Distributions and Operating Systems

• Leftovers

  • Joel Chrono ☛ Inbox Zero But RSS

    So, I accidentally marked as read every single feed in my FreshRSS instance, but I decided to make the best of it!

  • Rachel ☛ Figure out who's leaving the company: dump, diff, repeat

    One common element of the larger places where I've worked is that they tend to have a directory service of some sort that keeps track of who's an employee and who isn't. You can learn some interesting things by periodically dumping that list and then running comparisons against the previous dump.

  • [Repeat] Vice Media Group ☛ How Tech Firms Made a Crypto-Boosting Book an NYT Best Seller by Gaming the System

    Bulk orders are a time-worn path to juicing sales and becoming a bestseller, despite the Times being concerned enough about this form of system-gaming to have special typographical tools meant to combat it. The most basic version of the scheme is a publisher—or another group, typically associated with the author in some way—placing huge orders for the book with sellers that report their sales to the Times.

  • New York Times ☛ It Started as Winter Break. It Ended With a Doomed Moon Mission.

    Carnegie Mellon University students built Iris, a tiny lunar rover. When the spacecraft carrying it to the moon malfunctioned, they turned their vacation house into mission control.

  • SPAM

    • Unix Men ☛ Securing Linux/UNIX Systems: Best Practices for System Administrators [Ed: This is spam disguised as article; see anchor text and link on "Drupal headless cms"]

    • Unix Men ☛ Cloud Migration Assessment in Linux Systems [Ed: This is also spam disguised as article about "Linux". It's SEO linkspam.]

  • Education

    • Pro Publica ☛ Idaho Legislature Introduces Bill to Help School Districts Repair, Replace Buildings

      Idaho Republican leaders introduced a bill Thursday that would provide $1.5 billion in new funding over 10 years for school districts to repair and replace their aging and overcrowded school buildings — a proposal they said would mark the largest investment in school facilities in state history.

      The bill would create the School Modernization Facilities Fund, which districts could use for construction and maintenance needs. It would also provide money through an existing fund to help school districts pay off their bonds and levies, which are used to finance school facilities and district operating costs.

    • Pete Brown ☛ Parenting and the illusion of control // Exploding Comma

      Part of me does think these parents bear a good deal of responsibility here, especially when I read the bits about the kid writing that they are not listening to him when he says he needs help, and even more so when we get to the part about keeping a gun in the house.

      At the same time—and as a parent myself—I think that parenting is really hard and that while our culture has this notion that parents are in control of their kids, I don’t think the reality is anything close to that.

    • Matt Mullenweg ☛ Thoughts on Tech Employment

      The Washington Post writes The U.S. economy is booming. So why are tech companies laying off workers? This article has some good data, but I think misses the point with sub-heads like “Shine has come off the tech industry.” Really? How is that reflected in their stock prices?

      I think a few things are happening.

  • Hardware

    • The Sneaky Standard

      How defective chip maker Intel screwed over a standards body in the midst of giving computer users one of the most resilient technologies around.

  • Health/Nutrition/Agriculture

    • Pro Publica ☛ FDA Repeatedly Rejected Safety Claims About Philips Breathing Machines, Emails Show

      In the winter of 2021, with its stock price plunging, lawsuits mounting and popular breathing machines pulled from the shelves, Philips Respironics made a surprise public announcement.

      The company said the sleep apnea devices it had recalled only months earlier had undergone new safety tests and did not appear to pose a health threat to the millions of patients who relied on them to breathe.

    • The Register UK ☛ US regulators crack down on AI playing doctor in healthcare

      Passages in the memo about algorithms being used to make healthcare decisions, however, seem tailor-made to address controversy over the use of such software in denying Medicare Advantage coverage, which has led to multiple lawsuits. Medicare Advantage is a privately run alternative to the US federal government's standard Medicare offerings.

    • El País ☛ Arsenic in food: Should you wash your rice before cooking?

      Thoroughly washing the rice (rinsing six times) before cooking can remove between 10% and 30% of the arsenic. Cooking the rice with plenty of water (1:6 ratio) and discarding the leftover water can remove around 30-45% of the arsenic. However, the effectiveness of these methods may vary depending on the rice variety. Some studies suggest up to 57% of the arsenic is eliminated, while other studies like the one cited by AESAN indicate only 11% is eliminated. Washing rice may also eliminate some of the nutrient content of rice.

    • New York Times ☛ Polluted Flowers Smell Less Sweet to Pollinators, Study Finds

      This sensory pollution could have far-reaching effects, interfering with plant reproduction and decreasing the production of fruits that feed many species, including humans. It could also threaten pollinators, which rely on flower nectar for sustenance and are already experiencing global declines.

    • NL Times ☛ Suicide figures show worrying increase among young people

      The number of suicides among young people under the age of thirty is increasing. Since 2013, the number of young people who took their own lives increased by 16.8 percent. The increase is causing great concern, said Renske Gilissen, the lead researcher at suicide prevention hotline organization 113, and the chair of CANS, the Dutch committee monitoring reports of suicide. Still, the total number of suicides across all age groups actually last year was slightly lower than the year before.

    • Kevin Hennings vs. stage IV colon cancer: Are ivermectin and fenbendazole the new laetrile? (Part one: fenbendazole)

      Dating back to years before I even started this blog in 2004, one consistent theme in my writing has been deconstructing alternative cancer cure testimonials, in which a patient with cancer claims that some alternative cancer treatment or other cured them when conventional medicine could not. Examples abound, including Suzanne Somers (who, sadly, recently died of widespread recurrence of the breast cancer that she had claimed to have cured), Chris Wark (who is doing well and grifting off an alternative medicine business that he’s built as a result of his story), Farrah Fawcett, many patients treated by Houston cancer quack Dr. Stanislaw Burzynski, and more victims of quackery than I can easily recount here, including some at seemingly “reputable” alternative medicine clinics in Europe. Given that, I was hardly surprised when COVID-19 quacks and antivaxxers started—shall we say?—repurposing the already repurposed (and ineffective) drugs that they had touted as highly effective treatments for COVID-19, such as ivermectin, as treatments for cancer as well. The latest example comes in the form of an alternative cancer cure testimonial from a man named Kevin Hennings, whose interview on comedian Jim Breuer’s podcast (on Rumble, of course, and YouTube) from a couple of months ago seems to have gone viral last week. (Just search X, the platform formerly known as Twitter, for Mr. Hennings’ name plus “colon cancer” if you don’t believe me.

    • Ruben Schade ☛ My dmesg(1) reports a booting mind again!

      Completely out of the blue, these last couple of weeks have been some of the worst of my life! But as cliché as it sounds, things only being icky today feels wonderful. There’s something about perspective there.

      Even family and mental health issues aside, I was struck down this week by the worst flu I’ve ever had; my first illness that topped COVID. My mum often talked about her chemo sore throats keeping her from sleeping, and now I know how. To put it into perspective, I’d rather have testicular surgery again.

      Here comes the proverbial posterior prognostication: but… I managed to turn a corner last night, and today I feel fantastic. It’s as though the swallowfood service has started, and the breathe service got unstuck after having unmet boot dependencies. Being able to do these two things again without blinding pain is like appreciating a gift I always had, but took for granted.

