months ago

        I know of Tencent and the controversy about them… I don’t know anything about Advance though. Are they also controversial?

      • Catradora-Stalinism☭
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        9 months ago

        how much does tencent actually own? I could swear they only bought company stocks and not direct controls over reddit.

  • Gamey@feddit.de
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    9 months ago

    Uhm, that option was intreduced by sites and ad networks because the GDPR requires it so unless they plan to shut down buisness in the EU it’s probably going to fail!

    • TheSaneWriter@lemmy.thesanewriter.com
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      9 months ago

      The company said that it will still have opt-out controls in “select countries” without specifying which ones.

      I’m guessing that’s how they plan to get around that. They will leave the toggle enabled for people registered in EU countries, and disable it everywhere else. A fairly risky way to handle it in my opinion.

      • Gamey@feddit.de
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        9 months ago

        Well, that’s certainly illegal too, the GDPR requires opt-in and while there is room for interpritation (see all the shitty cookie banners) if you enable anything by default it’s not going to fly!

        • kautau@lemmy.world
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          While that’s true, I’ve seen GDPR enforcement to be sparse, at best. Someone has a cookie banner and they aren’t questioned, but even if you “deny all” there is still spyware on the site. I will do the usual. Hope for the best, expect the worst

          • Gamey@feddit.de
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            9 months ago

            The method of “enforcment” for that part of the GDPR is awful but for a big and fairly hated player like Reddit it will probably actually work, some organization or competitor just has to file a formal complaint. There was some NGO a few years ago that filed cimplaints against various big players and got platforms like Twitch to fix their banners that way but idk what happened to them!

            • kautau@lemmy.world
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              9 months ago

              Oh yeah not saying it won’t make waves for something like Reddit, it just wish it was more actively enforced from reports

              • Gamey@feddit.de
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                9 months ago

                I couldn’t agree more, a single look at our newspapers in Austira reveals a sad trueth, even the good ones use illegal “consent or pay” cookie banners!

        • Karyoplasma@discuss.tchncs.de
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          9 months ago

          About the cookie banners: I heard some time ago that EU wants to force browsers to have an option to automatically decline all non-essential cookies because those banners are pissing everyone off. What’s with that plan, any updates?

          • Gamey@feddit.de
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            9 months ago

            The feature is actually older than any cookie banner (do not track request) but idk if the EU will overwork the law that way, it’s a miracle that it passed at all and I would be surprised if the loopholes aren’t made for some lobbyists in the first place!

      • DudeDudenson@lemmings.world
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        9 months ago

        Something that always pissed me off is that while I might not be living in the EU currently I’m still a citizen but companies get to just fuck me over anyways?

    • samus12345@lemmy.world
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      9 months ago

      I still read some niche subs from time to time, but I don’t post or vote on anything any more. It could just be confirmation bias, but the comments do seem to be more full of assholes than before the API change.

      • linearchaos@lemmy.world
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        9 months ago

        Not that it’s not confirmation bias but I can confirm what you’re seeing.

        They lost a lot of active, enthusiastic, altruistic friendly people. I don’t think they’ve drawn in worse people, but there are less nice voices to balance out the vitriol. Under the circumstances there’s also less downvoting toxicity.

        I’m pretty sure it’s a real thing but how much it’s felt probably varies community by community.

        • samus12345@lemmy.world
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          9 months ago

          I also wonder if the combination of losing modding tools and mods being treated like garbage by reddit made them less enthusiastic about doing their (unpaid) job, too.

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      9 months ago

      I still check in to certain niche subreddits that don’t exist on lemmy. Those feel pretty close to how they used to. The other day I took a look at /r/all and… ooof. It’s very apparent quality has completely nosedived. Lemmy /c/all is a much better representation of pre-blackout reddit /r/all right now.

