Nostr Web Client

Ok, seriously time for a rant.

Your cell phone is no longer a phone. It is a tracking device, with lots of things to distract you from the things you should be doing. It's a fucking fidget spinner that also just happens to tell anyone who really wants to know exactly where you are and what you are doing. It is a digital collar, at the end of a wireless leash.

What happens when someone tries to call my phone number? Nothing. most times the bloody thing doesn't notify me, and the call goes to voice mail, where a computer records a message. Then I get an email that I have a message. So why the fuck am I carrying around a phone that is always powered on? So I might get a notification that I have a fucking email, that someone might have tried to make contact with me?

My wife really doesn't understand this. Her normie self thinks it is fucking normal to be available and interruptible all day and night. That is complete bullshit.

So why do I even carry my phone around at all? It is a fucking game-boy. I can do a crossword puzzle on it while taking a shit, instead of fucking around with a newspaper and finding a pen. It plays music in my car, and has maps. On my motorcycle, it shows my speed and RPMs, because the displays on the motorcycle itself are down by my nuts, and I don't ride around on my motorcycle looking at my own sack. On my boat, it displays nautical charts, GPS positioning and plotting, and speed. I can also check tide charts. In the grocery store, it keeps my store coupons organized and actually saves me money, but I question this a bit. And yeah, when I'm pretending to sit around and watch TV, I can play Mah-jongg, read shit on Nostr, and shitpost.

Are any of those purposes necessary? Nope. Not one. But some are really fucking handy. Probably the most handy are the maps and charts, MC displays, and maybe the coupons. The shittier part of this is the handy stuff is also the stuff that relies on mobile data and GPS, so going to WiFi only isn't a great option.

Does turning off my phone make sense? Not really. Just more bother turning it back on when I want to do something with it. I think I'll continue to just leave it behind more and more. That way the excuse "I didn't have my phone on me" rings true, because I rarely will have my phone on me. If I need it for something, I'll know where to find it.

But you know what I won't be needing it for? Phone calls. I'll see whatever came of those when I check my email next, which might be a few hours, maybe even a day or more. If you need something more urgently, come find me, or find someone else.

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Discussion

average_bitcoiner 2y ago

Maybe I should get a Graphene phone and do wifi only….

Sedj 2y ago

Worth considering.

bevo 2y ago

I knew this guy years ago before cell phones. His wall phone used to ring and he wouldn’t answer it. I asked why. He said it’s there for my convenience not theirs. To this day I have never forgotten.

cloud fodder 2y ago

That's the fun thing about #motorcycle with no nav, you just go down every road and get to learn all the roads eventually. A mind map, of where roads go. 😎🗺️🧭

mleku 2y ago

your motorcycle's display needs to be replaced. maps, really only useful if you are changing location frequently and even then. it really just reduces your rate of catching the gist of the geography because you are watching the phone the whole time.

the coupons, a cheap epaper device can replace for that, you can even get really cheap little things that are just big enough to show a barcode that you can program with usb.

the only mandatory thing for me on it is neobanks and those are mandatory because i'm itinerant, not really by choice. honestly, if it weren't for teh fact my bank is a bitcoin bank, and previously, neobanks, and the card had no balance functionality, i wouldn't have the phone as anything but a dumb modem at this point.

i mean, why do CCs not have a balance request functionality anyway??? seems pretty ass backwards to me.

Sedj 2y ago

Actually an annoyance that has come out of the ubiquitous nature of mobile devices and their tracking abilities is 2FA.

There are definitely 2FA maximalists out there. Also those that will tell you to never use SMS text as a 2FA option. Unfortunately, many services require some form of 2FA, and the worst of them require some interaction with a phone (unless you go to great lengths to subvert them). I'm lucky, I guess - I obtained a YubiKey, and I have a password manager that includes a TOTP authenticator that will run as a browser extension. Between those things and email, I can manage to find 2FA options that don't require my cell phone to be on or present.

₿itcoin 2y ago

Use a dumbphone as a starter phone, or maybe even wiphone, an open source VoIP variant that you can also use as walky talky.

Sedj 2y ago

So that sounds like good advice, dunnit? But what exactly is a starter phone? And what of the use cases I outlined would that really work for? And what about the annoyance of potentially having two phones to maintain, keep charged, etc. for different purposes? Whenever I really start digging in to the realities involved, it starts to feel like digging in quicksand, and I don't get very far.

At one point, I mentally walked through the steps needed to actually get a proper burner phone, as an early part of a larger exercise to create a full second "burner" identity (probably not a legal one, granted). It was a huge mess, and just creating enough geographic separation was going to take a lot of time (and gas money). It would also either piss off or alarm the wife, or both. In practical steps, I got as far as having a couple prepaid visa cards sitting around, that might not be easily traced back to me.

₿itcoin 2y ago

The one charges once in 3 or 5 days, its smaller and sturdier, isnt addictive and just does its simple job. Altough this would mean that in dome way the phone will give away your location via nearest cell tower "triangulation"(kinda like cornering). Keep that in mind.

Sedj 2y ago

"Does its simple job" - which is what?

₿itcoin 2y ago

Receive calls.

