This community usually discusses consumer rights, but nobody is discussing this initiative. Is it maybe cuz Lemmy’s majority ain’t American?
Changing your profile picture to Clippy to me seems the same as boomers posting “I DO NOT GIVE PERMISSION TO FACEBOOK”.
Just delete your account and stop using it.
Pff. This reminds me of the This Is Bob protest against the forced Google+ accounts that were the beginning of youtube enshittification. It didn’t do shit. Anyone who wants a profile on youtube nowadays has a Google account. Google+ may have failed but the intent and mission behind it didn’t. Google has total control over anyone who wants to use YouTube now.
You can set clippy as your profile pic and feel like you have done something, but it’s not gonna change anything.
If people want to actually do something, they should abandon these predatory services and go open source or maybe become anti tech as much as possible. It doesn’t matter whether or not you signal to the Zuckerburgers on top how you feel if you’re just gonna continue to use their products.
The only thing that would scare them would be the numbers plummeting if they saw a mass exodus from their platforms and services and people actively began looking for alternatives. But most people can’t be fucked to do that because they are too enmeshed with these services that it is easier to stay. But putting clippy as your profile pic is super easy and costs you nothing so yay. You get to feel like you did something without actually sacrificing anything to make change and the Zuckerburgers will look at you and shrug. “Ah, the peasants are blowing off some steam again”.
Sorry for being so negative, but this is honestly so fucking weak. I may have missed something, but when has slacktivism ever changed the minds of these companies?
when has slacktivism ever changed the minds
Hey, don’t you remember how changing your Twitter profile picture to have a green overlay encouraged the Arab Spring to bring lasting democracy all over the Middle East?!? /s
Lol, did people do that? I only remember the black square for the blm movement, but I have also never really been on Twitter, so most of what I know about trends on that platform is what has been shared on other platforms.
Google+ may have failed but the intent and mission behind it didn’t.
Google+ was Google’s attempt to take on Facebook with its own social product. It definitely failed, and the intent and mission failed too. That isn’t to say that they have no social data, but they definitely don’t have access to the full social graph that Meta does.
It wasn’t a complete failure. Before Google+ Google’s various products were all siloed. Your data in gmail was in a different silo from you data from search, which was different from your data from Google Reader, etc. As part of the Google+ push, Google put out an EULA that basically said that it could share data from any google product you used with any other google product you used and it was one big unified account now. Thanks to that, they’re able to target their ads based on much more data. But, they still wish they’d been able to get a Facebook competitor up and running so they could see more clearly who your friends and family were. There’s so much interpersonal data they’re missing out on.
Only one thing you can do to these bloated lizard-ass fuckers sipping boy-blood and soaking in little girl pussy on the most otherwise beautiful land in the world as the paranoiac securitization gradually creeps out from them building seemingly spontaneous bunker complexes everywhere they step will ever dissuade any of them from literally anything.
I do of course mean voting. You should vote for them.
I do really think that one of the things we have to do as collective, is something somewhat impossible but,
We need to pick the things we really care about. Limit ourselves from the everything that we have been offered for so long and find what brings us joy specifically and start following and protecting that and doing it off the Internet, or at least the at large big players.
Find artists in our spaces locally that make the comedy, or comics, or stories, the developers that make their own games and movies that dont outsource their work to others so that it no longer feels like art.We can still have globalised sharing and our spaces can support that by raising up the best of the best naturally through communication and sharing but not just by being told it’s gonna be big or given to us easily.
The only way out feels like we as a collective need to start putting work into cultivating and tending to our fandoms and we cant be as greedy as it will take more work. Im fine with us being an insatiable species craving for more cause its how we don’t stop, and i want new artists and new creators and new spaces. But i think we cant be lazy about it anymore. And i think doubly so we cant think we can do all of it.
Problem is that the majority of people are not going to do any of that because it takes work and people either don’t want to let go of comforts, they don’t care enough or they don’t have the energy to be digital activists after they have finished a day of work.
It will probably only gain traction if it becomes the cool thing to do among young people and even then, it will most likely be a smaller number of young people who will bother doing all of this.
The rest will become really good at prompting their way through life because its easier, more comfortable and takes the least effort.
they don’t have the energy to be digital activists after they have finished a day of work.
Good news! With the rate corporations are laying off and firing workers, pretty soon they will have plenty of time for activism.
/S
Yeah i mean that seems likely with how things are going but also things rarely go exactly to plan.