    • Omega_Haxors@lemmy.ml
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      9 months ago

      Sometimes I’ll check in to see if anyone’s asking me a question and it always just ends up being some random groyped up nazi posting vitriol on a comment that’s like, 3 years old. Now I don’t even get that because everyone’s either lost interest or jumped ship.

    • Adkml [he/him]@hexbear.net
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      9 months ago

      All the adds look like posts and all the posts are actually just adds now.

      Has anybody seen that shitty boomer comic that’s been boosted to the top ad space on every YouTube video for the last two weeks.

      Those have been the top post on comics for the last two days.

      It is primarily bots advertising to each other at this point and liberals circlejerking each other that they’re the good guys for “critically” supporting nazis.

    • stonedonkey@lemmy.world
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      9 months ago

      I’m actually surprised it’s still running, but it seems inevitable especially when they aren’t milking that sweet sweet af revenue.

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      9 months ago

      They cannot for now, old.reddit still drives a LOT of traffic for them and most of the reddit oldheads from what ive seen just use old reddit to surf the site, so if they’re not stupid enough to drive a huge part of their userbase away from their shithole to sites like lemmy and turn into digg 2.0, I don’t see old reddit dying for awhile but remember this is spez we’re talking about in the end, the self proclaimed Elon fanboi, so I cannot expect any intelligent decision from him.

      • empireOfLove@lemmy.one
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        9 months ago

        so if they’re not stupid enough to drive a huge part of their userbase away from their shithole to sites like lemmy and turn into digg 2.0

        HAHAHAHAHHA oh man that’s funny

      • LCP@lemmy.world
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        9 months ago

        According to Reddit last year, while only 4% of users are on old.reddit, 60% of all mod actions are carried out on it. They can’t get rid of it for now, but they are working on bringing updates to modding on new.reddit or newnew.reddit (nickname given by me).

        Early 2024 is the estimated rollout for this, so I’d say mid-to-late 2024 is when old.reddit is kicked to the curb.

      • Hotzilla@sopuli.xyz
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        9 months ago

        If those users are just dead weight to them, it makes business sense to even convert 10% them to their main ad filled product, and let the 90% go away. They want to go public and sell, they are definitely last stage of pulling a cash grab.

  • Renacles@discuss.tchncs.de
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    9 months ago

    The speed at which they are destroying Reddit is just impressive. Spez saw Musk taking a shit on Twitter on the daily and became inspired.

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      9 months ago

      As much as I want to hate Reddit’s management, this is not a move that will affect the average user too much. It’s really bad from a privacy standpoint, but a huge percentage of people don’t care too much about privacy (until it bites them). So this does (unfortunately) make ton of sense from a business standpoint.

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        9 months ago

        Yeah, this is no different from how every other social media platform operates. Unfortunately it’s just the way these websites make money to stay “free for consumers”.

        The only (distant) solution I can see will be the fediverse, paid for by UBI and decreasing server costs (i.e. green energy and tech breakthroughs)

          • tillary@sh.itjust.works
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            9 months ago

            Okay so what I really mean by UBI is the point that humans have successfully created an autonomous supply chain that keeps everyone fed and sheltered. AI has taken the majority of necessary jobs that humans do not wanna do, creating a surplus of resources that (in a utopia) even if 1% is distributed among the population, could be more than enough to keep fediverse software running on a server farm powered by green energy.

            I don’t mean some fox news version of UBI that they think just means higher taxes and everyone becoming fat and lazy.

            • Omega_Haxors@lemmy.ml
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              9 months ago

              UBI is a compromise made by neoliberals to distract people from socialism. In practice, it challenges none of the contradictions of capitalism and will, given enough time, decay into neofeudalism. Does the idea of your life becoming an enclosure sound like a utopia?

  • Steak@lemmy.ca
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    9 months ago

    Lol what ads. Old.reddit with Reddit enhancement suite and Ublock Origin. That’s the only way I ever browse Reddit anymore. I have never seen an ad on Reddit. If they ever get rid of old Reddit I’ll never go back there. As it is my Reddit usage has decreased by 95% since using Lemmy and never browsing Reddit any other place than my pc.

