Some thoughts on lying and the latest version of flash.

[surrealAmerican]

I installed the latest version of flash today. What should be a painless process is not - not because there was any difficulty downloading or installing the software, but because doing so requires me to lie.

I like to think of myself as an honest person, but somehow, using a computer in the Internet age has made me a liar. No, I did not read and agree to the multi-page conditions for this software. I don't know anybody who does, but you cannot install it without saying you did.

I also do not want to turn on push notifications for a game ever - some other time is not going to happen. I don't want my email account to have my cellphone number "in case I forget my password" since I do not have a cellphone, yet there is no way to get around telling them I will do this "later".

Is all this casual lying we are now required to do affecting our society in other ways? Will we still be able to trust each other?

[Jim Lane]

1. Putting aside the lying issue -- is Flash safe?

Some time back I uninstalled it, having been warned (on DU, I think) that unpatched vulnerabilities made it a major security risk.

What's the current status?

[surrealAmerican]

3. This had not occurred to me.

Is that true for on a Mac? I'll look around tomorrow, and see what I can find about it.

[bemildred]

2. We've been losing social cohesion as a country ever since WWII.

And lots and lots of that is because the political system is clearly and obviously rigged, and getting more so, and it habitually relies on gaslighting the public to get its way, rather than serving the public as it claims to do.

Yeah, it has consequences.

[hunter]

4. Fewer sites are requiring it. Hopefully it will soon be extinct.

I don't install it on my machines. If that renders a site inoperable for me it's their loss, not mine.