Proton CEO embraces Trump for "standing up for the little guys"
Unnecessary and deeply concerning bow to the new "king"
Update: position got backed up by an official Proton post on Mastodon, it's an official Proton statement now. https://mastodon.social/@protonprivacy/113833073219145503
Update 2, plot-twist: they removed this response from Mastodon - seems they realize it exploded into their face!
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Oh, goddammit.
The writing was on the wall for proton for a while now
No it hasn't. Back this claim up with some evidence
These are useful data for making decisions about using their service, but not exactly indicative of support for a right wing authoritarian leader who lies more in one day than he has hairs on his entire body.
Edit: typo
Damn; you're right. My bad. I somehow missed your opener saying exactly the opposite of what you were saying.
Everything you said is true and verifiable, and worth considering when you decide which service to use. It's a lot of reasons to favor the .onion/tor version of their service to limit what they have access to depending on your privacy stance.
They are indicative of opportunism and greed, which is exactly in line with preemptively sucking up to a future dictator.
Woah... an actually rock-solid account of problems with Proton! Nicely done.
This contrasts with the incoherent conspiracy theory spaghetti that has sometimes been trotted out to make the case against them.
This is interesting. I’m current using btguard, but was thinking about other vpn providers. I have a free protonmail email account and was wondering about their vpn service. Sounds like they are not so privacy oriented. And I assume NordVPN is a similar story?
1,2 and 3 are completely irrelevant. 1 is completely normal, 2 missed the point that the wallet (which I don't use, I never owned crypto) has nothing to do with privacy and 4 is an optional marketing strategy to incentivise migration from google. Nothing is wrong with any of this.
What did you go with out of curiosity?
Yea! I’m interested, I did not see that coming…
Neither did I.
They've been cooperating with law enforcement and handing data to the cops proactively since 2021.
Pay attention.
What do you mean with "proactively"?
Is this what you're referring to?
The proactive part is when they shut your account down and report it to the cops but yeah, the cooperating with interpol by providing data that they claimed they didn't keep is damning.
Where do they claim they don't collect this information?
And then we have the communists making Lemmy. Is there any moderate developers lol. Valve is the only big company I can think of that isn’t annoying. All the faceless Linux devs are good too
Glances at the child gambling enabled by the steam marketplace, an issue being blatantly ignored by Valve leadership.
Buddy, I don't know how to tell you this. I love Valve for all the good they do, but they got some serious skeletons, too.
Valve representatives were asked point blank if the third party gambling sites have a positive influence on their bottom line, and the dude replying sweated bullets for several seconds before nervously going "we.... don't have any data on that" while the rest stared daggers at him.
Coffeezilla has a recent video on the situation.
I love Steam, but thinking about switching to gog over this. Anybody have any ideas how we can let valve know this isn't okay?
I mean I always use GoG, if given the option. But there's almost always no GoG option. Publishers want some form of DRM.
I did this years ago and have like 500 games on GOG. Ended up going back to Steam due to features that gog just doesn’t have. Sigh.
I have a feeling I would feel the same. Its nice having everything in one place. What was missing for you?
All the social features, the workshop, easy browsing, and guides just off the top of my head. GOG is still good for those really retro 90s and early 2000s games though
I understand your frustration but I’m not casting some wide net here. I’m simply talking about political ideologies being in your face.
If it's between fascism and communism, the answer is pretty fucking simple imo. Only one of those ideologies considers all people to be equal.
And no, I am not a communist, and I would not choose communism unless it was the only alternative to fascism.
Totally understand what you’re saying. Obviously I am on Lemmy. Just wish we didn’t have ideologies in our face all the time
I fear for what will happen to valve when Gabr step down in the future
I have a bigger fear of what happens to Linux when Torvalds retires. He took a break a while back, and it was an absolute shit show of a power struggle.
Give some credit. Even if they aren't politically aligned with your, they did make Lemmy open source for others to run with.
lol got downvote bombed for desiring normal. Fucking Lemmy man. Honestly don’t know why I even use this platform anymore.
fuck off booooooot licker
The fuck are you on about?
Standing up for the little guy. Huh. Is that why billionaires and CEO are throwing literal tens of millions at Trump? Why he staffed his cabinet with billionaires? Why the center of his policy is tax cuts for the giga wealthy, at the expense of everyone else and the national debt, at a time where wealth inequality is literally tearing the country apart?
https://www.axios.com/2025/01/15/trump-windfall-fundraising-500-million
https://www.axios.com/2024/12/09/trump-wealth-cabinet-politicians-billionaires
These are objective, public facts. Like, I'm way more conservative than Lemmy’s center and willing acknowledge any good Trump does, but what reality is this guy living in? Who is this statement for? Who the heck does he think is using Proton services? He just pissed off his employees and customers for… What?
