Hacker News Reader

Comment by TreeRingCounter | Hacker News Reader

My device should serve me, not the EU. If I choose to violate EU emergency alert laws, that's on me.

Then you probably don't have one of those fancy new things called smartphones, as they are all very locked down and don't allow you to access or modify a lot of system settings, limit access to files apps create, don't allow to move some apps to the SD card, some of them even disallow you from installing apps from anywhere but their own app store. Certainly you don't have one of those devices that treat the user in a completely patronizong way.

Of course, you can liberate yourself quite a bit from the draconian rule of the manufacturer by rooting the device, but then you're also able to disable cell broadcasts permanently...

Notice that I used the word "should", not "does". And, in fact, I am deeply concerned about the war on general purpose computing.

For other use cases, I'd probably agree with you. But you being startled and confused during an emergency because you didn't see the instructions on time can be very dangerous for everyone around you. It's not just on you.

The marginal upside to everyone else is not even close to worth the marginal downside to me. It's my choice to make. If a government wants to force messages on me so badly, they can set up something like an air raid siren (and they typically do, for actual emergencies).

For people suffering from certain mental health issues, the alert itself can cause significant problems for them and others.

If you suffer from panic attacks, for example, and these alerts trigger them, they do not help you, no matter how well intended.

If you suffer from (C)PTSD, and these alerts trigger flooding, they actually make everything worse.

If this were to happen while you are driving, you might even cause an accident.

The world is sadly too complex for simple solutions that assume something to be always good or helpful.

Which is why I believe it's important for the user to eventually control his device.

If there is emergency, I'm sure you'll find out very soon that something is happening. We are usually not living in lone solitudies.

the same applies when the device is off, or i left it at home. unless there is a law that requires me to carry a functioning, powered device to receive emergency alerts at all times, there is no reason why a device should be required to receive alerts just because it is capable of receiving them. if i turn of alerts on my device, then it's no different from a device that doesn't have the capability to receive alerts.

Reply on news.ycombinator.com