I’m the kind of person where if you tell me there’s an alternative to insert website, I will wonder how it is different and if I would benefit using it over the one I am using at the moment. This leads to me searching for it and the biggest issue of trying to use some of them is that some are not as popular nor as polished for casual user. Because of that, it feels sort of pointless to try couple stuff out.
It’s like I want to like Matrix/Element but the issue is just me trying to find roughly same chat room/server I on Discord that has similar topic/interest which felt like I had give too many stuff up. It then explaining to people who use Discord about it and then trying to convinced them. I tried to get few my Twitter friends to join me on Mastodon which they just stuck to Twitter and I hadn’t talked to some of them since I left.
Also Steam is the one I love/hate. Hate for it having DRM on most games and I had to launch their client every time I want to play or install a game. Only stuck around because most PC Games will be on Steam which GOG may have some but not as many as Steam.
Wish I can fully get away from some of these services but sadly, just can’t as there barely much choices that not only suit my preferences but also popular enough for people to use it.
welcome to reality mate.
if you walk a path of safe and secure it is a lonely walk indeed.
your friends as wonderful as they were are on a path that is dangerous.
i have meet very few people competent enough to understand their own threat model. sadly it looks like your starting to just now understand the price of good decisions.
our parents, our teachers, our leaders are supposed to be educating us how to avoid evil, and murderous thieving shills.
instead we have to be a lone odd ball looking for advice and endup somewhere on the internet between teddit.net and Invidious looking for life standard advice so we can even survive.
sadly there are very few henry’s putting up websites were oddballs can go ask questions and look for advice.
pleas post the best you have found
1)topic - example of service
2)goal - why it is prohibitive for you to use normal “workarounds”
3)success - what is something you have found that is totally the one best solution that works for you?
chose your advisors carefully and weigh their words selectively. every one believes something. that will be the “1)reason 2)motive 3)objective” behind any and everything they ever say.
there is no safe way to be a gamer. i deleted my 10 year old 3 thousand dollar steam account some few months ago. i assume at 6 months i am now still having withdraws.
if you go to services like telegram they have channels dedicated to your gaming and social topics. but also beware there are also tons of extremely unhealthy channels on there that are being monitored and even propagated as poison honeypots.
find your self people who are willing to teach and give without any expectation or request. evaluate what they are giving. if that is really what you want, then you probably found a good social circle. enjoy it while it lasts. it wont be there long.
Holy moly 3 thousand! It’s not a drug addiction my man, just play games on steam, these withdrawal symptoms you speak of are just boredom. There was clearly a point in your life where you enjoyed gaming. So why stop? Because of some data collection from steam? Who cares, live your life and be happy, privacy is a choice! Even if the only thing you do in your life is post less on Instagram, that’s a win! You’re allowed to enjoy things that hurt your privacy. You’re allowed to have a Facebook account. You’re allowed to have any account you desire. People who tell you to delete your account don’t know you. This advice should be taken if you don’t have much to lose, but you clearly did. Privacy is about balance, not isolation, the goal is to do the same things, but with more privacy. If you feel like you have less instead of more freedom you’re doing something wrong. This line of thinking can make anyone miserable, and I know what it’s like because I go through it everyday. Stay strong .
It is a struggle to decide what to do. Life is all about choices and our choices make us.
Its not always as easy as just doing some of the things that makes us happy. For example Facebook: I used to have one in 2019. I deleted it. In 2021 I wanting to search marketplace for something so I looked into creating an account using an alias. But just going to Facebook and starting the sign up process disgusted me so much I just didnt complete it.
Its kind of like setting the bar of a personal or moral standard and just sticking to it. Different people have that bar or standard at different levels. For me Im actually happier without Facebook. When I forget I sometimes go back and Im immediately reminded why I left in the first place.
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