Through the lens of information warfare, it's hard not to view those comments as an astroturfing campaign from the exact organizations who would want device attestation
I think the point is that it takes very few data points to effectively deanonymize someone. And the less common a data point is, the greater the information gain. "User is male" eliminates ~half of users. "User actively reads HackerNews" eliminates >99%. "User uses this niche browser that only 1000 people have ever been seen using" eliminates 99.999%.
This is how surveillance operates at scale. You don't need a stable identifier linking a specific person's identity, you just need a few data points to narrow it down to even a few thousand people. Then you apply more focus on those people, gathering data points that eliminate people until you're left with your target. And thanks to decades of global iteration on surveillance infrastructure, and AI to glue data sets together, it's all automated.
I don't like the idea of a central authority determining what "my child should be kept away from" and then implementing Orwellian surveillance laws to enforce it. "For the sake of the children".
Seeing something scary, disturbing, or sexual on the internet as a child does not result in a maladjusted adult. These laws are about one thing and one thing only - furthering the global surveillance network.
Everything else is a smokescreen. Pretending that a phone or any Internet-connected terminal is something that should be kept secured and away from children is a parenting decision, not a policy one, and any attempt to justify it as a policy decision is toxic nonsense at best and astroturfing for the surveillance state at worst.
Or maybe it's that our archaic system was designed so that some people's votes literally matter more than others, and more than half the country does not have a meaningful voice in our Federal elections.
Anecdotally, pretty often. Whenever there is an engineering org failure, whether it be missed deadlines, unreliable software, missed KPIs, etc, there is no such thing as a truly blameless org. Somebody will be accountable in the eyes of leadership, and that boils down to this very choice.
Was it the devs fault for shipping code with a disastrous edge case, or the EMs fault for over- allocating work, resulting in less-refined code and a minimal review process that let the defect slip into production? Just as an example.
Why are we gauging our ethical barometer on the actions of existing companies and DoD contractors? the military industrial apparatus has been insane for far too long, as Eisenhower warned of.
When we're entering the realm of "there isn't even a human being in the decision loop, fully autonomous systems will now be used to kill people and exert control over domestic populations" maybe we should take a step back and examine our position. Does this lead to a societal outcome that is good for People?
The answer is unabashedly No. We have multiple entire genres of books and media, going back over 50 years, that illustrate the potential future consequences of such a dynamic.
They already understand the current system and status quo is going away. They understand, on some level, the consequences of the technocapitalist system they've built and perpetuated.
This is why the ultra rich have been building out heavily fortified, private, self sustaining compounds. They know the potential consequences of their choices, and are fine with them as long as they can leverage technology to insulate themselves from them. It's basically Fallout mindset.
We don't need "more" government, we need the government to do its job. We need the regulators who have been legally appointed to oversee these areas to actually respond to these behaviors. Regulatory capture is the issue, but the solution isn't less government. It's getting corporate money and lobbying out of the government (Citizens United is to blame for most of our woes), increase the enforcement of anti-corruption laws, and get antitrust back on the table.
I want big corporations to be scared. I want them to fear for their own survival, and to tread lightly lest the sword of damocles fall upon them.
If you had tried Ubuntu, KDE Neon, CachyOS, ElementsryOS, or really any other distro, this would not have been your experience.
Arch is a Manual experience designed for power users. It is not a good choice for even your average Linux user, let alone a first time Windows convert dipping their toes.
Being a 503c, they're required to disclose their expenditures, among other things. CN gives them a perfect score, and the expense ratio section puts their program spend at 77.4% of the budget
https://www.charitynavigator.org/ein/200049703#overall-ratin...
Worth mentioning that Wikipedia gets an order of magnitude more traffic than the Internet archive.