Bonum Certa Men Certa

Life Will Never Be the Same Again

City stock photo



Summary: It seems probable that month after month things will deteriorate further (hunger, conflicts, partisanship) and even though Free software remains the most accessible technology for impoverished and frugal people we may have to face greater perils than 'software wars'

THE PANDEMIC was "long time coming" and probably inevitable; history shows that it happens in cycles -- like economic collapses -- and high-density populations are harmed the most (or proportionally). It might be nature's way of 'balancing' itself; it has not been "long in the making" (nobody made it; no need to), it's just "long time coming..."



Please kindly ignore people who claim Bill Gates started it; Gates does not control China and assuming it started somewhere in China, it's no different than many old plagues (some started in the US, some in Europe, several in China too). It's not a "Fake alarm" or "False flag" or whatever, either; Russia and nations that are EU/US-hostile take this very seriously too, based on their own experts. They don't even need WHO to lecture them about the severity and evidence to which they're direct eyewitnesses (like high death rates among patients in overcrowded hospitals) is enough to alarm them.

"Please kindly ignore people who claim Bill Gates started it..."I won't comment on COVID-19 as it's way outside my area of expertise (and unlike Bill Gates I'm not pretending to be an expert, either). I wrote about why it's unlikely to be a biological weapon (no nation benefits from it, not even China which relies on endless consumption, upon which manufacturing is dependent).

I am rather pissed off (to be brutally honest) seeing some people who link to Techrights claiming that it 'proves' Bill Gates is a paedophile (we never made such a claim and anyone who somehow infers/concludes that has a severe case of dishonesty or lacks reading comprehension skills). There's extensive evidence, however, including admission from Gates himself, that he closely associated -- for years -- with people whom he knew were large-scale, serial, practicing paedophiles. These details do matter as otherwise our adversaries can seek to discredit factual reporting, based on deliberate distortions of what we wrote and very carefully published.

People are stuck home, watching stupid YouTube channels (to pass time), losing their sanity without even realising it...

For me, personally, almost nothing has changed because my wife and I have worked from home for well over a decade and I still do my nighttime job from the same old workstations. The main difference, to us at least, is that we no longer travel to places and we cannot go to the gym. Instead we work out from home.

"Financially speaking, for a lot of people these are unbelievably scary times."That said, everybody I speak to has experienced very profound changes. Some lost their job, some work at very limited capacity or temporarily lost their job, not even knowing if that job will ever resume at all.

Financially speaking, for a lot of people these are unbelievably scary times. They never saw that coming. Some already worry they'd get kicked out of the place they call "home" (mortgage or rent payments) if they formally lost their job; finding a new job is almost impossible at this moment as face-to-face interviews are rare and difficult, not to mention public and private transport restrictions (still in place in London for instance).

I recently heard some gossip about GNU/Linux news sites and various Free software companies; it seems like they're mostly OK and judging by some recent reports, Free software is actually surging in popularity right now.

Life Will Never Be the Same Again... if you work for a proprietary software vendor. Uber has just announced (privately) thousands of layoffs, talking to its newly-canned employees about it over the Internet (and not even in person). All that 'digital-only' vision isn't meant to last after the outbreak. People still need to do manual tasks; this is particularly true for warehouse workers of Amazon and couriers that actually ship the stuff. High-profile Amazon staff quits in protest, Amazon employees blow the whistle en masses, and Jeff Bezos is coming under greater fire each day (there's a new scandal today).

"Expect some crazy times ahead, maybe even a war (we hope not)."In some particular aspects, this may be the demise of internationalism (especially as far as shipping and travel are concerned). As we said earlier this week, there's no "back to normal"; society will never go back to the same old normal. Now is the time to introspect, to adapt, to learn new things. Tell that to the Saudis and Gulf states whose economy was almost solely dependent on fossil fuels (and whose gamble on the airline 'industry' was a misguided one -- a deeply-linked contingency tied to oil). Few people have paid attention to news about the US Army withdrawing from some Saudis territories along with Patriot [sic] missiles and the latest big scandal is an FBI 'leak' of a Saudi official connection to the 9/11 attacks -- details long suppressed by both the Obama and Trump administrations.

Expect some crazy times ahead, maybe even a war (we hope not). The real unemployment rates are now officially worse than during the Great Depression, but the corporate media intentionally distracts from that (more on that in our latest Daily Links). There's growing debate about the next pandemic phases and the likely food crises which those phases entail. And no, Mr. Gates, Monsanto (now Bayer) won't save us with their 'foods' (patented seeds and cancer-causing pesticides) any more than Bayer's predecessors 'saved' people during the last major war (using chemicals and lethal gases).

