Free, Libre, and Open Source Software

• Standards/Consortia

  • Tedium ☛ Interference Wars: The electric vehicle finds itself in the middle of the big debate over the future of AM radio. Could the AM dial get pushed off to the side?

    Today in Tedium: As you may or may not know, I have no deep love for Sen. Ted Cruz (R-TX), the Republican senator who once forced a government shutdown days before I was about to go on a honeymoon to a national park, earning him “enemy for life” status in my book. (Apologies if you’ve heard this one before; I bring this anecdote up often.) Politically, we don’t see eye to eye on much. But it has been interesting of late to see this guy going so full-throated on … checks notes … AM radio! Cruz cosponsored a bipartisan bill earlier this year to require vehicles, particularly electric vehicles, to continue to offer AM radios at no additional charge to customers. And that bill would have passed the Senate this week, but Sen. Rand Paul (R-KY), a man who hates mandates even when they support the talk radio icons that brought him to prominence, scuttled a unanimous consent vote and attempted to attach it to an endeavor that would end a popular tax credit for EVs. (Libertarians!) So, why is AM radio suddenly at risk? Today’s Tedium explains. — Ernie @ Tedium

Leftovers

• El País ☛ Why has the [Internet] become so boring?

  Everything seems too similar and there are hardly any new experiences. No more discovery and random connection with strangers (which is not the same as talking to a bot). Everything is repeated in an infinite loop by the work and grace of crazy algorithms that pressure us to adopt identical formats — first selfies, now reels, then who knows what next — and talk (if we fight, so much the better) about the same topics. The price of resistance is irrelevance. Don’t you often feel like you’ve spent two hours on the internet without really knowing what you’ve been doing? Aza Raskin created the infinite scroll in 2006, and in 2018, he admitted in a BBC interview that he regretted it: “It’s as if they’re taking behavioral cocaine and just sprinkling it all over your [Interface] and that’s the thing that keeps you coming back and back and back.”

• Manuel Moreale ☛ P&B: Eli Mellen

  This is the 15th edition of People and Blogs, the series where I ask interesting people to talk about themselves and their blogs. Today we have Eli Mellen and his blog, Oatmeal.

  I was introduced to Eli's blog by Piper Haywood, previously featured on the series, and loved the "tumblrness" of his digital home. That's a terrible description but still, if you used tumblr before you probably understand what I'm talking about.

• Ruben Schade ☛ Differentiating links to videos in text posts

  He had some more wisdom yesterday:

  "Nothing quite like the disappointment generated by reading a description of a link, thinking “oh yeah I’d like to read that” and finding out after clicking that it’s a video."

• Brandon ☛ Re: The Personality of a Personal Website

  One of the things I've struggled with is realizing that I have different parts and they show up at different times depending on the situation or my desires. For example: there is a hyper-focused, organized version of myself that appears when I need to get something done. There's an almost Dude-like version of myself that shows up when I want to relax and find myself taking the world too seriously. There is even a version of me who wants to own nothing and make everything as easy as possible when I feel overwhelmed.

• Education

  • Hindustan Times ☛ Colleges to now livestream practical exams on YouTube

    To curb malpractices and subject them to continuous public scrutiny, all 549 degree colleges affiliated to the University of Lucknow have been instructed to livestream their practical and viva voce examinations scheduled to begin December 12.

    As the ambit of the university has now expanded to five districts of Lucknow, Hardoi, Sitapur, Lakhimpur Kheri and Rae Bareli, it was imperative to put in place an effective monitoring system, the university said.

  • Omicron Limited ☛ AI can teach math teachers how to improve student skills

    We then conducted an experiment in which 53 middle school math teachers were randomly assigned to either this AI-based professional development or no additional training. On average, teachers spent 11 hours to complete the program. We then gave 1,727 of their students a math test. While students of these two groups of teachers started off with no difference in their math performance, the students taught by teachers who completed the program increased their mathematics performance by 0.18 of a standard deviation more on average. This is a statistically significant gain that is equal to the average math performance difference between sixth and seventh graders in the study.

• Hardware

  • [Repeat]Silicon Angle ☛ Critical Bluetooth security flaw discovered in Google, Apple and Linux devices

    The vulnerability is the result of a critical weakness in the Bluetooth protocol, combined with implementation-specific bugs across various operating systems. The vulnerability allows attackers to mimic a Bluetooth keyboard and connect to a device without the user’s confirmation. The process, known as keystroke injection, allows an unauthorized user to perform actions on the victim’s device as long as the actions don’t require a password or biometric authentication.

• Health/Nutrition/Agriculture

  • Is this “turbo cancer” claim the single dumbest misuse of VAERS that I’ve ever seen?

    Unlike the average person—or even the vast majority of my fellow physicians and scientists—I’ve been paying attention to antivaccine misinformation, disinformation, conspiracy theories, and pseudoscience for over two decades now and regularly blogging about it for 19 years. Moreover, I’ve been cataloguing the misuse of the Vaccine Adverse Events Reporting System (VAERS) database since 2006, when I first noted how lawyers pursuing litigation for “vaccine-induced autism”—we know that vaccines do not cause autism—had gamed VAERS by encouraging their clients to enter reports of their children’s autism as being a result of a vaccine or of vaccines. It was my introduction into how antivaxxers have long loved to take advantage of the nature of VAERS, which allows anyone to to enter anything that happened after vaccination as a potential “adverse reaction” to a vaccine, to misattribute complications ranging from autism to autoimmune disease to death and then do “dumpster dives” into VAERS in order to “prove” that vaccines cause horrific complications that they don’t cause. Depressingly, it was entirely predictable that they would do the same thing after COVID-19 vaccines rolled out, but the CDC, FDA, medical profession, and health authorities seemed utterly oblivious to the potential of a massive misuse of VAERS worse than anything ever seen before. Of course, that’s exactly what happened in 2021; weaponization of VAERS went mainstream. and scientists who should know better followed the well-trod path of antivax “scientists’ who had traditionally dumpster dived into VAERS to publish crappy papers linking vaccines to all manner of complications that, as more rigorous studies have shown, they don’t actually cause.

