hey man, i think you may have misinterpreted who i was replying to /what i was saying, or perhaps i didn’t communicate perfectly.

i am 10,000% on your side with this, and very much appreciate your post and appreciate your support in this thread/community on this topic. it’s actually giving me a tiny bit of hope that this community isn’t entirely lost.

i’ve really grown absolutely weary of the ridiculous denialism in society and especially in so-called tech communities on this topic.

the kindest thing i think you could say about the rampant denialism is they emotionally do not want to believe it could be happening, and therefore all rationality has gone out the window.

these threads are always a circle jerk of denialists repeating popular media headlines which say “its not happening”, and then if you read the article IT DOESN’T SAY THAT AT ALL. and these denialists WON’T EVEN FUCKING READ THE ARTICLES THEY POST.

apart from the emotional cope, perhaps also partial exposure to eg. basic consumer stuff like installing steam or downloading a movie, so they assume the bandwidth is too high to exfiltrate audio cos their music/game/movie audio files are big, completely ignoring the fact that the telecomms industry has put many decades and $ into producing efficient voice codecs for around 50 years now. they probably think nyquist is a brand of cough medicine

same goes for all the other erroneous ‘consumer tech’ false facts they parrot back and forth.

eg. the lunacy of saying the tired old statement “if they were listening ALL THE TIME, we’d know” completely ignoring threshold based noise gates have been a thing for well over half a century.

these self-proclaimed know-it-alls can’t even put in 10 minutes reading BASIC topics in an encylopedia to realise this shit was solved over half a century ago. (actually you don’t even need tech knowledge or an encylopedia to imagine such a fundamental thing as…i don’t know…not recording when nothings happening 🤯). they can’t put in even BASIC effort, yet are SOOO smug in not only telling us “its absolutely not happening”, but they actually can’t wait to be rude and ridicule randoms for even asking the question.

correct.

the level of unsubstantiated cope in this thread is mind boggling. from people many of whom should honestly know better.

cos the majority in this thread cannot even read the articles they cite mistakenly thinking it supports their unscientific claims that this topic is decided.

afaict no researcher has formally claimed a full coverage binary analysis.

if you know of such a study please link?

afaict the researchers are very upfront about the limits to the coverage of their studies and the importance of that uncovered ground being covered.

when the researchers themselves are saying the work isn’t over. why are all the super geniuses in this thread so smugly announcing this topic is wrapped up?

i guess they know better than the actual researchers do. amazing, someone should tell them not to worry cos the geniuses in the forums have it all worked out 🤣

[if you’re unable to reply with a direct excerpt from actual formally issued research (not some pop media headline) i will not bother responding]

yeah the level of technical competence on this site has plummeted since the influx of the reddit crowd.

just enough consumer tech enthusiast knowledge to delude themselves they can smugly and self righteously shit on the average non-tech person.

and now they’re the majority, drowning out legitimate curiosity by loudly parroting headlines from articles they didn’t even read. slowly turning lemmy into the regurgitated reddit pop media shithole they wanted to escape.

this topic is especially difficult because of the clear emotional desire for it not to be true. hence the degree of fragile cope in this thread.

thankfully not everyone here is a lost cause, and you’ve been given some good advice on delineating the other possible causes for what you’ve observed. when we do a careful analysis we must ofc consider all possibilities.

what i’ve not seen properly acknowledged in this thread, however, is that the possibility of alternative explanations doesn’t preclude the possibility of voice-based surveillance either.

always listening

i never claimed always, i specifically advised op to refrain from claiming always.

how can you pretend to represent a sound scientific approach when you misrepresent the scientific claims made in sources you cite

piss easy

many domain experts dedicating significant resources to it’s study

pick one.

when your sources repeatedly don’t say what you claim they say, maybe its time to revisit your claims ;)

Of course a researcher is never sure something is 100% ruled out. That’s part of how academic research works.

once again, that isn’t what they were reported to have said. [and researchers don’t need to repeat the basic precepts of the scientific method in every paper they write, so perhaps its worthwhile to note what they were reported to say about that, rather than write it off as a generic ‘noone can be 100% certain of anything’] it’s a bit rich to blame someone for lacking rigor while repeatedly misrepresenting what your own article even says.

what the article actually said is

because there are some scenarios not covered by their study

and even within the subset of scenarios they did study, the article notes various caveats of the study:

Their phones were being operated by an automated program, not by actual humans, so they might not have triggered apps the same way a flesh-and-blood user would. And the phones were in a controlled environment, not wandering the world in a way that might trigger them: For the first few months of the study the phones were near students in a lab at Northeastern University and thus surrounded by ambient conversation, but the phones made so much noise, as apps were constantly being played with on them, that they were eventually moved into a closet

there’s so much more research to be done on this topic, we’re FAR FAR from proving it conclusively (to the standards of modern science, not some mythical scientifically impossible certainty).

presenting to the public that is a proven science, when the state of research afaict has made no such claim is muddying the waters.

if you’re as absolutely correct as you claim, why misrepresent whats stated in the sources you cite?

no, they don’t

Please be careful with your claims.

