Getting Some Privacy Online

This comes from Warren Ellis, in the latest issue of his newsletter Orbital Operations, a couple of suggestions for privatizing your online persona in the coming years.

If you have access to a Windows machine, there's an excellent Twitter archive eraser called Twitter Archive Eraser, haha.  All you have to do is request your archive from Twitter, install Eraser and feed your archive to the machine. I mean, if you don't want to delete your Twitter account entirely, which I totally understand, but.

(You may want to do something with your LinkedIn account for similar reasons.)

Also, iMessage and WhatsApp are okay, but get Signal. If you're going to organise, try to form IRL spaces and try not to use Facebook right now.

Keep an eye on Safecast - as they build out their systems, their open environmental data may prove very useful in the coming years.

You may want to consider private newsletters - Tinyletter is a very good free option if you intend to speak to less than a few thousand people - and, despite being Facebook-owned, a private Instagram account may be better for you than a public one right now.

To the fine human beings whose politics lean to the right - do not assume these are suggestions purely for the weeping lefties, or that I believe they only apply now that the UK and US are under far-right governments. They applied before. I used many of them before.

If you are a fan of Ellis' work and you aren't a subscriber to his newsletter, give it a chance.

And remember, having a measure of privacy is always a good thing, no matter what sort of politics that you hold. The idea that having anonymous accounts means privacy isn't a good idea.

Why Things Like The ConTessa Convention Are More Important Than My Opinions On The Matter

The real reason that my opinion on the matter doesn't count has zero to do with my being a guy. The real reason why my opinion doesn't count is because, whether I agree with the existence of this online convention or not (and I do, by the way) it is something that needs to happen. I've been gaming for a long time, a very long time, and I have always been lucky to be able to share my gaming with groups that were diverse in some form or another, whether due to gender, sexuality, ethnicity or some combination of these factors. The thing is, you cannot have too much diversity. That's what makes something like ConTessa important.

Let's see more conventions like this, virtually and otherwise, where diversity is put at the forefront. Yeah, guys can't run the panels or GM the games. Not being able to do that is really going to kill anyone for a weekend, particularly when they can go back to their set ways the rest of the year. This is a good idea, whether anyone else likes it or not.

Click one of the links and join a game. Check out the +ConTessa G+ profile. Play something that you might not normally play. Have some fun and focus on the games, not the shape or color of the people. Ultimately we're all just people and it shouldn't matter who wants to run a game or a panel.