Bonum Certa Men Certa

Gemini Links 06/07/2023: Fire Retardants and lp0 on fire



  • Gemini* and Gopher

    • Personal/Opinions

    • Politics and World Events

      • What should the government do for us?

        Often, some people make remarks like “Don’t expect the goverment to just hand you things!” in response to concerns about healthcare, food, housing, what have you. This, I think, fundamentally misses the point of what a government, or at least a democratic government, *should be*.

        (Note: I understand there is a massive difference between “should be” and “is”.)

        See, like, if you’re just in a small group of people, you probably get along just fine talking things out with each other and making compromises. This is how things work in my family of all adults, for example. Most friend groups are this way too.

        This kind of breaks down when you have a much larger group. Maybe, *maybe* you could gather everyone in a small town together and have them hash out budgets and laws, but a big city? An entire nation?

      • Re: Fire Retardants are not a legal requirement

        The source in the original article lists only legislation for Delaware, and even then it only prohibits "harmful flame retardant chemicals".

    • Technology and Free Software

      • lp0 on fire

        A user once showed up at the office door, and claimed that the "printer smelled funny". That is never a good sign. What had happened was that they had loaded iron-on t-shirt paper into a laserwriter. The paper, or rather its coating, had in turn melted around the fusor, the most expensive replaceable part. No actual fire, but it did smell pretty bad.

        Fire is rare in server rooms, or rather "significant heat incidents" as one might see in the official reports. There may not actually have been a fire despite all sorts of burn damage from the, I don't know, electrical arcs.

      • Just some yet another day kind of whatever

        Fun couple days, in no small part for having less to do with monitors and/or keyboards.

        Grant it, I had to deal with so called "4th of July" activities. I think I summed up my take on that well when I turned to a couple adult guests and said, "This is what the people not good at math consider entertainment."

        I honestly have very little to say. I don't even like talking. And forget about listening to others unless they've an intriguing voice *and* come up for air regularly so others can get a word or three in.

      • Teaching physics with code

        I'm probably going to get a chance to help write a class that teaches physics majors how to code and how computation integrates with physics.

        This is actually a topic I love a lot and I've been low-key thinking for years that I wanted to write a textbook that teaches intro physics and intro programming at the same time, to avoid the panic-inducing nature of anything that requires calculus.

      • Internet/Gemini

        • revolting

          A few months ago, I happen to notice some crazy spikes in my gopher server stats.

        • I'm on Lemmy now!

          Following reddit's decision to monetize their public API, I decided to simply get off the platform. I'm however a fervent lurker, and love to mindlessly scroll through links and memes posted by random people. Hopefully for me, a bunch of nerds were already working on a decentralized link aggregator: Lemmy[0] (see also kbin[1]).

          It's a link aggregator one can self-host, but which can talk to other software involved in the €« Fediverse €». Long story short, all servers can communicate together, and with an account created on website A, you can read, post and comment on website B. Many software use this principle of federation, starting with emails (but also Mastodon, Matrix, …).

        • Fundamentals in Reform

          My purpose, in this address, is to bring about a juster understanding and appreciation of different classes of reformers among one another and to direct their attention to what seems the most practical as well as the easiest method of reform which is already within their grasp whenever they are willing to undertake it. I have no expectation of bringing about any formal union of those different classes; but only to favorably incline the most thoughtful individuals among them toward united action; and to soften, in some degree, the asperities which now prevail. Hoping that it will not entirely fail of its purpose, is the hope of…

        • activity pub (lemmy)



          I wanted to be able to find a post and just hit a "like" button to upvote them directly from my desktop.

          Found out that lemmy is kind of picky with the Accept header.


* Gemini (Primer) links can be opened using Gemini software. It's like the World Wide Web but a lot lighter.