  • JURIST ☛ UK former PM Boris Johnson acknowledges government ‘may have made mistakes’ during COVID-19 inquiry

    Former UK Prime Minister Boris Johnson gave testimony to the COVID-19 Inquiry, a body examining the UK’s response to the coronavirus pandemic, on Wednesday and Thursday.

  • Mexico News Daily ☛ Moderna and Pfizer COVID-19 vaccines authorized for sale in Mexico [Ed: Barely tested, proven to be low efficacy]

    The shots will reportedly cost between 2,000 and 5,000 pesos a dose, and will be available in some qualified pharmacies.

  • Press Gazette ☛ News diary 11 – 17 December: Sunak at Covid inquiry, COP28 end

    A look ahead at the key events leading the news agenda next week, from the team at Foresight News.

  • The Straits Times ☛ Indonesia’s govt calls for public vigilance over emerging Covid-19 sub-variants

    EG.5, informally dubbed “Eris”, and EG.2 are the dominant Omicron sub-variants in Indonesia.

  • Mexico News Daily ☛ Got 1 min? Meet Covid, the canine surfer of Veracruz

    From abandoned pup to social control media star, Covid the surfing dog is the "queen" of Villa del Mar beach in Veracruz.

• Proprietary/Artificial Intelligence (AI)

  • Gizmodo ☛ The Secret Behind AI Drive-Thrus? It’s Humans Doing the Work.

    Presto, the self-acclaimed “leader in drive-thru voice automation” wants artificial intelligence to take your order. The drive-thru AI company works with Carls Jr, Chili’s, and Del Taco, and it partially runs on ChatGPT. However, SEC filings from November reveal that Presto’s AI may not be capable of taking your burger order and requires a human to help out with 70% of its orders.

  • Riccardo Mori ☛ A few thoughts about Humane’s Ai Pin

    There are a lot of people in Humane’s personnel who have an impressive background in understanding user interfaces and human-machine interaction. There are a few aspects of the Ai Pin I find fairly interesting, and I think they nailed both the hardware design of the device, and its wearability. I also think that the concept of the Pin, in its most abstract sense, is pretty intriguing. I’ve always believed that technology and machines should serve people and adapt to their needs, instead of the other way round. So, when at the beginning Humane vaguely hinted at working on something following this philosophy, my interest was piqued. I think smartphones have done a lot of good to society, but also a lot of harm when it comes to the interpersonal sphere. And whenever I’ve had the time to be at my most contemplative, I’ve often thought about what is the next step beyond smartphones. That’s why I was very interested in Humane’s intents and projects. Again, these people are not amateurs at all. Let’s hear them out.

  • Modern Diplomacy ☛ Development of AI Competence in Developing Countries: Policy, Regulation & Prospective Career

    However, developing countries also face common challenges in this AI-driven landscape. These challenges include large young populations, often with limited access to quality education and skill development opportunities, resulting in a competency gap. Additionally, economic disparities within these nations can further exacerbate the uneven distribution of AI-related benefits. Tackling these challenges is essential to harness the full potential of AI and ensure its equitable benefits reach all segments of society in developing countries.

  • Japanese Company Shutters Tech Firm in Renton- 57 Jobs Going

    Omron, a leading tech company from Japan, has shut down a Renton Company it recently acquired.

• Licensing / Legal

  • The Register UK ☛ Cisco's cloud network push will tie licensing change to generational product refreshes

    The plan to change licenses along with products is part of Cisco's effort to create a "Networking Cloud" that, across the three days of Cisco Live Melbourne, The Register came to understand as not so much a product or technology or an attempt to change the way Cisco engages with its customers.

• Security

  • Integrity/Availability/Authenticity

    • CoryDoctorow ☛ Mapping out my understanding of (web-based) single sign-on systems

      The thing you want to end up with is an Identity Provider (IdP). Typical IdPs have two roles; they challenge users to authenticate (generally through a web browser) and perhaps approve giving this authentication information to other systems, and they provide authenticated identity information to other systems. They typically do their single sign on trick by putting a cookie in the browser to mark you as already authenticated, so when a system sends you to the IdP to get authenticated you just bounce right through without getting challenged. A garden variety IdP does all of this with HTTP(S) transactions, some of them from people's web browsers and some of them from systems to API endpoints (or from the IdP to other people's API endpoints).

  • Privacy/Surveillance

    • EFF ☛ The House Intelligence Committee's Surveillance 'Reform' Bill is a Farce

      While renewing any surveillance authority remains a complicated and complex issue, this choice is clear - we urge all Members to vote NO on the Intelligence Committee’s bill, H.R.6611, the FISA Reform and Reauthorization Act of 2023.

    • The Register UK ☛ Competing Section 702 surveillance bills on collision path for US House floor

      On Wednesday, the House Judiciary Committee approved the Protect Liberty and End Warrantless Surveillance Act (HR 6570) in a 35-2 vote. The bipartisan bill reauthorizes Section 702 of the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act (FISA) for three years with reforms including requiring all US intelligence agencies to obtain a warrant before conducting a US person query.

      [...]

      A day after the Judiciary Committee advanced its proposal, on Thursday the House Intelligence Committee unanimously passed the FISA Reform and Reauthorization Act of 2023 (HR 6611).

    • [Old] EFF ☛ Your university is a beacon of free thought. Naturally, you have been asked to allow a Tor relay on your campus. But should you?

      You may have many legal, technical, and policy questions. We tried to answer many of these types of questions below, but if you have other questions we would like to hear from you.

