How paranoid should I be? i have a bandaid over the camera and mic of my lap top. Is this crazy?

[Oaktree]

Well yes, but also no. You don't get a choice about your new car being connected or the new TV being "smart". People need cell phones in order to participate in modern society. Same with using Facebook or other sites. Yes you can drive an older car that's not connected, use a dumb phone and delete your Facebook etc accounts but you don't get the benefits of a newer car or tv, or the social connection from using the web sites. These days more and more services require you to have a smart phone, from governments to menus in resturants.

So it's not really voluntary unless you're a hermit.

Not sure I totally agree with that. If enough people stood up to all this instead of being sheep things might (key word, might) be different. I personally don't see how owning a connected car or smartphone will make my life easier or better. If that makes me a hermit, so be it. I will not patronize a business that requires me to have one.

I did join Facebook about 10 years ago under a fake name just to see what it was all about. They pestered me with so many nosy questions, and it seemed that I was blocked from seeing much of anything interesting there without creating a detailed dossier so I just abandoned the account and never went back.

 

[Jstpssng]

And that citizens are voluntarily incorporating these devices into their lives. Cellphones, connected cars, no one is forcing anyone to have these things.

I've been saying that for years. If a government employee had proposed a mandate that everybody would carry a tracking device everywhere they go, and tell what they are doing at all times he would have been met with pitchforks and torches.
Instead they gave us Jobs and Zuckerberg, who convinced us to do it voluntarily.

 

[Jstpssng]

Not sure I totally agree with that. If enough people stood up to all this instead of being sheep things might (key word, might) be different. I personally don't see how owning a connected car or smartphone will make my life easier or better. If that makes me a hermit, so be it. I will not patronize a business that requires me to have one.

I did join Facebook about 10 years ago under a fake name just to see what it was all about. They pestered me with so many nosy questions, and it seemed that I was blocked from seeing much of anything interesting there without creating a detailed dossier so I just abandoned the account and never went back.

What I find frustrating about FB is that so many businesses as well as some government entities use it as their platform; so unless you join you are excluded. (I do have an account with them but decided it wasn't my thing back around 2016, and haven't been back.)

 

[jyoutz]

What I find frustrating about FB is that so many businesses as well as some government entities use it as their platform; so unless you join you are excluded. (I do have an account with them but decided it wasn't my thing back around 2016, and haven't been back.)

I never joined FB because I don’t care to hear what my friends had for breakfast or what their darling brat did today.

 

[Hay Dude]

Duck Duck Go!

 

[Jstpssng]

Duck Duck Go!

I just went that route a few days ago. Typing in sites I commonly visit took some getting used to, but it didn't take long and it's nice to at least pretend that I'm not being tracked.

I never joined FB because I don’t care to hear what my friends had for breakfast or what their darling brat did today.

It wasn't as bad when I joined about 12 years ago... I was away from home and joined to see if I could find an old HS friend who I hadn't heard from since he joined the Navy in 1977. It took me 1/2 hour to find him, he's living out in California and has turned his old hobbies of shooting and blowing things up into a career with a Navy contractor.

 

[MossRoad]

I just went that route a few days ago. Typing in sites I commonly visit took some getting used to, but it didn't take long and it's nice to at least pretend that I'm not being tracked.

It wasn't as bad when I joined about 12 years ago... I was away from home and joined to see if I could find an old HS friend who I hadn't heard from since he joined the Navy in 1977. It took me 1/2 hour to find him, he's living out in California and has turned his old hobbies of shooting and blowing things up into a career with a Navy contractor.

Why don't you bookmark them?

 

[5030]

I never joined FB because I don’t care to hear what my friends had for breakfast or what their darling brat did today.

Farcebook is little more than a busybody site. Only thing of value is Marketplace and even that is regressing into just another Craigslist minus the 'adult' section.

 

[IndyJay]

Farcebook is little more than a busybody site. Only thing of value is Marketplace and even that is regressing into just another Craigslist minus the 'adult' section.

Facebook's parent site is "Meta"... what do you think that stands for?

 

[5030]

Facebook's parent site is "Meta"... what do you think that stands for?

Not a clue.