Self hosting, Hetzner, INWX, mailbox/posteo/infomaniak/proton and Ubuntu fix pretty much most scenarios.

I really don’t think it’s any difficult for individual, tech savvy users

Based in Liechtenstein, no idea, available in Liechtenstein, Hetzner, of course

Last time I looked at it I tried to find its declared HQ, Zugerstrasse, 6340 Baar, Switzerland, and found nothing, so it probably is a mail box or a coworking space.

There is no way I trust my data with a company that has no visible HQ. Happy to be shown where it is if anyone knows, otherwise hard pass.

You would be better off self hosting anyway.

The id check already exists, they’re just planning on forcing social media companies to go through it.

In an ideal world social media would be decentralized and free of commercial purposes, just a public square. The stuff these people offer wrapped in social media is highly addictive, that’s basically where all the internal R&D goes.

My point is, I really doubt banning social media is democratically viable. It would get revoked shortly. Best thing we can realistically do is put in place the usual barriers and limitations we have developed over the years for other similar products and services: age, disclaimers, taxation, fines, and so on.

The tool already exists and is used for serious stuff (dealing with the treasury department, police, banks, bond auctions), the only difference is you would be forcing mainstream social media platforms to get an OK from that government’s platform.

Sorry but if you can’t trust your country’s system as a legitimate large scale shield then there is no possible defense against multinational conglomerates and at that point you’re better off just going bunker prepper, I don’t really know what your point is. Democracy doesn’t stick in low trust societies.

And your point is? Creating an id check doesn’t increase the potential risk, the government already has all the data.

My question is, why do you want underage citizens to use social media platforms that a) have been proven to be damaging to their psychological health b) farm their data and store it far from our control c) don’t add anything to our economy.

Care to explain? Because it really fascinates me.

The “supported banks” figure is useless. The largest bank in continental Europe by market cap is Santander. And the two largest banks by number of customers are Spanish. None of them use Wero, but Bizum.

It’s my understanding they’re planning on a collaboration, but still.

Yes, and not thanks to the internet.

You know the things that started happening everywhere in the democratic world from 2015 on or so though?

Turns out the internet as is doesn’t do much to advance democracy, but it’s great for destroying it.

The US is, very precisely, the poster child on how libertarianism doesn’t advance democracy.

The right to bear arms advances no democratic values, because people who are individualistic or distrustful to the point they buy a gun to protect their property won’t fight for democracy, because democracy is a collective enterprise. Where are all those very very brave and very very armed Americans now that the executive is running rampant and shutting down their institutions and agreements? Yeah, I didn’t think so.

Likewise, the right to issue public anonymous opinions advances no democratic values, because if you need them to be anonymous in a free country, either they are malicious/fake and therefore you’re afraid of legal repercussions or you’re lazy/fearful and therefore you would fight no tyranny (same as those who bear arms).

I’m not arguing against the privacy of private communications, that’s an entirely different matter (that’s the point of private/public), but when one issues a public opinion one should be responsible and sensible enough to do it non anonymously. That doesn’t even mean I have to know your name, but we could create an open source encrypted platform that identifies public personas on the internet as a)individuals b)nationals of their countries in the EU. Simply add a check close to the handle and the official verification.

Our freedom to express a public opinion is precious and shouldn’t be weaponized against us by malign foreign actors. As I said before, nobody would go to a political rally by a random Russian in a balaclava. I don’t want to ban political rallies, I just want to expose farms of Russians in balaclavas.

Nobody would go to a political rally by an anonymous dude in a balaclava with a yank or russian accent, but somehow everybody loves to get their opinions molded by random anonymous, possibly paid and farm based, actors on the internet…

So does the government ban the news from criticizing them just because they’re not anonymous? That’s not the way it works in the EU. You’re very lost it would seem…