In my experience, whenever investigating these claims and refutations we usually find when digging past the pop media headlines into the actual academic claims, that noone has proven it’s not happening. If you know of a conclusive study, please link.

Regarding the article you have linked we don’t even need to dig past the article to the actual academic claims.

The very article you linked states quite clearly:

The researchers weren’t comfortable saying for sure that your phone isn’t secretly listening to you in part because there are some scenarios not covered by their study.

(Genuine question, not trying to be snarky) Will you take a moment to reflect on which factors may have contributed to your eagerness to misrepresent the conclusions of the studies cited in your article?

Anyone saying they know for 100% certain it’s not happening is probably speaking from their emotional desire for it not to be true - rather than actual fact.

Anyone who has looked into the actual technical aspects, rather than spouting the usual surface-level “tech facts” or parroting headlines (rather than the actual academic findings), cannot seriously claim to know for certain its 100% not happening.

@op i would advise caution on stating ‘24x7’ until there is evidence of that specific claim. (unless you’re referring to while voice assistants are enabled.)

this is a complex topic and probably belongs in a different thread.

essentially i don’t personally believe in punishing citizens of a country for the actions of its politicians.

at best its misguided, at worse it basically empowers politicians on both sides who draw power from friction between citizens of different nations. typical divide and conquer bs.

why do you not think a software developer wouldn’t have to

wouldn’t or shouldn’t? if you mean wouldn’t, it’s not surprising and its not the dev’s fault they have to comply with policy, so the criticism is not with them.

if you mean shouldn’t, i don’t agree with punishing athletes either, but regarding foss specifically, isn’t the “friendly competition” of olympics equivalent to that? sort of. in some ways yes. in other ways its actually the opposite.

collaboration is actually the opposite of competition.

and while there’s a case for the benefits of healthy sports competition, i don’t believe it truly fulfills the spirit of international goodwill to the degree it says on the packaging. foss and other forms of international collaboration for the betterment of greater society are definitely on a higher rung - in my opinion at least.

personally i don’t agree with sanctioning foss communities.

but fuckit, bring on more forks i say.

among other benefits, the scifi-type scenario of nations trying to patch eachothers backdoors and slip in new backdoors (and hopefully innovations). could make for an exciting OS space-race type scenario

its BIG. could be great to see some different teams tackle different issues.

for example a transcode team to tag and convert different media to the latest efficient formats might save alot of space.

and eg. voice-only recordings could be suitably encoded vs music etc

also some methods for diffing snapshots, or some kind of compromise on snapshots storage with minimal changes? not ideal but might be enough to get across the line maybe?

re. the “most important”, aside from specific items or archives, imo a crucial role might be text-only snapshots of most of the web. would help increase accountability amongst modern media outlets, journalists etc

incredible! can you please describe it a little more, how it worked and especially what the jets did and how that was pleasant vs being bombarded in an unpleasant way. what type of stream was coming out of the jets?

reddit is a cesspit, it used to be that misinformation or incompetency cope would be promptly identified, now its the top 5 comments on any thread…and the next 5 are circle jerks.

in other words: welcome reddit refugees. please please feel free to leave the reddit mindset at the door on your way in :)

Below is my general sleep guide.

From your post these points sound the most relevant:

• Once in bed, no work/study/planning thoughts. Identify and then free your mind of any thought patterns which keep your mind going. Resolve to address them at another time.
• You can even pre-allocate a time to resolve them during regular waking hours. eg. before getting into bed, remind yourself that any thoughts which ‘need attention’ will be resolved at 12pm tomorrow or during your commute etc. If they pop up durin the night, you already have a precooked answer which doesn’t involve waking your brain up even more.
• Don’t keep looking at the clock or trying to calculate how many hours of sleep you can get.
• Avoid looking at phone screen once you’re in bed, if you need to adjust volume use buttons or remote etc with your eyes still closed.

General

• Observe if caffeine plays a role, you can eg. avoid it after lunch or after dinner - whatever works for you & your body.

Late Evening

• Avoid cold (bluer) colour lighting & use warm (redder) colour lighting from late evening until bed. This is important and melatonin effectiveness is directly controlled by this ¹. To put it very very simply, we’ve evolved for redder light = sunset->sleep, bluer = day->awake. Angle of the light can also play a role if you want to go deeper into it.
• Schedule blue light filters on your phone & computers. Should be standard on modern phones & use something like f.lux for computer ².

