kbal

joined 1 year ago
[–] kbal@fedia.io 164 points 1 month ago (8 children)

The discourse about Mozilla is ridiculous, here and most everywhere. You've got people taking every perceived opportunity to attack them for things they do, things they didn't do, and things it's imagined they might've done. And then another crowd of equally determined people doggedly defending them for every idiotic blunder they make, such as this one.

Meanwhile Mozilla itself has nothing substantial to say. This is not the first time a prominent extension has mysteriously gone missing from amo with Mozilla telling us nothing about its role in the incident. @mozilla@mozilla.social needs to be in the discussion giving us a real explanation of what happened, why they got it wrong, and what they're doing to improve things.

[–] kbal@fedia.io 2 points 1 month ago (1 children)

The agency said that Evil Corp's ability to translate their criminal proceeds into real spending money was as important to their success as their technical exploits.

May their example serve to remind us all that the surveillance state must forever continue to expand until we finally attain the ideal financial system where criminals are no longer able to transform money into money.

[–] kbal@fedia.io 2 points 1 month ago

If you can't handle the shocking reality of someone choosing unusual pronouns to refer to themselves, fediverse may not be the social media for you.

[–] kbal@fedia.io 7 points 1 month ago (1 children)

It looks like your opinions about Linux are outdated and need an update.

[–] kbal@fedia.io 4 points 1 month ago

Indeed. But cups-browsed isn't necessary in order to be able to print things, it's for automatically discovering new printers on the network.

[–] kbal@fedia.io 6 points 1 month ago (2 children)

cups-browsed <= 2.0.1 binds on UDP INADDR_ANY:631 trusting any packet from any source

Well that would explain why I didn't have it installed (although I did have other parts of cups until jwz coincidentally reminded us two days ago that it can all be removed if you don't have a printer.) I clear out anything that opens ports I don't need to be open. A practice I would recommend to anyone.

[–] kbal@fedia.io 2 points 1 month ago

It's the "always will" where I disagree. This society we've built isn't anything close to sustainable no matter how much lip service is given to the idea that it should be. What can't go on forever, won't.

[–] kbal@fedia.io -1 points 1 month ago

Wait, what? You think they're not planning on getting paid for providing this data to advertisers?

P.S. It looks like Mozilla's Data Privacy FAQ is going to need updating. It doesn't even mention this stuff. As the noyb complaint points out:

  1. The Respondent does not provide any information at all in its privacy policy with regard to "PPA". Neither in the general privacy policy (enclosure 9) nor in the privacy information for Firefox (enclosure 10) is any relevant information apparent.
  1. The last update of the Firefox privacy policy took place on May 13, 2024.
[–] kbal@fedia.io 1 points 1 month ago (2 children)

I would say it's more of a desperate attempt to continue the current paradigm of online advertising which deems indispensable the kind of data about conversion rates to which the industry has become accustomed, despite the recognition that their current means of collecting it must come to an end.

But either way, it's incompatible with the principles of free software. Users are not meant to put up with features that are there for the sole benefit of someone else; someone they might normally consider an adversary. The only incentive we're given to participate in this scheme is one that resembles blackmail. Except it isn't even advertisers saying "do this, or we'll spy on you like usual" — it's Mozilla saying "do this, and maybe we can persuade a few of them not to spy on you as much, and to give us a cut."

They are selling behavioural data about their users to advertisers. People are not going to be happy with that no matter how they try to spin it.

[–] kbal@fedia.io -4 points 1 month ago (4 children)

They added a feature to track conversions among Firefox users for online advertisers. Selling it as a "paradigm-shifting boost to online privacy" while accusing others of pushing a misleading narrative is absurd.

[–] kbal@fedia.io 11 points 1 month ago (7 children)

There certainly are many people who seem suspiciously eager to find fault with Firefox. But it's not really a surprise when its authors do things like this. They chose not to make this feature opt-in because they know that nobody in their right mind would opt into it. There is no benefit to the user in it, only risk. Mozilla seems to be leaving us to go off and join the advertising industry instead. People feel betrayed, and it feeds the cynical nihilism that comes so easily to social media users under the conditions of late capitalism.

[–] kbal@fedia.io 3 points 1 month ago

Fucking garbage article and headline.

You got me to read the thing, just to see what could possibly be so offensive about it. It's a pretty good summary of the situation for an audience that might not be too familiar with Canadian politics. Don't blame the messenger.

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