Comment by wkat4242
10 days ago
We didn't quite yet. We're still here, pretty anonymous, I'm sure your real name is not deadbabe :) IRC still exists where you can just pick a nickname from thin air. And most of these things will stay, underground. It's the commercial mainstream that will bow to this, sadly.
Unfortunately, the expert in debugging Arduino electrical errors, or in numpy, or in evaluating what the burn pattern on your spark plugs means, or in identifying that strange object in your telescope, won't be on IRC. He'll be on Reddit, where you'll need a government-provided ID _and sanctioned device_ to participate. Or on Facebook, where you'll need a government-provided ID _and sanctioned device_ to participate. Or on whatever large, popular platform replaces them, where you'll need a government-provided ID _and sanctioned device_ to participate.
But rest assured, so long as you want to discuss privacy and nostalgia of the pre-invasionary internet, you'll find a knowledgeable expert on IRC.
There's lots of experts like that on Libera IRC. It's still a big hub for support of FOSS project.
So is Matrix which doesn't have the capability for this kind of checks (and is federated so you can add your own server without it).
Maybe there is an astronomy channel, maybe there isn't. The official page [1] requires longer to install the client to even know which channels exist. That's arguably worse than Reddit, which requires no software nor registration to know which communities exist.
[1] https://libera.chat/guides/findingchannels
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There are more free alternatives. We need to move to these platforms. We need the network effect here for sure.
In Germany, before I can send an anonymous message on HN, I have to send a picture of my passport to some government agency and have a video call with them, so that my phone is allowed to attach to the internet.
Could you elaborate? I lived in Germany for a while and I never had to send a picture to a government agency and have a video call with them to access the internet. Phone, laptop, and desktop.
Never heard anything like that from many people I know in Germany.
I feel like there is a huge chunk of context missing here.
Sure. The difference is probably that you had a contract assigned to your home address, so they had your identity and your banking coordinates already, no need to ask.
I'm referring to sim cards bought in a supermarket. Prepaid, no contract. The activation process, regardless of the brand (I've tried many!) involves those video calls.
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No you don't. You can get a prepaid SIM card.
Amusingly, one of the prepaid sim card that i got in an airport required as a first step that i install an app on my phone (with my previous sim since internet was needed) just so that the app could refuse to proceed because that sim was not German...
Most of the European countries require registering prepaid SIM cards for about 10 years now.
Can you in Germany? In Italy you can't.
I’ve literally never used IRC, wouldn’t know where to begin.