Probably doesn't want to get banned in the US... Or so my copium tells me.
Silver lining is that Proton is owned by a non-profit.
I was thinking this for a second, but is this really plausible? Normally when we talk about corporations we talk about how powerful they are and how they use different nations to locate headquarters and offices in order to mitigate legal and tax obligations. We regularly talk about how governments can't reign them in and how they act with impunity.
But now? "They HAVE to capitulate. They are just doing it to survive." Really? Do we really believe that? Or is it more likely that this is what they want and if they didn't, they'd be fighting tooth and nail to stop it? I'm with the second option honestly.
That’s what I don't get. If the proton CEO was actually raging MAGA, the last thing he should do, strategically, is stoke fires by stirring this up. That’s business 101.
…He must want conservative’s ears for some kind of policy issue, maybe to the detriment of Proton’s competitors. But what?
OpenAI has taught me that the non-profit stuff is meaningless.
Seems a lot of people share this view that somehow he's for the little guy, despite quite clearly being for the opposite. It's the same over the pond, there's a paranoia held by many that the government is out to persecute the common people. Very strange on both sides, it's almost Orwell levels of Newspeak.
The official @[email protected] account replied and doubled down
(Less importantly, my response)
Let's not get carried away. The scope of the comment is pretty narrow if you read it closely. This is one member of a 5-person board that also includes Tim Berners-Lee. The foundation structure is also a protection against abuses.
Yes you are right, and no you are not. It is concerning and something to stay vigilent about in the upcoming times.
Can't you both be right? One it is a very narrow complement and also it be very concerning that the "small tech" is also bowing harder than big tech.
But this may be the price for not donating?
The only thing I want to hear from you is that you actively disavow Trump, or if you feel this is going to hurt your business, at least say nothing at all. Anything other than that marks you as a shameless suck-up, and I want nothing to do with you or your business.
Ergo, I want nothing to do with Proton. It's time suck-ups pay the price and see their bottom lines drop because of their dubious choices.
I think the big difference is what the companies stand for.
If the CEO of The Anti-Spyware Company comes out in support of Spyware, is that not significantly worse than the CEO of The Spyware Company doing the same?
I supported The Anti-Spyware companies because of what they believed in. Now that is in question.
FWIW I don't use Proton but switching to it was in my 2025 plans. Not so sure about that anymore..
Yes he is. You are factually incorrect. You can see it from their official page too
Good to know, I was just going off what OP said
FYI, that user is incorrect. Yen is both the founder and CEO of Proton.
Thanks for the update! I guess I shouldn't have taken him at his screenshot
All right then replace support of Spyware with "praise for The Spyware Company"
Spyware was just an example? Proton is all about privacy and this board member is saying good things about a guy who doesn't think us peasants should have any.
I agree that this isn't the worst thing to ever happen. But I also agree with the people saying he shouldn't have said anything.
Fastmail is pretty great :)
Thanks for the tip, I'll check it out!
NextCloud is almost an "out of the box" experience for all of these.
Nextcloud isnt end to end encrypted.
Between your machine, and a machine you control, via ssl?
if you disavow every company contributing to the republican party/trump you might as well sell all your belongs, and learn to live off grid. no internet access, no power, no retail.
we just dont live in a black and white world. its lovely shades of depressing grey gradients.
As much as possible, I will take my business to companies that aren't openly terrible.
Tell that to the orange utan. He sure is about to turn the word from RGB to 1-pixel color space.
Do you really think I want to split people into people I can talk to vs. people I want to avoid at all costs? Trump is doing that. He's forcing shitty choices on everybody. I'd rather have constructive and peaceful interaction with my fellow man. But can you honestly shake hands with a magard and not feel sick to your stomach? I can't.
right, i agree the idea is revolting... but the old man at the dog park who only watches fox news isnt inherently evil. hes brainwashed. hes a fellow human who if shown the light would absolutely change his tune. to abandon those people is to abandon civilization.
sure thats not everyone, but its enough. we just need to show them the truth.. that theyve been lied to and actually do have a choice.
treating every conservative voter as you would trump himself is absolutely painting in black and white.
I'm sorry but no.
You have the die-hard racist MAGAs with the flags and the red cap. Those can fuck right off obviously.
