Article: Life Without the Tech Giants

[maurvir]

[Ribtor]

More in depth than the usual articles on the subject.

The author has certainly set herself up for a challenge because she seems particularly dependent on the tech giants for her regular mundane activities.

[iDaemon]

I just today read her piece on a week w/o Microsoft. Good reporting.

[Ribtor]

I've read all so far and I have to wonder who ties her shoelaces for her. She must be exaggerating her dependence for the sake of the article.

[iDaemon]

Oh. You’ve read the latest installment then have you? The Apple embargo?

[Ribtor]

I did.

To me it's sad, dark, foreboding and even a bit pathetic and underneath the light tone is a very serious problem that will demand a reckoning.

[Betonhaus]

I thought it was strange how she was trying all of this really obscure stuff instead of just using a cheap laptop with Linux Mint and tracking down an old PalmOne on eBay (though a Z30 could be got easily for $50). I sorta understand she wanted all new stuff but it was still weird.

That being said I feel like I'm mostly platform agnostic and could switch to anything if i wanted to - though I don't want to because it'll be a hassle and the effort wouldn't be worth it that much.

[maurvir]

That being said I feel like I'm mostly platform agnostic and could switch to anything if i wanted to - though I don't want to because it'll be a hassle and the effort wouldn't be worth it that much.

You missed the point. These companies are so embedded into the fabric of the modern Internet that you can't avoid them even if you managed to cobble together your own web browser running your own hardware. Visit most any web site these days, and you will inadvertently visit one of these big 5 (really big 3, because you can block Facebook and Apple for the most part).

With so many sites being hosted on AWS or Azure accounts, it's going to get more and more difficult to avoid interacting with Amazon and Microsoft, and Google controls the "free" APIs that so many sites depend on for functionality that would otherwise cost a fortune (maps) or be hard to duplicate (search)

[juice]

As I use Firefox, it's interesting how many times Noscript blocks access to at least one of the big 5 on sites that seemingly have nothing to do with any of them.

[Pariah]

As I use Firefox, it's interesting how many times Noscript blocks access to at least one of the big 5 on sites that seemingly have nothing to do with any of them.

Install Privacy Badger and you will discover Google is everywhere.

https://addons.mozilla.org/en-US/firefo ... -badger17/

[gemstone]

Privacy badger is good, I use it too. Redirect Path is a good extension to see who wants want, as they state "find the source of online ads and see which third parties are tracking a given URL".

[dv]

As I use Firefox, it's interesting how many times Noscript blocks access to at least one of the big 5 on sites that seemingly have nothing to do with any of them.

Install Privacy Badger and you will discover Google is everywhere.

https://addons.mozilla.org/en-US/firefo ... -badger17/

We have internally hosted applications at work that pull google scripts over the public web to do traffic stats and analytics.

Completely defeating the purpose of having an internally hosted, supposedly secure tool, but I digress.

[Ribtor]

The final article tells of her experience cutting out all of the big five simultaneously. In the headline she describes it as "Hell" but in her final analysis she also describes it as a worthwhile and fruitful exercise that she intends to continue but in a more measured way.

[iDaemon]

The same folks are Azure
Ars Technica

In an unusual turn of events, Microsoft this week warned Windows users off from using its Internet Explorer and dissed its new Office 2019 suite in a series of videos that show it to be worse than the competition.
While Windows 10 uses the newer, faster, much more standards compliant Edge browser as its default, it still ships with Internet Explorer 11. Enterprise customers with legacy systems from time to time want to make Internet Explorer 11 the default, but Microsoft doesn't think this is a good idea. Internet Explorer 11 isn't being updated to support new Web technology (and indeed, hasn't been updated for many years), existing only as a compatibility tool to access legacy "designed for Internet Explorer" content that simply won't work properly in any other browser.

[Betonhaus]

The same folks are Azure
Ars Technica

In an unusual turn of events, Microsoft this week warned Windows users off from using its Internet Explorer and dissed its new Office 2019 suite in a series of videos that show it to be worse than the competition.
While Windows 10 uses the newer, faster, much more standards compliant Edge browser as its default, it still ships with Internet Explorer 11. Enterprise customers with legacy systems from time to time want to make Internet Explorer 11 the default, but Microsoft doesn't think this is a good idea. Internet Explorer 11 isn't being updated to support new Web technology (and indeed, hasn't been updated for many years), existing only as a compatibility tool to access legacy "designed for Internet Explorer" content that simply won't work properly in any other browser.