    • Science Alert ☛ The Blood of Exceptionally Long-Lived People Reveals Key Differences

    • Science Alert ☛ A Tiny, Pea-Sized Thing in Your Brain May Be Much More Important Than We Thought

      Never underestimate yourself.

    • Science Alert ☛ Does Kimchi Actually Promote Weight Loss? A New Study Reveals The Truth

      Let's look at the evidence.

    • Off Guardian ☛ How GMOs will destroy Indian agriculture

      Hybrid Bt cotton, the only commercialised GM crop in India, has failed conclusively. Based on this failure and the evidence on GM crops to date, the Union of India’s proposal to commercialise herbicide-tolerant (HT) mustard will destroy not just Indian mustard agriculture but citizens’ health.

    • Federal News Network ☛ Goodbye SF-86? OMB approves new ‘Personnel Vetting Questionnaire’

      The PVQ takes a new approach compared to the SF-86 on screening questions around marijuana use, mental health, foreign connections and other areas.

    • Latvia ☛ Two expert teams to look at mold in hospital basement

      Next week, two teams of foreign experts will take samples again in the basement of the Rīga Stradiņš hospital's new building basement to check whether there are mold spores present there, Latvian Television reported on February 9.

  • Proprietary/Artificial Intelligence (AI)

    • AIM ☛ Where Would Meta Be without Open Source AI?

      Another hint of China’s open source AI dominance is the Yi-34B model released by 01.AI startup, reaching a unicorn status after the release. The AI startup by Kai-Fu Lee is developing AI systems for the Chinese market. The interesting part is that the second and third models on the Open LLM Leaderboard are also based on Yi-34B.

    • The Register UK ☛ Ivanti discloses fifth vulnerability

      Researchers at watchTowr blogged today about not being credited with the discovery of CVE-2024-22024 – the latest in a series of vulnerabilities affecting Ivanti gateways as the vendor continues to develop patches for supported versions.

    • El País ☛ Deepfakes accelerate cryptocurrency scams: ‘It is very easy to fall for them, they are becoming more and more sophisticated’

      These types of scams have filled social networks in recent months. By the end of last year, it had become impossible to be on X (formerly Twitter) without coming across purported newspaper articles of this kind, featuring celebrities saying things they never really said. In Spain, affected celebrities include the comedian Pablo Motos, the journalist Susanna Griso and the actor Antonio Resines, who appear to be recommending this type of investment. “In general terms, we are identifying an increase in publications whose purpose is to misinform. But surely the most problematic aspect is the appearance of deepfakes, because they are more difficult to identify. It is very easy to fall prey to these scams that are increasingly sophisticated,” says Ruth García, a technician at Spain’s National Cybersecurity Institute (INCIBE).

    • El País ☛ Artificial intelligence will force governments to devise national employment strategies

      Along with this imminent labor transformation, there will be another transformation of the social sphere, which will go hand in hand with the progressive aging of the workforce. This will result, on the one hand, in an increase in the total payroll — workers with longer careers have better conditions and more experience — and, on the other, in an increase in the age of the customer base of businesses. “This will have an impact on the size of the sectors, as there will be less demand for products and services for young people (toys, nightlife) and more demand for products and services aimed at the elderly (elderly care, insurance),” the study claims.

    • The Conversation ☛ Cybercriminals are creating their own AI chatbots to support hacking and scam users

      LLMs also make it feasible to conduct large-scale phishing scams, targeting thousands of people in their own native language. It’s not conjecture either. Analysis of underground hacking communities has uncovered a variety of instances of criminals using ChatGPT, including for fraud and creating software to steal information. In another case, it was used to create ransomware.

    • Quartz ☛ A Google and Microsoft-backed group wants to make “nutrition labels” for AI-made content

      The idea is that AI-generated content should have a label like nutrition labels for food, where a consumer is not prohibited from buying a sugary cereal, but can walk into the store and know what’s in it and make their own decision, said Andy Parsons, senior director at C2PA.

    • The Conversation ☛ AI: a way to freely share technology and stop it being misused already exists

      For example, the EU’s AI Act places greater restrictions on systems based on whether they fall into the category of general purpose and generative AI or are considered to pose limited risk, high risk or an unacceptable risk.

      This is a novel and bold approach to mitigating any ill effects. But what if we could adapt some tools that already exist? Software licensing is one well-known model that could be tailored so that they could meet the challenges posed by advanced AI systems.

  • Security

    • Integrity/Availability/Authenticity

      • India Times ☛ ai cloned voice robocalls illegal: US agency FCC declares AI cloned voice robocalls illegal

        The FCC noted that state attorneys generals previously could target the outcome of an unwanted AI-voice-generated robocall, but the new action makes the act of using AI to generate a voice in these robocalls itself illegal.

      • Tripwire ☛ Surge in deepfake "Face Swap" attacks puts remote identity verification at risk

        A "liveness" test will typically ask an individual to look into a webcam, perhaps turning their head from side to side, in order to prove that they are both a real person and to compare their appearance to identity documents.

        According to the report, the most commonly used face swap tools by malicious actors are SwapFace, DeepFaceLive, and Swapstream.

      • Bitdefender ☛ US insurance firms sound alarm after 66,000 individuals impacted by SIM swap attack

        As we've described before, SIM-swapping attacks involve fraudsters tricking customer support staff at a cellphone operator into giving them control of someone else's phone number. This allows the fraudster to receive the victim's phone calls and SMS messages, including two-factor authentication tokens.

        In some cases, SIM-swappers hijack phone numbers with the help of a rogue insider at the cellphone company.

  • Defence/Aggression

    • Gizmodo ☛ Former Apple Engineer Gets Prison Time for Stealing Driverless Car Tech

    • Gizmodo ☛ The AI Deepfakes Problem Is Going to Get Unstoppably Worse

      The Federal Communications Commission (FCC) outlawing deepfake robocalls is a step in the right direction, according to Balasubramaniyan, but there’s minimal clarification on how this is going to be enforced. Currently, we’re catching deepfakes after the damage is done, and rarely punishing the bad actors responsible. That’s way too slow, and it’s not actually addressing the problem at hand.

    • The Verge ☛ TikTok’s attempt to stall DMA antitrust rules rejected by EU court

      TikTok’s status as a gatekeeper means the platform will join other large tech companies like Apple, Meta, Amazon, and Google in making a series of changes for EU users, including allowing third-party businesses access to their services and requiring consent for personalized advertising. It also means millions of euros in fines for TikTok and all other gatekeeper companies, if they ever break DMA rules. (For a full account of Big Tech’s ongoing battle with the EU over the DMA, check out our StoryStream.)

    • Digital Music News ☛ Nearly 85% of TikTok Videos Contain Music, Study Finds

      Also as highlighted, 2023 delivered a record $9 billion in industry payments from Spotify – a figure that has by the service’s calculation “nearly tripled over the past six years.” (Bearing in mind the points, Spotify has for some time been working to expand its revenue base through non-music offerings, among them two-sided marketplace initiatives, audiobooks, podcasts, and more.)

    • Digital Music News ☛ Warner Music Group Won't Be Removing Music from TikTok

      While Universal Music Group is rallying plenty of music industry support following its TikTok pullout, that love isn’t spilling into a mass pullout. Even more telling are those that aren’t even thinking about it.

