this post was submitted on 07 Sep 2023
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I still use reddit for purposes ranging from getting solutions to pastimes. Same for discord. There are a few communities on it that I need to be connected, most notably dev related.

What suggestions would you guys make? Are there any bridges/frontend I could use to get more privacy?

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[–] [email protected] 16 points 1 year ago* (last edited 1 year ago) (2 children)

I'm using infinity apk own compiled version for free and it works fantastic. This is a guide if you are interested

https://colab.research.google.com/drive/13AE8RvjnCfuBJGaACEqxeBIMo33_l-Sc?usp=sharing#scrollTo=7r0vUW1e9RoB

Also I use Eternity (infinity spin off for lemmy).

This apps are life changing. Couldn't be happier.

[–] [email protected] 5 points 1 year ago (1 children)

Can I ask how does this still work for reddit when API pricing killed all the rest? Thanks for the info

[–] [email protected] 1 points 1 year ago

god damn I didn't know this existed, thanks for this boss

[–] [email protected] 11 points 1 year ago (4 children)

Ah, libreddit shut down, didn't it?

Run a browser in a container.

[–] [email protected] 6 points 1 year ago (2 children)

yeah it did :( . Should I delete the account and only browse there? I sometimes pop in a comment to ask questions.

Also speaking of containers, are you talking about firefox containers?

[–] [email protected] 4 points 1 year ago* (last edited 1 year ago) (1 children)

They probably meant an entire virtual machine (which is only feasible on desktop/laptop as far as I know).

[–] [email protected] 2 points 1 year ago (1 children)

No, I meant a container running a browser in it. An example of such a DIY container would be: Alpine base + Librewolf + Script to install necessary extensions in Librewolf and configure them + Guacamole as a VNC server. Or maybe just configuring X-forwarding (does that work with Podman) will do.

[–] [email protected] 2 points 1 year ago

Oh cool, never knew of this!

[–] [email protected] 1 points 1 year ago (1 children)

Yes.

An example of such a DIY container would be: Alpine base + Librewolf + Script to install necessary extensions in Librewolf and configure them + Guacamole as a VNC server. Or maybe just configuring X-forwarding (does that work with Podman) will do.

[–] [email protected] 1 points 1 year ago (1 children)

Is it yes to both questions?

[–] [email protected] 2 points 1 year ago

I think they are talking about docker containers.

[–] [email protected] 4 points 1 year ago (1 children)

I have to ask... Why not just use a fingerprinting-resistant browser?

[–] [email protected] 1 points 1 year ago (1 children)

AFAIK the only way to completely prevent trackers is to disable JS and even then people have created profiles of the TOR browser before.

I am not confident in my ability to block every single fingerprinting method possible, so instead I'll play their game against them.

[–] [email protected] 4 points 1 year ago (1 children)

What do you mean by “people have created profiles of the TOR browser before”?

It shouldn’t matter if you can identify the TOR browser, as long as different users of the TOR browser have the same fingerprint.

[–] [email protected] 1 points 1 year ago (1 children)

I meant unique fingerprints

[–] [email protected] 1 points 1 year ago

The unique fingerprints shouldn't be a concern as long as enough people have the same "unique" fingerprint.

[–] [email protected] 2 points 1 year ago (1 children)

i think it only halted development, not shut down. i've heard one of the contributors wants to revive the project though. libreddit still works fine if you self-host it and you're the only one using it, but not on public instances. self-hosting is easy tho, just download the latest release binary and run it in a terminal or something.

[–] [email protected] 1 points 1 year ago (1 children)

How exactly is it working without using Reddit's API?

[–] [email protected] 1 points 1 year ago (1 children)

i'm pretty sure reddit's api allows a certain amount of requests from an ip address before the user has to actually pay for it. or something along the lines of that.

[–] [email protected] 1 points 1 year ago

I see. That's how

[–] [email protected] 1 points 1 year ago (2 children)

For now yes, but some instances are still running, the list seems updated well enough

[–] [email protected] 2 points 1 year ago
[–] [email protected] 2 points 1 year ago (1 children)

How come some of the instances work, when the API pricing changes killed most alternatives?

[–] [email protected] 1 points 1 year ago

I'm not sure exactly, but it is either because they still spoof the mobile app or because they don't reach the API usage quota

[–] [email protected] 6 points 1 year ago (1 children)

I haven't used it personally, but there is a discord matrix bridge. You wouldn't get some of the fancy features like voice, but it might be alright for text only.