      Setting up a Tor relay not only benefits the world, it signals to others that your university is a defender of free speech and intellectual freedom. Running a Tor relay can help your university in all sorts of ways, including: [...]

• Defence/Aggression

  • DeSmog ☛ US Republicans at Dubai Climate Summit Have Accepted $11 Million in Fossil Fuel Donations

    DeSmog’s review of three Congressional COP28 delegations comprising dozens of senators and representatives has found that of the 36 Republican lawmakers involved, just 10 received more than $9.4 million of these campaign contributions.

    Each has accepted at least $500,000 from polluting companies over their careers, DeSmog found.

  • DeSmog ☛ Big Meat and Dairy Delegates Triple at COP28

    Lobbyists from industrial agriculture companies and trade groups have turned out in record numbers at COP28, which this year has a strong focus on tackling emissions from the food sector.

  • Democracy Now ☛ COP28 Activists Say Palestine Solidarity Protests Calling for Ceasefire Face Severe Restrictions

    At COP28 in Dubai, protests in solidarity with Palestine have faced severe restrictions. Asad Rehman, the lead spokesperson for the Climate Justice Coalition, joined with human rights groups at an unofficial media briefing to explain how climate summit officials have threatened to debadge participants for even wearing Palestinian colors or sporting visual depictions calling for a ceasefire. “This is probably the most restrictive we’ve seen,” Rehman said. “Everything we have tried to do has been within the U.N. rules, … but the rules are being changed on a day-by-day basis.”

  • RFERL ☛ Azerbaijan Tipped To Host COP29 Climate Talks, Says Russia Backs It

    Azerbaijan is tipped to host next year's UN climate summit after striking a deal with longtime adversary Armenia over its bid.

  • Democracy Now ☛ Exclusive: Indigenous Climate Activist Jacob Johns Speaks Out After MAGA Gunman Shoots Him in New Mexico

    Broadcasting from COP28 in Dubai, we speak with Jacob Johns, a Hopi and Akimel O’odham environmental defender who is leading the Indigenous Wisdom Keepers delegation at COP28. This is his first interview after surviving being shot in the chest by a far-right agitator in September. Johns and other Indigenous activists were holding a vigil opposing plans to reinstall a statue honoring the 16th century Spanish conquistador Juan de Oñate in Española, New Mexico, when a 23-year-old shooter wearing a red MAGA hat fired on the crowd. Johns says he died in the airlift on the way to the hospital and is still dealing with medical issues from the shooting, but wanted to come to the climate summit to share Indigenous wisdom with the world. “We as Indigenous people understand that as the old world dies, that a new one is created and that we must focus on that creation process.”

  • Democracy Now ☛ Why Is Brazil Joining OPEC+ Oil Cartel, If Lula Is Committed to Phasing Out Fossil Fuels?

    Brazilian President Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva is calling for phasing out fossil fuels but has alarmed many climate activists as Brazil moves to join the oil producer alliance OPEC+ as an observer state. Paula Vargas, director of the Brazil program at Amazon Watch, lays out Brazil’s environmental policy under Lula and Jair Bolsonaro’s legacy of impunity for those attacking environmental defenders. “Brazil has a big, big possibility of being the top leader in environmental change,” but civil society must push leaders around the world to enact climate solutions, Vargas says.

  • DeSmog ☛ Report: Canada and U.S. Are Top Public Funders for CCS with Nations Prepared to Inject $200 Million More

    Canada is the world’s second leading source of public funding for carbon capture and storage (CCS) technology, according to a new report, even though many experts say CCS is a greenwashing cover to pump more oil.

    Oil Change International’s study, “Carbon Capture’s Publicly Funded Failure,”  shows the Canadian government has given at least $4 billion in public subsidies to CCS efforts, out of a total of $20 billion world wide. Globally, the United States and Canada invest the most public money into the controversial technology, with the United States contributing $8 billion, the report states.. 

  • Common Dreams ☛ Reaction to the latest GST draft at COP28

    In response to the latest GST draft, Oil Change International Global Policy Manager, Romain Ioualalen, said: [...]

  • Common Dreams ☛ COP28 must answer the call for a fossil fuel phase out

    As COP28 resumes for a second week, negotiators will be faced with answering the call for a commitment to a Fossil Fuel Phase Out in Dubai. Never before have we heard so many voices, coming from so many directions to seize the moment and commit to phasing out oil, coal and gas. And never before have alternative formulations on fossil fuel phase out made it this far into a draft text. But there are still no guarantees on a decision on fossil fuels, so all is in play.

  • Science Alert ☛ The Climate Change We've Already Created Will Last 50,000 Years, Scientists Warn

    To see how this might play out on a geological timescale, we need to look through the lens of the Anthropocene. A delicately balanced planetary machinery of regular, multi-millennial variations in the Earth's spin and orbit has tightly controlled patterns of warm and cold for millions of years.

    Now, suddenly, this control machinery has been overridden by a trillion tons of carbon dioxide injected into the atmosphere in little more than a century.

  • CS Monitor ☛ Climate progress in charts: Gaps and gains, as world meets in Dubai

    In theory, this week’s summit is all about that pivot. These COP, or Conference of Parties, meetings have been going on for years (this is No. 28). Some nations nudge others to do more. Our charts with this story put it all in visual context – both the progress and how far short it is of what scientists say is needed to stabilize Earth’s temperatures.