But you also have all the ordinary folks who are NOT die-hard MAGA, but who decided that it was okay to vote for a convicted felon who tried to overthrow the government. And guess what: in a sense, they're even worse.
Voting for Trump is crossing a line. If you voted for Trump, I really don't want anything to do with you because you have proved to me that your sense of morality and your respect for the institutions of this country are compromised.
Either that or so fucking stupid that interacting with them wouldn't be worth my time. I honestly used to believe what originallucifer said, but after this election i've been thoroughly and completely radicalized.
remember that 88 million people who can vote, dont.
many of those that did vote are under a veil of propaganda. theyre not all rabid maga racists. its been proven that one-on-one interaction with adversaries can often change their minds. its just a slow, painful process.
Fuck, that's just exactly me. It's an autism trait??
More and more, I approach wishing everyone was autistic lmao
Thats not always true... That old man stuck on Fox News would likely rather shoot a bunch of brown people than admit he was wrong.
If I could live off grid I would. It's not even an option. I'm forced to live like caged rat in a society that crushes my soul.
Does this actually sound like a utopia to anyone else or just me?
Sure, there's not always an option, but sometimes there is. My tiny bit of $ isn't going to make or break a company, but i try to give it to places who donate less to the big orange turd. I'm in a constant struggle choosing among home Depot, lowes, and Ace hardware.
I do yes - VPN. I won't next month though.
Just be aware that this is a peculiarly American take. In Europe at least, most people will agree that somebody's opinions cannot somehow pollute whatever it is that they produce. Be it a traded good, or art, or in this case software.
Americans did not invent the idea of voting with their wallets. What a preposterous claim
The concept that wrong opinions are like a taint that rubs off on everything they touch is indeed pretty uniquely American (with some echos in the rest of the anglosphere). It explains much of the craziness and bitterness of US politics in recent years. It is absolutely not replicated in, for example, Catholic Europe.
Avoiding giving your money to companies that go against your politics isn't some irrational "tainted" concept. Not sure why you're insisting it is. It's just not supporting things you don't want to happen. These companies donate to and otherwise push forward bad policy. Also, still not sure where you got that Americans invented any of this, or how it would relate to the recent increase in polarization
This is a guy's personal opinion about one aspect of a politician's program. The only fact he mentions is just that, a fact. His insinuation that Democrats are supported by big business is also fairly defensible. There's no obvious link to his company's practices. The opinion is banal and widespread. You and a bunch of others here are treating this semi-non-story like some kind of religious heresy. I can tell you're American just from that fact.
The truth comes out. You think this is a "both sides" thing, and you agree with it.
No, what's being said ITT is that he's praising trump prematurely and people don't want to support a business run by people who do that. Incredibly simple, and might I add, logical.
I mean for most people there are lots of variables here. You have to pick and choose your battles. This is the entire concept of The Good Place TV show.
The only people that are 100% "good" are living in a fuckin yurt.
This. Also, in Europe you can get internet, electricity, email from coops. There are even some "ethical banks" and some survivors from the 2008 (at least in Sapin) as "small savings rural banks" (cajas de ahorros).
And if you aren't a rich progressist and can't afford some expensive eco-bio-coop consume, there are 2d hand options, food recicling, stealing is easy enough (and nobody will shoot a bullet to you for this) and so on. So, yeah, off-the-grid is a legit option, but on-the-grid stealing electricity from huge power corps is super legit also. No need to go to the caves.
Even in case of no alternative (say, I must have an id and a cellphone number), this doesn't justify anything from CEOs. Fun fact is, in the case of Proton, there is PLENTY of alternatives. So, let's use all the colorful gradients instead of accepting to remain in a dark-gray scale
Idk in the rest of Europe, but in France I've witnessed the contrary a lot of times. I do however not have a study on a big enough sample to make a claim, this is all anecdotal evidence on my side.
Examples please. France is the classic example of a country where most people put the art before the artist. The partial exception, unsurprisingly, is younger people who are more plugged into the poisonous world of America's culture wars.
Even Michael Jackson?
Absolutely, yes. Great example. Great music. I guarantee you that almost everyone outside of the US-centric bit of the anglosphere agrees with me here.
Well, assuming they actually like music, of course.
It send a chill down my spine nonetheless
Yes. The "Trump was a good idea after all" take seems almost to be spreading like a meme at this point.
You mean that traitorous piece of shit who sold us out to DRM on the Web?
Actually I ended up coming round to his view on this. If Firefox has stuck to its principles on DRM, then it would have been goodbye Firefox. And then you would have had no decent options at all, and neither would I. The setting is still opt-in.