Before Bed

• Avoid alcohol, lots of sugar or sugary drinks for at least an hour or so before bed.
• Some other otc/“natural” sleep aids to consider: l-tryptophan, valarian, hops, passion flower, chammomile. There’s some ‘complex’ products which are basically derived from these kinds of things eg. ³. [Always check anything you take for possible interactions with eachother or medication you’re on].
• Supplements like magnesium can help reduce effects of muscle tension.
• Ensure any herbal teas or other foods, drinks etc don’t contain more caffeine than you’d planned for. eg. some chocolates contain caffeine.
• Showering or bathing just before bed can help you relax.

In Bed

• Once in bed, don’t keep looking at the clock or keep trying to calculate how many hours of sleep you can get.
• No work/study/planning thoughts. Identify and then free your mind of any thought patterns which keep your mind going. Resolve to address them at another time.
• Is temperature or air flow effecting you? Some people find an oscillating fan can help regulate the airflow & temperature, and the repetition can be soothing.
• Are sounds keeping you alert or waking you up? Consider fan, white noise machine or rain sounds ⁴. You can adjust the EQ to mask specific problem sounds, eg. bass for thumps, mids/high for clatter or voices etc.
• Is light making problems? eg. light from electronics in standby mode, light coming through or around edges of windows, other lights in the house? Identify and cover them or your eyes as needed. Remember blue light is not your friend at this time, blue LEDs might look nice but can mess with the brain chemistry of sleep ¹
• Avoid looking at phone screen once you’re in bed, if you need to adjust volume use buttons with your eyes still closed.

Sound

Falling asleep to sounds can sometimes help. Different people like different things on different occasions: music, YT, movies, TV, audio books, ambient soundtracks (rainforest, crackling fire), even boring monotone talking can be good. Avoid any ads if streaming or TV as they’re designed to grab your attention.

There are music genres almost designed for sleep, various ambient genres can be great especially if they employ low frequency variations and alpha, theta and delta wave type transitions ⁵. There’s a bit of bs around this, but also some legit bio-entrainment science too. In general find what works for you.

If listening, consider using your phone & use a sleep timer app on your phone to automatically gradually lower the volume and switch off after a scheduled time, this can help avoid being woken up by it later in the night. Find the timer periods which work for you. Also ensure your alarm will still wake you.

References

¹ https://academic.oup.com/jcem/article-abstract/88/9/4502/2845835

² https://justgetflux.com/

³ https://www.flordis.com.au/products/redormin-forte/

⁴ https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7JyE47-Ykjo [Download rather than stream to avoid interrupts/ads during the night.]

⁵ https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Electroencephalography#Wave_patterns

no idea

but google cache is being shut down, then google announces they’ll be participating with IA.

now this.

really not a good time in history for our ability to easily document web history to be getting messed with.

When you work in an industry where the entire collaborative workflow of everyone is based on software that doesn’t run on Linux, then not running that software is equal to not being able to work in that industry.

there’s no denying that’s true, though ofc it has alot to do with microsofts very agreessive and anti-competitive practices.

though its all a bit tangential, the main issue i think comes down to what someone means when they say “everything”. certainly if someone said “you can do everything”, i’d expect them to qualify what is (should be) obviously a slight exaggeration as parlance. they don’t literally mean “everything” they just mean most everyday things. i think its fairly common in everyday speech for someone to be able to work out thats what they meant.

in the few rare cases when someone literally means absolutely everything, then yes that silly statement would be incorrect. and if strictly intended with that meaning would certainly qualify as misinformation.

Not sure if when people say you can “do everything that windows does”, they should be interpreted to mean “every single piece of software/drivers ever written for windows was also written for linux”.

aye exactly. i’d rather see it gone tbh, but since voting is apparently here, and if we try to work within it, such as mentioned above where hackernews prevents downvoting replies to you.

some other ideas

• permit upvoting but downvotes require a textbox reply (imo downvoting without a valid reason is just noise, and we want signal over noise right?)

• self posts not being upvoted (all posts start at 0)

• no voting until you ‘earn your stripes’. not perfect, but somewhat helps at keeping voting within domain expertise.

eg. i ‘fucking love science’, but just because an answer feels nice to me on nuclear rocket surgery doesn’t mean my vote should count.

background/defocused tabs are ‘paused’ by default.

paused meaning no runtime execution of scripts or anything else.

firstly, there’s always some security and plenty of privacy mischief around focus.

secondly, it’s almost always wasting cycles, so its just wasteful of resources and energy.

ofc with some option for you to eg. right-click on a tab and mark it as ‘runtime in background’ or something, for webmail or messengers etc which you do want runtime.

but it should essentially be whitelisted.

i’ve actually played with this in the firefox debugger and it essentially appears feasible so really hope this feature comes oneday - or i finally get some time to look into making an addon for it.