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[+] -14 points 5 hours ago (2 children)

I just think the reaction from fediverse users has been too harsh when you consider that Tesseract was free and open source software.

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  • [–] 14 points 5 hours ago* (1 child)

    If your free software is borderline malware (which it is because it's intentionally depriving users access to certain information with a deliberate attempt hide that fact from the users) I think people have a right to be harsh.

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  • [+] -10 points 4 hours ago (1 child)

    If it is malware then harshness is justified, but I'd be willing to debate over the strict definition of malware and whether it technically applies here.

    But I don't think most of the harshness we've seen is actually borne of that kind of outrage. Even the OP of this meme says they are not upset and are having a wonderful time.

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  • [–] 6 points 3 hours ago (1 child)

    I never said it's strictly malware, I said borderline malware. It can't be strictly malware because most definitions of malware focus on the malware taking (some or full) control of the system or extracting valuable information, things that generally pose as a direct threat of damage to the end user or system.

    But restricting user access to information without the user knowing information is being restricted and taking deliberate steps to hide this is being done in the first place is all malicious behavior. If you asked from a layman if this should be considered malware behavior or not most people would consider this malware behavior, hence borderline malware.

    And I don't see how it not being "strictly malware" would change anything. People are outraged by what it is doing and how it is doing it, not by whether it fits the strict definition of malware.

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  • [–] -3 points 2 hours ago (1 child)

    People are outraged by what it is doing and how it is doing it, not by whether it fits the strict definition of malware.

    Which is kind of what I'm getting at. "Outraged"? Really? Isn't that at least a bit melodramatic considering the stakes and circumstances?

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  • [–] 3 points 2 hours ago (1 child)

    The current reactions you're seeing aren't just about the software, it's also about the person.

    This very meme is about that person doubling down on their misguided belief that they have the right to dictate who is allowed to be visible on the fediverse. Then there's attempts to twist the narrative by claiming the knowledge of this list was always public (in case it needs to said, a block list deliberately omitted from the git and having the code inject it later from a completely different source means deliberate steps were taken to try and hide the existence of the list). And finally there's also the directed attack to ddos the instance that discovered this list, where the attack vector are unknowing users who read his manifesto on his site.

    If we were to just look at the malicious use of the software then yeah, you could make an argument it's been taken too far. But when you factor in the god complex and continued retaliation by the developer I don't think we're at a point where people are overreacting.

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