Incidentally, you're the only one of those that I follow. I don't know anything about them but seeing their posts, I doubt I'd get along with them since I'm also very Christian and don't care for the new age mystical energy approach.

The only part of it that's hard is getting it without KYC. Unless you know someone in person or are willing to use risky payment methods for a DEX, it's a real challenge.

Well said. The modern web is an absolute wreck thanks to out of control bots and the intrusive ways that sites defend against them. It's actually one of the reasons why I don't use a VPN nearly as much as I used to: it just turns the modern web into a nightmare to use. Thankfully, if you're worried about privacy, VPNs are actually less necessary these days. Switching to encrypted DNS with a privacy-respecting resolver (I recommend Quad9) virtually eliminates any actionable data that your ISP can sell. They still see the raw IPs but that sort of data is harder to market to data brokers and it's also less effective because of how so many sites run on massive CDNs, meaning they'd only be seeing your connection to the CDN's nearest datacenters. Granted, that doesn't prevent the CDNs from selling traffic data, and it doesn't prevent individual sites from knowing your IP, so there's still a use case for VPNs but it all depends on threat model. For me, I only really use a VPN for evading geoblocks and for when I visit an unfamiliar site that I don't want having my real IP. Everything else in my threat model is largely covered by using encrypted DNS with Quad9.

But that doesn't really work if you're in a more rural area.

Well said. I've been raising similar concerns. "Bitcoin is unstoppable" but it really isn't when KYC removes the sovereignty and onramps could be cut off in an instant. There are also the folks who underestimate the threat KYC poses. If BTC is all about self-sovereignty and ownership of your money, then how on earth is that compatible with KYC and similar regulations? If you have to ask permission to exchange your fiat for BTC, it really doesn't free you the way they claim. It also doesn't help that all supposedly 'no KYC' methods still have KYC somewhere in the pipeline. Unless you have trustworthy friends who can trade fiat for BTC, or unless you're willing to take a risk on cash-by-mail or gift card trades, you're inevitably KYCing through the payment processor you use.

The bit on the metadata was incorrect. While Signal doesn't protect metadata like a more anonymous messenger (a la Session, SimpleX), it DOES protect metadata. Most of it is encrypted (profile pics, for example) and Sealed Sender requires any MITM to be simultaneously observing both the sender and the recipient in order to know whom you're chatting with.

Personally, there are only two types of internet bans I'm okay with: this sort (no social media under 16) and porn. The latter is far more important to ban, however, because the 16+ social media thing is difficult to ban without implementing required ID verification for all users (which is something I'm very much AGAINST). Again, porn sites SHOULD require ID verification at the very least, if we can't ban it outright, but regular social media should not.

I'm a traditionalist but even I use AI. People seem to think it's impossible to use that tech without relying on it for everything. It's entirely possible to use AI without letting it replace entire swaths of your life and skillset.