Word has it that face scanning will soon be necessary to do anything at all on FB and IG (including deleting your account) so I'm in the process of taking care of that business now and trying to encourage the few friends I'm still in touch with to do the same.

Unfortunately, without an account you can't access content, and there are still numerous local businesses and organizations posting at FB and IG and I can't really expect that to change anytime soon. But it would definitely help sell the idea of giving them up if I can offer another way of seeing posts on those sites.

With IG, there is https://imginn.com/ which I've been using for a time, it seems to work well enough to show an account's IG posts.

What I really need is something like that for FB. I don't really need to see posts from individual accounts as I don't even think my friends post on FB anymore; I really just want to be able to see "Liked Pages" as those are often regional businesses and communities. Being able to see groups would also be helpful but those often require special permission even when you do have an FB account so I don't expect much there.

Thanx

[–] [S] 4 points 10 months ago*

Well, the thing is that this is not about creating collector's items or trying to make money or anything, this is something I would imagine more akin to a zine in terms of distribution. I used the term "trading cards" more in the vernacular sense to give an idea of what their physical description might entail, not that you might literally try to get kids to buy them and trade them or anything. I neither expect nor want this to be like a business idea, just a means of disseminating information that would be hard to track and remove. By making them physical and maybe encouraging people to take pictures to post on social media (inasmuch as people are safe to do so).

There’s something about that kind of concise structure

They're really not that much unlike the types of flash cards that students might use to prepare for a test, honestly. Easy, short, digestible information.

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  • [–] [S] 4 points 10 months ago (1 child)

    To be clear, I do not personally have to means to do this. Let's just say that if this entire thing is left up to me, there's no way it'll ever get completed. I have some health problems that would almost certainly delay things indefinitely, and anything that would cost money or require someone to know their local community is completely outside of my means.

    That said, thanks for sharing the idea. I'd also say that you can sometimes find old lino blocks at antique stores and those sorts of places are usually more than happy to accept cash.

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  • [–] [S] 8 points 10 months ago*

    That's funny, I just wrote a comment about the Iraq thing in my other comment, probably while you were writing this, lol. And yeah, I meant "Trading Cards" more in the common vernacular sense, it would be far more effective if they were distributed as a complete set.

    Either way, I'm not going to be pitching this to anyone outside of Lemmy. Again, this is where I want to remain anonymous. Anyone involved with any such project would do well to stay hidden, as they may become targets. Call me paranoid, but I'd rather be safe than disappeared.

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  • [–] [S] 8 points 10 months ago (5 children)

    OP here again.

    I also recall this exact strategy was used during the Iraq War, where US soldiers were given trading cards of Iraq officials and high-value targets to help soldiers learn to identify them. Knowledge is power.

    Another sort of tangential thought: Are there any DIY woodworking / metalshop people out there know how to make an old-fashioned printing press? Like, the ones with a hand crank? If you have the means and the desire to do this, bringing back the Gutenberg style press would mean a means of printing information that can't be traced to any specific printer or computer tech, and heat sensors wouldn't be able to pick it up from outside as they could with electronic devices. Bringing back old school tech could be very helpful to create and distribute information anonymously, plus by creating it in physical form it can easily be photographed and posted online.

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    So I have an idea that I do not have the means to make reality, so I want to share it with you all. I suspect if this is a genuinely good idea (and I don't know if it is) that places like Reddit will remove it.

    There's an early episode of The Simpsons (the B-Sharps Barbershop Quartet ep) that begins with the family at a swap meet or flea market or something, and Ned Flanders is selling a bunch of trading cards based on people from the Bible. They're basically designed to look like baseball cards. "Who ever thought that learning about religion could be fun?", Ned quips.

    And then I thought

    What if someone printed a set of collector's cards or trading cards that were designed a bit like baseball cards but they were of billionaire CEOs, including people like Z-ck and M-sk but especially those that the general population has never heard of, such as Darr-n Woods of Exxon-Mobile or Brian Armstr-ng of Coinbase. Stats would include what they do, where they live, what they're worth, and their crimes against humanity, plus anything else you can think of that would be relevant and would fit on a card. I'd also include people like Kevin R-berts of the H-ritage Foundation and that psycho C-rtis Y-rvin, as well as anyone else with a great deal of political and social influence, especially everyone who isn't a celebrity.

    Such a project would largely include research and design of the cards, finding photos, and of course printing the cards. If they are physical, and a bunch of copies are printed and disseminated worldwide, it would be very difficult for any authority to get rid of them entirely. Plus, then people could scan and photograph them and post them online, and I'd also suggest finding of means of spreading whatever digital file the designs are on so others around the world could download them and print and distribute their own.

    Then, rather than selling them as little random stacks like baseball cards, just sell the whole stack as a complete collection. You could also print them as stickers so they could be applied to public spaces where they would also, hopefully, be photographed and shared.

    I feel like a big problem right now is that save for the super famous guys like M-sk, most people don't know who the most powerful people in the world, which means there's a lot of people out there who are basically fucking things up without the knowledge of most of the general public. Spreading that knowledge means that more people know who they are and exactly how evil they are.

    Now, I'll be honest, I don't know how good this idea is, but I do not wish to receive any credit for it. This would need to be treated as a meme, with an anonymous author(s). If you think this is a good idea, feel free to straight-up steal it. As far as I'm concerned, it's public domain. You don't need my permission because you've already got it (and I'm not sure you actually need it). Feel free to just straight-up copy and paste what I've written here if you feel like it. I don't think this is an idea that can really be monetized and even if it could be, I don't want the fuckin' money. This information could be too important to be hidden behind paywalls or copyrights. If there ends up being several different card designs because a bunch of people decide to make it happen, GREAT. If it somehow miraculously takes off, I'll know it was my idea and that is literally all I need.

    If you post this idea, please do not mention that you found it on Lemmy, but if you do decide to post it elsewhere, include it in as many online spaces as you feel safe to.

    Thanks for reading.

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