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PaperclipPerfector  1d ago (text post)   1494 thread views

Small-Scale Question Sunday for October 25, 2026

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I've never been one to follow AI capabilities all too closely - I knew they've been rapidly improving but the particulars have never interested me beyond the headlines. However, with the rise of AI agents like ChatGPT Dot, the increasing integration of AI systems in consumer operating systems, and the growing prevalence of surveillance infrastructure, I'm coming to the conclusion that things are going to get very bad, very quickly.

Essentially, I've developed a belief that everyone is going to be surveilled to the maximum extent possible, and that surveillance is going to be used in all the conventionally dystopian ways. Advanced advertising, thought policing, price discrimination via social credit systems, etc. The usual rebuttal to this is, "well, you should have nothing to hide." I can understand the instinct toward this: who would care to closely watch the data of an ordinary person like myself? The key difference is that capable AI agents remove the labor bottleneck, so we can be monitored 24/7 without requiring a person to tediously comb through hours of data.

I've begun preparations to completely detach my life from big tech, switching to Linux, GrapheneOS on mobile, and taking whatever steps I can to anonymize my data. While AI models might not be capable of this surveillance right now, I want to get ahead of it so by the time they are capable, I've already become as much of a ghost as possible. Am I overreacting? How have you all prepared for the upcoming data revolution?

I made the switch to GrapheneOS and a telemetry-free Linux distro a few years ago for related reasons. I believe that ads are active attack on my mind, stealing my attention in order to change my buying habits, opinions, world-view, and emotional regulation in ways that are contrary to my own interests and in the interests of the highest bidder. Besides that, it corrupts the service that displays the advertisements, incentivizing them to keep your eyes there longer to increase ad impressions, usually to your detriment.

To Hell with all of them! I refuse to use any product that serves me ads, and I shield my family from the same. I am at the point where I am extremely hesitant to buy any product that uses closed source software, closed standards, or requires Internet connectivity to do a job that does not inherently require it. I've seen too many times the ratchet of enshittification slowly boil our collective frog. So, yea, I'm a bit of a zealot on this.

How's it working out? Pretty great to be honest. My banking app works with GrapheneOS. (Though it didn't when I got it; I wrote to them complaining about it and later it did work. I don't know if my complaining did anything.) I can't imagine going back to the advertising and digital restrictions management hellscape I see other people put up with.

Glad to hear it's worked well for you! Have you found Graphene has any usability issues? How is the messaging app? That's what I'm most concerned about - my friends and family have group chats requiring MMS and RCS, and I'm unsure if the stock app supports anything more than SMS.

Also, what distro are you using? I'm still determining which one I should install. I enjoy occasional gaming, so I've been eyeing up CachyOS (an Arch fork) but I'm unsure of its privacy features.

I never used any other android, so I can't really compare. I don't have any usability issues, but a group chat I'm a member of had to move to a different service because I couldn't receive RCS messages. MMS is fine. You'll have to decide how much Google (in the form of Google Play Services) to allow into your life. If the answer is none, then some apps won't install or work.

I use NixOS, but it's a bad choice for a beginner to Linux. Any other distro will serve you well.

NixOS might be a bad choice for a beginner, but it's an excellent choice when you want things to just stay configured and working.

You're preaching to the choir, my brother.

Yes indeed. Insane community aside, it's solved so much.

Manjaro FTW.

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