I have lots of old friends who I only maintained sparse contact with. When I let my personal email address die (the address they would all have records of), I did not bother to update them with a new address.

They are all on the platform of some surveillance capitalist (e.g. Google or Microsoft). Google & Microsoft both refuse connections from self-hosted residential servers. And even if they didn’t, I am not willing to feed those surveillance advertisers who obviously don’t limit their surveillance to their users but also inherently everyone who makes contract with their users. I cannot support that or partake in pawning myself to subsidize someone else’s service.

I just wonder if anyone else has taken this step.

  • soloActivistOP
    21·
    7 months ago

    It’s not enough. You have to follow the money (if you are an ethical consumer).

    A boycott no longer simply means to not buy products or service from. When you supply profitable data to a harmful entity, it’s as good as giving them cash.

      • soloActivistOP
        22·
        7 months ago

        Or you could say that by neglecting to boycott and participate in activism you are neglecting to participate in society.

        “Activism is my rent for living on this planet” –Alice Walker

        Activism is our duty.

        • fckgwrhqq2yxrkt@beehaw.org
          3·
          7 months ago

          Sometimes you have to stay connected to have any chance of saving the others. It gets a lot easy to take advantage of everyone if those that can see through it just leave.

          • soloActivistOP
            1·
            7 months ago

            Sometimes you have to stay connected to have any chance of saving the others.

            This is not that. In this particular situation remaining connected to the surveillance advertisers only reinforces through codependency the idea that people can centralize themselves on those platforms to count on being reachable by everyone. That’s not the right msg.

            Being the one hold out is a strong position. There was an academic group of people on FB that I had to corresponded with. When I refused to appear on that platform, everyone was forced to step outside of FB to reach me thus making them consciously aware of the problem. I wouldn’t have it any other way. Taking the pushover stance only proves to them that it works to choose the side of the monopolistic oppressor.

            Indeed it makes sense for a privacy advocacy org to have a Facebook acct to reach those people. But most of them get it wrong and needlessly advertise FB on their public website. Which means they’re not just using it for outreach.