As a complete noob who installed Mint about two weeks ago, I have Thoughts™. This is a good start, I think., and I’m really glad to see it, but it still makes some assumptions and misses a couple of things I came across that I think would be helpful.

I’ll try to find some time tomorrow to pull together some edits and suggestions to share, rather than a bunch of comments here.

How’s best to share them back?

Sorry, yes you do. Because it’s so interlinked in my mind I got that wrong. But deffot the easiest way to do it I’ve found (as long as you’re using proton mail though, I guess…)

I don’t, I’m afraid. But I can say that creating and managing them through protons password manager is a breeze.

I use Proton Mail, which lets you make ‘aliases’, which you can use for different sites. The alias forward staright to your main (or a nominated) email.

You can use https://simplelogin.io/ to do the same, and I’m sure there are similar services around.

E.g. I can’t have [email protected] as my WhatsApp email, and it would forward to whatever account I normally use.

I do this for pretty much everything on line, so they all have their own bespoke email for me.

Interesting. Will have a look on the snazzy package manager and give it a go. Ta.

Works fine on other browsers though. Not techy enough to say if your wrong or right, but the experience I have on a Tab s8 ultra is that ‘desktop’ versions are all zoomed in looking on FF.

Completely agree. The tablet experience licks balls.

Tabs are needed, and god knows what it thinks its doing when you tell it to load the desktop version of a site. Apparently it thinks I clicked a button saying “embeggen all elements and waste screen space pls”…

Enjoy it on phone, mind.

Urgh. Wish this were true, but nope.

Still needs waaay more effort just to do (some) simple stuff a normal person might just expect to work.

Just installed Mint on a laptop to replace W10. Went really smoothly, and was quite impressed.

Thought I’d try a bit of emulation with Yuzu. Wanted to use a Switch pro controller. Plug and play? Nope. Tried Xbox one controller instead. Neat. Works. I can live with that.

But then thought I’d try a bit of Xbox game stream. No controller works with browser. Try obvious things to fix.

Looked for answers and they’re all like, someone going: oh, you just need to clone the controllerwaffelen driver from git, then just compile the installer using the command sudo apt get- monkeyshyte wtf -make then run the installer from the folder using cmake- getfuckednoob.

I don’t know what any of this is. Tried following instructions.

And, frankly, I cannot be fucked to spend four hours finding out / troubleshooting for something I would have thought was fairly coomon.

It’s not a deal breaker, it’s just another bit of faff and fuckaboutiness that puts me off. And, I suspect would others even less tech minded.

Exactly. It seems people often completely miss the human behaviour element of this whole issue. Just saying ‘LeARn to TEcH N00b’ isn’t helpful or realistic in the real world for most people. I have family that still won’t touch a computer, or only use one for the most basic of browsing and email, but they can use a TV remote without issue.

Also, the implication that not being tech-savvy is a form of willful ignorance is unrealistically dismissive of the different talents and intelligence people possess. Being proficient in the many and various technology’s is just one skill set among many, and people value privacy and simplicity without having to jump through hoops to achieve it. Technology should serve to enhance our lives, not add another layer of complexity. The burden should not fall solely on consumers to fend off invasive advertising; it is also the responsibility of companies to respect their users’ desire for a straightforward and unobtrusive experience. (Though I suspect we both agree this bit is more dream than reality…)

Leaving aside the silly thing about buying stuff for show (which may be true of a fraction, but not the vast majority), I disagree.

While becoming ‘tech-savvy’ might allow people to navigate around the pervasive ads in techn like the Fire Stick, it’s unrealistic to expect this level of expertise from the average person. People have a myriad of responsibilities and interests competing for their attention; not everyone has the luxury of dedicating time to become a tech expert just to avoid advertisements. This expectation completely ignores the complexity of our lives and the sheer volume of knowledge required to custom-build solutions like a media PC, or build your own media library. It’s not about being willfully ignorant; it’s about the practical realities of everyday life.

My main question, that I admittedly haven’t been arsed to look for an answer to, is; would subscribers still have the same algorithms as non-subscribers controlling what ‘content is surfaced’ to them? Since it’s been kinda optimised for engagement and advertising for sometime… If that makes sense…

Psychedelics, by David Nutt. Probably the most recent and evidence-based on the topic.