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bmarquez

2,333 karma · joined February 27, 2018

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bmarquez··on X Algorithm Feeds Users Political Content Whether They Want It or Not
Yeah, it's even invaded the more obscure subreddits. Some posters try to shoehorn in political commentary even when it doesn't have much to do with the topic. I doubt there are even real humans behind some posts.
bmarquez··on More Americans Are Ending Up Homeless–At a Record Rate
In other words, "it's the economy, stupid"

(That phrase was used by James Carville to help Bill Clinton get elected in 1992)

bmarquez··on Threads Has Lost More Than 80% of Its Daily Active Users
I distinctly remember the mindset of HN that the second comment linked describes, that Meta was doomed. Then many started cheering it on because they wanted Twitter to fail. Neither of which has happened so far.

I think HN users (myself included) have a blind spot for general social trends. We're technologists, not tastemakers.

bmarquez··on TikTok is adding text posts
> Text posts appear similar to Instagram Stories

Seems more of an Instagram replacement than a Twitter one, the userbase of Instagram is also closer to TikTok than Twitter.

bmarquez··on Facebook Wanted NSO Spyware to Monitor iOS Users
Just because Facebook may potentially create their own app store doesn't mean others are going to use it. Even on Android, sideloading is fraught with warnings that the average older Facebook user might not figure it out.

Personally I'm looking forward to easier iOS sideloading, even if regulation was required to achieve it. Devices should be secure by design against malware, not by curation.

bmarquez··on Threads isn't ever going to connect to Mastodon, so stop pretending that it is
> Maybe a company can actually do a genuinely decent thing every once in a while

Sure. But I have zero confidence, based on previous actions, that company is Facebook/Meta.

bmarquez··on Threads isn't ever going to connect to Mastodon, so stop pretending that it is
> There was a proposed change about six months or a year ago, but it was walked back after public criticism.

Was that change ever walked back? I recall that Whatsapp wanted to send metadata (not the messages themselves, but phone numbers, IP addresses, etc) to Facebook/Meta for advertising purposes. I know it was delayed, but I deleted my Whatsapp account before having to accept the new terms.

bmarquez··on Threads, an Instagram app
I share your sentiment. I use Twitter for business and Instagram (before I deleted it) for friends. I follow very different accounts on each. I'm not going to mix business and pleasure so to speak, especially with Meta's poor privacy reputation.

And for people who have strong negative opinions on Musk, most of them hate Zuckerberg too. For them, Threads might have a better chance if it was a non-Meta product.

bmarquez··on Pixel fucked: Inside Hollywood's VFX crisis
> experience of working on a film or television series that is underbid, understaffed, subject to unreasonable, inflexible deadlines, and endless directorial nitpicking: "pixel fucked"

This feels like working for a video game company. People overworked, underpaid, and doing it for the love of the creative arts and working on a name brand project. Similar things have happened at Electronic Arts.

bmarquez··on Ignoring boys' emotional needs fuels public health risks
Intelligent enough to create a grift selling subscriptions to the "Real World" featuring rehashed low-quality dropshipping/crypto/copywriting content, sure. That's not even how he made his money but teaching how to launder money through casinos and adult webcam businesses probably wouldn't work out legally. I have younger friends who are into him so had to do research to see if they weren't getting fleeced.

I wouldn't put him in the same category as the other three men mentioned who deliver value for free.

bmarquez··on Ignoring boys' emotional needs fuels public health risks
> But let's never forget that we were and can be allies.

Can you share some examples? Honest question, I've never seen this happen in modern day America (it's usually just one side taking and taking instead of give and take).

Based on what you wrote the men's circles you talk about were probably influenced by Sterling Institute, Mankind Project, and the mythopoetic men's movement. I've attended related events in the distant past but I was much too young to "get it" (and honestly still don't get some of it coming from an immigrant family viewpoint).

Men's rights have been denigrated to the point my younger male (Western) friends are Andrew Tate fans because there isn't anything else left.

bmarquez··on Reddit’s blackout protest is set to continue indefinitely
How is it worse? From a privacy perspective they're both terrible and the data flows to the same Meta servers, but Facebook demands you use your real name (and demands photo ID if it thinks it's fake) while Instagram doesn't care.
bmarquez··on Reddit’s blackout protest is set to continue indefinitely
It would be interesting to see Facebook Groups divorce from Facebook itself. Maybe allow people to login using an Instagram or Whatsapp identity, or better yet an independent login.

I don't really want my group activity to be linked to my Facebook identity for tracking/advertising purposes.

bmarquez··on Reddit subs with millions of followers plan to extend the blackout indefinitely
Parent commenter is talking about (banned) conservative subs, not r/conservative specifically.

