You must log in or register to comment.
When I moved in with my partner her ex had left Amazon devices all over the house. And one of the first things I did was get rid of them all.
My phone and tablet are the only ones I’m willing to take a risk on, and I just have to hope they respects my permission settings. I have to actively press a button before Google Assistant starts listening.
But I have a ton of developer/tech friends that act so unworried about it all, usually Apple users primarily just like the author talks about smh
What surprised me the most with this announcement is how it was met with surprise and harsh reactions. People felt betrayed.
I would just call that naivety. Of the (average) consumer.
Not sure why they chose “geek” here, maybe we just have different definitions of that.
Calling Alexa users “geeks” is like calling McDonald’s diners “foodies.” Like, it might be true, but all current evidence to the contrary. Like if you wrote an article “Foodies are upset that McDonald’s is adding HFCS to their barbeque sauce.”
Geek has always just meant an enthusiast or connoisseur of some topic. But anyone who remembers the cultural cachet of “ThinkGeek” et al in the 00s will recall how the term became synonymous with a consumerist obsession of new tech gewgaws, and other “brainy kid” toys. Like being a gearhead, but about nothing in particular - just the toys.
Anyway, that association has forever stuck in my head, and probably many others’.
I mean, if we’re being pedantic, geek was a term for a specific circus performer who would eat gross things and hammer nails into their faces. Anything to gross out the audience. The term expanded to mean “weirdo” over time, and became associated with the term “nerd.” It has further evolved with the popularity of the phrase “geek out” to mean someone with strong enthusiasm for a specific topic. That’s the most recent popular definition of the word.
Either way, any legitimate “geek” would already know that they shouldn’t expect Alexa to respect their data privacy.
I suppose I walked into that one with my phrasing…
I think they’re using “geek” here to mean “fan,” but I agree that being a geek implies a level of fandom or interest that these “wounded fans” don’t have, or else they’d know more about these corporations they’re stanning.
I think a better word would simply be “fan.”
it probably shows their age.
nobody that grew up in the 1980s would use geek the way they are in this blog
Since like 2000s geek means mindless consumer of tech, pop culture and toys
Most spam is not “black hat spam”. It is what I call “white-collar spam”: perfectly legitimate company, sending you emails from legitimate address.
Sounds like they’ve never used an email that’s been leaked… I use an old email address for things I know are going to spam me, and the volume of “black hat spam” it recieves is way more than the “white-collar spam”.
We are talking hipster geeks and not informed geeks, i presume?
You might be surprised how many informed geeks will defend mass surveillance until their last breath, if it’s built with or adjacent to a technology that they feel connected to in some way.
I think most of them mean well, but unrealistic idealism and naïveté are definitely in play.
Ackhshully - it’s “GDPR”
I get what is said about Apple however, I think there’s proof at the moment that Apple does protect their users privacy. Like when they wouldn’t help the FBI get into that guy’s iPhone. And the recent stuff with UK.
Advance privacy protection seems the real deal. Of course unless you self host everything you always have to trust that the service provider is being honest about not having access or using your data.
