pineapplelover

So I have a young teen entering 7th grade and so they're about to receive their first phone. With that, it opens a lot of doors to all the big tech social media apps and privacy invasive services.

I'm not sure how to approach this. My parents probably want tracking features so it'll probably be Find My or a 3rd party app like life360 depending on if we choose iphone or degoogled pixel.

Social media I'm not sure if fediverse stuff is the right path especially for lemmy, since it's just tech nerd stuff and politics which isn't interesting really unless they go out of their way to find smaller communities. Their friends will probably force them onto Instagram or some shit and I don't really want them doomscolling on reels, that shit algorithm, and the malicious messaging app built in to it.

It's just kinda hard trying to blend being a functional member of society and maintain your mental well being and privacy.

So my mom promised my little sibling a phone in a few months.

As of now, they have no social media or anything, just a Steam account and Spotify I made with an email alias.

I have the feeling their friends will rope them in to mainstream social media and I have no idea how to combat this or even if I should. Fediverse social media is not even there yet and as for messaging, idk if these guys will find it batshit crazy to use Signal or not.

My main fear is just social media addiction, depression, and the big tech guys stealing personal information.

I'm thinking maybe we get an iphone because my mom still wants the tracking feature for peace of mind and some different phone number for social media.

Graphene phone might be a little hardcore so not gonna go that route, iphone with lockdown mode and no icloud should be fine.

For things like email, thinking protonmail for email because I'm used to it but I'm not sure.

Any suggestions? Do y'all think I'm crazy?

Google recently open sourced Pebble and today, Repebble has put some of the watches up for preorder.

So I've been running like a mile each day for 3 days out of the week. But I've laid it off since I've been getting a lot of plantar fascitis, knee pain, and pain around my shins.

I'm not even that old. I'm very confused, maybe there are some exercises I can do? Went to a running shoe store and they recommended me some more cushioning shoes like a glycerin gts 22.

Any tips, recommendations, comments, or suggestions would be appreciated.

If you asked me like 4-8 years ago, I felt kind of neutral about things. Now I don't feel an ounce bit patriotic or proud enough to even state that I'm an American.

Now, when I see an American flag around, I see it as a symbol of fascism, anti-intelluctialism, neo-nazism, and late-stage capitalism amongst other things. If there's an American flag flying on a car, I can totally see that person possessing at least one of those qualities.

I suppose it's good to be self aware and not blindly feel patriotic and ignoring that your country needs improvement.

I don't know what I'm expecting in the comments here but just thought I would get this off my chest.

I've heard of things like iPostal and Traveling Mailbox. Do these services allow you to register with bank, DMV, IRS, Voting, etc? How do they work? Would a normal P.O box using its physical address from USPS work? I've tried researching it and haven't gotten clear answers.

I don't want to show up on those whitepages sites with all my information on them. I want to stop it from the start.

I don't know if this topic is appropriate for this community but there is a lot of waste generated with the clothing industry so I hope it fits.

The only resource I know of to find ethically sourced clothes is https://goodonyou.eco/. However, those can be pretty expensive so lately, I've been looking for more alternatives that are more affordable. What do you guys think of Salvation Army, Goodwill, Thrift stores? I've been hesitant on going there because I fear not having a good selection of clothes. If you guys have any experiences with these that would be amazing