Recent Techrights' Posts

Before the OSI Was Bribed and Hijacked by Microsoft via GitHub and Compromised Management...
The OSI isn't even remotely "woke"
The OSI Has Been Silent for Over 3 Weeks, It Has a Severe Trust Issue After Promoting Microsoft and Proprietary GitHub
OSI took a lot of money from Microsoft to become a Microsoft lobbyist
Bribery is OK If You Work for Microsoft (No Punishment Expected)
It's very troubling and a symptom of a broken society/system when particular laws or rules are applied and enforced against some people but not against others
Someone Should Remind Microsoft Lunduke That Microsoft Hires Many Sexual Criminals and Pedophiles as Well
Microsoft Lunduke on an "expedition" to find one or more perverts, then generalise to everyone in the "community"
Cash Machines (ATMs) Make Mistakes and They're Proprietary Software
Correcting mistakes is a colossal challenge
Yes, Microsoft is the Problem
"I am no MS shill."
Another Failed Use Case for Chatbots (LLM): Legal Advice and Analysis
They're just some self-discrediting toy that costs way too much to operate
 
Local Staff Committee Munich (LSCMN) at the European Patent Office (EPO) Requests an Urgent Meeting to Avoid Abolishing the Office
This is dictatorship led by the most corrupt
Slopwatch: Fake 'Linux' 'Articles' and Spamfarms/Slopfarms
at least 5 fake articles in one day
Gemini Links 29/07/2025: Wayland Unfit for Use and LLM Slop Faking One's Language Skills With Robot Communications
Links for the day
Nailing the "Hey Hi" (AI) Hype Bubble
So-called "hey hi" as they define it now is all about large companies or regimes remotely controlling the processes running on your machine and even your very own behaviour on your machine, which is in effect no longer your machine but some remotely controlled apparatus
"Four decades; Four freedoms; For all users" Now as a T-shirt
That's shown along the sidebar
Links 29/07/2025: Bad Climate and "Fair Software Licensing" Blasts Microsoft
Links for the day
Links 29/07/2025: Data Brokers Gone Wrong/Rogue and "Copyright Thicket"
Links for the day
Slopwatch: Linuxconfig.org, Linuxsecurity.com, Fagioli, The Register
Today's "Slopwatch" isn't the first article about LLM slop
We Cover Topics Other Sites Are Too Afraid to Cover (Even When They Know the Facts)
It's not that they doubt the truth, they just realise there may be consequences for talking about it
They Try to Tell Us the Free Software Foundation Inc is Dying, But Its Revenue Doubled Since the Dot-Com Bubble Burst
Being in "Activism" is never easy; but it does positive things for society
It's About the Cost of Workers, Not the Fictional Skills Shortage (That Does Not Exist, the Media Spreads False and Sometimes Self-Fulfilling Narratives)
This issue isn't limited to computing, some dub it "globalism"
Links 29/07/2025: More Pushbacks Against Slop and More Praises of Tom Lehrer
Links for the day
Gemini Links 29/07/2025: Purple Yarrow and Understanding Op Amps
Links for the day
This Monday WebProNews Absolutely Flooded the Web With Fake (LLM Slop) 'Articles' About "Linux", Google News Promoted Them as Legitimate
All of the following are fake articles attributed to pseudonyms or authors that don't exist; the images are also slop. Why does Google promote these?
Linuxiac is Not a Slopfarm, But at Least Some of Its Articles Are Machine-Generated Fakes
what we said about it was correct
Expect More Microsoft Layoffs
"Are more job cuts coming?"
Microsoft Behaving Like It's Running Out of Money to Pay Salaries
Does that seem like the behaviour expected from a company which claims it is "worth" trillions?
LWN Downtime Due to Linode, Not LLM Bots
"I’ve received an email letting me know that there is a potential for data loss."
Over at Tux Machines...
GNU/Linux news for the past day
IRC Proceedings: Monday, July 28, 2025
IRC logs for Monday, July 28, 2025
Nonfree Software in My Bank, by Richard Stallman
Updated 8 hours ago
Links 28/07/2025: Science, Health, and Conflicts
Links for the day
Gemini Links 28/07/2025: Healthy Self-Image With Autism and a "New Life"
Links for the day
Links 28/07/2025: COVID-19 Sped up Brain Aging, "Circumvention is More Popular Than Compliance"
Links for the day
Richard Stallman is Usually Right Because He Thinks "Outside the Box"
he is able to observe society (mores and norms) as somewhat of an outsider
LWN Has Been Down for a Long Time, Another Casualty of LLM Bots?
Time will tell. How much time though?
Slopfarms Versus 'Linux' (and Against People Who Write Real Articles About GNU/Linux)
LLM slop in slopfarms by Brian Fagioli and Redazione RHC
Gemini Links 28/07/2025: Bila Yarrudhanggalangdhuray and Running pkgsrc in a FreeBSD Jail
Links for the day
Microsoft Turns News Sites Into Spamfarms
Is the site The Register MS the next IDG?
The Register MS/The Register US
On Saturday I contacted them for a comment (before issuing criticism)
Hacking revelations at Vatican Jubilee of Digital Missionaries
Reprinted with permission from Daniel Pocock
Over at Tux Machines...
GNU/Linux news for the past day
IRC Proceedings: Sunday, July 27, 2025
IRC logs for Sunday, July 27, 2025