    • Truthdig ☛ In Michigan, Muslims and Arabs Are Done With Biden

      In Southeast Michigan, a significant movement among Arab American and Muslim community leaders, including more than 30 elected officials from the region, has emerged in response to the Biden administration’s handling of the conflict in Gaza. This group has collectively pledged not to support President Biden in the state’s upcoming presidential primary. The initiative is spearheaded by Dearborn Mayor Abdullah Hammoud, who criticized President Biden for the civilian casualties in Gaza following an outbreak of war prompted by an attack from Hamas on Israel on October 7, which resulted in over 1,200 Israeli casualties and the taking of 253 hostages.

    • The Straits Times ☛ Kelantan Islamic laws decision solely made by apex court, Malaysian PM Anwar says

      Malaysia has a dual-track legal system, with Islamic criminal and family laws applicable to Muslims, running alongside civil laws. Islamic laws are enacted by state legislatures, while civil laws are passed by Malaysia’s Parliament.

      The Federal Court, in an 8-1 decision of the nine-member bench, on Feb 9 declared 16 laws in Kelantan’s syariah criminal code “void and invalid”.

    • India Times ☛ TikTok: TikTok challenges EU supervisory fee, following Meta's footsteps

      Under the Digital Services Act (DSA), 20 very large online platforms, including TikTok, Meta, Google, Apple and two very large online search engines are required to pay the annual charge. The size of the fee accounts for the average monthly active users for each company and whether it posts a profit or loss in the preceding financial year.

    • Greece ☛ Two migrant smugglers arrested at border

      Police arrested two men on Friday after they attempted to smuggle 12 people over the border with Turkey in Evros prefecture.

    • Defence Web ☛ Flow of illegal immigrants to South Africa continues, soldiers intercept over three thousand

      In December, the “haul” of illegal immigrants handed to police and Department of Home Affairs (DHA) officials was 1 383. This number rose substantially to 3 205 in January, with 1 584 Mozambicans intercepted while on their illegal way to South Africa. By far the bulk of these – 1539 – crossed the Mozambique/South Africa border in the Mpumalanga province with a further having their journey unceremoniously cut short after entering the KwaZulu-Natal province.

    • Zimbabwe ☛ Sudan hacker group cyber attacks Djibouti, Kenya and Uganda telecoms companies over politics

      Here is why it’s overwhelming, there are more than 45 armed conflicts in the Middle East and North Africa. Sub-Saharan Africa is the second worst affected region with over 35 armed conflicts.

      Today we talk about the conflict in Sudan and how a [cracker] group from the country has been on a rampage.

    • YLE ☛ Finland's Border Guard preparing for potential spring migrant influx | Yle News | Yle

      "In practice, preparation means refining tactics and approaches. We also go through how to act in different situations in advance if illegal border crossings occur."

    • India Times ☛ Former Chinese origin Apple employee sentenced to prison, here's why

      Zhang, faced allegations of unlawfully downloading internal company files related to Apple's car project. The files included a 25-page document containing engineering blueprints for an autonomous vehicle's circuit board, as well as reference manuals and PDFs outlining prototype details and requirements.

    • India Times ☛ tiktok bytedance: US lawmakers urge Commerce to put TikTok-parent ByteDance on export control list

      A group of 15 U.S. lawmakers on Thursday urged the Commerce Department to add TikTok's China-based parent company ByteDance to a government export control list to restrict its access to American software.

      The lawmakers, led by Republican Representative Dan Crenshaw and Democrat Josh Gottheimer, in a letter to Commerce Secretary Gina Raimondo urged that ByteDance be added to what is known as the "Entity List" in order "to address critical vulnerabilities created by the company's access to U.S. software."

    • Security Week ☛ Lawmakers Want Clampdown on American VCs Funding Chinese Tech Companies

      According to a report released Thursday by the House Select Committee on China, five prominent venture firms — GGV Capital, GSR Ventures, Qualcomm Ventures, Sequoia Capital and Walden International — poured investments into hundreds of Chinese companies that directly or indirectly support Beijing’s military and surveillance state.

    • Techdirt ☛ Federal Court Says Wichita PD’s ‘Gang List’ Is Possibly Unconstitutional

      Maintaining some sort of database of known criminals and their criminal associates is undoubtedly a smart thing to do. Cross-referencing detainees makes sense, especially when it comes to larger criminal organizations. Ensuring databases are up to date, both in terms of adding new associates as well as removing people who aren’t connected to criminal activity, is a must. Giving people a way to contest their inclusion in these databases would seem to be key, considering the nation’s largest gang databases (the “no-fly” list, terrorist watchlists) provide that option, even though it took quite a bit of litigation to make this happen.

    • AntiWar ☛ America’s Answer Is More Violence

      In an administration seemingly bankrupt of diplomacy or imagination, U.S. President Joe Biden and his team, led by Secretary of State Antony Blinken and National Security Advisor Jake Sullivan, have responded to the most hair trigger situations across the map in just the past few days with nothing but increased violence.

    • RFA ☛ N Korean leader shuns talks with South, threatens ‘annihilation’

      Kim Jong Un’s hostile remarks were made during a meeting with military chiefs.

    • Russia, Belarus, and War in Ukraine

      • France24 ☛ Putin says defeat in Ukraine 'impossible' in interview with US journalist Tucker Carlson

        President Vladimir Putin said in an interview released Thursday with controversial right-wing US journalist Tucker Carlson that the West should understand it is "impossible" to defeat Russia in Ukraine.

      • Hong Kong Free Press ☛ China’s Pooh-tin & Russia’s Putin accuse US of ‘interfering’ in their countries

        Chinese President Pooh-tin Jinping and his Russian counterpart Vladimir Putin accused the United States of “interfering” in their countries’ affairs during a telephone call on Thursday, the Kremlin said.

      • LRT ☛ Attacking Poland or Latvia ‘out of the question’, says Putin in scandalous interview

        In a controversial interview by US media personality Tucker Carlson, Russian President Vladimir Putin rejected talks that Moscow intends to attack Poland or other NATO countries.

      • RFERL ☛ German Chancellor Scholz Says Carlson Interview With Putin Tells 'Absurd Story' About Cause Of War

        German Chancellor Olaf Scholz has sharply criticized Russian President Vladimir Putin's interview with right-wing U.S. talk show host Tucker Carlson.

      • teleSUR ☛ Russia Sought Peaceful Solution to Problems in Ukraine: Putin

        In an interview with Tucker Carlson, the Russian leader also addressed issues related to the NATO expansion and the Nord Stream blast.

      • New Yorker ☛ Tucker Carlson Promised an Unedited Putin. The Result Was Boring

        In an interview that lasted more than two hours, the Russian President aired well-trod grievances and gave a lecture full of spurious history meant to justify his war in Ukraine.

      • CS Monitor ☛ Carlson’s interview with Putin yields propaganda, history lectures

        In a two-hour interview with Tucker Carlson, President Vladimir Putin offered Russian history lessons, Kremlin talking points on the war with Ukraine, and sent a message to Washington that a deal was the only way to end the war.

      • New York Times ☛ In Tucker Carlson Interview, Putin Suggests a Peace Deal

        The Russian leader clearly believes he can now negotiate from strength, but the message in the Tucker Carlson interview was muddled, critics say.

