I don't think anyone relevant in Australia has yet suggested banning VPNs. Too much gov infrastructure runs on them.

Plausible considering it's been shown that meta is the one responsible for lobbying this shit

Doesn't even need to be intentional when there are virtually no consequences for leaking that info

Lol, I bet removed is gonna be a slur someday.

My theory is its war with China. The US has likely alerted other country that China will do to them that the US does to Iran, using social media to guide elections.

The bad news for the AI goons is that the capitalists have squeezed us so hard that we no longer have any money to spend on the products we're programmed to lust after. Not sure what the end game is.

Agree because it's a real mental illness that some people are tornented with, and that word should not be thrown around playfully.

The word I didn't love from OOP was "unironically." I truly don't love that word.

I think you make a fair point here, partially. However, Marlboro could also advertise on snapchat if they wanted. Now there's no doubt something like that would catch massive eyes, landing them in hot enough water to probably change the law around it. If Marlboro leadership saw Juul as a threat, that would make sense to do. They lose a pittance in advertising and court fees, and cut off a competitor from an advertising stream.

But they're not a threat, they're an asset. Altria, the parent company of Philip Morris and NJOY, has a 35% stake in Juul. Altria is incentivized to keep their piles of shit separate.

Vaping has the potential to be healthier than cigarettes, socially and physically. But not when it's almost entirely controlled by companies that have a history of marketing to children. It's physically healthier sure, but only 107 countries have laws regulating the age for vaping, vs 188 for cigarettes. The e-waste factor is also huge, something that a lot of people who vape choose to ignore and I wish they couldn't. I vape myself, have for years, and it's a shit state of affairs with how popular disposables are. But I don't know what the realistic solution is. People are going to use tobacco products in a dystopia.

What a beautiful world we live in.

(my first ever post in the fediverse lol)

You’ve made the right choice. Just watch out for the crazies, they mask well.

Schizophrenia is a real, serious disease. It means a specific diagnosis that isn’t just 🤪

This is a great answer. It is worth noting that the word “dumb” used to literally mean what we now say is “non-verbal”. Funny how language changes.

See also: “lame”.

The advertisement goons are now incapable of determining who is a bot and who is an actual human.

Bullshit. Social networks track the living shit out of everyone and know exactly what's human traffic and what isn't. Device identifiers (user agent, IP ranges, browser fingerprint, (lack of) ad id, etc.) and behavioral patterns (including purchase history) differ wildly.

Advertising to children is a general no-no from politicians, or something,

Bullshit. Even advertising to kids were outlawed (it isn't), politicians could be just bought off by advertisers to turn a blind eye. This is particularly true for the land of their formerly free and home of the formerly brave where corruption is now an above-the-counter item, practiced out in the open by the president himself.

If of wasn't Metas involvement, I was thinking it would be the first stab at a social credit system.

Is definitely a ploy to identify us all and certainly not to protect children.

Palantir Orphan Hunter

That's actually vx-underground source for this post: https://xcancel.com/vxunderground/status/2032562782248349793#m

🧩 Hyper Rationalizing Autistic person here. My condition makes me view reality as systems within systems within systems with infinite recursion.

I have read this post.

I have not detected logical inconsistency in this theory... And all the facts that I know seem to support the hypothesis.

And yes I know I sound like AI. Ironically, AI tools tell me that too. 😅

If anyone wants to introduce a new premise or fact into the hypothetical scenario, I'll let you know if it makes sense or not (to me).

It's great for most written things in society.

Laws? Oh yes, please.

Any official communication? Thank you.

Even mundane things like cooking guides would benefit from history and versioning. Imagine entire family sending their branches for favourite pie/turkey/whatever else.

(I mean on OG reddit, where people would ironically make up conspiracies (like birds aren’t real (which they aren’t, but it was first discovered on r/conspiracy unironically [wake up sheeple])))

So what every website will have to have age verification? Or else if your website lacks such controls you go to jail?

I thought land of the free and home of the brave was Scotland

what's your problem with the word "unironically" ?

Eventually every USER will have to be identified on the Internet, to prove their age, so that we know they aren't children, because we want to protect children.

So I have to allow everything I say or do on the Internet to be exposed to the entire world, because parents can't be bothered to supervise their children's Internet use.

Well, clearly the government would be an exception, there are always "authorized uses" for every banned thing.

New premise.

New datacenters are not for AGI and never have been. The are to support the hyper personalisation of advertising that requires a massive surveillance apparatus and data mining operation.

Social networks track the living shit out of everyone and know exactly what's human traffic and what isn't.

Over 80% of Twitter’s accounts are actually bots

The difference now is that paying advertisers are demanding proof that their adverts are reaching humans, not bots.

Why are you given adverts for products you've just bought? So that paying advertisers can be tricked by the data into thinking their advert resulted in a sale.

test

I bet they write a 10 paragraph essay on why the word "unironically" is pretentious.

Advertising doesn't seem like a large enough lever to drive something this globally coordinated.

My read is that governments and large institutions are preparing for the kind of systemic instability climate change is going to produce.

Across the world we're already seeing laws and policies that quietly restrict the ability to organise, protest, or remain anonymous online, while surveillance capabilities expand at the same time. None of this is particularly popular, yet it keeps happening.

Why?

Because the next few decades are likely to involve continuous pressure from climate-driven problems: migration, water shortages, falling crop yields, energy instability, and the political conflict that follows when resources get tighter.

From that perspective, universal ID verification online isn't mainly about ads or "protecting the kids". It's about mapping who is who, who talks to who, and how information spreads.

If you expect future mass unrest, protest movements, or large-scale political instability, that kind of data becomes extremely valuable.