Im a realist so, i accept that it is entirely possible its gonna keep getting worse. I’m just also a sucker for optimism and maybe someday it will be better.
Probably not tomorrow or next year… Probably gonna be a lot more of this for a while.
Hold on to your optimism! We need people like you.
I consider myself a pessimistic optimist. Things probably aren’t gonna happen the way we hoped, but we will adapt and make some lemonade with what we are given.
It’s so rare that hyped movements go anywhere because the focus is always on the wrong things, but in the long term, if companies make it increasingly obnoxious to use their services, people will most likely silently make the move to open source through word of mouth. It isn’t as sexy and bombastic as making clippy your avatar and doing armchair V for Vendetta protests, but it’s through people’s silent choices that change will gradually happen. Whether or not this change will be felt on a grand scale, I don’t know. I also don’t really care. I just believe that over time, more and more people will eventually turn their back on the big tech companies while the rest will stick around either out of indifference or ignorance and that is their right too.
I’ve seen this posted before, so it’s definitely been discussed on Lemmy before. Reading the comments back then is much like reading the comments here, Clippy does not really seem fit as a corporation fighting symbol and frankly changing your pfp will most likely have no impact to Youtubes management. Why not simply go for a Reddit blackout kind of protest where everyone switches all their videos to unlisted or blocking monetization on their videos (if that is possible)? That will surely get the attention of Youtube.
The goal is to show each other we are many. He explained it in another video, the clippy movement actually had an impact. This is simply the first step for organising as a group around a shared idea: using a common symbol. It doesn’t matter what the symbol is, as long as we recognize each other using it.
Why not simply go for a Reddit blackout
Well the whole reddit thing was just a bunch of volunteer mods. On the other hand, many YouTubers make a career out of the platform. Considering their livelihoods are at stake, and the vast number of YouTubers you would need to get on board to make google actually care? Organizing such a thing would be anything but simple.
Also the Reddit blackout did nothing. So I’m not why that’s your reference point. Charging pfp would achieve exactly the same. Nothing.
Americans love their nothing burger demonstrations.
The reddit blackout got me off reddit. Well, that and reddit getting rid of third party apps and enshitifying the platform
I think the Reddit blackout did a lot, just not everything. I’m here on Lemmy because of it. Granted I’m still on Reddit as well, and Mastodon, and Xitter…
Just keep plugging along, and every little bit helps.
I’ve been out touching grass, what’s all this about?
Clippy is becoming a shared symbol. The idea it represents is that: we are not happy with the way companies lock us out of our own devices. We want to be allowed to do whatever we want with the hardware we bought. We want to be able to repair it. We want privacy when using it… Etc…
What motivated the choice of Clippy as a symbol? Meme value?
Kinda, but also that Clippy (real name Clippit, as it happens) was included as a feature that was genuinely intended to be helpful. Like, that’s not to say it was successful, or appreciated, but that it came from a time when you could buy a product in the expectation that you’d own it, you could keep it and it’d work for you, not for someone else.
lazy copy of my comment in another thread:
here, the video which started all: https://odysee.com/@rossmanngroup:a/change-your-profile-picture-to-clippy.:e
and where he goes a bit more into detail and talks about many of the points seen in this thread: https://odysee.com/@rossmanngroup:a/you-changed-your-profile-to-clippy-now:6
Clippy already was a big step in the wrong direction from Microsoft, i’m not gonna celebrate mistakes of the past because they seem benign in comparison to todays mistakes.
What about Tux throwing clippy in the bin? Acknowledgement and shows it doesn’t go far enough
Clippy wasnt a bad idea, especially in an era where computers were just becoming mainstream. But just like most microsoft’s products, the poor implementation made it useless and annoying…
I would but I don’t have a youtube account
hhh chad
No, simply because I’ve never commented on youtube, so it’d be pretty useless, if not counterproductive. Giving even more information about my political/tech ethics to Alphabet doesn’t seem smart nor useful in my position. Also, I don’t even watch youtube videos on their website now. I usually use invidious instances or newpipe.
But I’m not against people doing it, especially if the ultimate goal is spreading awareness and building a community of people with privacy oriented ideas.
I’m on the same boat, except for the part about not using Youtube. Unfortunately I’m caught in that spiral where I watch every clickbait_y video about new programming language, new tech stack …ect. Are you able to watch every video normally with invidious and newpipe on Desktop (Linux/Windows) ? My experience wasn’t going that well, also Youtube is so good because of the bandwidth and you easily switch quality.