      • New York Times ☛ U.S. Rejects Putin’s Latest Call for Ukraine Negotiations

        Skepticism remains high about the Russian leader’s intentions after he told Tucker Carlson that the war in Ukraine could be settled with a peace deal.

      • Meduza ☛ Kremlin insiders explain key takeaways from Tucker Carlson’s interview with Putin — Meduza

      • Meduza ☛ Russian election authorities use candidate bios to visually accent Putin’s name on presidential ballot — Meduza

      • Meduza ☛ ‘What about NATO? Please say NATO’: The best memes from Vladimir Putin’s Tucker Carlson interview — Meduza

      • Latvia ☛ Few sanctions breach cases reach court in Latvia

        Although several hundred criminal cases for violation of sanctions have been initiated in Latvia since Russia's full-scale invasion of Ukraine, only a tiny fraction – 22 cases – have reached the court. Seven judgments have come into force and the penalties are gradually increasing, Latvian Radio reported on February 9.

      • NYPost ☛ Biden argues it’s ‘close to criminal neglect’ for Congress not to pass Ukraine aid bill

        Some Republicans on Capitol Hill, however, argue that the US can’t afford to keep funding Ukraine’s war effort, especially when the US is grappling with a border crisis of its own.

      • France24 ☛ Five challenges facing Ukraine's new army chief Oleksandr Syrsky

        Ukraine's new army head Oleksandr Syrsky, who was appointed in Kyiv's largest military shake-up since Russia invaded, is taking the helm at a precarious moment in the war.

      • JURIST ☛ Polish farmers launch 30-day nationwide protests in response to economic pressures

        Polish farmers launched on Friday a 30-day nationwide protest in response to economic pressure on the country’s agricultural sector from the EU. The protest includes the blocking of roads around the country as well as the blocking of border crossings with Ukraine. It also involves general strikes throughout the agricultural industry.

      • RFERL ☛ Biden Calls Holdup Of Ukraine Aid 'Close To Criminal Neglect' As He Meets With Germany's Scholz

        U.S. President Joe Biden said on February 9 that a Republican hold on sending new U.S. aid to Ukraine for its war with Russia was “close to criminal neglect.”

      • RFERL ☛ Ukraine Extends Pretrial Detention Of Ex-Lawmaker Held On Treason Charge

        A court in Kyiv on February 9 extended until at least April 8 the pretrial detention of former lawmaker Oleksandr Dubinskiy, who is being held on various charges, including high treason.

      • RFERL ☛ New Chief Appointed To Head Ukraine's General Staff In Reshuffle Of Military Leaders

        Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskiy appointed Major General Anatoliy Barhilevych as Ukraine's new chief of the General Staff on February 9, replacing Lieutenant General Serhiy Shaptala.

      • RFERL ☛ Finland Announces New Military Aid Package For Ukraine Worth $205 Million

        Finland will provide Ukraine with a new package of military aid worth 190 million euros ($205 million), the Nordic country's Defense Ministry announced on February 9.

      • RFERL ☛ Ex-Customs Officer In Siberia Gets 12 Years For Links With Russian Group Fighting For Ukraine

        A Siberian court sentenced former customs officer Vitaly Alekseyev to 12 years in prison on February 9 on a charge of collaborating with the Freedom of Russia legion, which consists of Russian citizens who fight alongside Ukrainian armed forces against Moscow's invasion.

      • RFERL ☛ Bipartisan Group Of U.S. Lawmakers Arrives In Kyiv

        U.S. Ambassador to Ukraine Bridget Brink said on February 9 that a bipartisan group of U.S. lawmakers led by the chairman of the House Intelligence Committee, Representative Mike Turner (Republican-Ohio), has arrived in Kyiv.

      • RFERL ☛ Ukraine's New Commander In Chief Says 'Change Of Warfare Methods' Necessary

        In his first remarks since being appointed head of Ukraine's armed forces, Colonel General Oleksandr Syrskiy, said the country must change and improve its methods of warfare if it is to thwart Russia's full-scale invasion.

      • RFERL ☛ Two Killed In Russian Shelling Of Kherson As Ukraine Repels Drone Attacks

        Two people were killed in Russian shelling of Ukraine's southern Kherson region early on February 9, regional Governor Oleksandr Prokudin wrote on Telegram.

      • The Straits Times ☛ Ukraine aid package inches forward in US Senate

        The U.S. Senate on Friday edged closer to passing a bill that includes $95.34 billion in aid for Ukraine, Israel and Taiwan, but faces an uncertain path to becoming law due to Republican opposition in both chambers of Congress.

      • YLE ☛ Finland sending 22nd military aid package to Ukraine

        Finland is exploring long-term ways of supporting Ukraine, according to Defence Minister Antti Häkkänen (NCP).

      • CS Monitor ☛ What Zelenskyy’s military revamp means for ‘winning’ in Ukraine

        The war in Ukraine is at a pivotal point, after a disappointing counteroffensive and a halt of U.S. aid. Ukraine’s task now is to demonstrate a clear war strategy and shore up Western support.

      • New York Times ☛ Senators Work Into Weekend on Ukraine and Israel Bill as G.O.P. Slows Progress

        The $95 billion package appeared on track for eventual passage, but Republicans who killed a bipartisan version were still trying to make changes.

      • New York Times ☛ Biden and Germany’s Scholz Meet at White House and Push for Ukraine Aid

        The message came as congressional lawmakers were working on a package with billions in assistance but an uncertain fate.

      • New York Times ☛ Ukraine’s New Military Chief Faces Same Problems as Zaluzhny

        As Gen. Oleksandr Syrsky assumes his role, he must reckon with a grim calculus: When does the cost of defending ground outweigh any benefit gained by inflicting pain on the enemy?

      • JURIST ☛ Russia bans opposition candidate Boris Nadezhdin from 2024 presidential ballot

        Russia’s Central Election Commission (CEC) banned opposition politician Boris Nadezhdin on Thursday from the upcoming presidential election ballot. The commission made its decision after invalidating more than 9,000 signatures of support, leaving Nadezhdin short of the 95,000 valid signatures required to be listed on the ballot under Russian law.

      • RFERL ☛ Russian Court Detains Woman For 'Rehabilitating Nazism' Over Video Mocking WWII Monument

        A Russian court in Volgograd has detained a 23-year-old woman on suspicion of "rehabilitating Nazism" after she posted a video of herself online mocking a monument to a significant Soviet victory in World War II.

      • Meduza ☛ Russia launches overnight drone attack on Ukrainian regions — Meduza

      • Meduza ☛ Ukraine’s National Security and Defense Council secretary says no Ukrainian POWs on board crashed Russian Il-76 plane — Meduza

      • RFERL ☛ Arrested Russian Activist Udaltsov Added To Russia's List Of Terrorists

        Russia's Federal Financial Monitoring Service (Rosfinmonitoring) on February 9 added jailed opposition activist Sergei Udaltsov to its list of terrorists, meaning that all of his assets in Russia will be frozen.

      • RFERL ☛ Noted Siberian Artist Vasily Slonov Detained On Extremism Charge

        Siberian artist Vasily Slonov, known for producing a series of puppets challenging Russia's Soviet past and current government, was detained on February 8 on a charge of demonstrating extremist symbols, his wife said, adding that police searched her husband's workshop and the couple's apartment.

