Encryption

Sadly I can't find the comment-feed I had with the admin (was a year ago +/-), but yes as far as I remember the admin does not want to defederate other instances. Which is also a stance I understand, especially with the neutral mentality Switzerland has (and this is a Swiss instance after all).

I hope the admin comments so we can see the thoughts itself and not some phrases I remember hazily :)

In general I think everyone should be able to connect to any instance, as I'm a big advocate of a free and unregulated internet.

But as with many principles there are exceptions, and big data harvesting cooperation are my exception. The idea of the Fediverse is to have a decentralized, free (in both ways, does not cost and libre) and privacy respecting place in a world, where more and more governments and companies start to regulate and decide on what the users can do.

When I look back on the history of those companies I neither like nor trust them, and I think it would be not only a needed action but also a statement when instances defedrate them. We can not stop the data harvesting, as this can be done with simple web crawlers. But with gate keeping (and I do not like it when people do it, but here, I think it is necessary), we can maybe bring the Fediverse more into the public eye. Because when we allow the Threads instances to federate, most people will just see it as Threads. They will not understand what the Fediverse is and will not see it as a new way of using the internet. The same kind of happened with Android, most do not know it is Linux and just talk about Android. I think for Android it is not a big problem, but the Fediverse is a movement, a change and statement people are fighting for, and it shall be and stay that, not just another protocol that is used to transfer likes.

At the beginning of this instance, I once asked the admin and if I remember correctly, a defederation of such instances is not seen as an action to take. Maybe we need to mobilize in other communities on feddit.ch to raise our concern.

(Pinned your post, as I think this is an important discussion to have)

Why did I not got wind of that, thank you for bringing it to my attention!

I see the thinking behind it and that a state needs some tools to find and prosecute criminals, and that they did not follow the UK with E2E-Ban is good to hear.

But, that the council made changes AFTER the criticism shows that we need to be more on edge and look even closer on them, and maybe even start to launch more referendums. It could be a good idea to launch an initiative that clearly states and sets surveillance laws that protect the privacy and integrity of Swiss citizens. I'm very worried that as many other countries in the last few years, Switzerland too starts to value surveillance higher than privacy.

Does any one have the legal texts, I can't find it somehow...

Edit:

I can't check if this is the same but what I found:

Source: https://www.vischer.com/en/knowledge/blog/modernisation-of-surveillance-law-at-ordinance-level-part-1-39485/

Firstly, (three) new types of information are to be created for the purpose of querying longer-term and short-term identifiers (addressing elements, device numbers, subscriber numbers, etc.). These include (1) the query of the time of the last access-relevant activity of an e-mail service in order to determine when a communication process has been completed, (2) information on the last access-relevant activity of another telecommunications or derived communications service and (3) information on neighbouring networks for telephony and multimedia services in order to solve identification problems which occur when the telephone number is forged or unknown.

In addition, (four) new types of surveillance are to be created, with which in future the exact position of a terminal device can be determined once or repeatedly (up to now, only the approximate position could be determined, for example, in an emergency search for a missing person or in real-time surveillance).

I thought about that too, I think it could, especially since Bing pushes you to use their ChatGPT search. But without seeing the law text and court order it is more guessing than knowing...

Wasn't there a law suite against a girl, where Google Searches where used to convict her?

Edit: Found it https://www.washingtonpost.com/technology/2022/07/03/abortion-data-privacy-prosecution/

Good that they shut down the nuclear plants, comes in handy. Coal is way better for our climate!

True, but you can easily switch to Flatpaks and use them instead.

I think to start, Mint or Ubuntu is a good choice, it has support for most hardware and will probably run on whatever you install it.

Also something that I think most new Linux users should focus on; instead of distro pick the desktop environment (DE). As a beginner it does not really matter if you use, lets say, a Debian- or Fedora-based distro. Pick a DE that looks pleasing to you maybe GNOME or KDE and take the installation with that DE. Maybe do not start with Arch or Gentoo as they are for more experienced users that already have some Linux experience.

Distros will be way more interesting and important when you got a hold of Linux and you want to explore the differences of them.

Last tip: Make a separated /home directory, so when you want to change to a new distro you do not have to delete all your files and start over with an empty machine.

I wish you a good start into Linux and do not hesitate to ask questions if they arise!

I have Trackmania Stadium for that. Going into a full speed server (Only need to steer left or right while constantly press forward) and put some music up.

The flow of the race tracks together with the music is very nice and because no speed control is needed, no need to get into the physics and tracks to enjoy the game.

I can recommend to get into Trackmania when you have more time, the feeling of mastering a hard track is marvellous, but just speeding around is also fun as hell.