"The saying is true: If you are not paying for the product, you ARE the product." - "Brains may just get in the way." So true! I like your voiceover, Radical.
"So, that’s why I have little respect for the professions of lawyers, politicians, journalists, and celebrities. One way or the other, they are selling."
Hello Radical I. I really like what you say, both here, and on your About Page.
You rightly call to awareness, (what we all know), Big Tech. makes Billions but we pay them nothing.
Your first premise is that we buy what they advertise. (And I do appreciate it when you say, "PERHAPS you think you’re more independent minded than that.") Of course I do think that??? And I don't really buy very much of anything. Even my phones were given to me used, when someone did buy a new one.
Your second premise is that they sell our personal data. My data alone is worthless, but aggregated with many millions of others, it is proving to be worth the price. That takes us back to your first sentence: "Manipulating people is easy."
Actually an Internet advertisement is a computer program, (like buttons are programs too). With it, the platforms go-around their privacy statement, because "how can we be responsible for our advertisers"? They watch what your are reading and writing, monitor your searches, and record all the pages that you access. But "they" are confined to the browser that they were opened on. So the way to foil them is called "browser isolation". I have a half dozen (privacy, like Brave) browsers and each is dedicated to a different task. Big Tech is confined to only one corral. Delete cookies often also.
The question is where do we go from this awareness? I know quite a bit about privacy through experimentation, but most people I know are into heavy denial, even though they have known for a decade that Google collects data. But there are many more subjects that just privacy.
With discussion we can share ideas of how to live life with less intrusions, and still have all the fun that we are entitled to.
Thanks for an intelligent, knowledgeable comment. I guess that's why you go by Why Not Think.
I don't fully condemn the advertising and influencing that goes on. They have a right to do it, at least within reason. What bothers me is the huge numbers of people who aren't even aware that they are being manipulated. As you have alluded to, there is little that the manipulators and influencers can do to get us to go along, if we are aware of their process, and refuse to go along. It's the sheeple who are the problem. And they tend to be college bred liberal arts majors. I feel entitled to say that: I have a master's degree in educational administration.
I think that we have to go deeper than the term "Sheeple" to get to the bottom of this.
What is the temptation to blindly follow all the fads, both with consuming thoughts and with consuming tech gadgets? Well the gadgets are kind of amazing, and free too, or almost free. Everyone knows that we are being profiled, for decades. The myth is that of your first premise, that they are just preparing the best ads for us to look at. Really no cost (as of yet), so - I have this giant dossier that knows orders of magnitude more about me than I know about myself. (I forget: It does not forget.)
Well wait if you ever get called into court, (even through a mis-identity), and they ask you, "what did you mean when you said this in an email 13 years ago"?
____________
What happened to John David McAfee, perhaps an outspoken rouge. He must have had a lot of compromising data on our leaders. Perhaps his anti-virus was really a spy program. Anyhow he said countless times, if I ever commit suicide, it was murder. He was caught through data leaks, even though he was an expert. I think he allowed an interview in a secret place, but the journalist took a picture which was published. All pictures have hidden metadata which includes the location. That fingered him, and later he was "suicided" in captivity.
When more cases like this go public, people might begin to be wary?
(By the way, take a screen shot before uploading photos, that strips all metadata.)
"The saying is true: If you are not paying for the product, you ARE the product." - "Brains may just get in the way." So true! I like your voiceover, Radical.
Thanks!
"So, that’s why I have little respect for the professions of lawyers, politicians, journalists, and celebrities. One way or the other, they are selling."
Oh, this whole essay is so quotable. Good one.
Thanks!
Hello Radical I. I really like what you say, both here, and on your About Page.
You rightly call to awareness, (what we all know), Big Tech. makes Billions but we pay them nothing.
Your first premise is that we buy what they advertise. (And I do appreciate it when you say, "PERHAPS you think you’re more independent minded than that.") Of course I do think that??? And I don't really buy very much of anything. Even my phones were given to me used, when someone did buy a new one.
Your second premise is that they sell our personal data. My data alone is worthless, but aggregated with many millions of others, it is proving to be worth the price. That takes us back to your first sentence: "Manipulating people is easy."
Actually an Internet advertisement is a computer program, (like buttons are programs too). With it, the platforms go-around their privacy statement, because "how can we be responsible for our advertisers"? They watch what your are reading and writing, monitor your searches, and record all the pages that you access. But "they" are confined to the browser that they were opened on. So the way to foil them is called "browser isolation". I have a half dozen (privacy, like Brave) browsers and each is dedicated to a different task. Big Tech is confined to only one corral. Delete cookies often also.
The question is where do we go from this awareness? I know quite a bit about privacy through experimentation, but most people I know are into heavy denial, even though they have known for a decade that Google collects data. But there are many more subjects that just privacy.
With discussion we can share ideas of how to live life with less intrusions, and still have all the fun that we are entitled to.
.
Thanks for an intelligent, knowledgeable comment. I guess that's why you go by Why Not Think.
I don't fully condemn the advertising and influencing that goes on. They have a right to do it, at least within reason. What bothers me is the huge numbers of people who aren't even aware that they are being manipulated. As you have alluded to, there is little that the manipulators and influencers can do to get us to go along, if we are aware of their process, and refuse to go along. It's the sheeple who are the problem. And they tend to be college bred liberal arts majors. I feel entitled to say that: I have a master's degree in educational administration.
I think that we have to go deeper than the term "Sheeple" to get to the bottom of this.
What is the temptation to blindly follow all the fads, both with consuming thoughts and with consuming tech gadgets? Well the gadgets are kind of amazing, and free too, or almost free. Everyone knows that we are being profiled, for decades. The myth is that of your first premise, that they are just preparing the best ads for us to look at. Really no cost (as of yet), so - I have this giant dossier that knows orders of magnitude more about me than I know about myself. (I forget: It does not forget.)
Well wait if you ever get called into court, (even through a mis-identity), and they ask you, "what did you mean when you said this in an email 13 years ago"?
____________
What happened to John David McAfee, perhaps an outspoken rouge. He must have had a lot of compromising data on our leaders. Perhaps his anti-virus was really a spy program. Anyhow he said countless times, if I ever commit suicide, it was murder. He was caught through data leaks, even though he was an expert. I think he allowed an interview in a secret place, but the journalist took a picture which was published. All pictures have hidden metadata which includes the location. That fingered him, and later he was "suicided" in captivity.
When more cases like this go public, people might begin to be wary?
(By the way, take a screen shot before uploading photos, that strips all metadata.)
.