    • Event_Horizon@lemmy.ml
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      9 months ago

      I’ll bet cash that it’s only a short matter of time before old.reddit is shutdown and within 6 months of that happening Reddit access will be locked behind account login.

      • ItsMeSpez@lemmy.world
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        9 months ago

        I guarantee you the C-suite at reddit regularly kick themselves for giving into public backlash and keeping old.reddit. People weren’t happy with the redesign, but they would have definitely gotten used to it fairly quickly. Now, removing it will be another nail in the coffin they’re so desperate to build.

        • Event_Horizon@lemmy.ml
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          9 months ago

          I suspect you’re correct, although I doubt removing old.reddit will cause much of a stir.

          Notice how Reddit is releasing 1 shitty update every few weeks rather than all at once? By the time one shit update is released the vast majority of users have forgotten the previous one. Remember the API change? I reckon most of Reddits existing users don’t anymore. I suspect old.reddit will go the same way.

      • psud@aussie.zone
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        9 months ago

        The only thing keeping the main community that I still visit reddit for (not nearly often enough, since I only look at it on old Reddit) on Reddit is discoverability. People search Google and the Reddit community is in the results, so I don’t think they’ll make it log in to view

        That same community will probably leave the platform when old.reddit (with Reddit Enhancement Suite) is closed, unless Reddit actually adds comparable mod tools

        • DudeDudenson@lemmings.world
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          9 months ago

          A lot of sites show up in Google results and then force you to log in to actually see the content. I think most of them just get away with hiding the content a second after loading it in, that way the crawler bot still is able to see all the page but the user isn’t

          • Event_Horizon@lemmy.ml
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            9 months ago

            Similar to twitter.

            If I go to twitter mainpage I can’t see anything without logging in.

            If I go direct to a profile I see can’t see anything without logging and;

            If I go to a specific post, I can read the initial post but nothing else.

            That’s what I expect will happen to Reddit

    • Serisar@feddit.de
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      9 months ago

      Do you also get redirected to some random post with 2 up votes when you click on any i.reddit url/picture. I use the same setup and was wondering if I messed up some settings or if it reddit messing up the old interface.

    • mtchristo@lemm.ee
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      9 months ago

      But old reddit has changed a lot. Bringing it close to the newer interface.

      • for what ever reason sometimes even internal links inside reddit opens up a new tab with the new interface
      • Steak@lemmy.ca
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        9 months ago

        Old. Reddit still looks the exact same as it always has for me. I use Reddit enhancement suite so so maybe that’s it. Just turn off “use subreddits style” for every subreddit. Dark mode on. Ad blocker enabled. I don’t have the new tab issue. I can see that this won’t last forever though and eventually Reddit won’t exist to me anymore.

  • Anonymousllama@lemmy.world
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    9 months ago

    Who didn’t see this coming? Kill all good third party apps and funnel everyone into their dogshit, undercooked app and then leverage every metric and interaction for advertising

    • prole@sh.itjust.works
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      9 months ago

      Lol same… and I still feel dirty whenever I do it. Not because it’s porn, but because it’s reddit. Eww.

      • Omega_Haxors@lemmy.ml
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        9 months ago

        The reddit experience: Scrolling through someone just absolutely caked with human feces and going “ew, transphobic slur in the title”

      • lemick24@lemmy.world
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        9 months ago

        This is exactly how I feel. I wiped my primary account but not my porn alt, and I’m sad about it

      • empireOfLove@lemmy.one
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        9 months ago

        That’s the point.

        Advertisers hate porn. Anything that’s not safe and broad-appeal is bad for their image.

        • Omega_Haxors@lemmy.ml
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          9 months ago

          Our society sucks because advertisers would rather be associated with far-right fascists than content that like 90% of the internet is for.

          • uriel238@lemmy.blahaj.zone
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            9 months ago

            Advertisers are commercial.