Sedj 2y ago

Right - but that is the one thing I don't really need done!

₿itcoin 2y ago

Then you need some else stuff. Relying on sms also is inherently not privste because of dependance on a central identity host and relayer aka phone service.

Sedj 2y ago

SMS is garbage, agreed. Err - actually not. SMS actually has some great use cases, but privacy isn't one of them. The best use case I've found is getting a message out to a monitoring party when I am in very poor coverage areas. SMS has usually done a good job of trying to send out whenever the phone detects even its most basic carrier connection. I think this has actually gotten worse, because now I see messages come back as "not sent", and I have to manually try and resend them.

Most messaging isn't very private. That doesn't mean it can't be anonymous. But relying on SMS - well, you'd have to be more precise on what you're relying on SMS to do.

₿itcoin 2y ago

Yeah true. I wondered if there might be opensource equivelants to those technologi

Sedj 2y ago

Ugh. This feels like programming. When faced with a confusing and mentally taxing situation, we look to see if anyone else has solved it for us. And then, especially in the bitcoin/nostr world, I think we've been programmed to hope that the solution is open source, like any one of us is going to go and read the fucking code, or make changes to it. It's a virtue signal. If I say I want an open source solution to problem xyz, then the bitcoinbros will like me, and the nostrgirls will think I am a dev.

Dude, this really isn't personally aimed toward you, I promise. Just something that sparked a fucking short circuit in my brainwaves.

Fuck this. I hope someone has the solution, and kept it themselves, and wants me to pay for it, and doesn't want to share at all. Then I can tell them to fuck off, and go about my day figuring out my best path forward, which probably isn't a solution to my SMS problem, that I don't even have!

₿itcoin 2y ago

Well, let me clearify my point of view here.

#Open-source is first of all important to see if there are no malicious codes in there. Indeed, not everyone is going to read the code (altough there should be special programs DESIGNED for inspecting and sniffing trough code) but it is also about being able to proof IF a corporation is doing shady stuff. We cannot easily prepare on how to get privacy on microsoft windows because we don't know what is in it. If we have strong suspicions that microsoft is installing crap in windows, like an AI (cortana) that listens to you, we cannot prove that Microsoft is actually doing that, they can just deny it or ignore it. With FOSS #Linux, we can actually prove to everyone if something is happening, giving the users a stronger position.

Secondly, being able to set up a program or utility without having to go trough the repeating process of asking for a license, or asking for knowledge, is more efficient. We don't have to pay a corporation to access an app or service, if we can just scroll trough the open-source code itself and duplicate that. Advancements can be made faster, like setting up independend networks.

Third, it is just a moral decision that decentralizes the abilities and knowledge of anything. It is more transparant, it is free, it is innovation focused and if it goes rogue, we can fork it.

₿itcoin 2y ago

And it also is less enslaving and less addictive.

Sedj 2y ago

I think most of that, for most people, is cope. but if it works for you, great. This last bit is nonsense, unless maybe you are saying that OSS isn't built with the intent to enslave and addict, and arguably other code is.

I like OSS too, but I think its strength is in its contributor group and the diversity it represents, and not every OSS project has a large diverse contributor group. For something like an operating system, you would hope that would attract many contributors - but for simple tools, perhaps not.

The other thing about Open Source that I like is even more philosophical - in that I don't think intellectual property should be a thing. Thoughts and ideas should be freely shared, rather than hoarded and protected and hidden. But on the flipside, I think the opposite about physical property. And source code is somewhat there in the middle. It is an idea that has been implemented into something, and someone did work to produce that product. So I would say my mind on this aspect of open source isn't entirely made up at this point; I could be convinced to see this a different way.

At the end of the day, I think I want convenience and utility. These are tools, we expect them to do something for us to improve upon the experience of doing similar tasks without. Often OSS is not the best of these things. Linux is inconvenient in how long it takes to learn, set up to your liking, etc. Other OSS tools are developed to optimize a specific utility, while a more general closed-source tool has broader utility (more features). I've found this especially true with map software. There is a convenience to working with one software, or one software company, across a broad suite of tasks, instead of having separately developed and packaged tools for each use case. Like for my automotive repair, I tend to buy tools from one supplier, and perhaps in larger kits. I haven't acquired each socket and wrench independently, although I definitely have some specialty tools. I might start with Craftsman, or a store brand like Kobalt, and then specialize into DeWalt or Snap-On.

Corporate closed source software tends to have a lot of utility and convenience because they are looking to attract the broadest market of people, so they add value by adding features for everyone. OSS doesn't tend to do this, and rather focuses narrowly on features, because the incentive to sell to broad markets isn't there, in most cases.

Ultimately I don't need the best tool for each use case, just something that gets the job done easily enough with the least amount of bother, and unfortunately, OSS isn't really aligned with this, at least not today.

₿itcoin 2y ago

I understand your viewpoint.

In my opinion, FOSS software empowers the user when they need it. And people who dont care about it being foss, might still care that their cpu is sucked up by a game that has gigantic amounts of background ads data collection. And then they can turn to people who are willing to check it out and be able to prove stuff if its open-source and otherwise not.

most FOSS software is definitively less bloated, doesnt try to keep you in the app, has no ads, etc etc. It is straight to the point and offers much choice.

