OK, the pandemic has been ongoing for a while, now. Many of us moved their gaming online. What remains, after more than a year? And what about privacy?
In one of my gaming groups we had been using Skype for a while. It seemed that audio quality was lacking after a while so we moved to Zoom. I didn’t like that, but another group I was in also moved to Zoom. And we still use it.
In another two gaming groups we are using Jitsi. At least two Internet service providers I know run instances.
The benefit of Jitsi is that you don’t need a special client if you’re on your laptop – but you do if you’re on your phone as the website needs access to camera and microphone and that doesn’t work (at least it does not on the iPhone and iPad).
I’ll note that on my laptop Jitsi uses a lot of CPU power and the fans go crazy but there is no problem on the tablet with the app. That’s is why I prefer using Jitsi on the tablet, and that explains why I need the app after all. 😅
If the website fails us, we have also used conference calls with Signal. It worked surprisingly well but we also just had three people in that call.
Perhaps this is what I’m most interested in when playing online: smaller groups.
Let me go back to the privacy argument, for a second. You might think that it doesn’t matter in the context of games. But consider this: you shouldn’t have to weigh your rights against some convenience. All our rights should be honored, whether we need their protection right now or not. Otherwise, the window of acceptable behavior shifts even more.
Arguing that you don’t care about the right to privacy because you have nothing to hide is no different than saying you don’t care about free speech because you have nothing to say. – Edward Snowden on Reddit
And here’s how this relates to Zoom:
FTC said that Zoom claimed it offers end-to-end encryption in its June 2016 and July 2017 HIPAA compliance guides, in a January 2019 white paper, in an April 2017 blog post, and in direct responses to inquiries from customers and potential customers. In reality, “Zoom did not provide end-to-end encryption for any Zoom Meeting that was conducted outside of Zoom’s ’Connecter’ product (which are hosted on a customer’s own servers), because Zoom’s servers—including some located in China—maintain the cryptographic keys that would allow Zoom to access the content of its customers’ Zoom Meetings,” the FTC said. In real end-to-end encryption, only the users themselves have access to the keys needed to decrypt content. – Zoom to pay $85M for lying about encryption and sending data to Facebook and Google, by Jon Brodkin, for Ars Technica
I’m sure there are similar arguments to be found against Microsoft Skype and Microsoft Teams. Right now all I can find related to Microsoft Office, however.
Last week, the German state of Hesse declared that its schools may not legally use the Office 365 cloud product … It appears that the HBDI would rather not ditch Office outright, preferring to pressure Microsoft into compliance with German law. – Office 365 declared illegal in German schools due to privacy risks, by Jim Salter, for Ars Technica
Office 365 declared illegal in German schools due to privacy risks, by Jim Salter, for Ars Technica
#RPG #Privacy
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on my laptop Jitsi uses a lot of CPU power and the fans go crazy
I have found that Chromium works much better than Firefox with Jitsi (which is annoying, but if you’re using Firefox, switching is worth a try).
I’m sure there are similar arguments to be found against Microsoft Skype and Microsoft Teams.
Eight government institutions in Sweden recently decided that Microsoft Teams were not acceptable for their use. I think I read they switched to using Microsoft Skype instead, which is puzzling, but perhaps it helps that Skype originally was founded by, among others, a Swede 🙂
– Adam 2021-08-04 19:11 UTC
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I remember there being a Firefox bug in the early days of the pandemic that really messed Jitsi up. This bug got fixed, however, and then I uninstalled Chromium. For the moment I prefer using the tablet and the app. I trust them more than I trust the degoogling of Chrome.
I think that Skype for Business has the option of self-hosting the server in your organisation. Which is why I don’t understand business people upgrading from Skype for Business to Microsoft Teams.
– Alex 2021-08-05 05:21 UTC
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I stopped using Skype 8 years ago for just these reasons:
https://edavies.me.uk/2013/08/bye-skype/
– Ed Davies 2021-08-05 07:50 UTC
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Thanks for the refresher on the decline of Skype. Small startups trying to get rich by getting bought by big software companies, then developers working for the big company and the software product itself then dying somewhere along the way. That’s how it often feels.
– Alex 2021-08-05 09:07 UTC