And historically, elites often choose to invest more effort in managing the consequences of systemic problems than in solving the underlying causes.

So instead of "AI spam broke advertising", the bigger story might be that institutions are building the infrastructure to monitor and manage populations during a much messier future.

If you want to see where we're going, look no farther than Russia's Internet. Which is currently much worse than China's.

So be prepared for your service to be degraded to unusability.

Hello, this was never about kids. Do you routinely believe what politicians are telling you?

Humans are illogical creatures who hype over irrational things. Some random key players pulling strings to heard the mob just a little but no greater strategy exists then "make money by any means possible fuck everyone else""

It is the third option. For a schizo conspiracy it makes a lot of sense.

Considering there is no internal infrastructure, it would be way to tricky to allow public only assets access and enforce the gaps. They already aren't , not meant to use it avoid stuff, but people already do.

But again, feel free to provide a source that says otherwise if a relevant member of the lower house has suggested tabling anything.

I absolutely believe this

How is this a theory? This is literally what's happening lol

Even if it's not advertising itself pushing it, the rest of what was said is true.

That's my point. Kids aren't even at risk of circumventing age restrictions so requiring IDs or banning VPNs is targeting adults privacy. Not protecting kids.

Conspiracy theory? It’s not, it’s absolutely true. But they left out the bit about the quasi-alliance between big tech and right-wing extremists.

Tech bro’s want to keep their revenue streams, techno-fascists want to remove privacy barriers that stop them from training AI with your personal data and actual fascists want to crack down on public speech and dissidents.

The political right in both the US and EU are continuously working to remove privacy and surveillance restrictions under the auspices of free markets and innovation.

Why are you given adverts for products you’ve just bought?

You could return it. They have to make sure that you stick to your choice.

Correct. But not wholly correct. There are legitimate advancements being made by the serious ppl. But 99% yeah, it's a smokescreen and everyone sees it coming a mile away, and they think we're fucking stupid. They have no respect for us, the common people.

They are too busy robbing their own children of a future metaphorically, and then finishing up by raping and eating said children on the island.

Why?

Because:

Darkseid

is.

Edit: Which is why I opted out of the system. I play games for fun. Unfair games are inherently not fun, so I stopped playing. Made a straight 🐝 Line to the exit.

Bought a house when the historic market low hit after 2008 recession during 2013.

Paid it down aggressively in 10 years with a cherry 2.3% interest rate.

Solar panels and efficiency upgrades to decrease lifetime cost of living.

Rent 50% of property for supplemental rental income (charging UNDER market rate intentionally because I am not trying to be greedy).

Filled property tax grievance to drive property tax down as much as possible.

In 2024 I retired at age 38 by allowing my unethical employer to walk into a wrongful termination lawsuit because they are morons who think they know more than me.

Litigation in progress but I can confidently predict the outcome.

They will either settle for 1 million, or take my custom package. If they value their pride they will settle. If they value money, they will take my custom package. If they litigate it will likely destroy their company. 1.6 million in fees and defense costs, a humiliating public loss, and then I will go tell local news just to finish them off for fun.

Oh and I did all that with a few emails and a couple forms for $0. Just answering the complaint alone has cost them $60k so far.

FATALITY.

Correct!

https://agelesslinux.org/

Grandma's brunch grits git branch

feds corpos

This is not a conspiracy. Look at who funded the bill, who wrote it, and who funded the opposition to the bill in each state. Every time one of these passes, each legislating body already has the votes the need to pass before the actual bill material surfaces.

Meta has reportedly funneled over $65 million into a network of four primary super PACs to manage this state-by-state strategy. While they appear distinct on paper to "scatter filings" and avoid centralized FEC scrutiny, they are managed by the same leadership: Brian Baker (a veteran GOP strategist) and the Democratic consulting firm Hilltop Public Solutions.

1. American Technology Excellence Project (ATEP): The national "umbrella" super PAC that serves as the primary funding hub.

2. Forge the Future Project: The GOP-focused arm, active in states like Texas, Florida, and Utah. It frames the legislation as a "parental rights" and "pro-family" issue.

3. Making Our Tomorrow: The Democratic-focused arm, active in Illinois and California. It frames the same legislation as "tech accountability" and "corporate responsibility."

4. Mobilizing Economic Transformation Across California (META PAC): A California-specific PAC focused on protecting Meta's interests in its home state, particularly regarding AI and child safety regulations.

The "Shadow" Advocate: Digital Childhood Alliance (DCA)

The group providing the "boots on the ground" testimony for these bills is the Digital Childhood Alliance. Investigations have found that:

• Legal Status: The DCA reportedly has no EIN, no IRS registration, and no incorporation records. It is essentially a "ghost organization" or astroturf group.

• The Meta Link: Internal filings and investigative reports confirmed the DCA is almost entirely funded by Meta, though its website and testimonies never disclose this.

• The Mission: They are launching Proof-of-Personhood for exactly the reasons specified in this post. By integrating a unique identifier at the OS-level, they are effectively killing the VPN. Soon websites will start requiring that unique identifier to view “adult” content in order to comply with the government.

How will this data be used? I’ll let you speculate, but let me reassure you that privacy is dead and a bunch of know-nothing geriatric pigs come up with a new way to destroy democracy every day.

Bullshit. Social networks track the living shit out of everyone and know exactly what’s human traffic and what isn’t. Device identifiers (user agent, IP ranges, browser fingerprint, (lack of) ad id, etc.) and behavioral patterns (including purchase history) differ wildly.

https://github.com/xvzc/SpoofDPI plus a browser fingerprinting blocker.

Right.

YouTube Kids has no ads at all because of this.

Google isn't doing this because they're being nice.

Joe Camel begs to differ

I thought dumb and removed already was