I’m a broken record: block Google (or whomever) with network-based blocking (IP and/or DNS), these guys have third-party tracking in virtually every website and app.

they're perennially jealous of the shit Apple can get away with.

😒

I really wanted it to work on Fly.io but I couldn’t get it to. I’d also like to get the Tailscale software Dockerized but running multiple nodes on the same host with custom DNS was a complete shitshow.

I really love Tailscale, but the daemon and CLI seem to be absolute garbage.

Pierre, South Dakota. I’m actually from Iowa (I live in Los Angeles now) and my family went on vacation to South Dakota one time. I remember driving to the capital and realizing it was smaller than my hometown in Iowa!

I get that feeling you’re talking about with Des Moines. I used to go on tons of long road trips around the Midwest around age 18, looking for something new. Coming back to visit, Des Moines always feels comically small — I find myself wondering how businesses stay in business with such few customers.

Honestly, just Unbound for DNS filtering + Tailscale + commercial VPN solves 99% of my problems with privacy online.

I’ve been blocking Google domains completely (except for OCSP) for almost a year (using DNS). I’m sure some domains use Google Cloud and slip past the DNS blocks, but usually the only things that break are captchas and some shitty old websites that pull jQuery from a Google domain (why would anyone do that?).

“It breaks all of the internet” is a little dramatic, maybe if you block their OCSP domains that’s true.

I do agree though that 80% is low, even if only counting the traditional tracking script that’s been used everywhere for ages.

I’ve never heard of flashing to pass, the only thing I’ve seen it used for is to let a car in the right lane trying to get into the left lane know it’s safe to do so (as a driver in the left lane). I’ve only ever seen it used by truckers.

As far as Minneapolis goes, I’m quite the opposite. Having lived on the west coast I dread going to Minneapolis — everyone seems to be in a bad mood whenever I go there.

I hate to say it, but when traveling in Tucson the Canadian drivers make me absolutely crazy. It’ll be 100°F out and they’re driving as if there’s ice all over the roads.

I definitely think it’s cultural/regional. I was highly sarcastic with everyone in real life growing up, but moving across the country I came off as extremely rude and have met people from all different parts of the world that only appreciate certain nuances/layers of sarcasm and have adjusted myself accordingly.

Maybe DNS or IP blocking, but blocking only in the browser likely won’t be helpful as apps (on basically any platform) also track users by calling assets on their domains.

You need to block Google completely. Simply abstaining from Google services and/or using a browser ad blocker will do you no good — like 80%* of apps / the web include their tracking assets (among many others).

* Just a number I pulled out of my ass, don’t sue me

If you’re from the Midwest, anywhere in the Midwest. It’s all exactly the same.

Source: Went on crazy long road trips as a young adult looking for something new; ended up moving somewhere completely outside the region later.

Myself, not that I did something so beyond recognition but I think about where I am now a lot.

I was a very naïve, somewhat sheltered Midwestern kid to a 17 year old mother who married (someone else) happily when I was just six months old. In elementary school and into middle school I was never popular and kind of chunky. I’ve always been a computer geek and started making websites when I was around 10 (I was bored a lot).

Heading into high school I made tons of friends in different groups. I had friends in the “drug crowd” but wasn’t into drugs myself. I graduated early only to go into working in fast food and never could finish college.

In my 20s I got really into weed and drinking and I had a friend who inherited a ton of money and long story short, we moved to Los Angeles. Tons of partying and lots of hard drugs later, we moved back but I came back alone two years later with nothing more than a backpack, computer monitor and $800.

10+ years later, I don’t party nor take drugs and have a rather boring life as a web application developer after ~5 years in warehouse jobs.

I’m generally very happy, but I’m very frustrated with the world after having lived in a big city now for almost half my life and having not been raised knowing how exactly the world works — if took me much, much longer to get where I am than those optimistic 90s teachers had me believe it would. Some days I daydream and wish I could go back to those wild days living it up, taking a couple mollies and not having a single a care in the world.