      • Meduza ☛ Zelensky awards Hero of Ukraine title to former Commander-in-Chief Valerii Zaluzhyni and military intelligence head Kyrylo Budanov — Meduza

      • Meduza ☛ Oleksandr Syrskyi makes first public statement after replacing Valerii Zaluzhnyi as Ukraine’s chief commander — Meduza

      • Meduza ☛ Zelensky appoints Anatolii Barhylevych as new Chief of General Staff of Ukraine’s Armed Forces — Meduza

      • Deutsche Welle ☛ 2024-02-08 [Older] German aid: Volodymyr Zelenskyy's plan for Ukrainians

      • Deutsche Welle ☛ 2024-02-08 [Older] Ukraine: Top general Valerii Zaluzhnyi removed from post

      • CBC ☛ 2024-02-08 [Older] Zelenskyy appoints new Ukrainian army chief, displacing popular military leader

      • US News And World Report ☛ 2024-02-08 [Older] Baltic, Nordic Lawmakers Complain That US Lacks Urgency on Ukraine Aid

      • US News And World Report ☛ 2024-02-08 [Older] US Has Enough Funds for Now to Continue Training Ukrainian Pilots on F-16, National Guard Chief Says

      • US News And World Report ☛ 2024-02-08 [Older] US Will Work Effectively With New Ukraine Military Chief -Pentagon Official

      • US News And World Report ☛ 2024-02-07 [Older] The Senate Eyes New Plan on Ukraine, Israel Aid After Collapse of Border Package

      • US News And World Report ☛ 2024-02-07 [Older] Bipartisan Border, Ukraine Deal Looks Set to Fail in US Senate

      • US News And World Report ☛ 2024-02-07 [Older] 'No Plan B' to Getting Ukraine Aid Package Through US Congress: US Govt

      • US News And World Report ☛ 2024-02-07 [Older] Ukrainian Bill Intended to Draft More Soldiers Passes First Reading

      • CBC ☛ 2024-02-06 [Older] House of Commons passes new Ukraine free trade deal over Conservative opposition

      • Deutsche Welle ☛ 2024-02-06 [Older] Ukraine: Is Europe starting to change its strategy?

      • The Local SE ☛ 2024-02-06 [Older] Sweden to change law so Ukrainians can get personal numbers

      • Spiegel ☛ 2024-02-05 [Older] Ammunition Shortages: German Chancellor Pledges To Boost Production for Ukraine

      • US News And World Report ☛ 2024-02-05 [Older] Putin Will Visit Turkey Soon to Discuss New Black Sea Grain Export Ideas for Ukraine, Minister Says

      • US News And World Report ☛ 2024-02-05 [Older] Some Ukrainian Soldiers Express Unease Over Possible Dismissal of Army Chief

      • US News And World Report ☛ 2024-02-05 [Older] Zelenskyy Signals a Shakeup of Ukraine's Military Leadership Is Imminent at a Critical Point in War

      • US News And World Report ☛ 2024-02-05 [Older] Ukrainian Troops Near Bakhmut Expect to Fight Until War Ends

      • CBC ☛ 2024-02-03 [Older] A primer on the messy U.S. migration debate now spreading everywhere from Ukraine to Canada

      • Deutsche Welle ☛ 2024-02-03 [Older] Arming Ukraine: Could Germany step up if the US steps back?

      • Deutsche Welle ☛ 2024-02-03 [Older] Ukraine updates: Zelenskyy welcomes new air defense systems

      • US News And World Report ☛ 2024-02-03 [Older] The EU Is Providing Ukraine With $54 Billion. How Will the Money Be Spent?

      • US News And World Report ☛ 2024-02-03 [Older] House Republicans Announce Bill That Provides More Military Aid to Israel but Leaves Out Ukraine

      • US News And World Report ☛ 2024-02-03 [Older] Polish President Criticised for Doubting Ukraine Can Retake Crimea

      • Scheerpost ☛ 2024-02-02 [Older] ICJ Rules Against Ukraine on Terrorism, MH17

      • Deutsche Welle ☛ 2024-02-02 [Older] Ukraine Cabinet minister: €50 billion EU aid is 'vital'

      • Deutsche Welle ☛ 2024-02-01 [Older] EU overcomes Orban's veto on €50 billion Ukraine aid deal

      • Modern Diplomacy ☛ 2024-02-07 [Older] Asia’s commercial heft helps keep Russia’s war economy going

      • Deutsche Welle ☛ 2024-02-07 [Older] Ukraine updates: Russian attacks cause power cuts in Kyiv

      • Modern Diplomacy ☛ 2024-02-08 [Older] A reflection on William Burns’ remarks on Russia and China

      • Modern Diplomacy ☛ 2024-02-08 [Older] EU cautious on idea of using Russian frozen assets as collateral

      • HRW ☛ 2024-02-08 [Older] Ukraine: New Findings on Russia’s Devastation of Mariupol

      • US News And World Report ☛ 2024-02-08 [Older] Russia's Putin: We Have No Interest in Invading Poland or Latvia

      • CPJ ☛ 2024-02-06 [Older] Exiled Russian journalist Denis Kamalyagin charged with violating foreign agent law

      • US News And World Report ☛ 2024-02-07 [Older] Russia Says Former Fox News Host Tucker Carlson Has Interviewed Vladimir Putin

      • US News And World Report ☛ 2024-02-07 [Older] Analysis-Russia's GDP Boost From Military Spending Belies Wider Economic Woes

      • US News And World Report ☛ 2024-02-07 [Older] IAEA Chief Says Zaporizhzhia Nuclear Plant Has Enough Cooling Water - Russian Agencies

      • US News And World Report ☛ 2024-02-07 [Older] Kremlin Says Goals of Russia's 'Special Military Operation' in Ukraine Remain Unchanged

      • US News And World Report ☛ 2024-02-07 [Older] Munich Security Conference Did Not Invite Russian, Iran Officials This Year

      • US News And World Report ☛ 2024-02-07 [Older] Russia Says It Downs Seven Ukraine-Launched Rockets, Two Drones Over Belgorod Region

      • US News And World Report ☛ 2024-02-07 [Older] US Faces Heightened Risk From Russia, North Korea, Treasury Financing Report Finds

      • Engadget ☛ 2024-02-05 [Older] Yandex sells its Russian operations to local executives for $5.2 billion

      • US News And World Report ☛ 2024-02-05 [Older] The Owners of Russia's Tech Pioneer Yandex Are Selling — at a Big, Kremlin-Required Discount

      • US News And World Report ☛ 2024-02-05 [Older] Explainer-Why the $5.2 Billion Sale of Russia's Yandex Is Significant

      • HRW ☛ 2024-02-05 [Older] The Price of Defiance in Russia

      • Deutsche Welle ☛ 2024-02-06 [Older] Ukraine updates: Kyiv says Russian spy ring uncovered

      • US News And World Report ☛ 2024-02-06 [Older] US, Russia Clash at UN Over North Korea, Patriot Missiles in Ukraine

      • Gizmodo ☛ 2024-02-05 [Older] Russian Cosmonaut Sets New Time Travel Record After Spending 879 Days in Orbit