Sometimes we have to compromise.
Yeah plus it's a swiss company...with a crypto banking feature. They probably just want to attract Nazi bitcoin.
Taking the time to remove Google, embraced proton mail ... Maybe it's time to just write letters and send meme post cards.
Meme post cards are a great idea actually.
That's pretty cool, nice tool for the communication toolbox
hand drawn, because of these fingerprinting yellow dots
Same here; but I'm switching to tuta
Sad. The way tech companies are changing stripes, we are about to hit a surveillance state by summer
The US are a surveillance state already. But I guess it could get even worse.
It’s like everyone forgot about the Patriot Act and NSA stuff. This shit has been going on through at least 4 different presidents. And that’s just the modern surveillance state.
I don't understand how everyone can be so blind to the surveillance that already exists.
Literally all your communications or purchase or browsing history, 90% of people's photos and contacts, everything you ever say near your phone/smart devices, your health data with devices like fitbit, cm resolution spy satelites, 4D maps of the entire globe being created via services like Pokemon Go, phones create and store in the cloud high resolution 3D maps of your face, mesh networked devices like Alexa now surveil without you even having internet access, your home and your exact location down to a meter are already being live spied on. Not to mention full remote access to all your devices.
Sometimes with a thin veneer of privacy on top of it, like Apple pretends to have.
Basically the only part of you that the surveillance state doesn't constantly surveil already is your butthole.
Even avoiding just 10% of this surveillance in your daily life is almost impossible.
Soon smart toilets will also surveil your butthole.
It's like people were born after Snowden's leaks
So Proton is out.
Sorry, I won't trust a service that licks fascist boots.
There is no ethical consumption under capitalism, and that applies to tech. I pay for Proton and this is disappointing af but not shocking. Corporations and wannabe billionaires always fold to fascism.
Gonna start looking around at alternative email services to consider but I use my Proton email everywhere, so switching away is going to suck.
Yeah, I think (hope?) we will find that his opinion is not echoed among them.
People don't accidentally get on a board. The whole idea is that you actively search for and interview and even recruit people who best embody the values of your project. Then you get nominated and often voted.
Ingl, I think the only way to stay sane these times is to ignore what they say and look at what they do. As long as his products are up to my standards and values, I'll just ignore whatever he says to appease whomever
Agreed. If I haphazardly ditched services based on the opinions of tech folks, I’d be reduced to using a pair of cans attached with string and nothing else.
Were the cans and string ethically sourced, though?
I saved them from a landfill! They smell kinda weird though.
Nonetheless is one word :)
I cannot think of a free VPN that doesn't suck; does anyone has suggestions outside of Proton for that, please?
I think I'll have to do this as well. I'm tired, boss.
I agree with this as much as the next guy, but this is also kinda cope.
I take it as more of an observation and use it to be more mindful of what I buy, the services I use, etc. The reality is that we don’t know what happens behind the scenes with so much of this stuff, but we can still be conscious of it and use it as an opportunity to reduce clutter in our lives.
When you register a domain, you own the whole name-space of that domain:
On your domain, you are also free to choose the linked services such as web, email calendar etc. If you are not satisfied with one provider, you are free to switch to another one at your own convenience.
https://migadu.com/freedom/
Why does he think Trump is against big tech when he's working side by side with Musk?
Been using their paid service for months. I have so many aliases. I'm just surprised. Surely this company knows its biggest user base has to be too educated to let this slide.
People somehow still surprised by Switzerland being neutral on Naziism
I see a lot of good discussion here. I've been on proton for years now, using my own domain. While true that Andy is one of 5 board members, and it's a nonprofit etc, these statements are raising hairs on my neck, personally.
Does anyone have a good guide on problems associated with self-hosting email?
Why can't we have nice things?
Very disappointing that this is the CEO and founder of Proton. I'll be moving my stuff elsewhere and deleting my account this week.
I can understand being fine with a nomination that aligns with his personal interests but from there the journey to « party of small people » likely takes a convoluted path.
It's probably just a language thing. When he says small people he means sub-mega corporations. Actual humans probably pass beneath his notice.
So you’re thinking he means small in terms of Proton vs Google.
Well, he's clearly not talking about small people like say, me or you compared to Trump or Musk. And let me be clear, he is probably wrong about that as well. If Trump is anti-google that is likely nothing more than a negotiating position.
I just assumed Google was kissing the ring to avoid antitrust.
The little man does some heavy lifting
I fucking love Oh Brother, Where Art Thou
As it's usually the case.
