This is a reminder to lemmy users, that this new meta expriement will use the ActivityPub protocol, meaning that it can interact with other lemmy instances, please urge your lemmy instance admins to de-federate from this crap as soon as it launches!
I run a pair of PiHole instances for DNS on my home network, and I periodically check the logs and look up blocked domains that I don't recognize. Every single time, it's a service that provides telemetry for mobile apps. It's insane how much data apps try to collect.
I bet they said something like "we don't use most of that information, we just need access in case we add a new feature in the future that uses it". And then it'll come out that they've always been using it, and it's been associated with your identifying info. And then their server will be hacked (because the admin password was "meta123") and the all the info will leak. The modern internet sucks.
It's gratifying seeing this because usually when I see these kinds of worrying data permissions it's because a service I really want or need is being held hostage until I agree to this false choice and I have to start figuring out whether there's some way around this or if I'm going to have to embarrassingly explain to someone why I can't use this service they expected me to sign up to.
But then I see this and it's for something I'd never want to sign up to anyway and it's just like a list of dodged bullets. 😎 So nice to just laugh at their bullshit.
If the general public was just aware of how much privacy they lose by downloading these apps, companies like Meta would never be able to get away with stuff like this.
That's a big nope from me lmao. Mastadon seems to have alot of the important accounts I follow from Twitter. Liking it so far, no algorithm playing with your feed, no corporate advertising (unless you subscribe to it), no blue checks spreading insane conspiracies.
Are people really going to sign up for another Meta site? I'm sure as shit not. I finally deleted my Facebook account a couple weeks back, and I'm feelin' free!
I've said it here before and I will say it again: Facebook and Google's entire approach to ads from data is based on an incorrect assumption of using enough data to build a profile on a person to predict what they are going to be interested in, when if you stop and think about it, it doesn't make any sense: people's needs will always change with circumstances at the time, ex. no amount of data in the world will help you predict whether I'll want a burger or Thai food for lunch tomorrow even if you do the digital equivalent of creeping on me outside my window and digging through my trash can. If you want to know what people want to buy, why not ask them?
Unfortunately, they've deluded themselves for more than a decade with the lie, so now the rest of the world also think that internet ads by them actually works.
I'm not going to rag too hard on Facebook here because most thing has been said by others already, but I will say that since literally every single one of their social media product took the same approach of maximize data to sell things, why is it that they are all losing people and their most successful place at selling things is actually Facebook Marketplace?
This. We're all bashing on reddit but the reason why I went to reddit and then here was to take a break from meta-owned social media. They don't only take and sell our data, they also exploit small businesses and creatives by making them pay or post several times a day for "visibility" (translation: not to be shadowbanned) without providing anything back.
Not defending this, but isn't this basically also what Instagram (and every other mainstream social media app) takes? Doesn't make it right obviously but considering 99% of users for this thing are coming from Instagram/Facebook in the first place Meta already knows everything about them anyway.
When Instagram replacement on Fediverse? Fediverse also needs youtube replacement. Lets go all the way and hit these greedy mfers where it hurts. Unfortunetly my dev skills are poor, but I can offer moral support.
Can anyone explain how these are different from the data Meta already collects from its Facebook, Instagram, and Messenger users? I've been slowly moving my online presence away from Meta products, but I feel like Threads isn't going to do much better than BlueSky, or Hive, or Post, or even our beloved Mastodon.
On android you can take away all permissions though and it still works fortunately. On my phone i didn't give it one single permission. Or is there some way to gather sensitive data anyway for the app?
Dude I have a step counting app that doesn't even need that shit. It just goes off the gyro. Definitely have no reason to be giving a social media app access to that shit.
They're the same as for Facebook and Instagram and since this one is perhaps most geared towards existing Instagram users, there won't be much more data given because you've probably already done it.