      • Jacobin Magazine ☛ 2024-02-05 [Older] No, We Don’t Need Conscript Armies

      • Deutsche Welle ☛ 2024-02-05 [Older] Ukraine updates: France to summon Russia's ambassador

      • US News And World Report ☛ 2024-02-05 [Older] Four Killed in Russian Shelling of Ukraine's Kherson -Officials

      • US News And World Report ☛ 2024-02-05 [Older] France's Foreign Ministry Has Summoned Russia's Ambassador Over French Aid Workers Killed in Ukraine

      • US News And World Report ☛ 2024-02-05 [Older] Georgia Says It Seized Russia-Bound Cargo of Explosives Sent From Ukraine

      • US News And World Report ☛ 2024-02-05 [Older] Interview With Putin? Tucker Carlson Says With a Smile: 'We'll See'

      • US News And World Report ☛ 2024-02-05 [Older] Kremlin Warns West Against Using Frozen Russian Assets as Collateral for Ukraine

      • US News And World Report ☛ 2024-02-05 [Older] Russia to Summon Israeli Ambassador Over 'Unacceptable' Comments – TASS

      • Deutsche Welle ☛ 2024-02-04 [Older] Russian cosmonaut breaks record on space deployment

      • Deutsche Welle ☛ 2024-02-04 [Older] Ukraine updates: Russia blames deadly shelling on Kyiv

      • US News And World Report ☛ 2024-02-04 [Older] At Least 28 People Died When Shelling Hit a Bakery in Russian-Occupied Ukraine

      • US News And World Report ☛ 2024-02-04 [Older] Russia Says Death Toll in Ukraine Shelling of Lysychansk Rises to 28

      • US News And World Report ☛ 2024-02-04 [Older] Russian Cosmonaut Sets Record for Most Time in Space - More Than 878 Days

      • US News And World Report ☛ 2024-02-04 [Older] A Russian Cosmonaut Sets a New Record for the Most Time in Space

      • Vox ☛ 2024-02-04 [Older] America is exporting more arms than ever. Here’s why.

      • Jacobin Magazine ☛ 2024-02-03 [Older] Two Years Into the Ukraine War, Europe Has No Strategy

      • Modern Diplomacy ☛ 2024-02-03 [Older] Bloomberg: Russia is wearing down Ukraine’s defenses while Zelenskiy fights with his top general

      • US News And World Report ☛ 2024-02-03 [Older] Fire Put Out at Russia's Volgograd Refinery After Drone Attack

      • US News And World Report ☛ 2024-02-03 [Older] Russia Says 15 Killed, 10 Injured in Ukraine Attack on Bakery in Occupied East

      • US News And World Report ☛ 2024-02-03 [Older] South Korea Summons Russian Envoy Over Criticism of President Yoon's Remarks -Foreign Ministry

      • US News And World Report ☛ 2024-02-03 [Older] Ukraine Hits Russia's Volgograd Oil Refinery in Latest Drone Attack Source

  • Transparency/Investigative Reporting

    • Reason ☛ Students Don't Have Right to Lie About Administrators

      But the story E.B. later told her parents was that the assistant principal had approached E.B.'s stall and looked into it while E.B. was urinating. Based on their daughter's report, E.B.'s parents complained to the school and then to the police. It quickly became clear, however, that E.B.'s story about Ms. Cironi was not true. Compounding matters, it later came out that E.B. had asked another student to lie for her, and that E.B.'s friends threatened that student to back up E.B.'s falsehood. A disciplinary hearing was held, and the school board decided to expel E.B. for 180 days.

    • Bruce Schneier ☛ No, Toothbrushes Were Not Used in a Massive DDoS Attack

      Near as I can tell, a German reporter talking to someone at Fortinet got it wrong, and then everyone else ran with it without reading the German text. It was a hypothetical, which Fortinet eventually confirmed.

    • The Dissenter ☛ Unauthorized Disclosure: Patrick Winn

  • Environment

    • Deutsche Welle ☛ Lobito corridor: Hoping to break China's grip on African ore

      "Today, we have only moved maybe 500 meters. We haven't even reached one kilometer," the 52-year-old complains. "So now that the day is almost finishing, we haven't even reached the border. We really need to go to the customs (office) today. But I don't know whether we will make it."

    • Energy/Transportation

      • Quartz ☛ Bitcoin price could hit $50,000 as ETF buyers join frenzy

        Back in January the US government said that exchange-traded funds, or ETFs, could start investing in bitcoin. Someone got so excited they hacked the US Securities and Exchange Commission’s website to break the news just a little bit earlier. Though a bunch of people — mainly the ever-woeful Grayscale trust — got out of their holdings after the rules of the market changed, a different bunch of people (or maybe even the same people seeking a better deal on fees) moved their money over to one of the nine other bitcoin ETFs that sprung up last month.

      • Mother Jones ☛ Bitcoin Miners Are Sucking Up More than 2 Percent of the Nation’s Electricity

        The Biden administration is now requiring some cryptocurrency producers to report their energy use following rising concerns that the growing industry could pose a threat to the nation’s electricity grids and exacerbate climate change.

      • Prof. Werner Antweiler ☛ The social cost of bitcoin mining in BC

        Estimates for the worldwide use of electricity for bitcoin mining range between 100 and 200 Terawatthours [TWh]. That is roughly the amount of electricity consumed by entire countries, with Belgium at the lower end and Egypt at the upper end. Some estimates are even higher, suggesting that worldwide bitcoin mining could consume as much electricity as Australia. In 2021, The New York Times provided an analysis that explains why bitcoin mining uses more electricity than many countries. Reliable estimates such as the Cambridge Bitcoin Electricity Consumption Index point to about 170 TWh/year annual electricity use. All that electricity use comes with a hefty environmental footprint because generating electricity uses fossil fuels in many of the places where bitcoins are mined. Estimates (also from the CBECI) suggest annual emissions of about 86 million tonnes of carbon dioxide (MtCO2e), assuming an average mix of electricity generation worldwide. In the worst case, if bitcoin mining relies much more on coal power at the margin, this total could double.

      • US EIA ☛ Tracking electricity consumption from U.S. cryptocurrency mining operations

        Although cryptocurrency mining began in the United States about a decade ago, the activity began to expand rapidly in 2019. Recent growth is largely due to cryptocurrency mining operations relocating to the United States from China after that country cracked down on digital currency mining in 2021, though reports indicate that there may still be some mining in China.3 As cryptocurrency mining has increased in the United States, concerns have grown about the energy-intensive nature of the business and its effects on the U.S. electric power industry. Concerns expressed to EIA include strains to the electricity grid during periods of peak demand, the potential for higher electricity prices, as well as effects on energy-related carbon dioxide (CO2) emissions.

      • DeSmog ☛ Pro-Coal MP Appointed to Lead Influential Cross-Party Environment Group

        A Tory MP who backed the UK’s first new coal mine in over 30 years has been elected to chair the all-party parliamentary group (APPG) on environment.

        Desk-banging and jeering were heard in the House of Commons committee room on Wednesday night as lawmakers voted in Trudy Harrison, who represents Copeland in West Cumbria – where the proposed mine in Whitehaven is located. 

      • Science Alert ☛ Nuclear Fusion World Record Smashed in Major Achievement

        A giant legacy.