On your opinion about source code being in the middle of the free for all and absolute ownership spectrum: I think that sourcecode is just information shared in a standardized package. It doesn't cost much to replicate it, like digital books and whatsoever. But it is information that is being shaped and constructed on a set of many many many many rules.

Also, digital things can almost always be replicated and thus be automated. Maybe there even are already programs that automate the interaction of other programs. Programs are in itself just automation codes for computer codes.

₿itcoin 2y ago

And I like it if a program is simple for only a few usecases, because it keeps it easy to find an open-source solution for almost any task. It also keeps unused parts out of the box.

a source familiar with the matter 2y ago

My precautions:

Taped over cameras

Faraday bag for travel/driving

Leave phone at home when walking/cycling

Keep cellular data off at home (using wifi)

Use Firefox configured for privacy rather than chrome

But what do I actually use the phone for?

2nd laptop (YouTube, email, nostr, etc)

Text (could do through laptop)

Voice (could do through laptop)

Android apps (could do through laptop)

Navigation (on occasion)

Photos (either at social events or just as an emergency device in case of car accident or the like)

So if I wanted to get rid of my cell phone I'd need a GPS (or just road maps and some more preparation) and camera (maybe disposable physical film camera if they still make & develop them, maybe a digital camera which must be quite cheap these days).

I would have some minor decrease in convenience in coordinating social meetings, comparison shopping, and voice calls, but these all seem quite minimal.

Honestly I'm tempted to ditch the cell phone after reviewing this in detail. I think I'll try enabling my text & voice to go to my laptop and see how that goes.

Sedj 2y ago

Fair, but why?

As you mention, the cellphone for you is essentially a second laptop. There are certainly reasons why having the utility of a laptop in a smaller form factor is a good thing - mostly portability. I actually rarely use a laptop, and never really got used to using a tablet, although I tried one for a little bit. For me, I can either use my desktop, or use my cell phone. My wife has managed to skip the home laptop/desktop altogether, and ONLY uses her phone. This works for her 99% of the time.

So why not ditch the laptop and keep the phone? Or fuck it, keep both? Maybe ditch the carrier service? It's really tricky, once you start actually thinking it through. We apparently are still expected, as human adults in America, to be able to provide a ten-digit number where we can be notified. This is stupid, but true. Ditching the carrier service means paying someone else for a 10 digit number. Yes, you can get them for free, but when you do, what are you giving up? Also, I have had my 10 digit number for 25 years. I'm a little attached to it, because that means that 25 years worth of personal and professional contacts have associated those 10 digits with me. Maybe I don't want to disappear from them, should they want to reach out.

All worth considering though. I wouldn't tell anyone here what to do, because my use cases, preferences, experiences, etc. are not anyone else's. The only thing I believe we should be doing is actually considering these kinds of things more carefully.

a source familiar with the matter 2y ago

My motivation is a combination of security, cost, and the obvious behavior change of having a device always at hand versus deliberately choosing to check voicemail

I don't currently own a desktop

My carrier also operates a web phone service - I should be able to switch from my number from phone to laptop pretty easily if I want to, and I think doing so would save some money (at least in the long run)

Marks 2y ago

This resonates. I also wear a smart watch that does even more to distract me. About three weeks ago I just made the decision to stop wearing it and I love it. Maybe I can find a way to reduce my phone usage as well.

kyle 2y ago

this is great. I'm turning off my phone today

Joe 2y ago

Why do you continue to use it in ways you do not want to use it? Most of the issues you describe are self-inflicted and rectifiable.

Sedj 2y ago

I use things because my expectation is that by using the thing, my overall experience and outcome will be better than than if I did not use the thing.

Sometimes, proximity has something to do with it, as would familiarity. And as I've pointed out, there are reasons I use a cell phone that might mean it is physically with me - so since it is with me, why wouldn't I use it for other things as well, even if it weren't the perfect thing to use, since I already have it with me?

Think of it like going camping. Are you going to bring every pot, pan, whisk, spatula in your kitchen, because those are what you would use to cook a small feast at home? Nope, you are going to only bring the fewest things you need to get the job done. That might be a tin cup and a fork. Are those the best tools for everything you plan to do with them? Nope, but they will keep you fed and hydrated.

How specialized we get with our tools is a reflection of our means and circumstance, as well as the attention and focus we bring to the task. If I live in luxury but don't have any interest in working on cars, I won't have an extensive specialized tool collection.

While some of what I stated was self-inflicted and rectifiable, once you start digging into solutions, it immediately becomes apparent that you are moving contrary to convenience, and suggesting specialized solutions that would require additional attention and focus, as well as perhaps the luxury of time to figure them all out.

PsySov 2y ago

Followed for more epic rants

0ZNCV 2y ago

lol excellent! 100%!

0ZNCV 2y ago

This is gold lol!

zhenya 2y ago

Long alphanumeric password and fast screen timeout it will make it so grateingly annoying you'll start reaching for the paper more.

Drop the biometric sign in. It makes accessing the thing too easy and is the root cause.