Try printing the email to a pdf?

I’d definitely take that document to a local lawyer (preferably one that specializes in labor cases) and ask if there’s anything there.

By chance, you aren’t in a union, are you? If so, take this to your union rep, too. You’re union will have lawyers who will deal with this sort of thing.

First thing to ask is what state you live/work in? Is it a right-to-work state? If so, then they can fire you or choose to not promote you for no (reported) reason at all, which very likely means you have no legal recourse. If they were to come out and directly say in documented way that they will fire or not promote you if you don’t use this app, that might be different. You’d need to talk to a lawyer who is familiar with laws in your state. But you’d also need documented evidence of this, which means emails sent stating this, or a recording (keep in mind if your state has 2-party consent laws) of a higher-up saying it.

If you’re in one of the 27 Right to Work States, though, there’s likely very little you can do about it short of finding a different job.

I don’t think it’s a distraction. I think it’s people who are too bought in on conspiracy theories and desperately want there to be some kind of spy thriller conspiracy to uncover. They just really want the world to be less mundane and banal than it is, so they latch onto a single thread while ignoring the overwhelming weight of evidence.

I think calling it a distraction is itself a conspiracy theory. Who is orchestrating this distraction? What are they supposedly distracting from?

No, and based on reading your incredibly rude response to people trying to answer your question in an Ask community, you clearly don’t understand what “proto-” means.

Get over yourself. You’re not better or smarter than everyone else. Yes, the PT both mirrored and predicted IRL events. That’s what good social commentary does. And, yes, you could learn the lessons taught in those movies through other media or history, but the same could be said about tons of stuff. You could say literally the exact same thing about Andor, which is deservedly getting a lot of praise right now.

Every generation needs fiction that speaks to them and meets them where they’re at. Maybe you could learn the same things taught in the PT by watching something else or reading about history. But that’s not as accessible and engaging to everyone, especially the children who the PT was geared towards. Get off your high horse and recognize that not everything needs to be perfect or groundbreaking to have a genuinely important contribution to society and culture.

You said the first scene, by which I assume you’re referencing when Rey hands him the lightsaber and he tosses it away, “basically took a shit on a beloved character by way of cheap slapstick,” which I thoroughly disagree with. I think him rejecting the lightsaber is perfectly in character with what we saw in the OT and the 30 years of character development since.

TLJ is legitimately one of the best Star Wars movies, and Luke’s characterization in it, right down to rejecting the lightsaber, is more in-line with his characterization in the OT than anything else he’s ever been in, including everything in Legends and the new expanded universe canon.

There’s problems with them, especially with dialogue and the existence of Jar Jar. But they were also incredibly prescient for the modern political climate. I think it’s an important story about how a scared and lonely child raised by people who told him to suppress and ignore his emotions can turn into a fascist while also telling the story of how a manufactured political crisis can get a populace to support the transition from a liberal representative democracy to a fascist dictatorship.

The Last Jedi is legitimately a very good movie.

The Force Awakens is fine, but dull and mostly forgettable.

The Rise of Skywalker is just bad.

Boy, you couldn’t be more wrong.

I wouldn’t say “unaccepting”, but I really just did not like kids at all. I didn’t enjoy playing with them, or even being around them because I felt I had to moderate myself due to their presence.

Then I had kids and now I really enjoy being around kids, playing with them, and talking to them, even ones that aren’t my own.

Probably the Windows, then. Like I said above:

This new one uses Windows 11. I did log into Windows 11 with my Microsoft account. Maybe that’s how they tracked it? That seems far-fetched, but maybe?

No. Lemmy is the best I’ve found, but there aren’t nearly enough users to make it anywhere close to as useful as Reddit.

did you use the same websites on brave that you normally use?

No. I exclusively have used Brave just for Reddit specifically for this reason. I also used Edge, which came installed on the laptop. Maybe data from Edge is used in Brave or Reddit is somehow able to track that? I never went to Reddit in Edge, let alone logged in, but I did log into my Google account (which has never been linked to any Reddit account, but I’ve been logged into it on the same browser as my older Reddit account in the past).

did you use a different operating system?

I’ve used Reddit with my old account on Android phones and my old laptop, which ran Windows 10. This new one uses Windows 11. I did log into Windows 11 with my Microsoft account. Maybe that’s how they tracked it? That seems far-fetched, but maybe?

did you use a brave account on it?

No, and I only use Brave in incognito mode. I know that doesn’t prevent anyone else from tracking anything, but it’s supposed to not save local files after closing the browser.

did you verify that your vpn was using an exit point ip address that you’ve never used before every single time you accessed reddit?

I mean, I don’t track every IP address I’ve ever used. As far as I know it’s been a new IP address, but I really have no way of guaranteeing that. It seems incredibly unlikely I happened to stumble upon one I’ve used before, though.

most importantly: why bother using reddit?

Lemmy isn’t to the point where it can be a Reddit replacement. Sure, for some stuff it’s fine, but the user base is just too small. There are multiple subreddits for local communities around me that are very active which I like to check. There are communities for more niche hobbies, games, and books I like to follow. There’s just WAY more content on Reddit that you can’t get on Lemmy.

Nope. It was a temp email account from one of those temp email sites that deletes the email account once you close the browser. I have no idea how they were able to track me, but it’s kinda scary.

No, I don’t think so.

A few months ago I got permabanned from Reddit. I had an older account I hadn’t used in a few years. I logged into that one and found it, too, was permabanned, with a reference to my other account. I tried to start a new account, and it got immediately banned.

A few weeks after that, for unrelated reasons, I got a brand new laptop. Without ever even going to Reddit on that laptop (let alone trying to log in), I downloaded a new browser I had never used on any device before which advertises it’s focus on safety (the name of the browser is Brave). I connected my VPN. I created a new burner email account. Then I created a new Reddit account. Within 2 days it was permabanned referencing me trying to evade a ban on my other account.

I have no idea how they were able to know it was me. It was a new account, made from a new device, with a new email, through a new privacy-focused browser, on a VPN (so different IP address). There should have been no way for them to track me, yet they somehow still did.

I’d really like to know how they tracked it. Not even just to get back on Reddit. If Reddit is able to track you like that, then you know other companies and governments can.

I, too, would very much like to know. Not so much to get a new Reddit account, but if Reddit is able to track me across devices, IP addresses, browsers, etc, then who knows who else is tracking us across all that.

I did. I was pretty active on NoStupidQuestions there. I called another user a fascist sanewasher because he was claiming Musk’s Nazi Salute at the inauguration was perfectly normal and something every politician does all the time. Within 15 minutes of me posting my comment I got a 7 day ban from the sub. Less than a day later I got perma-banned from Reddit completely. I hadn’t even commented or posted anything between getting the 7 day ban and the perm-ban.

I also had an alt account which I hadn’t used in a few years. I logged into that and found it was also permbanned, referencing my other account.

A couple of weeks later I got a new laptop (unrelated). I downloaded a new browser I’d never used on any device before (Brave), turned on my VPN and created a new Reddit account using a burner email address. Within a day, before I even posted or commented anything, the new account got permabanned and they referenced my other account. I don’t know how they knew it was me. It was a device that had never logged into my old accounts, in a browser that advertises itself as secure and that I had never used before, on a VPN so they weren’t matching my IP address. I’m clearly permanently banned, though.

Cannabis

It all needs to get a lot less complex and confusing. I know the complexity is a byproduct of the defederated nature of the whole thing, but it’s also the primary thing limiting growth. The fediverse is never going to grow to anything other than a tiny niche if it isn’t immediately understandable to people who have 0 background in tech.