There is no way Trump wrote that tweet. It is full of punctuation and clearly gets a point across. It was clearly written by someone else. Nevertheless, time to delete protonmail.
I literally just switched over from Google a few months ago and finally got all settled in. Just great. Does anyone know of any good alternative? I know Tuta exists, are there other options?
I wonder what is the percentage of nuts tech ceos.
Seems to be abnormally high
Sure, yeah, anti-big tech.
Oh FFS, and here I was recently considering switching to ProtonMail... fuck the fuck off.
Dear CEOs: if you're eager to suck dick, I'm sure you can find someone better than authoritarian shitheads. Have some fucking standards.
Honestly I'll still be using Proton and recommending it because it's just good and a net benefit for everyone, but goddammit Andy you should've taken Swiss neutrality to heart this time and not said anything.
If you think any anti trust shit is happening to any company who gave trump a million dollars, I have a used car I would like to sell you.
what's the big deal with second hand cars in the USA ?
Information imbalance and weak consumer protection laws
Can you give a little more detail?
Used car salesmen have s reputation of being the sleaziest of salespeople
Right. I thought they were talking more about the recent insane inflation of used car prices and maybe they knew something to explain it that I'd missed.
Edit: looking back at their original comment, yeah, nm, you're right.
Used car salesmen are seen as swindlers who make superficial fixes to hide real issues.
Scummy used car salesmen, and lack of consumer protections in the US.
May it live forever even if they delete the toot: https://web.archive.org/web/20250115165213/https://mastodon.social/@protonprivacy/113833073219145503
Yes I'm sure he'll crack down hard on all the tech companies that are giving him millions of dollars and kissing his feet...
What a moron.
Another tech dipshit, whose wealth allows him to exist outside the realm of reality, bending the knee to an anti-democratic felon rapist so he can get some handouts.
Pathetic loser.
Growing up, if you had told me half or more of America would end up elevating a rapist to the presidency and prostrating themselves at his feet, I'd have laughed you out of the room. This nation has sunk LOW.
NordVPN is superior in every way. If you have ProtonVPN, dump it and swap to Nord.
What's that, Lassie? Another platform that's not self hosted outing themselves as a chud? Well, I never!
Nooooooo not Proton! 😡
Ffs. I just switched a ton of stuff over to proton. Hopefully this is an individuals view and not that of the company as a whole.
I went through so much effort to move my small business and team over to proton. wtf.
Really disappointing. Never imagined this from Proton. Truly dead to me now.
I thought they are based in Switzerland
God damn it.
Yeah this really makes me doubt the security of the service.
Fox and Roku, everyone's two favourite small companies!
Extra weird because this is always the narrative, yet Trump could be any further from "standing up for the little guys" if he tried. It's the same with the AfD in Germany, their voted policies (which is public as per the EU regulations) are as anti-consumer pro-corpo as you can be, even edging our truly crazy libertarian money sucker positions.
Fuck me, I now feel like a clown for taking advantage of that lifetime subscription I bought a couple of months back.
Glad I changed my stack over a few months ago:
I'd also recommend KeePassXC in place of Proton Pass, and Cake Wallet in place of Proton Wallet. However, these were both Proton services I never used anyway.
Long time Posteo user. It's pretty basic but works great, is reliable and is very cheap. Only downside is they don't support using it with your own domain.
Damn, that's critical for my needs.
Yeah, it sucks. And they haven't been very responsive to user suggestions either. In fact the UI for their webmail hasn't appreciably changed in like 10 years.
Too bad, I was considering their service when my VPN service ran out. Not excluding them outright, but will have to keep a eye on it.
Theres the real problem with repugs. They think they are the "little guy"s
First strike Andy.
It's so all over the map, what does or doesn't count as toughness. That criteria rewrites itself in real time like the plot of a dream.
Avoiding or ignoring questions I would have thought is weakness. Letting covid sweep the country. Falling behind China and India with a weaker labor force. Being ready to surrender to Russia. Being unable to confront the truth that you lost an election.
Any number of mixed and matched definitions could include or exclude those from operative definitions of toughness/weakness without and make just as much sense. It's all just working backwards from tribalism.
he was absolutely right on that
...and you're out. That's enough for me.
He went after big tech as a punishment for fact checking the bullshit coming from his administration and his followers. That was it.
Now that all big tech has turned away from democrats (probably as punishment for their antitrust lawsuits), we will see a much different perspective from the Trump administration.
I don't want to mix tech with politics, but what in the actual fuck?