I’m using FreeTube on desktop. World pretty well. If you lots an update you might have issues before getting the latest version
Are you able to watch every video normally with invidious and newpipe on Desktop (Linux/Windows) ?
In my experience, yes. For desktop usage you can use invidious from browser and freetube [https://freetubeapp.io/] as external client/software (but I’ve never used Freetube so I can’t comment on that). Newpipe is android only and I HIGHLY recommend it if you have Android.
The problem with invidious instances is that sometimes they get pretty laggy because of server overloads (I guess? honestly idk). You also don’t have your account tailored recommendation, but in my experience you can jump around a lot, especially if your main interest are programming videos.
Another method I use is downloading the videos I’m interested into using JDownloader 2, but that’s pretty extreme and I relied on this to combat my “algorithm addiction”. Got fed up by it months ago, so I put my favourite channels on a RSS feeds and downloaded only the videos I was truly interested into. Usually downloading videos require way less bandwidth than streaming.
(edited for spelling errors, eh)
I remember using Newpipe before my Android device got stolen, but back then I got recommended so much normie stuff, and comment were flooded with nsfw accounts (weird profile pictures)
If I remember correctly you can use ReVanced to login into your Youtube account and have an experience similar to Newpipe. You’d probably have better recommendations (the bot comments depends on the channel though). I’ve never looked into it, but it seems a popular choice.
Those businesses give no flying fucks about signals you’re angry; they only care about money. So unless you use the Clippy avatars to mobilise people and to hurt those businesses’ revenues, it’ll do nothing.
(For YouTube, this means to stop or at least reduce platform usage. After all its revenue comes from ads.)
Where’s that mobilisation? *cricket noises*
What’s that clippy stuff about? I asked elsewhere and someone posted a youtube clip. Not gonna waste 15 minutes of my life watching this shit.
Clippy never sold your data or demanded a subscription fee for something you already bought. Clippy just tried to help.
The clippy movement is not about clippy as a program, but as an idea that companies need to be held accountable, and that we will hold them accountable.
If a company tries to make a feature a paid subscription after you paid for the product, or releases and update that removes your privacy, we will be watching and we will hold them accountable.Companies can lie to one person or hide changes from a few people, but they can’t handle all of us. Samsung has already reversed their added subscription fee for a smart TV as a result of community action.
Awesome, thanks a lot for the elaborate reply, much appreciated!
It’s about that, but it’s also at this point just about showing and spreading the community. People will be more likely to actually take action if they know that there are more like them.
will most people with clippy as their pfp actually do anything beyond a few comments? nope. but there will be more people who do than if clippy wasn’t used as a mascot
youtube pfp to clippy ?
That would require having a YouTube/Google account, so no
This comment section does not understand what Rossmann’s trying to do. Obviously google, facebook etc. are not going to fall to the ground with tears in their eyes with this. It’s more about building and organizing the community, to make them feel their not alone and something can and should be taken back. This is analogous to how 4chan making Trump their meme candidate helped him out a fair bit.
The real question is of course whether or not anyone is gonna do something past changing their profile pictures.
I give this trend a couple of months. Maximum a year and then a bunch of people will have clippy avatars and everything will go back to normal.
Something like Stop Killing Games was an initiative that only survived because one man dedicated a good portion of his life to get the issue brought before the eyes of actual politicians. Even before the pirate software drama, Ross had been talking about this issue for years and many people agreed, but nobody did anything except for Ross. Maybe the petition would have reached its goal without piratesoftware’s initial meddling. Maybe it wouldn’t. His subsequent sperging turned failure into success, but the issue is still in process to be reviewed and maybe it will be a win, maybe the lobbyists will shut it down. We don’t know yet. But without Ross’ stubbornness, nothing would be done.
Imagine if Ross had told gamers to change their profile pic to pacman to show game companies and consumers that "we dont agree with the companies’ practices? That would be a total joke.
Obviously google, facebook etc. are not going to fall to the ground with tears in their eyes with this.
It won’t? Well, that clinches it: I’m out.
Y know this comment section-and every other i see when this vid comes up- is a perfect illustration of why the left always loses. We would rather criticize everything/anything than DO anything. Who fucking CARES if they care, if the notice, if it matters or affects anything??? Who fucking CARES who/what the mascot is??? The message is something im reasonably sure 99.99 percent of usernames in this particular commie off brand reddit corner of the internet AGREE WITH. Yet. We sit here shouting at each other and arguing over each fucking comment, nuance and semantic instead of doing even the tiniest, most trivial resistance… this more than anything is why the left is so useless and despicable, as a movement. Theyre too busy shooting each other in the feet to notice the race is already over. MORONS.