    • Wildlife/Nature

      • Science Alert ☛ The Genetic Secret of Giant Ocean Creatures Is Finally Revealed

        "Humans also have these genes."

    • Overpopulation

      • El País ☛ Saudi Arabia recruits one of the world’s most cited scientists, Spain’s Fernando Maestre

        This activity is the main means of subsistence in Mano Perdida, a small piece of land with just over 200 inhabitants, where property is mostly communal and which is accessed by an asphalt road connected to the highway that winds along the river Papaloapan (“river of butterflies” in Nahuatl). The quality of the water that flows through the ecosystems is being affected by the pollution caused by sugar cane plantations around the communities, a million-dollar business that devours more of the natural landscape every day.

  • Finance

    • RFA ☛ State sector employees tighten belts ahead of Lunar New Year

      Employees take to social control media to complain of unpaid wages, year-end bonuses.

    • FAIR ☛ Rakeen Mabud on Greedflation

    • Gabriel ☛ All the good content.

      At the beginning of the year, I did an unsubscribe spree from many services and subscriptions and only kept a few. This does not include app-related subs, but more like Patreon content, websites, and podcasts, although, app subs also were cut.

    • Federal News Network ☛ Oregon senator urges Biden to fire Social Security IG

      Senate Finance Committee Chairman Ron Wyden (D-Ore.) said he’s “lost confidence” in Social Security IG Gail Ennis, and is calling on the president to fire her.

  • AstroTurf/Lobbying/Politics

    • Simon Willison ☛ Figure out who's leaving the company: dump, diff, repeat

      Rachel Kroll describes a neat hack for companies with an internal LDAP server or similar machine-readable employee directory: run a cron somewhere internal that grabs the latest version and diffs it against the previous to figure out who has joined or left the company.

    • Vice Media Group ☛ AI Deepfakes Are Everywhere and Congress is Completely Out of Their Depth

      An AI-generated Biden called voters in New Hampshire ahead of the primary and told them to stay home. X locked down the search term “Taylor Swift” after AI-generated nudes of the pop giant flooded the platform. In the wake of both scandals, Congress has struggled with how to fight back against the flood of fake bullshit. Keeping the world from drowning in fakes affects all of us, but some of the cures sound worse than the sickness.

    • India Times ☛ Taylor Swift wows Chinese women tired of Xi Jinping’s conservative era

      The values celebrated in the show stand in stark contrast to President Xi Jinping’s increasingly conservative vision for women, providing a rare outlet for young women rejecting ever-tighter social controls and the Communist Party’s rigid expectations.

    • Atlantic Council ☛ China’s stock market collapse is the end of the road for many foreign investors

      The market downturn comes on top of the real estate debacle that caused developers to default on bonds and saddled China’s local governments with $13 trillion of debts. The stock downturn has specifically shaken technology companies that Beijing regulators had favored with fast-track access to initial public offerings of shares. While China led the world in IPOs during the first eight months of 2023, those issues subsequently dried up, and many startups are starving for cash.

    • India Times ☛ Google: Google rebrands its AI services as Gemini, launches new app and subscription service

      With the advent of the Gemini app, named after an AI project unveiled late last year, Google will cast aside the Bard chatbot that it introduced a year ago in an effort to catch up with ChatGPT, the chatbot unleashed by the Microsoft-backed startup OpenAI in late 2022. Google is immediately releasing a standalone Gemini app for smartphones running on its Android software.

    • R J Faas ☛ Sometimes compliance is just compliance – and sometimes compliance breaks things

      The DMA requires Apple to allow users to choose something other than Safari as their default browser and allows those browsers to use engines other than Apple’s webkit. Webkit is the basis of how Apple has implemented PWAs in iOS. The company can’t know how they will function with another company’s browser engine. The law also prevents Apple from giving Safari any advantages over those other browsers and engines. The PWA functionality based on webkit would constitute an advantage. Apple therefore needs to remove that advantage to ensure a level playing field as required.

    • Digital Music News ☛ Spotify CEO Daniel Ek Sells $58M in Shares As SPOT Surges

      Running with that pertinent point, filings show that different Spotify executives yet – longtime HR head Katarina Berg (32,609 shares sold for about $7.74 million), board member Heidi O’Neill (2,325 shares sold for roughly $553,861), and CTO Gustav Söderström (40,000 shares sold for $9.57 million or so) – have likewise joined Daniel Ek in selling shares.

    • FAIR ☛ In the Wake of Santos’ Lies, Media Double Check Records of Potential Replacements

      Following the scandal involving serial liar George Santos, there is a welcome push by some major media to conduct intensive research on claims being made by the two candidates running to replace him.

    • The Nation ☛ The Race to Take Over George Santos’s Seat Heats Up

      Is New York’s Third Congressional District suddenly cursed with obscurely unlikely candidates? It 2022, it elected human GOP punch line George Santos, who was eventually expelled by his peers for falsifying everything imaginable, from his religion to his mother’s time and place of death, and, maybe more significant, identity theft, misuse of campaign funds, and more. The race to replace him in a special election features a Republican candidate who is actually a registered Democrat, and who is less known to this Queens and Nassau County district than Santos when he was chosen.

    • Insight Hungary ☛ Orban proposes constitutional amendment after presidential pardon controversy

      "There's no pardon for pedophile offenders. This is my personal belief, "Hungarian Prime Minister Viktor Orbán said in a video shared on his Facebook page. Orbán emphasized the need for decisive action, asserting there should be no room for legal ambiguity. "A clear and unambiguous decision is necessary to rectify the situation," he said in the video.

      The unusual statement comes after pressure is intensifying on Hungary's head of state, Katalin Novák, to step down following revelations that she granted a presidential pardon to an individual convicted as an accomplice in a child sexual abuse case.

      Excellent discussion today with the American ambassador to Hungary, @USAmbHungary, who enjoys bipartisan support for his excellent work advancing American interests and values. pic.twitter.com/YTMLDYM792

    • Deutsche Welle ☛ 2024-02-08 [Older] Boris Nadezhdin: Russia bans antiwar candidate from election

    • US News And World Report ☛ 2024-02-05 [Older] Putin's Anti-War Challenger Faces Likely Exclusion From Election

    • Deutsche Welle ☛ 2024-02-03 [Older] Russia: Police detain journalists at Moscow anti-war protest

    • US News And World Report ☛ 2024-02-03 [Older] Journalists Briefly Detained in Moscow at Protest by Soldiers' Wives

    • Democracy Now ☛ “Political Crisis Will Continue”: Close Contest in Pakistan Amid Election Crackdown

      Initial election results in Pakistan show a lead for candidates affiliated with imprisoned former Prime Minister Imran Khan. Khan’s political party was blocked from running for office, and supporters have accused Pakistan’s military-backed interim government of trying to rig the election by shutting down cellphone and internet services just as voting began and by delaying election results. “It’s up in the air exactly how many seats each party has got,” says journalist Munizae Jahangir, who reports from Karachi that “there is no clarity” on who won, despite substantial voter turnout. “Irrespective of the results, the political crisis that we’re seeing in Pakistan is going to continue,” says Pakistani political activist Alia Amirali, who describes the long history of military interference with democratic processes in the country. “It’s not that people’s votes don’t matter; it’s just that the military will certainly manipulate the results.”

