Ayreon is awesome. That’s all I took away from this.

Reddit is no longer accessible through Apollo. That’s really it.

Most VPN services are a sham. They just hide your network activity from your ISP, however they have full visibility in to your network traffic. Some of these VPN providers are even owned by ad agencies, but advertise privacy as a selling point. You’re better off running your own WireGuard or OpenVPN server at home or with a VPS. At least you will have control over the server and limit your exposure to unscrupulous VPN companies. (Yes using a VPS is shifting the trust from one to the other, but you will have to make a decision that is right for you.)

Yes, definitely. Maybe I feel like my contributions matter more since we are all trying to make this a viable platform? I dunno, but it’s definitely more fun interacting here than on reddit.

I use adblock wherever I can as ads have only become more annoying and intrusive over time. It’s incredibly frustrating going to a site and having three banner ads covering 60% of the screen, or seeing an unskippable ad interrupt a YouTube video every 90 seconds. It’s wasted time I will never get back, and it feels like theft of my life. I wish I could have adblock everywhere outside of the internet.

Simple and clean UIs are an improvement over what’s now considered “modern web design” meant to manipulate your attention to particular things. It feels like the agency is taken away from the user. I am loving the fediverse for this reason and have been a fan and user of FOSS apps for over a decade because the design goals of the software match the actual use-case of the app without trying to tie you in to something else. No distractions, no advertisements, no walled gardens. Just, here’s the app, here’s the functionality, it’s been delivered. Now use it as you see fit without an ulterior motive from the developer or their investors (or lack thereof.)

It’s wild how quickly reddit went from being beloved despite some missteps to an absolute pariah on the internet.

Still scroll reddit for certain communities, but the conversation here is refreshing and I find myself participating more, that’s a good thing. Lemmy needs sustained engagement more than a honeymoon phase. We will see once third-party apps shut down.

I really need to buy one of these.