There’s a lesson I learnt from playing team games: If your teammate makes a bad call that you disagree with, you should still follow them 100%. Going all-in on a questionable decision is almost always better than second guessing each other.
I think it applies here, and it’s why right wingers and religions are so effective. They don’t care if their arguments are flawed or their leader is a rapist, they’re jumping into that fight every time.
Not an online gamer, but I heard a similar sentiment from a boss about 20 years ago. He told me “if you make a mistake one time, I got your back, but we’ll speak in private and I’ll counsel you. Make the mistake again, I’ll let my pen do the talking. Make it a third time, you’re off the team.”
It escalates quickly, but his management style helped us learn from the mistakes. Sometimes the second time happened. But everyone was willing to go to war with this guy. I mean, proverbially. This was also a guy who would bring his grill to work and cook for everyone one weekend a month. Companies that say you’re family, big red flag. A boss who walks the walk as well as talks the talk? Huge green flag.
I agree with your sentiment, but calling people morons isn’t going to win anybody over to your side
no. I think Goatse would make more of an impact than Clippy. But something tells me there’d be a problem with that
Don’t Google that
PFP idea: a smashed server and a dude ripping it apart. I call it GOAITSE
how are there so many low iq comments about other mascot suggestions. rossman is doing something and he got traction. any people eternally caught in argument about details will never get the momentum to do anything. i used to not like clippy just like a lot of people, don’t get me wrong, but just focus on the important core idea, and the large exposure that is unique for the current moment and finally gives a glimmer of hope.
The issue is what this even accomplishes.
Traction is indeed important. But people also get exhausted (how many folk were whinging about “first I needed to make my avatar a rainbow and now it needs to be black? Oh, you mean a black box. Whoopsie” back in 2020?). It is why “just do something, it doesn’t matter what” is such a stupid fucking mentality because you waste the general good will towards pointless slacktivism and then people stop caring by the time you have an idea of how to utilize them.
Which… is where the Rossman comes in. I have a lot of issues with him as a human being but as an activist he is REALLY effective… for Right to Repair… for repair shops. But he has also made his career on convincing everyday people that he is fighting for them when he is really using them as ammunition for making sure his repair shop (that totally doesn’t violate any labor laws…) can stay running because OBVIOUSLY this lobbyist movement to support activity that requires a full hotplate and high powered microscope is something that everyday consumers care about (sort of in the sense of having options, but at this scale the poison pill apple compliance is actually probably just as good, if not better, for consumers)
I haven’t been able to even find a good explanation of what this is even supposed to accomplish. But, dime to a dollar, it is Rossman et al demonstrating how quickly he can mobilize The Internet as a negotiating tactic for whatever he and his lobbyist buddies are pushing on right now.
Im actually fine with “just do something” mentality.
Cause if every person did to the limit of what they are capable of things would still change.
For Rossman the limit of what he is capable of might be changing laws via his followers so he can keep his repair shop running. For others it might be legal efforts. For some it could be talking directly to their parents who are the wealthy overlords, and for some it might mean running themselves. And for some its just beinf oart of a chorus that shouts what they believe in.
It has worked for religion for so long.We are a numbers species. We arent as clever as we think and individuals actually rarely get anything singularly done themselves. But we cant stop at whats easy but what is within our reach.
If everyone “did what they can” to make the world a better place, we just might have a shot at it.We are a numbers species
And we only have power when we act in numbers towards a focused goal.
This is why we (should) have (more) Unions instead of just “Negotiate for yourself and everyone will benefit”. And that, inherently, needs leaders who know how to work towards a shared purpose.
Everyone should work towards making the world a better place. But we also need to understand what we are actually working towards and what those “somethings” actually can accomplish.
Yeah. Agreed but chicken or the egg right?
It’s easy to say we just need the unions and groups but we need to build them by people just starting.
We definitely need to pick people to lead us better and not lazily accept people saying they are the right person to lead simply because they are.
It helps when we have a shared idea of what better is.
I think Clippy is the wrong icon for this. Microsoft Bob would have been better and it predated Clippy by a few years.! .
It’s not as recognizable though.
actually I recognize this one more. I only know about clippy from retro computing videos, but I remember this dog and that sorcerer clearly when searching stuff (now that I mention it, Windows’ search sucks nonetheless)