Unless you can convince the server mods to bridge directly, you'd probably want a puppet bridge.

https://matrix.org/ecosystem/bridges/discord/

[–] [email protected] 1 points 1 year ago (1 children)

I'm on a few servers with bridges and one unfortunate thing is occasionally they'll go neglected and disconnect then you'll be stuck in an unmoderated community with other Matrix users

[–] [email protected] 1 points 1 year ago

I wouldn't recommend a normal bridged room, just a puppet bridge. So it'd basically be the bridge using your own account and pretending to be a real client, not trying to bridge a matrix room with a discord channel.

Puppet bridges are kind of like bitlbee if youre familiar with it, but for matrix

[–] [email protected] 4 points 1 year ago (1 children)

Devs are usually technical enough to understand privacy. Have you tried suggesting a switch to matrix or simplex?

[–] [email protected] 3 points 1 year ago (1 children)

It's a learning community, with possibly thousands of participants. The server mods won't switch from discord for this reason

[–] [email protected] 2 points 1 year ago (1 children)

One can bring horse to water.

[–] [email protected] 4 points 1 year ago (1 children)

I know the saying, but I don't understand the benefit of your comment. If you say the horse is me, the only way it works is I give up my access to the learning community. If the mean the discord admins/mods, they're still working on scripts for discord bots, so no they won't be switching anytime soon. The server is Odin Project btw, and the size of new users won't let them switch.

[–] [email protected] 3 points 1 year ago

Worry not! The horse in this case is them. You can show them a better way, but can't force them to take it :)

[–] [email protected] 4 points 1 year ago

I gave up discord a week or two ago but when I used it, I only used the online version on Firefox in a container. I think Ublock Origin blocks most of the science API things too! Example: https://discord.com/api/v9/science

[–] [email protected] 3 points 1 year ago

For reddit I use Libreddit selfhosted instance on baremetal..for discord I use goofcord,its an foss discord client that allows vencord modding which allows customization and tracking blocking

[–] [email protected] 3 points 1 year ago (1 children)

On android i use Aliucord works great 😄

[–] [email protected] 5 points 1 year ago (1 children)

Vandetta is more up to date. That is what I use now.

[–] [email protected] 2 points 1 year ago

Aliucord mod here

Link

[–] [email protected] 1 points 1 year ago (1 children)

It is called a web search. I use DuckDuckGo. Most things are already answered. One should only waste people's time with a question once they have made a good faith effort.

For me, rarely do I need to ask a question and if I do it is usually too hard and I get nothing anyway.

[–] [email protected] 8 points 1 year ago (2 children)

Already looked up privacyguides to no avail for my specific use case. You can save your time by simply not interacting with any post you don't like, since you wouldn't know if the poster made a good-faith attempt to find info and couldn't find it.

For me, rarely do I need to ask a question and if I do it is usually too hard and I get nothing anyway.

It's amazing that your already know the result to your future questions. I don't, since I'm human.

[–] [email protected] 2 points 1 year ago* (last edited 1 year ago)

You take me wrong. Not saying your question is a bad question. You ask what I do when I have a software dev question or other similar questions.

Software in particular but for many topics a web search leads you to the answer. If not that, then a more particular search of Wikipedia or alternativeto.net for example. Lot of these searches lead to familiar places some of course Reddit included though not that common for really good software dev answers. Software stuff is very well documented this way too. Source code, documentation, discussions ... literally anything. I generally work my way back. In the end one can just read the source though we all try to avoid that.

You asked about a bridge. Search is the bridge. If I actually needed some direction from someone else I would find a specific forum or the actual dev community for that specific piece of software but only after I had put in the up front work.

So my answer was a serious one. Encouraging a way of thinking.

[–] [email protected] 1 points 1 year ago

By the way, another approach is AI. It can act as another interface and entry as long as you do not plan to take it too seriously. AI can give a great summary and sound really authoritative but be very wrong in crazy ways. So useful but not an end point.

[–] [email protected] 1 points 1 year ago

I just isolate Discord on Brave browser with all the settings privacyguides recommend (minus the cookie thing since I want to keep my account logged in)

[–] [email protected] 0 points 1 year ago (1 children)
[–] [email protected] 6 points 1 year ago (1 children)

I like to be part in the discussions in the topics that I'm interested in, or at least just read people's opinions. I already don't use any other social media, and am not very social irl due to circumstances. Your suggestion would ensure that I turn into a hermit, and might as well live under a rock.

[–] [email protected] 3 points 1 year ago

lol the absolutism of people in privacy communities can be really be so unhelpful and tonedeaf at times

For discord there’s a couple things that can increase privacy to some degree, OpenAsar has some options related to privacy and tracking and will speed up load times, no clue how effective the anti-tracking feature is though. You could also use modded or 3rd party clients, I remember hearing about Powercord back when I used discord more and Replugged seems to be the continuation of that project. I also remember hearing of clients that basically simplifies the app to an IRC client with a super basic gui, I’ll edit if I remember the name