- cross-posted to:
- pulse_of_truth@infosec.pub
- cross-posted to:
- pulse_of_truth@infosec.pub
I love the level of disdain the linux community has for this kinda bootlicking.
Then he said Arch Linux should implement it anyway because the law requires it. archinstall PR #4290
Well, it’s not “the law”, it’s your local law. To most people on the planet, it doesn’t apply any more than for example North Korea’s laws. As far as I can find, Arch Linux is not owned by a foundation or similar legal entity (i.e. which could have been located in California), but the lead developer appears to live in Germany.
I mean they kidnapped maduro and are trying him under new york law so…
Germany has a similar law already active
§12 Jugendmedienschutzstaatsvertrag
(1) Anbieter von Betriebssystemen, die von Kindern und Jugendlichen üblicherweise genutzt werden im Sinne des § 16 Abs. 1 Satz 3 Nr. 6, stellen sicher, dass ihre Betriebssysteme über eine den nachfolgenden Absätzen entsprechende Jugendschutzvorrichtung verfügen. Passt ein Dritter die vom Anbieter des Betriebssystems bereitgestellte Jugendschutzvorrichtung an, besteht die Pflicht aus Satz 1 insoweit bei diesem Dritten.
(3) In der Jugendschutzvorrichtung muss eine Altersangabe eingestellt werden können
But yes, neither such laws nor the implementation into systemd is in any way positive and should be fought
Jugendmedienschutzstaatsvertrag
Is that a single word? O_O
Kinda. In Germany, we put many words together, to form a new word.
Jugend = youth Medien = media Schutz = protection Staat = State Vertrag = contract
Thanks for the clarification ! And how do you know which word can be put together? Sorry if this question is kinda hard to answer :/ don’t if it’s to long and needs some complicated grammar or something like that, i’m genuinely curious !
I can’t tell you exactly, because as a German I have no idea of our grammar, I speak and write how it feels right. But I found this, if you are interested: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Compound_(linguistics)
Collaborator
to all y’all with the “it’s just a text field”: what if the field is “race”? “sexual orientation”? “jerks_off_to”? what the fuck has a system managing daemon got to do with any of that? and why would you preemptively put it in there without even a pretense of a fight?
fuck you make us! make linux illegal, in Cali of all places. guess how long that will last?
Yeah, scary.
What about some other scary fields like:
- Real Name
- Office Address
- Office number
- Office telephone number
- Home telephone number
- external e-mail address
I mean if those fields were stored, could you imagine the danger that Linux users would be in?
You don’t have to imagine, because those fields have been stored in UNIX/Linux since 1962. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gecos_field
Your argument is an informal fallacy called Whataboutism.
I invite you to educate yourself by reading about it on Wikipedia
Those are also entirely optional and not having them filled in doesn’t cause other software to stop doing what the user wants.
(same for the birthDate field)
Not true. Because the stated purpose of the laws at play is to enable that to be queried so that sites can decide what is appropriate for you to see.
That is the purpose, but the field is implemented as optional and modifiable with admin privileges.
That is not the point and you know it.
Your point is true, but I’m saying its impact is also optional.
The same with the birthDate field.
… unless someone merges a PR making it required, which is the discussion of this thread.
What if someone makes a PR making your real name and address being required? Damn…
So you’re arguing that systemd shouldn’t have reverted that pointless PR because it’s not actually enforced? Sorry, I’m probably not understanding your comment
“It’s just a harmless field; what’s the big deal?”
The big deal is that it’s on the heels of age verification bullshit that fascists are pushing through with the help of tech bros, so that they can eventually push all of us into a scenario where we have zero privacy.
It’s not the adding of the field itself or the fact that it can be filled with nonsense. It’s the reasoning backing it.
“But it’s the law!”
Yeah, fucking and…? It’s a stupid mass surveillance law disguised as a protection, and per usual, it’s written like vague dog shit. This is the smallest part of the wedge. More will come of this and if developers like this keep volunteering themselves to help the fascists, we will all be fucked. Here’s an alternative approach: just don’t add this. You can fight back by not fucking implementing this. Easy.
Twenty Lessons For Fighting Tyranny
- Do not obey in advance. Most of the power of authoritarianism is freely given. In times like these, individuals think ahead about what a more repressive government will want, and then offer themselves without being asked. A citizen who adapts in this way is teaching power what it can do.
https://www.carnegie.org/our-work/article/twenty-lessons-fighting-tyranny/
THIS! Those that do obey in advance, especially trying to help impose it on the rest of us, are collaborators!!! Treat them as such!
“But it’s the law!”
I was just following orders!
this same person would be chuckling to themself about how pointless this all is as he locks the door on the gas chambers.
He’s adding age verification for the internet, not sending people to gas chambers. You really need to touch grass, urgently, because clearly your dependence on the internet is not healthy.
As you sit by and let the pot get one degree hotter
wasting 32 or 64 bits for absolutely no reason is also pretty offensive in itself
Next they will mandate a “race” field, and the same kind of imbecile will implement it.
Be careful now! His coworkers will act most silently.
Lots of disingenuous comments in this thread regarding the change being “just json” considering they’re already on a warpath of implementing id verification. They are testing the water to see what they can get away with. Furthermore, the Linux community has always been against shit like this (see: systemd outrage, open bios, gnu etc).
I’ll believe that if and when they actually force me to upload identification to prove that my birthday really is 1970-01-01 and my name really is Nunya Bissnis. Otherwise, it’s really no different from Steam asking my birthday when opening store pages or porn sites asking “click here jf you’re 18” and take my word for it.
So long as it’s being enforced just as well as the realName field, I maintain that it is indeed harmless. If the point is to have a hilariously ineffective solution as a fig leaf against a stupid law, I’ll prefer that to efforts to actually implement verification.
I’ll believe that if and when they actually force me to upload identification to prove that my birthday really is 1970-01-01 and my name really is Nunya Bissnis
It’ll be too late by that point. Way way way too late.
Your real name and location data have been stored in UNIX/Linux for over 60 years. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gecos_field
realName and location have been fields in systemd since the beginning.
Were you panicking about this before social media told you to be afraid?
Your real name and location data have been stored in UNIX/Linux for over 60 years.
IF you entered that info. And it wasn’t being used by applications to enable surveillance laws. It’s a false equivalency.
The birthDate field is optional. As userdb as a whole.
It’s like talking to a wall with these people.
What do you mean with “these people”?
All I say is that no one forces you to enter a value in an optional part oft the systemd project (not to be confused with systemd, the init process).
Linux Community: It’s Free Software. You can do what you want!
Also Linux community: BUT NOT THAT!
Jesus fucking Christ guys. Regardless of your thoughts on age verification, hunting down someone just for complying with the (currently) rather inoffensive law is nuts.
Posting his face here is absolutely going to get him doxxed, and going to cause someone to actually hunt him down and hurt him.
Focus your anger on the people who actually passed and push for this law. Not the person who drew the short straw and had to implement it.
EDIT: Yeah, this whole discussion is toxic now. Suggesting that someone shouldn’t be lynched for making a change in a piece of software is equivalent to me agreeing with that change. I don’t like the push for age verification. It gives me a lot of stress. But I don’t think some random software developer should be hurt for it.
Reading the room wrong when writing software is not worth a life.
Well, I’m not in a lynch mob. So there’s that.