Because this information is very valuable to advertisers who want to target to customer base. If Meta sells them the users who happen to be X, Y, and Z and also happen to be searching recently for a similar product, Boom they’ve got themselves a likely customer. Much easier than advertising to the masses and hoping 0.1% will bite.
It’s all about discreet money making. The advertisers and Meta only care about how to make money off you.
To this day I have refused to download messenger for mobile since "needing it" is totally bullshit since you can just hit "view desktop site" in Chrome mobile. Won't ever get this bs either.
Absolutely laughable that all these corporate dumbasses are tripping over themselves to explain why their platform is more user friendly but even with near unlimited resources to build a decent product Meta et al still can't figure out a way to justify their existence without quantifying and selling their users' private behaviors
Smells like a failure. The reason people use twitter was it is the only one that is twitter by then, now we have thousands of twitter-alike, why bother to join an ads server, XD.
I was somewhat optimistic about this app given that they were embracing federation, felt like an important milestone like when AOL had to stick a full featured web browser in their app. But this is just gross. Don't want to be a data slut for Zuck.
Twitter has the same amount of required permissions tho. Of course it collects a lot more data than any fediverse application or site but for proprietary software its about average
On iOS at least, a lot of these (location, contact info, health & fitness, etc), you can deny access to via a popup prompt when the app tries to access them.
It’s a Meta app though so at a bare minimum it’s absolutely going to track the heck out of how you use the app.
Absolutely laughable that all these corporate dumbasses are tripping over themselves to explain how their corporate platform is more user friendly but even with near unlimited technical resources to build a decent product Meta still can't resist the allure of quantifying and selling every element of the human existance
I’m actually excited about Threads because it supposedly uses ActivityPub. I know all my non-techie friends are going to use it and I should be able to participate from my self-hosted Mastodon instance.
Seriously, I'm curious how it goes. Meta can pour an insane amount of money into this, but that didn't work for the Metaverse. People already use IG as a Twitter replacement anyway, and Twitter itself just left a lot of people in a bad taste in their mouth.
So I would predict this doesn't have much of a place anywhere, but who knows.
😟 Shiettt, do I have to delete my Instagram account? I only use it to stay "connected" to old friends.
What about using the Instander app which is what I use to access Instagram? Is it still the same privacy invasion?
L Oh Fucking L. Horrifying that people will just give all this information to a company that already has class action lawsuits against it for data mishandling, without even giving it a second thought. People are dumb.
I have a request to any mods/admins/instance owners reading this:
You might get some mileage by putting sticky posts up, ideally in as many communities as possible, warning users about using Meta's app. Make it so every time a Meta user comes and checks us out, they're reminded, over and over, that Meta is spying on them. Repetition gets the message into people's brains!
"Did you know Meta's app watches and times your doomscrolling, and phones home to Meta to tell them which stories caught your eye? It records everything you type, even what you go back and delete, and sends that home to Big Brother. Consider using a spyware-free app, here's where you can get them..."
It's a lot of Info but knowing it's planning on using the Fediverse is pretty cool, Glad that everyone should be able to use there own platform / application that they prefer using. Sure a lot of people might end up using Threads due to it being 'Main Stream' but if people on things such as Lemmy & Masterdon can access all the features that Threads and other platforms are wanting to add in, then I see this as a win.
I deleted Facebook over ten years ago, and I told everyone I work with that it was about shit like this. Nobody cared. To this day, I have nothing but contempt for those folks. I don't work there any longer, and I don't regret losing touch with those people... Some people just want to watch their own world burn.
yeah, that's why i'm making another account on Threads. i'm super excited for Threads though. large social networks are good for some things that Mastodon/Lemmy/etc will never be good at, by design.
if i had to pick a single platform to use, it'd be Mastodon. but i don't have to pick a single platform.
As much as I dislike Zuck, Mastodon will not scale to millions of users. Normies need their thing too. I don't use Twitter but I do like to view Twitter-like posts for news. If BlueSky or Threads go mainstream, that's good for normies.