VPNs like NordVPN for almost everyone.
But if you don't use a VPN with military grade encryption hackers can steal your money from the banking website that only uses military grade encryption!
In a somewhat metaphorical but nonetheless very real sense - most politics is effectively snake oil.
There's a set of people who exhibit a particular combination of mental illness and natural charisma, such that they feel an irrational urge to impose their wills on others, a lack of the necessary empathy to recognize the harm they do and the personal appeal necessary to convince others to let them do it.
There's another set of people who feel an irrational sense of helplessness - who want to turn control of their lives and their decisions over to others, so they can just go along with a preordained set of values and beliefs and choices rather expending effort on, and taking the risk of, making their own.
And just as in any more standard "snake oil" dynamic, the first group, exclusively for its own benefit, preys upon the weakness and hope of the second. Just as in any other such dynamic, the people of the first group make promises they have no intention of keeping ultimately just so that they can benefit, and the people of the second group continue, irratiomally, to believe those promises, even as all of the available evidence demonstrates that the promises are empty.
Snake-scented oil. (1% snake oil)
MS Windows
AirUp/Flavored water companies
If you want orange flavored water, squeeze an orange in your water, damn it! You don't need a subscription service for some chemicals that taste like orange
IoT, AI, much of consensus based academia and press.
I feel like there is legitimate uses for IoT and Ai but it gets shoved into everything where it isn't necessary.
Dietary advice based on the food pyramid/MyPlate. Before the late '70s, cardiovascular disease, diabetes, obesity, and mental illnesses were all rare in the general population.
We need to be eating fewer carbohydrates, not basing our diets around them. We need to be getting most of our calories from fat, not demonising it.
Thankfully, we have people like Dr. Ken Berry, Dr. Chris Palmer, Dr. Anthony Chaffee, Dr. Georgia Ede, Dr. Shawn Baker, Dr. Paul Mason, Dr. Tony Hampton, Dr. Jason Fung, and others spreading this message.
The latest Super Foods. Remember when coconut and especially coconut oil was called a super food and was all the hype, yet coconut oil is full of saturated fats (higher than in butter) and actually raises cholesterol levels when consumed regularly.
Television. I cannot understand why anyone would willingly pay money to be advertised to constantly.
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