I want to start off by saying that everyone in this whole comments section has been making points as if what they are saying is "fact". Nothing here is "fact" because there are no laws around API usage. I don't think lawyers even know what HTML or JSON mean. Everything here is an opinion and there are clearly opinions on all parts of the spectrum.
Meta is currently completely within their rights to put in their terms of service that there should be no 3rd party clients, there should be no way to access their APIs, etc. That is true. However, we believe that shouldn't be the case. People should be allowed to have the freedom to choose how they use platforms. People should be allowed to control which apps access their data and what they do with it. Some people in the comments mentioned that this is very similar to "Ma Bell" and the whole anti-trust situation along with that, and it very much is. We are stifling innovation and creation of jobs, wealth, and truly wonderful products in the social space because of the stronghold Meta has over the market. For example, both Brazil (PIX) and India (UPI) have open instant payment systems that came about due to Government anti-trust regulation that encouraged competition. This led to a boom in digital payments and was a huge boon for both countries. If you have tried either of these systems, you would know that they are leagues ahead of more "modern" countries like the US. By not allowing interoperability and portability of social networks, and user data at large, we are stifling the growth of the economy and of the products that can be built. Listen, this is no small amount. Social networks were responsible for onboarding the first billion people onto the internet. These tools now help everyone in the world communicate at all times. Do not underestimate the impact they have and the reduction in value across the world because they are not interoperable. Users who use UPI in India have a choice of over a dozen payment apps, that work with all banks, and they can send money to any other bank, instantly, 24/7! This is HUGE. Similarly, social networks that allow for portability and interoperability will allow for dozens of different apps that fit specific use-cases, allowing for more internet users, and a greater value to the entire world.
So, we built OG because we thought this was the first step to realize this vision of the social internet that was truly open, portable, and interoperable.
Getting to interoperability won't be achieved by questionable third party clients essentially abusing the API of a company. What a weird way of thinking. Work out standards, lobby for them etc. You very well knew what you were doing and what you'd risk.
> People should be allowed to have the freedom to choose how they use platforms
I absolutely despise meta but this is just weird. If a company provides a service, they can do so as they see fit, as long as they are compliant to laws etc. If you don't like it, don't use it.
There are nice projects like mastodon or matrix, which seem to have very similar goals as you. I just can't shake the feeling of you guys being shady af. You can't be naive to think this would work? You have no privacy policy, circumvent the compliance of meta (which is afterall, one of the most watched companies) and essentially proxy all user data. WTF? And who on earth would fund that?
Back in the AT&T monopoly it required a third-party device (the Carterphone) to actually be released on the market for their anti-competitive terms to be challenged and eventually struck down in court.
> circumvent the compliance of meta
How? If an idiot user gives their credentials to a shady third-party, it's the user's fault for compromising their own data, not Meta's. If a user were to print out pages of the Facebook web UI containing private data and then start distributing them in the streets, would you also blame Meta, and not the user? What about if the user writes down the private data manually, and then distributes it? Etc.
> essentially proxy all user data
What's wrong with proxying? Plenty of mobile e-mail clients for example do proxying as well because there's just no way to maintain a persistent connection or do regular polling on mobile devices due to network & battery life constraints.
Is there any evidence they captured or misused the proxied data for beyond what's needed to provide the service?
Also keep in mind that a vast majority of Instagram data is public by design - people put it out there because they want it to be seen, and it can be seen by anyone accessing the web interface. The people who ultimately own the data often don't want it to be private.
> who on earth would fund that?
Someone who's actually interested in setting the legal precedent that would allow this behavior and invalidate ToS preventing it?
> Back in the AT&T monopoly it required a third-party device (the Carterphone) to actually be released on the market for their anti-competitive terms to be challenged and eventually struck down in court.
That's so american to think that another company should fix this. It's the state's responsibility to fix that, if people want it.
> How? If an idiot user gives their credentials to a shady third-party, it's the user's fault for compromising their own data, not Meta's. If a user were to print out pages of the Facebook web UI containing private data and then start distributing them in the streets, would you also blame Meta, and not the user? What about if the user writes down the private data manually, and then distributes it? Etc.
I mean content and distribution. Also, providers might be liable for not protecting the user enough. Sorry but your other examples are stupid and totally not what I meant.
> Is there any evidence they captured or misused the proxied data for beyond what's needed to provide the service?
I bet you take care of security in your job ... not. "ThEy DiDn'T aBuSe AnYtHiNg (yet)".
> Someone who's actually interested in setting the legal precedent that would allow this behavior and invalidate ToS preventing it?
Still, liability is a bitch, as you can see. The risks were all laid out quote clear beforehand.
> It's the state's responsibility to fix that, if people want it.
