I don't even mind subscribing to 404media, as I feel like their operation makes sense. But there's no way I'm going to pay to read some sponsored content on a page riddled with trackers.
Yeah. Sites like CNET and TechRadar seems completely uninteresting at this point. Wired and the Verge seem to have done a better job at transitioning into reporting on how tech affects society, which is much more interesting. 404media seems to be doing well in that business.
The leading article of the Verge at the moment is on what is real in the age of deepfakes, relating to war and disinformation. Wired writes about "All the ways big tech fuels ICE and CBP". 404media runs a story about how "CBP Tapped Into the Online Advertising Ecosystem To Track Peoples’ Movements". Meanwhile, CNET is headlining how "Apple's new MacBook Air is faster. It also costs $100 more", and TechRadar tells us about "the seven best gadgets we have seen today". I cannot even imagine caring. I wouldn't even have cared back when I did care.
Besides, if a tech site does their job these days their readers will not be using Google any more at all.
Gaël Duval, the lead developer behind /e/OS, has been recommending an app called Zettle on his blog. It at least work on degoogled /e/OS, probably GrapheneOS as well. I have no personal experience as I prefer sticking to cards.
This is probably a much more efficient "mention of the fediverse" than if the journalist had started trying to explain that there is this federated network of independent social media sites bla bla bla.
The people reading this are looking for something they can understand. I expect naming Mastodon and leaving it to them to check it out will convert more people than if they started trying to explain what it is.
I'm a bit weirded out by all the attention given to w-social.eu by mainstream media, though. First of all it doesn't exist yet, second we have no reason to believe it will actually be decent, third we have good reason to believe it won't be.
The neat thing about algorithmic social media is that content relating to suicide and self-harm inspires a lot of interaction among teenagers, causing it to be shoved in their faces whether they search for it or not.
Suicidal teenagers are not searching for suicide material on Instagram; Instagram is feeding suicide material to regular teenagers for ad views.
I don't fully understand this shit out of a lack of really caring, but wouldn't it be fully possible for an "AI agent" to create a crypto wallet on its own, scam some people to get money into it, and then just lose access and have the money pretty much just lost?
And if that happens, where does the money go? Into crypto "stock" in whichever coin it invests in?
He does some good things and some bad things. Don't fall for simplistic thinking where everything and everyone is either good or evil.
When fighting to tax the rich, Macron is not an ally. When fighting to regulate American big tech he can be an ally, and it would be stupid not to use him as such.
It's all about the marketing and nothing about the technology or company.
I opened google for the first time in months (years?) to check out the results for "best private browser". Predictably, the AI overview confidently responds as follows:
The best private browsers in 2026 for enhancing online anonymity and blocking trackers are Tor Browser, Brave, and Mullvad Browser. For maximum privacy with high security, Tor is top, while Brave is best for daily, fast browsing. Mullvad is ideal for anti-fingerprinting, and LibreWolf offers excellent privacy for Firefox users.
I would be very surprised if Brave did not at least at some point sponsor content to position itself as privacy oriented. This hidden advertisement then bleeds into both AI and human armchair experts with no deeper understanding of the tech they're commenting on. And so the myth that Brave has good privacy becomes self-enforcing.
Unrelated edit: Answering "why is firefox bad for privacy", Google AI becomes oddly self-hating:
Firefox is often considered "bad" for privacy by privacy-conscious users because, despite its pro-privacy marketing,it collects significant user data by default via telemetry, relies on Google as its default search engine, and has updated its privacy policy to allow broader use of user data. While superior to Chrome, its default settings are not "privacy-maximalist," necessitating manual configuration.
We pretty much all agree the US sucks here, you're trying to argue the mass murdering mess of the USSR somehow didn't also suck. Whataboutism won't help you.
But the evangelical Christians want the Jews to trigger the rapture by fighting the final huge war in israel, and I imagine the antisemites are also fine with the Jews all being sent away to israel for then to be sent off to fight a senseless war to their deaths.
Somehow they managed to start off from different angles and both end up wanting Jews to die.
When I started using Linux in 2009 it had around 0.6 percent market share on desktop. Windows had 95%.
Today Windows is measured below 68%, and Linux has been measured above 4% by statcounter.com.
These things move faster the more people make the change. Linux only reached 1% in 2013, 2% in 2021, 3% in 2023, and 4% was somehow first measured already in 2024. For every single person making the switch it becomes easier for others to do the same, and companies consider Linux support to be a little bit more important. One can only wonder at which percentage of market share it will be offered as a mainstream alternative when buying a new computer, but it seems pretty clear that we're getting there.
I guess my point is that we all won when you ditched Windows. Thanks for that.
I don't even mind subscribing to 404media, as I feel like their operation makes sense. But there's no way I'm going to pay to read some sponsored content on a page riddled with trackers.