  • The Washington Post ☛ Opinion: A Trump dictatorship is increasingly inevitable. We should stop pretending

    The magical-thinking phase is ending. Barring some miracle, Trump will soon be the presumptive Republican nominee for president. When that happens, there will be a swift and dramatic shift in the political power dynamic, in his favor. Until now, Republicans and conservatives have enjoyed relative freedom to express anti-Trump sentiments, to speak openly and positively about alternative candidates, to vent criticisms of Trump’s behavior past and present. Donors who find Trump distasteful have been free to spread their money around to help his competitors. Establishment Republicans have made no secret of their hope that Trump will be convicted and thus removed from the equation without their having to take a stand against him. Advertisement

    All this will end once Trump wins Super Tuesday. Votes are the currency of power in our system, and money follows, and by those measures, Trump is about to become far more powerful than he already is. The hour of casting about for alternatives is closing. The next phase is about people falling into line.

  • Kansas Reflector ☛ Donald Trump said he would be a dictator on ‘Day One.’ Imagine if Joe Biden said the same.

    But wait. Let’s do the experiment in real time, right now. I’m going to relay the exchange as described in the Washington Post, changing only a few key details. For instance, I’m going to change the candidate, questioner and network. For all of you conservatives out there, just imagine that you somehow tuned into MSNBC on Tuesday night.

  • India Times ☛ Indonesia's GoTo in talks with TikTok over potential ecommerce partnership

    Indonesia in October banned online shopping on social media platforms to protect smaller merchants and users' data, after which TikTok had to close its e-commerce service TikTok Shop. TikTok has 125 million users in the country.

  • India Times ☛ Trafficking for cyber fraud an increasingly globalised crime, Interpol says

    The global police coordination body said law enforcement from more than 20 countries in October carried out inspections at hundreds of trafficking and smuggling hotspots.

  • The Nation ☛ Why Is One of Trump’s Fake Electors Still Overseeing Voting in Wisconsin?

    The fake electors, waited for 35 months to do the right thing. And then only under the looming threat of a civil trial that was unlikely to go well for them.

  • Russia, Belarus, and War in Ukraine

    • New York Times ☛ Putin Says He Will Seek Another Term as Russia’s President

      The announcement was long expected after the Constitution was amended in 2020, effectively allowing the Russian leader to stay in power until 2036.

    • Meduza ☛ Putin’s presidential nomination to be held December 16 in Moscow — Meduza

    • teleSUR ☛ Putin Announces Plans to Run for President in 2024

      "We have proven that we are capable of tackling some of the most complex challenges," the Russian president said.

    • The Kent Stater ☛ British Foreign Secretary David Cameron urges US Congress to pass Ukraine aid package

      CNN —  Britain’s Foreign Secretary David Cameron has urged US lawmakers to “lift the morale” of Ukraine by passing an aid package for Kyiv that has become entangled in Republican quarrelling. Cameron, a former British prime minister, told CNN during a trip to Washington, DC, on Thursday that the US is “the lynchpin” of the Western...

    • Atlantic Council ☛ Ukraine in the EU would be a game-changer for Europe’s decarbonization drive

      Both decarbonization and Ukraine’s accession will require reforms to the bloc's internal decision-making processes.

    • France24 ☛ IOC clears Russian, Belarusian athletes to compete as neutrals in Paris Games

      Olympic chiefs on Friday gave the green light to the participation of Russian and Belarusian athletes at next year's Paris Games as neutrals, outside of team events and as long as they did not actively support the war on Ukraine.

    • New York Times ☛ Athletes From Russia and Belarus Are Cleared to Compete at Paris Olympics

      A decision by the International Olympic Committee paves the way for individuals from the two countries to take part over the objections of Ukraine and others.

    • RFERL ☛ IOC Approves Participation Of Russian, Belarusian Athletes As Neutrals

      Russians and Belarusians who qualify in their sport for the 2024 Summer Olympics in Paris can take part as neutrals, the International Olympic Committee (IOC) announced on December 8.

    • Latvia ☛ Dozens of Latvian food companies still doing business with Russia in 2023

      81 companies registered in Latvia received food products, including cereals, from Russia in the first 11 months this year, according to a list of companies at the disposal of LETA news agency.

    • RFERL ☛ Kyiv Expects Delivery Of F-16s 'Soon' As Further U.S. Aid Remains Stalled In Congress

      Ukraine's defense minister says his country expects to take delivery of advanced F-16 fighter jets "soon," as the Biden administration warns the U.S. Congress that failure to support Ukraine could mean the U.S. will have to pay a high price in "national treasure and in American blood" in the future.

    • RFERL ☛ Russian Opposition Politician Ilya Yashin Placed In Stricter Regime Unit At Penal Colony

      Russian opposition politician Ilya Yashin, who is serving an 8 1/2-year prison term for his criticism of Moscow’s invasion of Ukraine, has been placed in a stricter regime unit in his penal colony after serving five days in solitary confinement, his Telegram channel said on December 8.

    • RFERL ☛ Germany Delivers Fresh Military Aid Package To Ukraine

      Germany has delivered a new package of military aid to Ukraine that includes shells, drones, and vehicles, the government in Berlin said in a statement.

    • RFERL ☛ Finland Refuses Kyiv Request To Extradite Russian Ultranationalist Detained In Helsinki

      Finnish media reports on December 8 said the country's Supreme Court refused to extradite to Ukraine Yan Petrovsky, a Russian ultranationalist and former commander of the Rusich saboteur group, which fights alongside Russia's armed forces against Kyiv.

    • YLE ☛ Supreme Court: Finland can't extradite terror suspect to Ukraine

      The suspect was detained in July.

    • CS Monitor ☛ Ukraine vanquishing the other enemy

      Examples of selflessness, especially in curbing corruption, not only aid the war effort but also may help Ukraine join the European Union.

    • New York Times ☛ An Aid Package for Ukraine and Israel That Invests in American Security Goals

      Congress should promptly approve a military aid package that includes crucial support for Ukraine and Israel.

    • LRT ☛ Abramovich slams calls to review law over his children’s Lithuanian citizenship

      Russian billionaire Roman Abramovich has criticised Lithuania’s efforts to review its citizenship law after it was reported that his two children have Lithuanian passports, Bloomberg reports.

