@dennyhenke Unfortunately it's like whack a mole. 25 years ago I remember trying to boycott companies and it was difficult then. At the time it seemed there were a few campaigns showing which companies were linked to each other. Now it's a million times worse. We're all so reliant on the worst of them it's nigh on impossible to free yourself. We just make excuses to ourselves and carry on in guilt.
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Where can I switch my google account to?
@FatherEnoch
I would suggest proton.me or tuta.com. Both offer a free account. Proton also offers an encrypted cloud drive service with document features, similar to google docs. Both are based in Europe and are privacy focused. Both offer fairly low-cost email plans for around $4/month. Between the two I'm using Proton a bit more and will be using them in the future.
Could I at least DECLINE the "cloud drive service?"
One drive was put on my last pc when I did NOT ask for it, and now I'm constantly getting emails threatening to wipe my files if "I don't renew" a service I never asked for.
@FatherEnoch Oh, I'm not sure. I think they (Proton) include it but you certainly don't ever have to use it. It's just there in the background. It's not put on your device at all. By default it's a cloud service you can access via the web. They do offer apps you can install on your device but you can just stay with the web.
Both services also include contacts and calendars if you want to use those.
@dennyhenke it's often possible to record the sounds during the playback without breaking any DRM. It takes as long as playing those audiobooks but it's not absolutely vital for someone to be there while playing back.
So if you have an audiobook you can "save it" by recording it, digitally splitting the audio stream.on Linux you can do it with pipe wire, here is how you record Spotify:
https://gist.github.com/KarolTrzeszczkowski/d3359e692733da2dbda2a0518612724c
You could probably modify it to record Amazon stuff.
@dennyhenke
META needs to be included in this. FB & Insta are just as much a scourge on our future as amazon, google & ms. We need organizing spaces that dont use META services.
If you feel you need to or just want to, use Windows you can do so with a local account rather than a Microsoft account.
https://www.techbout.com/switch-microsoft-account-to-local-windows-11-71385/
@the5thColumnist Yeah, I've seen that mentioned and I'm glad it's still an option. I've read though that Microsoft keeps making it more difficult to accomplish a local account.
I came over from the Mac side but the M1 Mac I still have no longer connects to iCloud. But for myself, I've found GNU/Linux a great experience and it's privacy by default with no built in ads, promotions, forced upgrades, etc. I greatly appreciate that I don't have to work against a company to control the OS.
@dennyhenke I add Apple to that list. Yes, they have a few great privacy features but the level of integration they provide across services and devices is a lure and the gulag for developers of apps quickly drained me.
@ottomate 100%. I've posted a lot about boycotting Apple, thought I'd give them a break today. lol. I'm actively boycotting them and have happily switched to GNU/Linux. Mint and Trisquel are fantastic user experiences.
And the more I hear about the newest version of macOS, well, I'm starting to feel a little sorry for the Apple folk that don't know what they're missing out on.
@dennyhenke I'm so glad you can afford to do that.
@johnbloor @dennyhenke That should be the way, unironically. It’s not all or nothing and it’s not a competition (though if people want to make competitions about it, have at it, whatever gets it done for them.) The more we can each do the more that gets done, and the more blazed the trail becomes for others. The fact that we’re here on mastodon proves alternatives can be developed.
@cwicseolfor @johnbloor
I think the more we talk about our efforts the better. Online, with friends and family... we need to build a culture of action and resistance. I say that about those of us in the US specifically. We've been so passive in our ethics and over active in our consumption.
Working together, encouraging, strategizing, sharing what works and doesn't, seems like a fairly easy and productive way to move forward. But I do think we in the US have all just gone along for the ride, reinforcing the worst behaviors more often than not. In every way possible, we have to turn this ship around. We have decades of inattention to make up for.
One of my mental hobbyhorses putting its nose over the fence —
Wealthy circumstances reward individualism; patchy unpredictable circumstances reward cooperation. This is so general that I found out about it studying grassland rodents, and then had someone in business economics give it a name, and it happens in small scales over and over in human history.
1/2
@dennyhenke @johnbloor Changing the norms pivots the people “just along for the ride,” too. It starts with making it easier for the interested non-trailblazers to follow along with somebody else’s tutorial or copy their notes; then it grows and becomes how families and households and neighborhoods and municipalities might do things as interest grows & the used path becomes worn, then paved, then lit and widened into the main highway.
For this reason I also love pointing out the immediate personal benefit - research on ecological buy-in showed people were more likely to respond to electric car marketing (not a “solution” but readers-along, let’s not lose the forest for the trees) if posed the idea of “never paying at the pump again” … & then subsequently took up the idea of it being an ethically-motivated choice. Whatever the motivated reasoning, behaviour changed. Tilting the table in favor of the right thing being the easy thing to do - the popular, accepted, “done” thing - gets people moving.
Afford to do it? That implies that you think I have a higher income. I live well below the poverty line. No medical insurance. I keep my cabin at around 58° during the winter. I buy food in bulk to save money while still eating fairly healthy food. I'm 56 and my income has been below the poverty line for all of my adult.
That's not a complaint, it was a choice. I've built a life based on the idea that I did not want to consume more than my share of global resources. In my practice, ethical consumption is a lot of things including not engaging in over consumption which is counter to the US way of life. I definitely fall outside of the usual American lifestyle. Perhaps that makes it easier for me. But it also means I generally live on far less.
I'm willing to do without products and services I probably didn't need to begin with. I work and finding alternatives for the things I absolutely do need. But I don't kid myself about what I need and what I want.
@dennyhenke Team 58°! What is it about that temp that makes it the lower bound of comfort at rest, I wonder? (Also team bulk food, etc.)
I believe the proper terminology for this kind of voluntary reduction is “badass,” I don’t recall if I followed you for this or some other solarpunkism, but it’s seriously affirming to see people considering from first principles what a need actually is.
@cwicseolfor Badass! Ha, yeah, I like that. And, to be honest, I don't disagree. There IS something kinda badass about voluntarily choosing to do with less comfort in an effort to be more fair and more just.
US folks have gotten very, very good at ignoring basic ethics regarding consumption of resources in the global context. Hyper-consumption, consumption for the sake of consumption, has become the norm. But, that's capitalism and in many ways the US is the core of global capitalism.
@dennyhenke I am well on the way, though it's taking time.
@dennyhenke Unfortunately it's like whack a mole. 25 years ago I remember trying to boycott companies and it was difficult then. At the time it seemed there were a few campaigns showing which companies were linked to each other. Now it's a million times worse. We're all so reliant on the worst of them it's nigh on impossible to free yourself. We just make excuses to ourselves and carry on in guilt.
I don't agree. I'm not saying it's easy but just boycotting a handful of the big ones named here would be a significant step. Not only that, but were we to elevate the boycott as a tool to be readily adopted, it might, over time, change the culture.
In general folks in the US have been far too passive about their ethics and being vocal about them. We quit everything before we even try. I think that's pure bullshit. Action is inconvenient and so people just shrug and pretend there's nothing they can do.
We've got to flip that table and throw it across the room.
We've got to take action on every possible level. Boycotts, general strikes, all of it. ALL. OF. IT.
The time for laying down because we don't want to be bothered should never have been a thing. As a result we've gotten this moment of fascism. Billionaires that have learned they can get away with anything.
#Boycott #Action #ICE #Fascism #Tech #US #GeneralStrike #Amazon #Google #Apple #Microsoft #Meta