Do We Truly Own Our Devices Anymore? What's Going On With The Tech Industry?
What is going on in the tech world right now? Last week I posted about Boost Mobile locking my phone because of some sort of time constraint. Apparently you have to have 12 consecutive months of service before they will unlock your phone. I had been a customer for close to 4 years. I purchased my phone through them. It was the first time I purchased an expensive phone too. However, due to an expired credit card on file and not checking my emails, I had a short lapse in service. Like 3 days.
Looking back, they sent emails. I thought it was someone trying to scam me. You know, "We will cancel your service unless you update payment information" was mixed in there with the Nigerian Prince and other charlatans. I assumed it was the usual spam. Honest mistake, but it was enough for them to reset my contract. After buying a $500 phone from them and having 3 years of consecutive lapse free service, they decided to use a loophole and lock my phone. I had met any obligations or so I thought.... Shame on me, sure it's my fault, but shame on them! I'll never deal with them again and make sure to tell everyone I know to stay away. Here's the article if your interested, it's more of a rant. I still can't believe they did me like this. Just plain dirty!
So, that led me to wonder, if they can lock someones device, their property. Did they ever truly own that device. On top of that, what did I pay for? At the very least, they should supply the phone if that's how they want to treat people. That was my phone, that I paid for. It wasn't their's to lock IMHO.
This leads me to MS Windows. Every time I step away from the computer it seems to update. I have a dual boot system with Linux on another partition. When it reboots, it automatically loads Linux unless I choose Windows. I've been using Windows more lately because of business reasons. It's more secure with printers and frankly a little easier to use.
I get it, that's part of auto-updates. It's about making life easy for people that might not be so technologically savvy. Yet, not matter what I do, I can't shut off auto-update now. OK, fair enough. Not that big of a deal.
Here's the deal breaker for me though, I HATE THE VERY CONCEPT OF CLOUD COMPUTING. I don't want my data on any other computer than my own unless I choose to put it somewhere else. I have several reasons for that, the main one is Cryptocurrency Seed phrases, banking and credit info, passwords, and I don't like anyone snooping around my data. No matter what I do, MS OneDrive keeps loading and trying to backup my data.
I can't remove it. I can't uninstall it. I've even gone so far as to delete directories so it can't load. Each time, it's good for a day maybe two, then suddenly it appears again. Loaded with the next update.
It didn't really bother me much until I seen a seed phrase get saved to One Drive and I completely freaked. What else had I missed? Considering most of my work is crypto based. I just don't want my data in the cloud.
With that said, its more of a freedom issue. It's my computer, I decide what will be on it, when it gets updated, and where I'll store my data. Unless I give it to you directly, it's not your data, it's mine! Once I post it online, then it's public data, until then, I'll decide where it's stored and who gets access to it.
The fix was very simple in this case. I just switched over to my Linux partition which I haven't used in a couple years. The main reason I was using Windows in the first place was for image and video editing. Then I started the resell business and needed it for networking and easy and secure printer setup. Now, I'll just have to load Linux for most of my daily tasks and when I go to do shipping, I'll boot into Windows.
More than anything, I think this is a freedom issue. When did we loose control of our devices? If you don't want a piece of software in YOUR computer, you should be able to remove it. Linux, gives you that freedom. In this instance I had a choice and a simple solution. With my phone, not so much...
No company should be allowed to brick your device for any reason. I get fining someone or penalizing them for breach of contract. I'd even be OK with paying a small REASONABLE FEE. Just bricking a device though, that's just wrong. I paid for that device. It's my property. Nobody should have the right to destroy that property and that's pretty much what they did. I now have a $500 paper weight.
On top of that, we're living in a world of corporate fascism. None of this would be a huge issue if we could trust corporations with our data. However, they've proven time and time again, that they have no interest in that. Almost any government can request data through legal loopholes and the corporations just fold and release it. No warrant, no fuss, they just roll over in most cases and release whatever they're told to.
Another interesting example is the case of Nancy Guthrie and Google Nest. In this case it may work out in her favor, but still there are serious privacy concerns here. For those that don't live in the U.S. or have been living under a rock, Nancy Guthrie is the mother of a journalist who was recently kidnapped. Even though she wasn't subscribed to the Google Nest service, the camera was still recording. The FBI was able to get several images of the alleged perpetrator. In this instance, it's a good thing, however, why was Google recording? Certainly all that data traveling around is bandwidth use and very costly to the company. Wouldn't it be cheaper to just shut off the device? Why keep it recording? This is a serious privacy issue that is being completely ignored because of the "ends justify the means mentality" we have lately.
