I have officially deleted my Amazon account and cut ties with their ecosystem entirely. For a long time, the convenience of Prime felt like a necessary evil, especially since they have a warehouse in my city and can do same day shipping. But I can no longer reconcile the big tech giant's behavior with the values I promote at Terminal Tilt. As a privacy advocate and FOSS supporter, continuing to feed the machine feels increasingly hypocritical.
Ethically, their treatment of labor is indefensible. Between the terrible warehouse conditions and the dark patterns designed to make canceling subscriptions nearly impossible, it is clear they view both employees and customers as numbers to be exploited, with contempt. Their anti-competitive practices have done irreparable harm to small businesses and independent creators who are forced to play in a rigged sandbox.
As an FSF and EFF member, I believe privacy is a fundamental right. Amazon's business model relies on massive data harvesting and a huge surveillance network that I simply do not want to be a part of. Deleting my account is my way of reclaiming my digital sovereignty and refusing to let my personal data be a product in their inventory.
The change also affects how I handle Terminal Tilt going forward. I am officially ending the use of Amazon affiliate links for the channel. While the links are a standard revenue stream for most creators, I refuse to track my audience into the Amazon ecosystem just for a small commission. I would rather the channel grow slower and more honestly than profit from a company that actively works against user freedom. Convenience is the enemy of sovereignty.
When I review products now, whether it is the security keys from @nitrokey , @yubico , and Token2 or open source hardware, I will provide links to direct manufacturers or ethical, privacy-respecting retailers instead. Convenience should never be the primary metric for our choices.
If you want to support my work on Linux, privacy, and the #NoAI movement, I encourage you to use my LiberaPay or Ko-Fi links. Supporting creators directly ensures that the content remains independent and free from the influence of the Epstein class and corporate overlords. You can find all my direct support links on my self-hosted Linkstack: https://links.terminaltilt.com
It feels good to be out. It is time to prioritize people and principles over same-day shipping.
#DeleteAmazon #AmazonBoycott #Amazon #Privacy #FOSS #Linux #TerminalTilt #EthicalConsumerism #Ethics #InfoSec #Yubikey #Nitrokey #Token2 #2FA #MFA #Surveillance #SurveillanceCapitalism #DigitalSovereignty #SelfHosting
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, and discussions on the state of computing.