            Commercial interests are capitalist.

            Capitalist interests are hierarchical.

            Hierarchical interests have to retain their structure either through deception or by power of force.

            As a Venn diagram its a bunch of concentric circles.

            The internet spreads information like California wildfire, which nullifies false notion about the failure of capitalist equity.

            So yes, fascist rhetoric, disinformation and obstruction of internet interconnectivity are the last recourses of commercial enterprises.

    • Ricaz@lemmy.ml
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      9 months ago

      No chance they will block out the entire EU market. They will probably just do the same as everyone else and make a specific EU policy.

      Actually I think Meta Threads is still not available in EU for the same reasons.

      • lud@lemm.ee
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        9 months ago

        The company said that it will still have opt-out controls in “select countries” without specifying which ones. It mentioned in a blog post that users won’t see more ads but they will see better-targeted ads following this change.

        • sunbeam60@lemmy.one
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          9 months ago

          The “selection” will all be yellow stars on a blue background. Can’t wait to see Vestager tear them a new one. Heeeere’s the EU, legislating your aaaaass!!

  • Danny M@lemmy.escapebigtech.info
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    9 months ago

    If we’re serious about transforming the conversation around this issue, we’ve got to be more intentional with the words we choose. Let’s call a spade a spade: labeling them as “personalized ads” is a gross understatement.

    It’s more than that. It’s like someone constantly lurking behind you, watching every move you make, and getting into the private spaces of your mind. It isn’t mere content tailoring—it’s relentless stalking and a brazen assault on our psyche.

    We need to call it what it is.

    • TWeaK@lemm.ee
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      9 months ago

      It’s theft is what it is. Personal data has value - so much value that companies like Google and Facebook have used solely data to become some of the wealthiest businesses in the world. These companies take our data for free, tell us it’s so worthless it isn’t worth paying us, and then they make pure profit. We might not know how to do what they do with the data, but you can’t build a car without paying for the nuts and bolts; we should be paid our fair share for every data point they collect.

      • query@lemm.ee
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        9 months ago

        we should be paid our fair share for every data point they collect.

        And every time they sell it, every transaction it leads to.

        • TWeaK@lemm.ee
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          9 months ago

          I think a flat one time fee per access is fine, so long as it’s proportional to the sales they make. Data has a value with respect to time anyway, new data is more valuable than old data, even if the data is the same, so it’s not like they’ll just be getting it one time.

      • whoisearth@lemmy.ca
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        9 months ago

        People on sites like this really need to understand that for good or bad we are a vocal minority. People by and large understand “if you aren’t paying for it you’re the product”. Many people have come to terms with this be it reddit, or Facebook, Amazon, Google, etc.

        Does it make it right? Or course it doesn’t.

        But I seriously don’t know, outside of a serious privacy breach involving hundreds of deaths, how do we effectively change the narrative in a way the masses can not only consume but understand?

        I’m in my echo chamber here but at the same time I’ve come to terms that if it’s online expect it to be sold and nothing is private.

        • TWeaK@lemm.ee
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          9 months ago

          I disagree with you there, what people need to understand - the masses in general - is that this is a completely new and deeply flawed way for human beings to trade value between each other. One where the things one party is giving up are poorly defined, and they don’t get anything in return or have any room to negotiate. Hell, it isn’t even really a transaction, they just invite you in and then rummage through your pockets.

          We have a long-established set of rules for forming deals, called contract law, that we’ve developed over thousands of years. Mass commercial data collection flouts the core principles of this.

    • whoisearth@lemmy.ca
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      9 months ago

      I agree with you but let’s cut the hyperbole please? It is not “a brazen assault on our psyche”. Ain’t no one of sound mind seeking out a therapist for trauma because reddit changes it TOS.

      • blandy@lemmy.ml
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        9 months ago

        I think they are an assault on free will. Ads aren’t well reasoned arguments for the purchase of a product or service; they’re whatever they need to be to get you to change your behavior. If they have to scare, shame, trick, etc. they’ll do it.