Proton Mail --> Mail-In-A-Box
Proton Calender --> Mail-In-A-Box
Proton Drive --> Mail-In-A-Box
Proton VPN --> Mullvad VPN
Proton Pass --> Bitwarden/KeePass+Mail-In-A-Box
Proton Wallet --> Stick with your cryptos base wallet app. Never give your private keys to any service.
Can't tell if > is meant as "greater than" or "can be replaced by"
Crap. Fixed it. Thanks!
What?? „Stands for the Little guys“
Are you fucking tripping?!
Little crooks, if they're seriously backing the Republican party, it's because they're admitting to being a two bit criminal wanting to be a three bit criminal.
It's double-speak, right here 41 years later for your aural pleasure.
In people fall for it all again 😓 it is so sad
Burned my accounts, moved to Tuta.
Ah yes, Fox News. The company that is simultaneously 'news' or 'entertainment', depending on which description serves them better at the time. These are perfect representatives for the era where billionaires are supposedly 'anti-establishment' and book burners that police other people's identities and force their religion onto others are supposedly all for free speech and freedom of expression.
I just don't know anymore. How do you deal with people who will point at a fly and tell you that it's a bird, while sincerely believing it?
God. Fucking. Dam. It.
I use too many of their services right now to get everything switched over to something else before trump takes power.
The swiss better fucking jail this guy if he hands over data to the us government without swiss court approval, per swiss law.
Now I have to find a new password manager, VPN, and email provider. Open to suggestions, but I want to find services that aren't hosed in the us or by trump friendly countries/companies, and ideally use open source software and zero access encryption.
Mullvad for VPN, Bitwarden for password manager.
Yea I previously used bitwarden, my issue with it is that bitwarden is hosted in the US(which was the only reason I switched to PP), so I'm thinking about renting a vps and hosting vaultwarden in it or something.
They now have European hosting
Oh this saves me so much time and energy, thank you!
It might not have all the convenience of Proton Pass, but Keepass has been and probably always will be dependable.
For the email provider i recommend tuta
I'd be interested in the Mooltipass, but they've been out of stock for over a year, saying they're working towards a new unit. Last update I saw was about a month or two ago, saying they were 'close'...
I use password store for my management. There's a client for all the major UIs. But I have SO MANY aliases in proton pass.
I literally signed up for their VPN last night since NordVPN doesn't offer port forwarding. . . Oh well, I can 30 day guarantee it and get mullvad I guess. All I lost was a bit of time setting it up in all my containers, and any respect I had for Proton
Just some advice for all of you affected by this.
Begin demanding a response from the ownership of this company.
"Is this Message approved by your board, and owners"
Just leaving doesnt make a difference, and some of you in the comments bought services right before this. That fucking sucks.
We dont have journalists and media on our side to help any more(arguably we never did, but that's a separate discussion)
I think there are still good bones in Proton, but you know where at least one piece cancer is, and its in the worst spot. Demand as stakeholders that they remove the cancer or admit its not going to happen. Repeat your messages until they publicy respond as a company not just the head of it.
Its a shame if you dont do at least as much as expressing that they owe you an explanation and that you need the company as a whole, to why this had happened
This is a betrayal to many of you, tell them exactly what they need to do
Good luck. It only takes one of you to suceed and we all win
Biden's pick Lina Khan deserves all the credit for aggressively prosecuting anti-competitive practices. However, Gina Slater looks like someone capable of continuing that work and a legitimate admirer of Lina Khan. Yes there are ties to Vance and the FTC office is likely to end up beholden to the egomaniac in chief. So the whole "little man" thing aside (that's baloney), that's one person that's not a shit stain out of all the shit stains in the incoming cabinet.
Look Lemmy, you're welcome to choose what you want in your life and what you don't. But being too rigid with letting stupid opinions of a project's founder cause you to reject everything, would have you miss the big-picture benefits of having such a project exist. If you look at this Lemmy development co-leader's opinions on transgenderism, are you going to stop using this software that lets you converse on an LGBTQ+ safe-space instance with no involvement on a social level from said developer/founder?
"omg, turns out this big tech company is not my friend"
Sure. That’s exactly why small businesses thrive in democrat cities, right? And exactly why more small business popped up under Biden, right?
Gimme a break. People are so blind and dumb.
Regrading Update 2, maybe the other board members can push his guy out? I'm paid for to the end of the year, so I'll wait it out a bit. I'd rather not jump ship, only to have that ship also go pro fascist too.
Well, I'm embracing a new e-mail service. And maybe a new VPN.
