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Is it possible to allow sideloading and keep users safe?

(shkspr.mobi)
205 points ColinWright | 2 comments | 30 Aug 25 12:03 UTC | HN request time: 0.611s | source
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martin-t ◴[30 Aug 25 13:27 UTC] No.45074485[source]▶
Evolution used to work by some people dying before they could reproduce.

That's how we become the smartest animal on the planet. But it no longer works, we are very good at keeping everyone alive. And there's nothing wrong with that, as long as we don't compromise our freedoms to achieve it.

Some people getting exploited is the modern equivalent of leopards eating your face. It would be nice to protect people from it happening but NOT by everyone giving up basic human rights. And yes, in the modern world, running any software on your hardware should be a basic human right.

Especially at a time where computation is starting to resemble intelligence. Otherwise we all become serfs all over again.

replies(1): >>45075569 #
1. martin-t ◴[30 Aug 25 15:40 UTC] No.45075569[source]▶
Ah yes, the rudest form of agreement - downvote without justification.

If you can't explain why i am wrong, consider i am right.

replies(1): >>45078546 #
2. broker354690 ◴[30 Aug 25 22:28 UTC] No.45078546[source]▶
A certain kind of arrogant man who hails from the land of theory tends to believe that everything can be perfectly optimized, that even real-world systems can be designed with mathematical guarantees as to some constraint or another. In their world every thing and every one is an abstract variable to be managed and modified, a goat to be herded. User input is modeled as untrustworthy, hostile input and treated accordingly. The unwashed masses have never toiled in their sterile computer science cathedrals, never been anointed with the sacred waters of ROOT, and thus could never possibly deserve to wield the powers of computation without the infallible guidance of Saint Jobs (peace be upon him) and his holy host.

To compute on one's own is to open one's electronic soul to the Sins of Free Software. Such devilish arts must be shunted to the margins of society, till they may be purged on That Day when all shall bask in Google's light forevermore.