# Social(?) Media

Rumor has it that Microsoft wants to buy Discord for $10 billion. Of course, that’s wrong. Microsoft isn’t interested in buying a chat application. They could easily develop one for a fraction of that price. What they are shopping for is an established user base with an existing vendor lock-in.

The lesson to learn (again) is: think twice about signing up for services, make sure not to grow dependent on them, run like hell when they get sold. Because no way in hell, the new owner won’t try to squeeze your balls to earn back his money.

(Pretty sure, the idea here is to upsell Discord users into the X-Box ecosystem - don't worry, you'll fall for it. Microsoft has been playing this game probably before you were even born.)

Clarification: Mastodon is bound to fail

My last post seems to have caused a few misunderstands.

Mastodon is bound to fail

and that's probably for the better

How to follow a Youtube channel without an account

RSS to the rescue!

I’m loosely following the news shitstorms on apps being suspended from Google Play. Happens pretty often, it seems. If only there was a way to backup APK files.

Don't lick the rat poison!

(word to the wise - not like anyone listens anyway, right?)

The aftermath of "No, 'Open Source' does not mean 'Includes Free Support'"

Got some hilarious reactions. Gotta share.

Like oil leads to global warning, data leads to social cooling

Sure, laugh at Trump for calling TikTok a threat to national security (it’s kid posting karaoke vids of themselves after all!), but accidentally, he’s actually right…

• In 2019, TikTok made 20% of its revenue ($36 million) in the US. That’s the US economy hemorrhaging money towards China.
• TikTok is specifically targeting teenagers and young adults - upcoming first time voters. It’s the “Russia uses Facebook to influence democratic elections” argument all over again. Only this time, China controls the network.
• TikTok captures the audience Facebook is loosing with a twitterized version of Youtube and it’s really good at it. One could see this as an attack on the US economy.
• TikTok is dark patterns wherever you look. It rewards self exposure with 5 minutes of fame and uses peer pressure to conquer the school yard. Now think of a high ranking government official (military general, business leader,…) having a teenage daughter publicly documenting her life. Sooner or later, something sensitive is going to spill (granted, this is a side effect and can happen on any social network, but TikTok is the Chinese one, damnit!).
• The sins of one’s youth make for great leverage in one’s future.

Ok, I’m facing a moral dilemma here. Trump’s going to force Google to ban TikTok from the US Playstore on Sunday. I’m pretty sure that I could cobble together a quick and dirty region free apk downloader for this one app.

So, what’s worse? Not standing up to censorship or being instrumental in helping to turn kids into social media addicts?