Proton has been giving me some issues sometimes when I couldn't access my inbox, I can't have that when I'm in great need to see if anything has happened. Also, I've joined Tutamail just now and I can make a lot of folders. Screw you, Proton for endorsing trash and limiting how many folders I can make. Which sounds like a silly complaint and it kind of is, but who the hell limits basic features like that?
So I'll be giving Tutamail a year long trial, just as I did with Proton 4 years ago before making it my primary service of choice. Push comes to shove, I'll just use GMail again for at least it's reliability and as an ironic middle-finger to Proton for this kind of move.
Well, that's a platform I'm leaving now.
Swiss-based Proton? Wtf? One less reason to switch from Tuta.
OK let me add fuel to the fire. here in Andy's response he says the tweet was from last year which is technically true but it was from December 2024.
Also how can he think that Trump stands for little guys when he has elon musk as his pet monkey
well this makes me slightly less fomo'd after going for tuta and mullvad- but i'm probably jinxing it rn ;-;
Gotta kiss the new king's ass so he doesn't go after you.
Does anyone have links to the dumpster fire of a reddit thread in one or the Proton subs? There was also one of r/privacy but I can't find either so suspect they've been deleted to try to quell the flames.
It was very entertaining drama
He does realize that Big Tech loves trump, right?
Hmm... is Tuta still good these days?
Talking from a usability standpoint it's gotten much better. It's still slow to open the app but the search got much more efficient.
I've always had it as a backup email so it'll be relatively straight forward to gradually migrate. I meant more in terms of its security/privacy reputation and whether or not a CEO has said/done anything concerning.
It's not bad
Damn, this sucks. I fled Google for Proton and use it for email, files, and my own domain email.
the rich got so unbelievably rich and the poor became so insignificant / invisible that these few people in the middle think they're the "little guys"
wake the fuck up
I’m not sure what’s worse, kissing the ring or taking that Trump post seriously. He obviously did not write it, and he also obviously only makes statements like this to threaten others and secure their loyalty. Here we are a month later, and some of the richest tech bros in the country are expected at his inauguration.
This is a stretch & honestly not worth abandoning proton because of this. Don't just abandon a good FOSS/Privacy project just because of a CEO's (of a frickin Non-Profit in Switzerland) statements, you're too busy arguing & not getting things done Have some nuance guys
Could be 1000+ IQ chess move in disguise, appeal to Trump's ego & get him to make trouble for big-tech Let's see whether this actually affects Proton & decide from there
as a side-note: people from techlore are scumbags
These CEOs really don't want the average people to like them.
I don't think they can comprehend what an average person is.
I was just going to start my de-google to Proton. Time for a new plan.
Things are taking a wild turn.
That's annoying, I was thinking about switching away from GMail to Proton, but now that's out of the question. Anyone who cozies up to fascist fuckwads isn't a trustworthy keeper of my data. All these CEO types are the same.
This is worthy of raising complaints to the board of Proton, kick this stupid fucker off.
What's the best way to transfer to another secure email provider?
It’d actually be super useful if all of the VPN CEOs publicly stated which authoritarian leaders they are a fan of, so that consumers can make an informed choice on how easily they’ll sell you out to the security apparatus of your country.
Self hosting is better these days.
Oh well. Another scratch on my list of companies I'll never patronize.
Andy is sad that he didn’t taste that sweet sweet cheeseburger and diet coke cock.
Insanity
He's the founder and CEO tho. Not looking good :( I'm surprised this went unnoticed until now. The tweet is from December!
I'm not going to switch away from them just yet... But I am going to start using an address with my own domain. My only regret is not doing this from the beginning.
Hypothetically, if Hitler saved a child from being hit by a car would you publicly sing Hitlers praises and be happy to make positive quotes about it?
Does being on the right side of a single issue negate everything else?
Did he (the CEO) really need to do this? 🍄's probably never even heard of Proton. The transition for me from Tuta to Proton was long and rough, so I'm not prepared to jump ship just yet and really hope I won't have to.
Any good alternative to proton services? For mail I have tuta so far, but they cover only that part and the webmail UX in tuta is actually worse for the free tier.
I've been using Infomaniak for the past two years, and I'm mainly happy about it (drive and online docs editor have been working really well, idk about the webmail cause I use Thunderbird).
Link to the source.
Please dont post screenshots of text. Link to the source
Oh damn. I was hoping proton had another good 20 years before some limp-dick ceo started with this shit.
I guess that makes tuta the company to beat?
Posteo as well
Large corporations like google have grown and thrived in Silicon Valley, supported by the politicians of California. So by extension they are partially responsible for enabling these companies to be the giants they are.