Which leads me to my final issue. It's all being done intentionally. That's why there is such a huge push for cloud computing. I do it the old fashion way, and back up my computer weekly or monthly depending on what I'm doing and how important the data is. That's my choice and my freedom to do so. If I unsubscribe from a service, I expect that service to complete shut down, not continue to spy on who is coming and going from my house all day. Again, this rare instance it worked out, but what's the final cost.... Our privacy. It doesn't always go hand in hand with our safety.
On top of that, everything ends up on the dark web. I don't want data on any server I don't trust, and that's ALL OF THEM. Who knows what gets loaded into OneDrive. Passkeys, passwords, seed phrases, logins, personal photos, phone numbers, contacts.... JUST NO... None of this stuff should be in the cloud. PERIOD.
With that said, how do we get back control of our devices? It's obvious the law favors the corporations. Who gets to decide what's on our machines and devices? It started with software that couldn't be deleted. Then it was bricking our devices for breach of contract. At that point, I no longer own my device even though I bought and paid for it. Then we're being forced to accept software we might not like or that's even spying on us. Where do we draw the line?
Will we eventually get to a point where if you're doing the backstroke through some back-channel of the internet they just lock your machine. Maybe they decide TOR has to go. Maybe they don't like crypto! Maybe they don't like who your chatting with, or the platform your chatting on. Just lock the device.
Not only is it about true ownership, but also freedom and privacy. Nobody should be forced to share their data or store it somewhere they don't trust.
We've seen several influencers get de-platformed on social networks for speaking against the status quo. What's to stop Microsoft or Android from just bricking your device to silence you. 20 years ago, that may have been far fetched, but if you don't think that could happen today, you're obviously not paying attention. There are so many issues here I can't even address them all in this article. The bottom line is our devices no longer belong to us, and corporations are in complete control of the flow of data and how it's being stored and even used. This is just a recipe for disaster. I'll leave it there. Maybe I'll touch on this more in a future post.
Freedom comes with a price, I suppose.
Free markets created some tech giants which are more or less monopolists and therefore can do whatever they want.
Although better, more privacy aware solutions around, we tend not using them, due to many reasons. Convenience, or better said, inconvenience, is one of them.
Freedom allows us to decide what we use and what we don't use. But, we cannot always stay away from what we do not want to use, I know that as well.
If we dont like something, we shall act upon, ie not use a service or product. That is the only way corporates will change. When lets day 50% of the O365 users step away for eg OpenOffice, Libreoffice, or one of those open source equivalents to O365, then I am darn sure Microsoft will act and changes whatever they need to change to increase its user base again.
But, people dont act, at least most people dont act. They just continue to use whatever is made easiest for them. That said, any alternative, espcially the open source altewrnatives, shall finally spend much more time on UI and UX, since that is usually what is lacking. As we can see with many tools and frontends here at HIVE. And they are not all open source as well :) Focus on tech, instead of focussing on the customer journey creates services that aren't used by many.
You nailed it. In a perfect world I'd love to see:
That list could go on and on. That's just a start.
We have the technology and great alternatives. I do agree though, most open source project lack a bit in the UI and UX category. Still the trade-off is usually worth it.
Thanks for the awesome comment!
I gave up on Windows as I didn't feel in control of it and it seemed to want to stop me doing things. Linux is not like that, but you have to take responsibility for more aspects. I do use some cloud services, but that is just pragmatism to make my life easier. It all has a price and sometimes that does mean handing over money. In that case I want a better service.
Doorbell cameras are controversial, but ours caught an actual crook who tried to get into our car. We need to know how the data is being used.
I've heard that the US government is trying to get details of people who criticise them on social media. That is not on! So much for free speech, but then you have a president who can't stand anything being said against him. There are forces trying to ban being anonymous online and that is also not good. It's not just crooks who like their privacy.
!BEER
I'm going to write about this more in the next week or so. It's incredible to me how much better most computers run on Linux. The downside is you often have to configure stuff on your own, very little is plug and play. Sometimes you have to get creative to get things to work right as well.
We had a similar issue. I'm against the doorbell cameras, but as soon as our car got broken into, the first thing I did was ask the neighbors across the street if they had doorbell footage and sure enough, one of them did. They never caught the guy, but he's on camera doing it to my house and the guy next door.
I try to not get too political on here. I may start writing about some of this stuff though. It's getting really weird here. A lot of stuff I never thought I'd see in my lifetime is coming to pass. The assault on free speech, the censorship, scripted news reports, everyone reporting the same story with a minor twist on perspective. Trying to control social media. It goes on and on. Frankly, the entire thing is horrifying to watch unfold. These are truly interesting times we're living in. It doesn't look like it's ending well for so called "freedom and democracy" The good news is more and more people are waking up. The bad news is we can't seem to agree on anything. Truly scary times!