        • whoisearth@lemmy.ca
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          9 months ago

          Just out of curiosity how old are you? My sense is your opinion is probably shared by those younger people who came of age during the beginning of the death throws of cable.

          I’m not saying your opinion is wrong for you. But I’m 46 now. I grew up inundated by commercials. They have always done all those things you mention. We were raised in an environment where media literacy included commercials allowing us to better see and smell the bullshit. Maybe that is what is lacking?

          They are definitely not an “assault on free will” as you put it. Advertising is one of the oldest industries known to man and it will continue to exist and evolve.

          That said, you are very correct in that it has gotten worse in recent years. This is predominantly (I feel) because government has stopped regulating specifically what is marketed to kids (thanks 1980’s!). There is also an angle that we stopped teaching media literacy like we used to.

          • blandy@lemmy.ml
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            9 months ago

            I’m in my late thirties, actually. I think the difference in the ads we were exposed to compared to young people today is that nearly all of ours were broadly targeted. ie there was no micro targeting or anything really tailored to the individual outside of direct mail. We all watched the same commercials, you know?

            Modern ad tech is much less “spray and pray” but as to what difference that makes vis-a-vis people’s ability to see BS, idk. I’d imagine the proportion of young people who are skeptical of advertising hasn’t changed much but the effectiveness of ads on those who are susceptible to it has increased. But again, I’m just talking out my ass here haha.

            But all ads share the goal of altering your behavior to their own ends. Isn’t that in and of itself a reduction of your free will? An idea or thought you might have had is supplanted by one placed there by an advertiser, right?

            • whoisearth@lemmy.ca
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              9 months ago

              Maybe this is where we differ then. I agree with everything you’re saying but at the same time in no way do I feel like my choice to choose is being taken away. I am not being forced to buy anything.

              • blandy@lemmy.ml
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                9 months ago

                No, you’re not being forced of course. But advertisers are absolutely trying to bend your decision making process towards their products. That’s how ads work, right? They ultimately want you to spend money on something. Not saying you’re like Homer Simpson driving down the road stopping to obey all the billboards, I’m just saying it’s the inherent nature of ads. I didn’t mean to imply anything else

      • Danny M@lemmy.escapebigtech.info
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        My intention wasn’t to equate ads with psychological trauma, but rather to emphasize the profound impact such invasive practices can have on our sense of privacy and autonomy. The terminology of ‘personalized ads’ can often obscure the magnitude of surveillance behind it. I understand that this might come across as hyperbolic to some, but it’s essential to articulate the depth of concern many feel.

    • Catradora-Stalinism☭
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      9 months ago

      transforming the conversation

      are we ever going to do shit about it or are we going to continue to sit and talk about the same thing over and over uselessly

        • Catradora-Stalinism☭
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          9 months ago

          lol I have yet to see barely a finger lifted by suburb libs to do anything for the rest of us

            • Catradora-Stalinism☭
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              9 months ago

              sis if you have the ideology of a suburb liberal while not being one, you are an even sadder motherfucker than I thought you were

              • Danny M@lemmy.escapebigtech.info
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                9 months ago

                if caring about privacy and not wanting companies and governments to watch everything you do is “the ideology of a suburb liberal”, then fine, I’m a “suburb liberal” lol

                EDIT: reading your profile you’re (in your words) a “Firm believers in Marxism Leninism, cartoons, and the need for Gulags” so I don’t think I will continue this discussion. have a nice day ^^

                • Catradora-Stalinism☭
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                  9 months ago

                  if caring about privacy and not wanting companies and governments to watch everything you do is “the ideology of a suburb liberal”, then fine, I’m a “suburb liberal” lol

                  strawman, love to see it. How is any of what you said relevant?

                  Im unapologetic about my love of Marxist freedom, I wonder why you feel the need to hide your ideology…