Recent Techrights' Posts

Video: University in Peru Honours Richard Stallman
Tomorrow, January 20, Richard Stallman speaks in France
FOSDEM is Called "FOSDEM" Because of Richard Stallman (RMS)
The overlap there seems timely; yesterday RMS spoke in French-speaking (in part) Switzerland where questions in French were accepted
January 20: Richard Stallman Talk in Europe
evening time in Europe, around midday in the United States and Canada
Slopwatch: Too Lazy to Write Real Articles, Offloading to Chatbots Instead (LLM Slop About "Linux")
The Web was already full of garbage before the LLM frenzy. Now it's even worse.
 
Total Lock-down Ambitions - Part III - The Web Browser as DRM Pusher
A lot of "streaming" stuff is DRM
IBM Termination Story and Information From Microsoft About Mass Layoffs
In 2 weeks of 2025 Microsoft already had 2 waves of layoffs
Over at Tux Machines...
GNU/Linux news for the past day
IRC Proceedings: Saturday, January 18, 2025
IRC logs for Saturday, January 18, 2025
Links 18/01/2025: Restoring the Great Wall of China and Economic Expansion in China
Links for the day
Guardian Digital (linuxsecurity.com) is Spamming the Web With Microsoft's Promotional LLM Slop About UEFI 'Secure' Boot (Which is Against Real Security)
This is an attack on honest journalism
Links 18/01/2025: TikTok's Endgame, "Car Freedom", and Spying in Cars 'Fines' GM (Settlement)
Links for the day
Links 18/01/2025: Apple Getting Out of Hey Hi (AI) Slop (Too Much Misinformation), Chaffbots/Chatbots Try to Settle Copyright Infringement Lawsuits
Links for the day
What Fake News Sites Are Doing to GNU/Linux
The LLM slop about Linux serves two purposes
Links 18/01/2025: Microsofters Upset at Microsoft's Ridiculous Rebrands (Excuse for Massive Price Hikes), Chaffbot Company ('Open'AI) Faces More Lawsuits
Links for the day
Gemini Links 18/01/2025: Surge in Illnesses, ctags, and Gemsync
Links for the day
Over at Tux Machines...
GNU/Linux news for the past day
IRC Proceedings: Friday, January 17, 2025
IRC logs for Friday, January 17, 2025
RMS 'Inauguration' in Montpellier (Government Administration) on January 20th
Happy hacking
Even Technical Articles and HowTos From UNIXMen Nowadays Seem to be LLM Slop
We've just permanently removed the RSS feed of UNIXMen
The FSF's 2024 End-of-Year Fundraiser Succeeds: Over $400k to Support Software Freedom
That's worth bringing up again because the SFC is trying to 'crash' this achievement of the FSF
[Meme] Fentanylware (TikTok) Banned in the United States, Next Up European Union (EU)
And the United Kingdom (UK)
President Biden is Right, "Free Press is Crumbling" and the United States Exports Its Media-Hostile Culture to Other Continents
perhaps Biden should pay closer attention to how Donald Trump-inspired Americans take their battles to other continents
Links 17/01/2025: TikTok Banned by the United Stated (SCOTUS Rejects Appeal)
Links for the day
Software Freedom Conservancy Inc (SFC) Makes It Obvious It's Just a Copycat Trying to Exploit or Leech Off the FSF's (and GNU's) Work
They swim next to the rich people (who "match")
Links 17/01/2025: Fentanylware (TikTok) Herds Its (Drug) Users Into Even More Harmful "Apps"
Links for the day
Guardian Digital, Inc (linuxsecurity.com) Uses Microsoft-Controlled Front Groups and LLM Slop in Order to Spread Microsoft-Directed Anti-Linux FUD
Microsoft garbage likely produced by Microsoft LLMs, spewing out Microsoft FUD
Likely Fake 'Article' About Linux Mint 22.1
BetaNews fired up its plagiarism machine (LLM)
Over at Tux Machines...
GNU/Linux news for the past day
IRC Proceedings: Thursday, January 16, 2025
IRC logs for Thursday, January 16, 2025