    
    

    • RFERL ☛ Lithuania Investigates Granting Of Citizenship To Relatives Of Russian Tycoon Abramovich

      Lithuania's Interior Ministry said on December 7 that a commission has been established to investigate how relatives of Russian billionaire Roman Abramovich were able to obtain citizenship in the Baltic nation.

    • Latvia ☛ Daugavpils says Soviet-related street names will remain

      A year has passed since the Society “Center for Public Memory” called on the city of Daugavpils near the Russian border to change street names associated with the Communist regime, but the city has stated the names will not be changed, LRT+ reported December 8.

    • New York Times ☛ In Soldiers’ Remains, Russia Plots a Way to Reconcile With France

      A man with close ties to the Kremlin went looking for and found the remains of World War I Russian soldiers in France. Moscow hopes to use the discovery for diplomatic purposes.

• Transparency/Investigative Reporting

  • Patrick Breyer ☛ Pirate party initiative makes the European Court of Justice more transparent than ever before

    In future, the European Court of Justice will proactively and systematically publish the letters and arguments submitted by the parties to proceedings on its website after a judgement has been delivered. An exception applies if the author of pleadings objects, but in this case there is a right to access the information via the EU Commission upon request. This is the result of the negotiations on the reform of the CJEU Statute between the EU Parliament and the EU Council, in which Pirate Party MEP Patrick Breyer was involved. The new transparency rule applies to all questions referred to the ECJ by national courts (“preliminary ruling procedures”). Following the initiative of Breyer, who is himself a judge by profession, the European Parliament had called for public access to the pleadings and arguments exchanged in court proceedings.

  • Tom's Hardware ☛ Google admits the Gemini AI demo hands-on video was staged

    That footnote might be described as an understatement, or diversion from the truth, though. As the video wasn’t just shortened, there was no real interaction during the recording. Google’s spokesperson told Bloomberg that the hands-on video was cobbled together with “using still image frames from the footage, and prompting via text.” Thus, Gemini only responded to typed in prompts and still images that were uploaded to it. The conversational flow, with the human speaking, drawing, showing objects, playing with cups and other objects, was seemingly just staged for the demo video.

• Environment

  • University of Michigan ☛ U-M team’s work centers on tracking undetectable space junk

    The results are among the first to come from a larger, collaborative project funded by the Intelligence Advanced Research Projects Activity’s Space Debris Identification and Tracking Program. The project is led by military contractor Blue Halo and includes the University of Alaska Fairbanks.

    Trash in space is more than unsightly — it’s hazardous. At a typical orbital speed of 22,000 miles per hour, a plum-sized piece of space debris can hit another object with the same energy as a car crash on the highway, potentially putting a satellite out of commission. Even smaller pieces can damage spacecraft, so tracking them is mission critical for satellites and spacecraft that need to take evasive actions.

  • DeSmog ☛ Leader of Ecocide Movement Aims to Criminalize Long-term Harm to the Environment

    Jojo Mehta co-founded Stop Ecocide in 2017, alongside legal pioneer the late Polly Higgins, to support the recognition and establishment of ecocide as a crime at the International Criminal Court at the Hague. She’ll be at COP28 in Dubai to push for an ecocide law.

    Ecocide is generally defined as mass damage and destruction of ecosystems — severe harm to nature that is widespread or long-term. Stop Ecocide generates collaborations around the globe at every level of society, from diplomats and politicians to lawyers and academics, from corporate influencers to indigenous and faith leaders. As a result, legal recognition of ecocide is emerging as a powerful driver of change and a key solution addressing the climate and ecological crisis.

  • Energy/Transportation

    • Meduza ☛ Belarusian citizen charged with train explosions on key railway in Russia’s Far East remanded into custody until January 30 — Meduza

• Finance

  • Yahoo News ☛ Nationwide: 500 Swindon head office workers at risk of redundancy

    A building society has announced that about 500 workers are at risk of redundancy as its head office goes through a "streamlining" process.

    Nationwide, based in Swindon, said it expects about 200 workers to leave as it will seek to find people new roles.

    The company said the redundancy consultation aims to improve efficiency and direct investment into other areas of the business.

    Nationwide added that "customer-facing colleagues" will not be affected.

• AstroTurf/Lobbying/Politics

  • Digital Music News ☛ Who Got Fired at Spotify? Scathing Internal Memo from Daniel Ek Leaked

    Spotify shed around 1,500 people from its workforce of 9,000 earlier this week, sending another shockwave through the industry. Yesterday, Spotify CFO Paul Vogel exited the company effective March 2024—selling off nearly $10 million in stock before the revelations were made public. Vogel was appointed to the CFO position in January 2020—but Daniel Ek doesn’t appear to have been happy with his peformance.

    According to an internal memo to Spotify employees that was leaked to Business Insider, Ek did not mince words. “By most metrics, we were more productive but less efficient. We need to be both. While we have done some work to mitigate this challenge and become more efficient in 2023, we still have a ways to go before we are both productive and efficient.”

  • The Register UK ☛ Musk takes SEC 'Twitter sitter' consent decree appeal to US Supreme Court

    Filed yesterday [PDF], Musk's legal team repeats the same general argument it has made since Musk and the SEC signed an agreement in 2019 that required a lawyer to vet tweets from the Tesla supremo that could have an material effect on the company or its investors.

  • Scoop News Group ☛ IRS is making progress on its digitization efforts, commissioner says

    During the ACT-IAC/DCI CX Summit in Arlington, Va., Werfel acknowledged Washington Post photos of an IRS cafeteria in Austin, Texas, that was flooded with paper tax return files, while stumping for the agency’s paperless future, which he said would improve data security and efficiency.