Well that article has a bit of a spin to it.

Microsoft doesn't want you to use IE because they want you to use Edge, which is a fresh start at making a secure browser and doesn't have any legacy code from Internet Explorer by design. Not entirely sure how switching to Chromium changes that, but the main thing is that Internet Explorer is obsolete and eventually will be dropped entirely. It would be like Apple telling you not to use mac OS 9 and you getting into a tizzy about it.

The Office 2019 this is a little bit clearer: they want you to use Office 365, which has Office 2019 plus a little bit of other stuff and if you stop giving Microsoft money you can't use it.

[maurvir]

Microsoft pushing Office 365 is a no-brainer. Rather than settle for a single payment for a perpetual license, they hook you for a subscription that will exceed that license cost in a few years. Perpetual revenue for Microsoft.

Which is why I am still amazed that so many people are buying in. I guess not having to deal with Office updates must be worth something, but damn.

[arkayn]

Microsoft pushing Office 365 is a no-brainer. Rather than settle for a single payment for a perpetual license, they hook you for a subscription that will exceed that license cost in a few years. Perpetual revenue for Microsoft.

Which is why I am still amazed that so many people are buying in. I guess not having to deal with Office updates must be worth something, but damn.

I did a four year subscription to Office 365 for $60, but that is the college price.

[dv]

Anybody who's not a college student or an organizational user is better off with LibreOffice, and that's fine, because those users weren't buying updated versions of Office anyway.

[obvs]

Yeah, LibreOffice is just fine and dandy.

[Pariah]

Yeah, LibreOffice is just fine and dandy.

Yep, LO is even over-kill for most things. I use Abiword most of the time. Simple and fast.
It's like with my photos. I do a good 90% of what minor editing I do in Pix even though I have The GIMP.

[iDaemon]

Well that article has a bit of a spin to it.

Here’s Forbes

Microsoft’s transformation into a modern, cross-platform business has one victim: its legacy services. Following news this week that Windows 7 is about to get a lot more expensive, now Microsoft has issued a serious warning about the once all-conquering Internet Explorer web browser… 
In a subtle-as-a-brick blog post called ‘The perils of using Internet Explorer as your default browser’, Microsoft has warned that using Internet Explorer is downright dangerous and the company goes so far as to no longer even describe it as a web browser

Wherein “SPIN”=“TRUTH” with quotes and everything.

[avkills]

Interesting article; and kind of scary at the same time. I've been trying to slowing ween myself off of Facebook. Right now I pretty much just open it up to look at stuff; but am seriously thinking about deleting it off my phone.

Nation is going to be in a world of hurt if the power grid ever goes out for a long period of time.

[juice]

I deleted the app long ago and only access the website to stay in contact with family via Ghostery. FB has proven that they cannot be trusted with your data.

[Ribtor]

Interesting article; and kind of scary at the same time.

The banality of subservience. The tone of the article is casual and the author doesn't seem to appreciate that her entrapment is not benign.

[iDaemon]

The good folks of Gizmodo have just the Rx echoing Ribtor’s observation here

https://gizmodo.com/how-to-completely-g ... 1832789295

[Ribtor]

The good folks of Gizmodo have just the Rx echoing Ribtor’s observation here

https://gizmodo.com/how-to-completely-g ... 1832789295

That was an ad for Google.

[iDaemon]

Aljazeera omits mention of Jobs’ “ice water in hell” and lets Windows marketing dude define legacy as the kicker. Ruining an otherwise decent retrospective piece.

https://www.aljazeera.com/programmes/fa ... 24457.html

[Pariah]

Aljazeera omits mention of Jobs’ “ice water in hell” and lets Windows marketing dude define legacy as the kicker. Ruining an otherwise decent retrospective piece.

https://www.aljazeera.com/programmes/fa ... 24457.html

I LOLed at the statement that with Jobs it was never about the money. A thread that runs thru Jobs entire career was the relentless pursuit of putting more money in his pocket starting with ripping off Woz, constantly pushing to up the price and down the specs on Apple's computers.