And yes there is a difference, there was a "Never Trump" movement led by conservatives which obviously wouldn't have been popular on places like r/the_donald. It's not a giant monolithic block.

bmarquez··on Killing Community
> The abuse is directed at everyone; no matter what opinion you share, no matter who you are, you will be verbally abused in a variety of ways.

Yeah, this is what people misunderstand about 4chan. Obviously my race gets a lot of flak, but I've even seen racial slurs about white Europeans I've never heard anywhere else.

I'm not saying it's morally right, but it feels more of a hazing tactic than legitimate hatred. Once you pass that filter you have access to some interesting information.

bmarquez··on Livestream of Reddit subreddits going private in protest
I was watching the stream earlier. It was an exciting feeling to have 10,000 people viewing, and cheering on the chat whenever a new subreddit went dark.

I don't know if I should be excited or sad. Reddit is dying, but I'm seeing it live on Twitch with the community cheering on in a festive atmosphere.

bmarquez··on Thousands of subreddits pledge to go dark after the Reddit CEO’s recent remarks
You can't vote on a poll using a 3rd party app. For example, if you click on a poll using Apollo, it opens the Reddit website as a new window and you have to log in again and vote through that website.

This level of friction means I've never voted in a Reddit poll unless I was on a computer, and many other 3rd party app users probably act similarly.

bmarquez··on r/ProgrammerHumor will be shutting down to protest Reddit's API changes
From what I've seen, only for niche programming or highly technical circles.

My "normie" friends don't even want to try something polished like Signal. Mastodon would have to be heavily simplified, polished, and maybe sponsor some exclusive influencers to actually take the spot of Twitter.

bmarquez··on r/ProgrammerHumor will be shutting down to protest Reddit's API changes
I initially thought this was a dupe of next weeks protest, but no, this is a permanent shutdown.
bmarquez··on Apollo will close down on June 30th
the_donald made it very clear that they were a subreddit trying to mimic a Trump campaign rally. You could even be a conservative, mildly critical of Trump's policy and still get banned. It never claimed to be unbiased and proudly proclaimed the opposite.

On the other hand, we expect some level of fairness and professionalism from Reddit and its administrators.

bmarquez··on Tell HN: "I don't care about cookies” extension bought by Avast, users jump ship
Previous discussion (from 8 months ago): https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=32850799
bmarquez··on "The French Connection" censored and re-edited for "modern sensitivities"
> it's just been improved

This is a debatable statement. Personally I want to see the original artist's intent, warts and all. It gives insight into the cultural sensitivities, or lack thereof, of an era before I was born.

bmarquez··on Don't let Reddit kill 3rd party apps
Also, this article talks about a protest (which is new information, unlike previous HN submissions which only reported the changes.)
bmarquez··on Third-party Reddit apps are being crushed by price increases
To be fair, I had this same issue pre-Elon. You have to go into your settings and turn off everything except "Related to you and your tweets"
bmarquez··on Third-party Reddit apps are being crushed by price increases
Facebook and Instagram started the enshittification process long before Twitter did. And Reddit even hired Ellen Pao as a scapegoat to push through unpopular decisions.

Reddit was heading in this direction long before Musk was involved.

bmarquez··on Had a call with Reddit to discuss pricing
Blue seems to be a "less likely to be a bot" badge.

Considering that I've seen ChatGPT-type comments in various subreddits, I expect paid social media like Twitter Blue, Reddit Premium and Discord Nitro being pushed even more in the future.

bmarquez··on Had a call with Reddit to discuss pricing
Ivory is for Mastodon. Lemmy is the Fediverse replacement for Reddit.

The only iOS app for Lemmy is Remmel which is dead and no longer available on the App Store.

bmarquez··on Show HN: Micro Chat – Private group chat
This sounds pretty awesome, like a private Discord server or replacement for Facebook groups that's actually private (assuming it can be self-hosted or encrypted).

One thing I noticed is that there's no privacy policy. I assume this is a proof of concept but people willing to use this product over Facebook care about how their information is stored and protected.

bmarquez··on YouTube removed dislike counts, so this guy made Rotten Tomatoes for YouTube
Even my self-proclaimed liberal friends admit NPR has a left-leaning bias. And there's nothing wrong with that.

But calling everything disliked "extremist" is counterproductive and is itself an Overton window shift.

bmarquez··on YouTube removed dislike counts, so this guy made Rotten Tomatoes for YouTube
> more centrist news sources like NPR

NPR is not considered centrist, but left-leaning.

When I check logged out I get CNN and Fox side by side, along with a lot of non-political basketball and Mr. Beast type stuff. Content probably varies on your IP address.

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