Tell me more about Hazel's bush...

Go on...

Did your "friend" make you feel bad for getting mad at him? Frankly, it doesn't sound like you owed him an apology at all - and if he didn't apologise, he absolutely should have done.

When people get justifiably angry because their boundaries have been broken, emotionally abusive bullies often try to make their targets feel bad for "getting emotional". It's all an attempt to redirect the fact that they wronged you, not the other way around.

Sure, but there's not much they can do about it if things are properly encrypted, for example using DKE on M365.

This is familiar.

In particular, my accent gives me a distinct advantage, as I speak with what some might describe as a "BBC" English accent. I work using English outside of the UK in a multinational company, and it's served me very well.

In international contexts people just seem to trust that I know what I'm talking about, because they think that I sound like I should be narrating a nature documentary.

I recognise that security through obscurity isn't something you can rely on, so don't consider my own practices to be secrets and am willing to share them to help others.

I use strong unique passwords stored in a KeePass database, and MFA whenever it's available. I also have a VPN specifically so that I can use public Wifi when I have to (or wish to do something more private on the internet, such as downloading Linux ISOs).

I also have a vanity domain that redirects all mail to a central mailbox, so whenever I sign up for something I can easily use a unique address. This allows me to block specific addresses that produce spam and see where the spammers got that address.

Nope. There's a reason they go after video games that use the red cross symbol for health packs, that dilutes the meaning of what the red cross stands for.

This is like saying:

I am not against taxation. I am against MANDATORY taxation. Do you honestly think that giving people a choice is a bad thing?

No-one wants mandatory military service, but it's necessary for the sake of society as a whole. Maybe one day it won't be, but clearly that's just how things are now.

As for choice, you do have a choice and you know it. Civilian service is a thing here.

Maybe it's just the young people I know, but the people I know in their late teens (nieces, nephews etc) are all genuinely good people - better than I was.

They're certainly far more aware and supportive of each other than I ever was twenty years ago.

The lack of content is a double edged sword, though.

Sure, I can't scroll endlessly, but then again, I can't scroll endlessly. I kind of like that there's not always some new discussion to jump into.

This is definitely a strength of federation.

Want to get rid of right wing communities and their fascist members? Defederate with the instances that host them.

Want to get rid of left wing communities and their commie members? Defederate with the instances that host them.

Want to get rid of hate communities and their toxic members? Defederate with the instances that host them.

You don't need to completely close communities, you can just let people have those discussions in their own space, as should be their right. Centralised systems don't really have this choice.

Bing Chat is great, and at work we use M365, so I can easily search for work content through Bing too.

Bing Rewards are also a nice bonus.