According to this article Google has funded 40 elected officials and spent $10.7 million in lobbying California's legislature and Governor this year alone.
If a president (even a shitty one) was considering putting a damper on companies like google, I would not be against that. We'll see if anything actually happens.
I'm not ditching Proton over one fucking tweet
Good for you
Pop goes the weasel
Well shit, I was about to make the switch to Proton for email... glad I've been lazy about it, now. I'll figure something else out, mail-in-a-box looks like what I really want anyway
Lmao, proton looked sus to me for a long time. Good I never felt for anything more than their email.
Is he right about the start of the anti-trust action ?
One thing I saw was lacking in the comments here are some alternatives (Some were named, more self-hosted options, which can be good for a person, but not always)...
RiseUp.net and Disroot.org both are ran by collectives, and both protect your privacy. RiseUp has a log of how they've done so, as well.
It's almost understandable to bend the knee in the hopes of avoiding the coming purges, but this goes well beyond just seeking corporate survival. Genuinely disgusting. It looks like the way forward for Proton will be lit by the bridges they're burning.
I moved from proton to tuta recently :D
Someone remind me, what's the first chapter in On Tyranny?
Let's see if he keeps Leena Khan if he's so anti trust
Oh damn
WELP
Damn it. I just switched over from Google about a month ago. Worked on creating lots of aliases for my signs-in throughout the internet. I'm not leaving this easily, but now it's something that I'm thinking about and will bounce if things get worse.
Phew! Thanks for letting me know
And I was so close to paying for Proton...
Mailbox.org
Honestly, building a mail server isn't that hard if you aren't afraid of the command line.
Trump fired Lina Kahn, so we know this is bullshit.
Can anyone recommend a decent free vpn? I can't afford to pay for one rn and theirs is the only reputable free vpn i know of :/
I guess it's time to look at self-hosted cloud storage services like NextCloud, OwnCloud, Seafile, CryptPad etc. that can replace Proton Drive, but does anyone have any recommendations for a secure email service to replace Proton Mail? From what I read on r/selfhosted, while you can technically run your own email server, it's just not worth it.
say what you will about trump. sure hes a small pathetic man. sure he is under musk and putin, but there are people under him. He may be a sycophant but he is the head sycophant.
Is this the same as, "fuck standards, pay for a walled garden, and promote crypto-scams" proton? I'm shocked 😮
Aww FUCK. I'm a huge proton pass user. I don't want to go looking for a replacement but if anyone knows an easier way to set up email aliases on the fly and reply to emails sent to that alias easily like I can w proton I would switch
Must be talking about a dwarf Trump pays to wipe his ass.
My take is that a libertarian who thinks big government (or the spooky 👻 deep state) is out to get him is an attitude I want for the ceo of a privacy company.
If Trumps associates are going to jail for refusing to turn over passwords to their proton accounts, then I think the service is working.
Gonna be super funny when Trump turns on him anyways though, and bans proton from the US, because only his privacy actually matters.
Noooo pls noooo
One thing that this entire situation has done for me is to make me feel more justified in my posture of never paying a subscription for an online service if I can avoid it. So far I'm using Proton stuff for the free tier only, so I can have some degree of relaxation in evaluating any alternatives withotu also having to worry about banking stuff.
I was considering a new email. Bullet dodged!
Let the salad tossing commence.
Is this really the CEO of proton? Is there a link to the tweet?
What the dems get for crushing populism in their party. If Trump ends up actually arresting a bunch of Democrats... well that's karma bithcez
If for "little guys" Proton CEO intends minors, we are cooked 🤦
Also, top 10 anime plot twists
Im glad I dont use any of their products
As a non-american I don't care. I will not move anywhere.
It's ridiculous how many people just go "oh well time to dump Proton" because of a picture (not even a link) of a tweet without context. Also the title is misleading. Andy Yen in this picture is complementing Trump, and also apperently posting facts about who started the antitrust actions. "Embracing" is, really, as I have written, misleading.
proton is CIA
I am not a security expert, but I remember reading Proton is not really secure?
Edit: expanded in comment below. I think what I remember is “Proton is not really any more “secure” than other email providers.”
Based!
People have private lifes. CEO‘s too. I don’t see why I should remotely care what the personal opinion of a CEO is. And I am deeply concerned that this is such a big deal, no matter what their opinion is.
If you have a personal problem with that, that‘s totally okay. Putting them on a stand, is not okay. Let them have an opinion. Debate if you disagree. But stop making such a scene out of everything.
Leftist: fuck the little guy