  • The Verge ☛ EU reaches provisional agreement on AI Act, paving way for landmark law

    Now that a provisional agreement has been reached, more negotiations will still be required, including votes by Parliament’s Internal Market and Civil Liberties committees.

  • Gizmodo ☛ Should Section 230 Protect AI Companies From Being Sued Out of Existence?

    Broadly speaking, Section 230 was designed to protect [Internet] platforms from getting sued over the content created by third parties. While individual users of those platforms may be liable for the things they post online, the platforms themselves are afforded legal immunity in most cases. The law was developed in the 1990s largely as a way to protect the nascent [Internet], as regulators seem to have realized that the web wouldn’t survive if all of its search engines and message boards were sued out of existence.

    Of course, times have changed since the law was passed in 1996 and there have been ongoing calls to reform Section 230 over the past several years. When it comes to AI, there seem to be all kinds of arguments for why (or why not) platforms like ChatGPT shouldn’t be covered by the landmark legislation.

  • El País ☛ This is how Finland is looking for its next Nokia

    But something seems to be missing in Multala’s reasoning: how did the Finns manage to get around the short-term thinking? “We understood that science and education were not only ways to build the foundations of economic growth in the medium and long-term, but that, in the short-term, they also served to send a signal to companies, so that they could understand that there’s a commitment from the government. This gives them security to also undertake their own investments in research and development,” the minister responds.

  • The Drone Girl ☛ FAA’s 2023 holiday marketing campaign suggests agency is bracing for onslaught of drone Christmas gifts

    The FAA’s 2023 Holiday “12 Days of Drones” Safety Campaign runs each weekday from now through Dec. 22. Each of the 12 days hones in on a different aspect of drone safety. Given that the topics are beginner focused, it’s clear that the campaign is largely centered around people planning to give or receive a drone as a holiday gift.

  • New York Times ☛ E.U. Agrees on Landmark Artificial Intelligence Rules

    The law, called the A.I. Act, sets a new global benchmark for countries seeking to harness the potential benefits of the technology, while trying to protect against its possible risks, like automating jobs, spreading misinformation online and endangering national security. The law still needs to go through a few final steps for approval, but the political agreement means its key outlines have been set.

  • Insight Hungary ☛ Yermak suggests meeting between Zelensky and Orbán

    Andriy Yermak, the head of the Ukrainian President's Office had a phone conversation with Hungarian Foreign Minister Péter Szijjártó, who is currently in Ghana, Yernak wrote on Telegram. Yermak informed Szijjártó that the Ukrainian Parliament is preparing to adopt several important pieces of legislation. 

    According to Foreign Affairs spokesman Máté Paczolay, the parties agreed on the importance of improving relations between Hungary and Ukraine, and that personal talks are the best option.

  • Misinformation/Disinformation/Propaganda

    • Six Colors ☛ The cops think iOS 17’s NameDrop is dangerous

      I’m glad that so many sources are rushing to correct the original police department posts, but if you really want to get depressed, visit one and read the comments from all the people who are grateful for the misinformation. You’ll have to laugh to keep from crying.

• Censorship/Free Speech

  • New York Times ☛ Six Teenagers Convicted in France for Role in Teacher’s Killing

    They were convicted on charges of being involved in a criminal conspiracy to prepare a violent assault. Four received suspended prison sentences of 14 to 20 months. The fifth received a two-year prison sentence, with 18 months of it suspended and six months to be served under house arrest with an electronic bracelet.

    Mr. Paty, 47, had shown caricatures of the Prophet Muhammad during a civics class to illustrate free speech and was subsequently beheaded because of the act on Oct. 16, 2020, near the school where he worked in Conflans-Sainte-Honorine, a northwestern suburb of Paris.

  • BIA Net ☛ Turkey detains popular OnlyFans creator on 'obscenity' charges

    With an Instagram following exceeding 350,000, Bağdaçiçek is one of the most popular OnlyFans content creators in Turkey. The detention follows a similar incident in late November when another social media user using the nickname "Laz Kızı" (The Laz Girl) was detained on the same charge after a TikTok live broadcast.

    At the start of the year, Merve Taşkın, another popular OnlyFans creator, was acquitted of obscenity, after standing trial for the content she published.

  • Hong Kong Free Press ☛ Hong Kong woman faces jail for removing devices from home of sister arrested under security law

    Beijing imposed a national security law in Hong Kong in June 2020 following months of protests and unrest sparked by a controversial extradition law. The legislation criminalised subversion, secession, collusion with foreign forces and terrorist acts – broadly defined to include disruption to transport and other infrastructure.

  • RFERL ☛ Turkmen Activist Believed To Be Missing In Russia

    Independent websites monitoring developments in Turkmenistan quoted friends and colleagues of noted Turkmen opposition activist Malikberdi Allamyradov as saying that he has been missing since December 4.

• Freedom of Information / Freedom of the Press

  • RFERL ☛ Police In Belarus Detain Two Journalists Amid Crackdown

    Police in the southeastern Belarusian city of Svetlahorsk on December 8 detained the chief editor of the Ranak television channel, Yulia Dauletava, and correspondent Lyudmila Andenka on extremism charges as a crackdown on independent journalists and democratic institutions continues.

  • Jacobin Magazine ☛ Andy Borowitz to Leave New Yorker, Pursue Career as Satirist

    The New Yorker announced this week that it’s cutting ties with resident humorist Andy Borowitz. Where will we go now to find side-splitting skewering like “Trump is a liar” and “Republicans are dumb”?

  • Press Gazette ☛ BBC warns 6.7% licence fee rise will lead to £90m further cuts

    The BBC’s board warned immediately after the announcement that the new licence fee figure will require “further changes on top of the major savings” it is currently delivering, while the National Union of Journalists attacked the government for “reneging” on previous funding promises.

