What do you say to an IOT fanatic?

I tried explaining how ring, nest, google home, Just how many points of data they have on you and how you are a product being sold every day and how insecure they are. They say I don’t care about how much they know about me, I don’t go to sketchy places online to get hacked and I get kick backs like gift cards for my data so I live having these things. What do you say to convince them to leave the mainstream IOT side?

Maybe if they read this?

Ultimately some people just won’t care until they get inconvenienced.

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Nothing.

It’s their life, their choice.

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You will never convince a true believer. We still engage with them, though, for the benefit of any third party, who may listening from a distance. If we make a compelling argument, we may save untold numbers of these bystanders from being victimized by big tech and the surveillance state.

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My home is full of mostly homemade IoT lights and outlets, based on ESP microcontrollers.

I don’t care or see the harm in Amazon or Google or the Chinese government knowing how often I turn my bedroom lights on or off, or what radio stations I stream through smart speakers.

As far as them listening to what goes on inside my house, I really don’t care. I live alone and don’t accept visitors. All they get from me is yelling at the dog and turning the lights on and off, maybe laughing at the occasional YouTuber.

Would I buy something like a DRM refrigerator or other appliances, absolutely not. I like my appliances simple. The guy whining about HP locking his printer fibbed about where he got his ink, or the media covering the story left that important detail out. Subscription ink comes with strings attached that are clearly spelled out in the ToS.

I would ask them if they are willing to give up the protections and human rights guaranteed by the Magna Carta, which our ancestors fought for for a millennia to obtain? The moral hazard inter generational psychopaths have inevitably and repeatedly seized upon, without totalitarian stop gaps in place (which the IOT effectively removed and flung us back into the dark ages of personal liberty), has been a manifest issue throughout time. Whether it’s kings with “divine authority” to search your properties and seize your lands on a whim, or it’s secret forces that spy on us all like the cowards they are, it makes no difference. Individual rights are sacrosanct, and if some technologies make those unenforceable, they should be controlled like weapons technology which is what they are.

If anyone would have told me I would have to give up the rights and guarantees of the Constitution, and Bill of Rights, which were built on the prototype of the Magna Carta, so I could have the convenience of cell phones, Bluetooth, WiFi, and other wireless communication, I would have told them to shove it up their ass, lol.

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Somewhat related: Unbridled centralized computing is evil! Keep your computing power localized or face the consequences!

:smile:

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Even the acronym, IoT, invokes the imagery of the hideous “Eye of Sauron”, lol.

I laugh so I don’t cry…

What do you say to convince them to leave the mainstream IOT side?

If they don’t care about privacy or security, point them to examples where companies discontinue products and things just stop working. They happen all the time, and from brands people recognize. Here’s one from this week.

There’s also the unexpected upkeep costs due to “smart locks”, like not being able to replace consumable parts with generics.

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That’s a good idea.

Same reaction to an iTard. Nothing, then just walk away. No saving someone who doesn’t want to be saved.

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As an iPwned user, I think this is probably the best tactic…