Instapaper iOS 8.2

Instapaper iOS 8.2 is now available on the App Store. This release includes in-article search, text justification, and several design updates that make it faster and easier to access some of your favorite Instapaper features.

After a long period of being ignored, it’s great to see the developers actively working on and improving Instapaper.

#iOS #Apps

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Ashley Belanger, Ars Technica

After Apple updated its privacy rules in 2021 to easily allow iOS users to opt out of all tracking by third-party apps, so many people opted out that the Electronic Frontier Foundation reported that Meta lost $10 billion in revenue over the next year.

Meta's business model depends on selling user data to advertisers, and it seems that the owner of Facebook and Instagram sought new paths to continue widely gathering data and to recover from the suddenly lost revenue. Last month, a privacy researcher and former Google engineer, Felix Krause, alleged that one way Meta sought to recover its losses was by directing any link a user clicks in the app to open in-browser, where Krause reported that Meta was able to inject a code, alter the external websites, and track “anything you do on any website,” including tracking passwords, without user consent.

Now, within the past week, two class action lawsuits [1] [2] from three Facebook and iOS users—who point directly to Krause's research—are suing Meta on behalf of all iOS users impacted, accusing Meta of concealing privacy risks, circumventing iOS user privacy choices, and intercepting, monitoring, and recording all activity on third-party websites viewed in Facebook or Instagram's browser. This includes form entries and screenshots granting Meta a secretive pipeline through its in-app browser to access “personally identifiable information, private health details, text entries, and other sensitive confidential facts”—seemingly without users even knowing the data collection is happening.

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In the meantime, the lawsuits say there is an easy way to stop Meta from collecting this info. Instead of clicking on links shared on Facebook or Instagram, copy and paste them directly into your preferred browser.

I have written so much about Facebook and its fucked-up ways that I get tired of repeating myself. But I think it’s important to continue shining a light on the shit that they continue to do. This time specifically targeting iOS users.

#Linked #iOS #Privacy #Facebook

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After using Todoist for 2 weeks, I’ve decided to stick with Things. Here’s why.

These three things were a dealbreaker for Todoist:

1. This first item is a privacy issue and a big deal for me. In Todoist, if you delete a task, it is not actually deleted because there is an entry made in the Activity Log for the deleted item. The Activity Log is a log of every single thing you’ve done in Todoist, and there is only one way to delete the log. That is to delete your account. In Things, a deleted task is deleted and not recorded in the Logbook. And, any or all items in the Logbook can be deleted.
2. In Todoist, having to assign a project to every task was annoying.
3. In Todoist, you cannot create a checklist within a task. This is something that a do fairly often in Things.
   

In addition, the aesthetic of Things is much cleaner and more organized, and I can also see my calendar events. I did like Todoist's’ natural language entry. I would like to see that in Things at some point.

#Apps #Mac #iOS

Update March 20, 2022: After using Todoist for 2 weeks, I’ve decided to stick with Things. Here’s why.

I have a long history with Todoist going back over 10 years but in 2017 I switched to Things when version 3 was introduced. Today, I'm seriously considering moving back to Todoist, and here's why.

First, let me clarify that this is strictly speculation on my part. Things 3 has been around for 5 years now and I'm thinking that a version 4 must be coming soon. With that in mind, the upgrade will be either a purchase (remember each platform Mac, iPad, and iPhone is a separate purchase) or a subscription.

To get ahead of this possibility, I've been using the free version to Todoist to see if it meets my simple task manager needs. Not surprisingly it does. Plus it has several features that aren't currently available in Things.

• Natural language entry (this is a big plus for Todoist)
• More personalization options
• App integrations (Fantastical)
• More view options (plus boards)
• Browser Extension for multiple browsers
• And a web app

Back to Todoist?

#Apps #Mac #iOS

I don't watch a lot of YouTube, but I do it often enough that the ads are really fucking annoying. I've been using an ad blocker since they were first introduced almost 20 years ago. It’s been so long ago that I forgot that ads even exist on the web. Except of course for YouTube ads.

Safari is my primary browser with Wipr for ad-blocking. Wipr blocks all ads, trackers, cryptocurrency miners, EU cookie and GDPR notices, and other annoyances. It works in Safari and all apps that use Safari to display web pages.

With Wipr version 1.26 Wipr blocks YouTube ads.

Wipr FAQ

What Is Wipr Extra?

Starting with version 1.26, Wipr will include a fourth Safari Extension named Wipr Extra. It provides blocking on the few sites where the Content Blocker API is not enough, such as YouTube.

Wipr works with Safari on Mac, iPhone, and iPad. Goodbye, Grammarly ads.

#HowTo #Mac #iOS