  • RFERL ☛ Russia Adds Journalist Masha Gessen To Its Wanted List

    Russia's Interior Ministry has added U.S. journalist, writer, and outspoken Kremlin critic Masha Gessen to its wanted list. Gessen's name appeared on the ministry's list on December 8 without specifying what the journalist is wanted for.

  • RFERL ☛ Belarusian Court Labels RFE/RL Social Media Accounts 'Extremist'

    A court in the southeastern Belarusian city of Homel on December 7 labeled the Telegram, YouTube, X, and Fentanylware (TikTok) accounts of RFE/RL's Belarus Service, known locally as Radio Svaboda, as "extremist."

• Civil Rights/Policing

  • Meduza ☛ Russia’s Kursk region bans ‘coercing’ women to have abortions through ‘propaganda’ of abortion and childfree lifestyle — Meduza

  • RFA ☛ Police out in force during Lhasa religious festival

    It was the latest effort by China to suppress Tibetan religious and cultural expressions by sending a large police force to religious gatherings to surveil attendees.

    Marked by displays of butter lamps and candles, the Gaden Ngamchoe festival commemorates the death of Je Tsongkhapa, the founder of the Gelukpa school of Tibetan Buddhism, a revered 14th century scholar.

  • CNN ☛ The self-checkout reversal is growing

    Dollar General is joining the growing list of retail chains reversing course on self-checkout technology.

    “We had started to rely too much this year on self-checkout in our stores,” Dollar General CEO Todd Vasos said Thursday on an earnings call. “We should be using self-checkout as a secondary checkout vehicle, not a primary.”

  • EDRI ☛ NGOs and experts warn AI Act negotiators: don’t trade our rights!

    As the supposedly final negotiation on the EU’s landmark Artificial Intelligence (AI) Act drags on, the undersigned civil society coalition calls on lawmakers to unequivocally reject attempts to legalise dangerous and discriminatory police AI.

    EU lawmakers are being pressured by governments and security industry lobbyists to trade away our fundamental rights and freedoms. The Parliament’s position on prohibitions is backed by the UN High Commissioner for Human Rights, the European Data Protection Supervisor and Board, networks of national human rights institutions and equality bodies, academics and other experts.

  • Tech Central (South Africa) ☛ Apps that use AI to undress women in photos soaring in use

    In September alone, 24 million people visited undressing websites, according to the social network analysis company Graphika.

  • RFERL ☛ Facing An Uncertain Future, Afghan Girls Finishing Sixth Grade Leave School In Tears

    Hundreds of thousands of sixth-grade girls in Afghanistan attended the last day of the school year, many with tears in their eyes as they face an uncertain future because of Taliban policies that forbid them from further schooling and restrict their basic human rights.

  • RFERL ☛ The Azadi Briefing: Concerns Mount For Women In Taliban Detention

    The Taliban currently holds at least five women's rights activists in detention. Neda Parwani, Zholya Parsi, Munizha Siddiqi, Bahare Karimi, and Parisa Azadeh languish in various Taliban prisons and detention centers around the capital, Kabul.

• Internet Policy/Net Neutrality

  • Truthdig ☛ Living With Limited Internet Access in the Black Rural South

    Philadelphia, Miss., is 54% Black, and the median income is $37,000. A Brookings Institution study showed that the less money an individual makes, the more likely they won’t have access to high-speed broadband. Black and Hispanic populations are disproportionately affected.

    As a result, Black people, young adults, and low-income folks rely on smartphones for internet access, according to Pew Research Center. In a tech-driven society, there are “workarounds” for this, such as driving to the nearest library (if there is one, or you have a car) or using a neighbor’s computer, Riley said, but it requires additional time and money.

• Digital Restrictions (DRM)

  • The Register UK ☛ Polish train maker denies claims its software bricked rolling stock maintained by competitor

    Newag, a Polish train maker, emphatically denied that it installed such software in a statement [PDF, Polish] issued Wednesday, attributing any issues to unknown hackers.

    The rolling stock and engineering business insists its software is correct and that it did not design the trains' programming logic to fail under specific conditions, as has been claimed. "This is a slander from our competition, which is conducting an illegal black PR campaign against us," it protested.

Monopolies/Monopsonies

• India Times ☛ Google against potential EU break-up order, says not proportionate

  Alphabet's Google on Friday criticised a potential order from EU antitrust regulators to sell part of its lucrative adtech business, saying it was disproportionate or not right for its advertising partners.

  The comments from Google's director Oliver Bethell and its vice president for global ads Dan Taylor came after the U.S. tech giant responded to EU charges issued to the company in June.

• Copyrights

  • Torrent Freak ☛ DNS Resolver Quad9 Wins Pirate Site Blocking Appeal Against Sony

    DNS-resolver Quad9 has won its appeal against Sony Music's pirate site-blocking order at the Higher Regional Court in Dresden. The non-profit Quad9 Foundation no longer has to block pirate sites. The court concluded that it can't be held liable, since DNS resolvers don't play a central role in copyright infringing activities. Meanwhile, trouble is brewing in Italy.

  • Torrent Freak ☛ Piracy Shield: Pirate IPTV Killer Goes Live, No Casualties to Report....Yet

    A new law passed in Italy during the summer promised a new dawn in the war against pirate IPTV providers. It soon transpired that Piracy Shield, the all-new, massively hyped anti-piracy system poised and ready to eliminate piracy had a minor flaw; it wasn't actually ready. By law, it had to launch yesterday, and reportedly it did just that, albeit with a couple of tiny caveats....

  • Torrent Freak ☛ RIAA Files Massive 'Repeat Infringer' Copyright Lawsuit Against U.S. ISP Altice

    Around 50 record labels, all members of the RIAA, have filed a mass copyright infringement lawsuit against Altice, owner of U.S. ISP Optimum. Filed in a Texas district court, the complaint focuses on Altice's alleged failure to take action against customers the plaintiffs describe as 'repeat infringers'. Last December, a group of music rightsholders including BMG, UMG, and Capitol filed a substantially similar lawsuit against Altice at the same court.

