Andy Yen, the CEO of Proton, had a message for an employee in the company’s security Slack channel who urged the company to at least take a few days to pentest newly written code before pushing it live. “That’s bullshit and loser thinking. Of course it’s possible to be fast and secure,” Yen wrote in the channel at the end of August. “Stop thinking always of how to be slower, and focus more on how to be faster.”
In a follow-up message, Yen reiterated his point: “only losers think like that.” His ultimate message for the team was to “stop lovingly handcrafting all our code and use AI more.”
I’d like to thank Andy for introducing me to Proton’s competitor Tuta.
He certainly clarified for me whether to pay for Proton or not. It’s not.
I just cancelled my subscription and quoted him as the reason.
same here and i will forever be thankful for it :p
Tuta, funnily enough, makes it very hard to send encrypted mail to people who aren’t also using tuta. Maybe also look at Mailbox.org and Posteo. They have a lot less marketing/hype/fearmongering compared to tuta and Proton, but have similar features regarding encryption and security, with less walled-garden like restrictions.
I just took mailbox.org for a spin and wasn’t impressed, I have to say. No apps, which I can live with, I guess. There was an option for installing the various functions as apps - but apparently Firefox isn’t compatible. So sadly it’s a no from me, I need a bit more functionality from a paid service.
I don’t want/need an app, and would say that there are more than enough mail clients on all platforms.
If you want one, though, I can see why this is a no-go.
Do you have experience with the office software or cloud drive from Mailbox.org? Proton’s spreadsheet app can’t even handle my modest flashlight collection and their Drive won’t mount as a drive on my Linux machine.
For something like a personal flashlight collection, you might try LibreOffice Calc. Esp since you mentioned using your Linux machine. I use librecalc for random things kinda like what you described. It works great, and your files stay local.
No, I just let them run the mailserver, both the mail clients and all other Web applications we need are hosted by us.
I can give +1 for posteo. I have my posteo adress some years allready.
I’m currently in the market for a new VPN provider. I’d like to thank Andy for pointing me towards IVPN.
IVPN has been working well for me. Heard AirVPN is good if you need port forwarding too.
I’ve literally registered with them yesterday. Seems nice so far, worth exploring further.
“Loser talk” is something a fucking 4chan basement dweller would say. I hate how society is just the stupidest fucks at the forefront now.
Stupid fucks keep getting money from evil fucks because evil is controlling the stupid to do bad things without understanding what’s being asked until it’s too late.
Guess that’s one way to throw your business case of being a secure and privacy focused service provider out of the window.
Didn’t you listen to the man? Security and privacy are for losers!
truly innovative and disruptive
he must be getting so many linkedin points
they did some of it already when they got their ceo to praise trump
Every time this asshole speaks it just throws the entire company even further off a cliff lmao
As someone who has been an Executive Director, I couldn’t imagine taking a political stance on anything. Good way to alienate your customers and lose profit. Anyone with a couple of brain cells to rub together knows this.
Idk, somethings are worth taking a political stand on, not all things, but something. The all mighty dollar isn’t all there is to life
Ah, yes, once again the old adage “When they show you they are, believe them” has proved it never fails.
A happy Proton paying customer, I bailed within a week when Andy made his pro GOP/trump comments some time back.
Folks said I over reacted. I handed them that adage. It was right.
Protons top “loser” engineers will find themselves welcomed elsewhere. What a disaster Proton has become under Yen.
Maybe I’m a particularly sensitive, spiteful snowflake, but if the boss of my company accused me of being a “loser” because I cared about the quality of the product, I’d be looking to deliberately sabotage the product. And for a new job, of course.
Many of us are in exactly that position with our employers, but finding another job in this climate is easier said than done.
Stop giving Proton money
WTF? Is he 12 years old?
Is this really true?The business culture is sick. This way of thinking is not limited to just a few people.
Andy Yen sounds like an asshole.
I still need to move away from Gmail, but it’s probably not going to be to Proton.
He sounds like my manager. For him AI is a silver bullet for every problem.
Get rid of Andy Proton
Ah shit balls! 3 months into a paid up email, calendar, drive and VPN suite. Have moved a lot of files over. Will start looking again, but definitely separating everything from now
I just got out of my 1 year membership with them and happily moved over to tutamail and selfhosting 😅
My membership end in march… Tome to find another mail hoster.
Everything is going this way, best to set up a list of things to do to help yourself move quickly each time, you’re going to be doing it a lot.
Great strategy and one I’ve adopted (now).
RIP Proton.
Privacy minded people tend to also want security.
Vote on making him step down
Alright, that’s enough for me. What’s the best mail, calendar and drive alternatives? Preferably the ones that aren’t slop-coded.
Also, has anyone had any experience with Migadu?
Mail: Tuta, Posteo
Files, calendar: Nextcloud. Self-hosted or managed. Mine also does my contacts and task sync.Nextcloud is slop-coded, unfortunately.
Define “slop-coded” with regard to Nextcloud. The self-hosted sub has presented a useful terminological framework to pin down what software “made with AI” can entail:
Hint - AI suggested solution, human does the task. Assisted - AI acts on part of a task, but a human handled the bulk. Pair - About a 50/50 split of human made and generated. Generated - Human prompted, AI generated.
Where on this scale do you see Nextcloud?
Nextcloud is assisted, but it is still slop. That’s why I didn’t use vibecoded.
Just looked into their AI policy. Looks reasonable to me, so I don’t think the blanket characterisation as “slop” is fair, but you do you.
The only reasonable policy for me is Zig’s AI Policy.
the best are the ones you host yourself. quite doable, except email if you don’t want to send emails straight into the spam folder.
I don’t trust my skills enough to spin up a mail server. Or honestly any server that will be exposed to the internet.
Neither do I trust my uptime/maintenance of a mail server. I pay 1 EUR a month to Posteo, & it’s the only subscription to anything I have. Email ends up being an important access point for recovery & contact, so I keep it separate—paying to keep the lights on somewhere that posts it encrypted & responsibly.
you dont have to expose or open ports nowadays.
I commented before from the summary. Read as much of the 404 story as I can now.
It’s bad. If I didn’t trust 404 Media, I might think this was a hit piece. But 404 does good work and I trust their journalists. I should really subscribe!
Social media is prone to instant lynch mobs, one of its worst aspects. I do not intend to rage quit. But I WILL re-evaluate in 3 months. Just marked my calendar. They need to very publicly reverse course, AND restore my trust. I believe in giving ppl and co’s a chance to learn from mistakes, or nobody ever gets wiser. But I need to see that happen, or me and my $ are out.
I also no longer trust Andy’s judgement. The Proton engineers are saying the right things. Again I trust 404’s homework, or I would be much more skeptical of all of this.