So let's say there's a bad law on the books that prevents this. How do you get people to understand why they should revolt against it without giving them a tangible example? There's plenty of bad laws out there such as the CFAA, yet it's virtually impossible to get people/politicians to care about it because they're not affected by it directly. On the other hand, giving people a tangible example of why the law is bad, such as by breaking it to deliver something valuable, will immediately get people's attention when that valuable service stops because of the law and they got used to relying on the service.
> providers might be liable for not protecting the user enough
How do you effectively protect the user when they are voluntarily giving away their credentials? Furthermore, is it even "protection" (as opposed to rent-seeking) if the user consensually and voluntarily shares their credentials because they trust the third-party?
> I bet you take care of security in your job
Well my security model is that the user is only allowed to access the data they are entitled to. If the user gives away their credentials voluntarily, despite all warnings, there's really nothing I can do, and maybe I shouldn't do if it turns out the third-party is actually operating a legitimate service that the users find valuable.
> Still, liability is a bitch, as you can see
Well, all of this will have to be determined by courts, and ultimately depends whether there's any money to be collected in the first place. This entire operation may have been planned ahead of time with the company structured in such a way that there's nothing for Facebook/Meta to collect even if they end up winning any eventual lawsuit.
If you want me to trust your app then open source it. Until then, your app is as far as I'm concerned a black hole of information that is potentially siphoning whatever it can from Instagram when you proxy for a user.
Without that and no privacy policy, no monetization scheme etc leads me to have zero trust in anything you say about a truly open and clear internet.
I had this same problem so I made an app that allows me to use Instagram without using the Instagram app. It also blocks ads + suggest posts, removes all tracking, removes read receipts in DMs and when viewing stories, and also allows me to create custom feeds like Twitter lists.
Turns out a lot of people had this problem, so I made it into a company.
I don't want to blatantly advertise but let me know if you'd like me to link the website.
(Developer of the Github repository in the post here)
Is it possible for me to easily integrate with sioyek to provide PDF converting ability directly within the Chrome Extension? This would be useful for the following reasons:
- For the times when you click on a link and it opens the PDF in Chrome
- Many people I know use Chrome as their main "PDF Viewer" app.
I believe this will be a great way for both our OSS projects to collaborate.
Perhaps in the future we can work on the language model as well. Very cool reasearch btw!
Correct, it's not possible in default PDF view in Chrome -- contentscript is not injected. However as long as you have full access to pages, you could intercept a PDF link, render it with, say, PdfJS, and start from there. Maybe!
Would anyone here be interested in working on a startup that is making alternative front-ends but adding additional features (ability to edit feed algorithm, better DM support, etc.)? Feel free to reach out!
While that sounds interesting, I wouldn't stake my income on trying to build a third party frontend for these companies that can be rather hostile to such efforts.
Just wanted to give my thoughts on the whole situation. This is in addition to our official statement here: https://twitter.com/TheOGapp_/status/1575217497011200001
I want to start off by saying that everyone in this whole comments section has been making points as if what they are saying is "fact". Nothing here is "fact" because there are no laws around API usage. I don't think lawyers even know what HTML or JSON mean. Everything here is an opinion and there are clearly opinions on all parts of the spectrum.
Meta is currently completely within their rights to put in their terms of service that there should be no 3rd party clients, there should be no way to access their APIs, etc. That is true. However, we believe that shouldn't be the case. People should be allowed to have the freedom to choose how they use platforms. People should be allowed to control which apps access their data and what they do with it. Some people in the comments mentioned that this is very similar to "Ma Bell" and the whole anti-trust situation along with that, and it very much is. We are stifling innovation and creation of jobs, wealth, and truly wonderful products in the social space because of the stronghold Meta has over the market. For example, both Brazil (PIX) and India (UPI) have open instant payment systems that came about due to Government anti-trust regulation that encouraged competition. This led to a boom in digital payments and was a huge boon for both countries. If you have tried either of these systems, you would know that they are leagues ahead of more "modern" countries like the US. By not allowing interoperability and portability of social networks, and user data at large, we are stifling the growth of the economy and of the products that can be built. Listen, this is no small amount. Social networks were responsible for onboarding the first billion people onto the internet. These tools now help everyone in the world communicate at all times. Do not underestimate the impact they have and the reduction in value across the world because they are not interoperable. Users who use UPI in India have a choice of over a dozen payment apps, that work with all banks, and they can send money to any other bank, instantly, 24/7! This is HUGE. Similarly, social networks that allow for portability and interoperability will allow for dozens of different apps that fit specific use-cases, allowing for more internet users, and a greater value to the entire world.
So, we built OG because we thought this was the first step to realize this vision of the social internet that was truly open, portable, and interoperable.