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Thanks for the link, that’s a lot more context than the usual reactionary “Andy Yen said one nice thing about a Republican therefore he’s fascist pro-Trump MAGA” takes I’ve been seeing. Not only does it more or less disprove that narrative, it makes me question how much of the hate against him lately is genuine and how much of it has been seeded and signal-boosted by nation-state actors who don’t want people to use encrypted communications.
Yen is clearly trying to be nonpartisan and praise what he sees as good for privacy while pointing out abuses of power, regardless of who has the power at the moment. He sees this as his way of adding weight to the scale in favor of better privacy and tearing down big tech. I know many in my country and on the web are hyper-polarized and addicted to anger, to the point that if someone says anything even slightly positive about their perceived political enemy, it’s seen as legitimizing and aligning with that enemy, but I don’t believe that’s a healthy or productive mindset to have. I believe that kind of divisive attitude is preventing us from uniting with those who should be agreeable to our cause, and that’s exactly what the oligarchs want. It’s making us weak.
I’ve been on the fence for a while since this whole thing started, because I do use a paid Proton email, and it sounded bad, but I kept getting this nagging feeling I wasn’t seeing the full picture. That’s gone now - Andy may be politically and/or socially inept, and he may have a different perspective on what it means to support privacy and democracy, but I think it’s clear his heart is in the right place, and the work he and Proton are continuing to do for tech privacy is helping to erode authoritarian power structures, including Trump’s.
I am inclided to agree with you that Andy Yen is just an idiot and that Proton is doing it’s best to stay natural and make the most of the situation. However their communications team is pretty lackluster.
On another note, the article I linked is an opinion, so while it is laid out pretty well it is probably not telling the entire story. I have a custom domain on my Proton account so I can Switch if it ever goes to hell. I would advice you to do the same.
Yeah I looked further into the article and it indeed does not seem to paint the entire picture. Especially with the omission that Gail Slater worked for the Internet Association which is a lobbying group for companies like Google, Amazon, eBay, and Facebook after leaving the FTC.
And The Internet Association had been covered by EFF before highlighting some things they didn’t agree with.
The Internet Association—a trade group for big technology companies such as Google, Facebook, and Amazon—spent nearly $176,000 to lobby the California legislature last quarter, according to the Washington Post. It is now running misleading ads on social media asking Sacramento lawmakers to weaken the law.
The group claims that surveillance-based advertising technology, which slurps up and broadly spreads consumers’ personal data without their knowledge, should be exempted from the CCPA. In truth, surveillance-based adtech is one of the worst privacy hazards that the law was designed to stop. It also provides little benefit to online publishers, and erodes trust between companies and their consumers.
So medium article just glossing over who Gail started working for after leaving the FTC makes the omission a sign of incompetence or intentional. And who even is ovenplayer? We got no idea who this random person is so not covering the whole details because it might not support the agenda trying to be pushed just the approach they took questionable.
I haven’t fully committed to a new email yet to fully transfer over to, but I have been testing out tuta with it being one of the emails recommended by privacy guides. Still undecided though on what paid option to move to.
Tuta is located in Germany which is part of the fourteen eyes intelligence aliance.
Germany also had a conservative party and a far right party win the elections.
Not saying Tuta isn’t good or anything, just wanted to share the info I have about it which might be relevant.
Already well aware of the CDU and AFD. As long as nobody forms a coalition with the AFD not too bothered. Of course, if they do then it becomes a big problem.
Why
because their ceo came out as fascist and mastodon is calling them out.
I’m not super informed on that. Didn’t he say that he didn’t mean it that way? Could you clarify please? I wonder what other options there are? Tuta?
https://medium.com/@ovenplayer/does-proton-really-support-trump-a-deeper-analysis-and-surprising-findings-aed4fee4305e
Tldr, the CEO is an idiot, Proton is bad at (social media) and there is a cultural difference between how people in the US look at politics
Thanks for the link, that’s a lot more context than the usual reactionary “Andy Yen said one nice thing about a Republican therefore he’s fascist pro-Trump MAGA” takes I’ve been seeing. Not only does it more or less disprove that narrative, it makes me question how much of the hate against him lately is genuine and how much of it has been seeded and signal-boosted by nation-state actors who don’t want people to use encrypted communications.
Yen is clearly trying to be nonpartisan and praise what he sees as good for privacy while pointing out abuses of power, regardless of who has the power at the moment. He sees this as his way of adding weight to the scale in favor of better privacy and tearing down big tech. I know many in my country and on the web are hyper-polarized and addicted to anger, to the point that if someone says anything even slightly positive about their perceived political enemy, it’s seen as legitimizing and aligning with that enemy, but I don’t believe that’s a healthy or productive mindset to have. I believe that kind of divisive attitude is preventing us from uniting with those who should be agreeable to our cause, and that’s exactly what the oligarchs want. It’s making us weak.
I’ve been on the fence for a while since this whole thing started, because I do use a paid Proton email, and it sounded bad, but I kept getting this nagging feeling I wasn’t seeing the full picture. That’s gone now - Andy may be politically and/or socially inept, and he may have a different perspective on what it means to support privacy and democracy, but I think it’s clear his heart is in the right place, and the work he and Proton are continuing to do for tech privacy is helping to erode authoritarian power structures, including Trump’s.
I am inclided to agree with you that Andy Yen is just an idiot and that Proton is doing it’s best to stay natural and make the most of the situation. However their communications team is pretty lackluster.
On another note, the article I linked is an opinion, so while it is laid out pretty well it is probably not telling the entire story. I have a custom domain on my Proton account so I can Switch if it ever goes to hell. I would advice you to do the same.
Yeah I looked further into the article and it indeed does not seem to paint the entire picture. Especially with the omission that Gail Slater worked for the Internet Association which is a lobbying group for companies like Google, Amazon, eBay, and Facebook after leaving the FTC.
And The Internet Association had been covered by EFF before highlighting some things they didn’t agree with.
https://www.eff.org/deeplinks/2019/09/lawmakers-must-not-let-internet-association-weaken-california-consumer-privacy-act
So medium article just glossing over who Gail started working for after leaving the FTC makes the omission a sign of incompetence or intentional. And who even is ovenplayer? We got no idea who this random person is so not covering the whole details because it might not support the agenda trying to be pushed just the approach they took questionable.
You can read past discussions here
https://archive.ph/quYyb
Wow! That’s shocking. Any alternatives you recommend?
I haven’t fully committed to a new email yet to fully transfer over to, but I have been testing out tuta with it being one of the emails recommended by privacy guides. Still undecided though on what paid option to move to.
Tuta is located in Germany which is part of the fourteen eyes intelligence aliance. Germany also had a conservative party and a far right party win the elections.
Not saying Tuta isn’t good or anything, just wanted to share the info I have about it which might be relevant.
Already well aware of the CDU and AFD. As long as nobody forms a coalition with the AFD not too bothered. Of course, if they do then it becomes a big problem.
Thanks for the link