Only got advertisements, stopped watching TV. Only got unsolicited mail. Only use the postal service for receiving bills. Only got spam calls, stopped answering my phone. Only got spam mail, only use my email for signing up to stuff. Only got spam text messages. Stopped using text messages. Only got blogspam. Stopped checking the blogs. Only got promoted content. Stopped using facebook. I don't know if this merits yakety sax or a jaws music.
2 years ago 路 馃憤 mozz, lykso
@syntheist Hmm, I got 3 spam text messages just this morning. Due to the nature of how sms messages work, where it's very easy to spoof senders, it's not easy to block them either. But yeah, this isn't really me cutting out tech, so much as abandoning tech that's completely been overrun with various forms of abuse. 路 2 years ago
Well, there's value in staying in the loop to some degree, becoming a digital hermit, while okay, is maybe going too far. I also can't remember when I last received spam via text or call, it's been years, but I think Denmark is good in that regard. For me, not watching TV and uBlock Origin in my browser takes care of 99% of advertisements, which is good enough. And not using anything Facebook, ever, obviously. 路 2 years ago
I'll allow that trying to cut out all advertisements, to the point of keeping one's friends from trying to verbally sell to you, is likely a losing proposition. I don't think that you have to cut out *all* such things to keep a channel useful. But then, I also still use texting, email, and phone calls.
Creating a walled garden of communcation into which one only allows approved entities (and from which one can eject said entities at any time) seems like the most effective route one can take absent significant sociopolitical changes (which may bring problems of their own). 路 2 years ago
@lykso I dunno, maybe you can slow down the process in various ways, but I'm not sure it's even a technical problem. In the end, even person-to-person communication among friends can be affected by this effect (MLM, etc). I think it cooks down to the tragedy of the commons. We just can't have nice things. Anything that gets big enough to attract a crowd eventually becomes attractive as a substrate for selling stuff. Inevitably it goes overboard and then all the creative and interesting people leave for greener pastures, and it ends up like the dead sea. 路 2 years ago
The common thread: none of these forms of communication use cryptographic identities and whitelists. 路 2 years ago