  • Digital Music News ☛ SUISA Files Copyright Lawsuit Against Twitter/X in German Court: ‘Resolute Action Against the Illegal Use of Music’

    Bigger picture, Twitter/X isn’t the sole social media service facing infringement allegations; Epidemic Sound sued Facebook and Instagram parent Meta in the summer of 2022, and the legal battle, which could head to trial next year, has been in full swing in the interim.

• Gemini* and Gopher

  • Personal/Opinions

    • Negligence

      Agnes Heller (1929-2019) wrote philosophy for 70 years. In 2010 she wrote A Short History of My Philosophy, critically reviewing her major books, papers, and lectures of the previous 60 years.

      It's refreshingly unsentimental and clear. It was how I decided where to enter her vast ouvre of pol- itical, moral, ethical, aesthetic, and philosophy of history thought.

    • 🔤SpellBinding — DEIKSYV Wordo: STEWS

    • Patches of Greasy Residue on Plots of Impotent Land

      Vlasta called me. How she had my number is anyone's guess. She called me and I was in Prague. Why I was in Prague is anyone's guess. *Come pick me up at the bus station.* That's what she said. Or it wasn't *exactly* what she said, but it was close. How close is anyone's guess.

      So I arrived to whichever place she had declared and I picked her up. What did I pick her up in? I picked her up in my arms with an embrace. After all, it had been 18 years since we'd seen each other. She had aged, but not as much as I'd've imagined. She was still fit and only mildly crinkled. A good portion of Moravian women age very mildly. Apparently Vlasta was one of them. The first thing she did was offer me a cigarette. I was surprised and guffawed in my socially inappropriate way, that way that the truly important people in one's life don't mind. *When did you start smoking?* I asked. She replied *I never started. I bought them for you.* Ah yes! During a portion of the epoch when we spent time with each other, I was **indeed** a smoker. No longer, though. So I guffawed again.

    • The Anti-Life Equation

      Sometimes it’s easy to start thinking that since even breathing is part of the CO2 cycle, I’d do a better job of fighting climate change if I were in the grave, and that everyone better forget about having kids.

      But the entire point of wanting to fix climate change is to preserve life. Annihilating the planet just to save it would be majorly missing the point. Yeah, yeah, it’s more than just human life that’s at stake, and it’d be worse if all animals died than if “only” humans died, but ideally we do want people to get to live their best lives. (Or their horrific awful life, if Ligotti is right about the human condition. Either way is fine by me.)

    • A Day For Staying In

      We knew there was some snow coming - not a huge shock here, in winter, but it's been a strange one, jumping between cold and warm (well, above freezing), so that we haven't actually had much snow on the ground. But when my partner was driving home from work yesterday, she said it was starting to get a bit dicey. I went out for groceries a couple hours later, when the online buzz around Shohei Ohtani maybe flying to Toronto turned out to be an elaborate mistake/hallucination. The wipers were going like crazy. The snow was starting to stick around on the ground, and it was wet. Wonderful.

  • Politics and World Events

    • Hope

      Hope I'll get enough sleep to be a good nurse for my patients tomorrow, a good support to my staff, to attend to needs, prevent crises, and go home on time, after only 12 or 13 hours.

      Hope, the start of Advent, looking forward to the possibility light will come into darkness. Maybe not believing it'll come, but dreaming, preparing, because what if it did? I should be ready. We should be ready.

    • A dangerous religion

      I wanna talk a little bit about something few people in my circles dare to speak out about because they don’t want to criticize people’s personal beliefs. But we need to dare to talk about this.

      In America, 60% of adherents to this conviction favor the death penalty, even though over a third of them have a criminal record of their own. All over the world, domestic violence and sexual violence is running rampant in this group.

    • Putting it the complement of mildly

      But to me going the full distance on this is a matter of seeing the even more dangerous religion underlying that referenced in the article, namely faith in a free-willed individual calling itself "I". There's no horror a biological system drunk on that faith *can't* inflict upon itself and all the rest.

    • cycles

      I haven't ever had much of a connection to my cycle in the past - hormone issues warranted an early introduction to hormone treatments and birth control. I was very used to feeling the exact same the entire time except for the withdrawal bleeding at the end of the month. I wasn't even aware that that's what it was; I wasn't ever told what the hormones do, or that the pause was entirely artificial, not needed, and not a true period.

      [...]

      I will soon get my hormones tested again and see if my progesterone levels are atypically low for its cycle phase at that point and probably supplement it. My PMDD symptoms later in the cycle are likely due to too low progesterone, and also my persistent histamine issues too, since it helps in creating DAO, which is needed to deal with histamine in food and that I supplement right now before eating.

  • Poetry

    • The magick of thought againness

  • Technology and Free Software

    • Semi-Random Beat-Maker

      For some regularity, there are onsets on beat 1, 2, 3, 4, and another four beats on the half-beat mark. These would usually be a bass drum and hi-hat, though the above code randomizes the pitch and thus drum selection, which is bad if you know what you are doing, and might be good if you're throwing stuff at a metaphorical wall to see if anything sticks. Otherwise longer rhythmic patterns are generated though not totally randomly.

    • Internet/Gemini

      • Putting it the complement of mildly

        Hey, sorry for seemingly lying about not being around. But it turns out the vacationing environment has wifi, *and* those we're vacationing with apparently don't arise as early as their "good game talkin'" suggested they do.

      • Apologies, Antenna followers

        Dammit, I won't up with double a couple posts because I managed to forget to prepend entries with '=>', instead concluded something was wrong with Antenna, tried it from BBS/Bubble... and then eventually got the former right... and now I'm feeling even stupider than usual.