    • Democracy Now ☛ Liberals Feckless, Conservatives Reckless: Elie Mystal on SCOTUS Trump Ballot Ban Case

      The U.S. Supreme Court heard oral arguments in a historic case Thursday to determine if Republican presidential front-runner Donald Trump is eligible to remain on the ballot for the 2024 election. The justices are reviewing a decision by Colorado’s high court that found Section 3 of the 14th Amendment of the U.S. Constitution makes Trump ineligible to run for office because he engaged in an insurrection on January 6, 2021. The Nation's justice correspondent Elie Mystal responds to the first day of proceedings, saying he was disappointed to hear both liberal and conservative justices casting doubt on the Constitution's application in this case to avoid the political ramifications of keeping Trump from office. “They decided to lock hands and ignore that because it would be too messy for the country to apply the law to Donald Trump,” says Mystal, who also explains Trump’s far-fetched plan to claim immunity from prosecution until after the presidential election, the scandal surrounding Fulton County District Attorney Fani Willis during Trump’s prosecution in Georgia, and writer E. Jean Carroll’s successful defamation suit against the former president.

    • Free Youngsters from Their Screens

      Dr. Claire Nader directly addresses these youngsters with over 50 topics relevant to their life and preparation for young adulthood. Law Professor Robert Fellmeth, a leading children’s advocate, highlights her book in the following guest column, taken from the Public Citizen newspaper.

      [...]

      Their brains will not fully mature organically until around the age of 25. Until then, they may be exploited or damaged by those with a commercial interest focus (and it’s not as if adults are immune to commercial manipulation)

    • Misinformation/Disinformation/Propaganda

      • Gizmodo ☛ 2024-02-05 [Older] TikTok Is Destroying Itself From the Inside Out

      • Engadget ☛ 2024-02-08 [Older] Meta and TikTok sue over paying the EU's fee for policing content

      • US News And World Report ☛ 2024-02-08 [Older] Ex-TikTok Executive Claims She Was Fired for Reporting Sex, Age Bias

      • The Age AU ☛ 2024-02-07 [Older] TikTok stunned by well-known road rule at popular holiday spot

      • The Age AU ☛ 2024-02-06 [Older] The biggest drama on TikTok right now is coming from an epic world cruise

      • Vox ☛ 2024-02-07 [Older] Tiktok is full of tryhard slang

      • DeSmog ☛ Fossil Fuel Advocates Spread Disinfo About Canada’s False Advertising Bill - DeSmog

        Taking inspiration from Canadian government bans on tobacco advertising that went into effect in the 1990s, New Democratic Party (NDP) MP Charlie Angus has proposed private members bill C-372, An Act respecting fossil fuel advertising.

      • Graham Cluley ☛ The toothbrush DDoS attack: How misinformation spreads in the cybersecurity world

        There’s an issue with Aargauer Zeitung‘s report. It didn’t actually happen.

        The story is fiction. Three million smart toothbrushes didn’t launch a DDoS attack against a Swiss company.

  • Censorship/Free Speech

    • FAIR ☛ At Northwestern U, Distributing a Parody Paper Gets You Threatened With Prison

      Students at Northwestern University in Evanston, Illinois, produced a parody edition of the school’s paper, the Daily Northwestern, to call out the school’s stance on Israel’s war on Gaza. Some folks wrapped the fake front pages around some 300 copies of the actual school paper.

    • Pro Publica ☛ AMLO Attacked Our Reporting. Here Are Some Facts.

      Almost every weekday at 7 a.m., Mexican President Andrés Manuel López Obrador holds a press conference known in Spanish as “la mañanera,” or, loosely translated, the morning show. He takes questions from reporters, but his purpose is to control the news, recounting his achievements and bashing his enemies, real and perceived — especially those in the media.

      Since last week, López Obrador has focused much of his ire on an article we published on Jan. 30 about allegations that drug traffickers contributed $2 million to his first, unsuccessful presidential campaign in 2006. He dismissed the story as “completely false” and “slander.”

    • CPJ ☛ 4 Nigerian journalists charged with cybercrime, defamation over fraud investigation - Committee to Protect Journalists

      Authorities in Nigeria should immediately drop all charges against journalists Adisa-Jaji Azeez, Salihu Ayatullahi, Salihu Shola Taofeek, and Abdulrahman Taye Damilola, and allow them to work without fear of arrest, the Committee to Protect Journalists said on Friday.

    • Meduza ☛ Kremlin de facto bans dozens of top singers from performing Russia’s secret music industry blacklist contains war opponents, ‘almost naked’ party attendees, and others

      In early February 2024, the Russian authorities sent the country’s music producers and promoters an updated list of artists who are “banned from concert activity” in Russia. Meduza has obtained a copy of the document from two sources in the music industry.

    • Meduza ☛ Russia creating blacklist of YouTube bloggers in hopes of forcing them to switch to Russian media platforms

      Russia’s Civic Chamber is creating a blacklist of Russian bloggers who release content on YouTube instead of on Russian social media networks, according to Alexander Malkevich, a member of the Civic Chamber’s Commission for the Development of Information Society, Media, and Mass Communications, reports TASS.

    • Alexandra Wolfe ☛ How sad is it that we’re all stuck …

      Sadly, for all of us, it feels like we can no longer have any meaningful discussions because there will always be—not just differing opinions, which we should expect—but out and out extremist who look for any opportunity to destroy common discourse with vitriol, lies, and worse, bullying.

    • Greg Morris ☛ Self Censoring

      Last month, I wrote a post that never got published. It was written out, formatted, edited and ready to go. As far as I could take it, but I hovered over the publish button and decided against it. There was nothing controversial there, but it criticised a poor take from someone who is well liked, and I couldn’t do doing with the hassle of replies.

    • Gabriel ☛ 🔗 On Self Censoring

      I struggle with self-censorship a lot, far too often in fact. There have been a few instances when I had spoken and/or written my mind, perhaps an opinion, or hot take as the kids call it, or just something that, to me, was either funny or just a random thought, and have been scolded in some capacity.

  • Freedom of Information / Freedom of the Press

    • The Gray Zone ☛ UK steps up war on whistleblower journalism with new National Security Act

    • New Yorker ☛ The Artist Holding Valuable Art Hostage to Protect Julian Assange

      The project is called “Dead Man’s Switch,” and the “dead man” in question is the Australian WikiLeaks founder, Julian Assange, who is currently jailed on remand in London’s high-security Belmarsh Prison. In 2010, WikiLeaks published a spate of leaks from the Army private Chelsea Manning about U.S. military activity in Iraq and Afghanistan. After Sweden issued a European arrest warrant for Assange in connection to sexual-assault allegations (a case that has since been dropped), Assange took refuge at the Ecuadorian Embassy in London in 2012, where he remained for seven years. A hacking charge against Assange was unsealed in April, 2019; one month later, the U.S. government added new charges, indicting him for violating the Espionage Act for his part in WikiLeaks’ disclosure of secret military and diplomatic documents. The indictment has raised concerns over its implications for First Amendment rights and journalists who report on national-security issues.

    • YLE ☛ Study: Yle Radio Suomi most-listened-to station

      Yle channels accounted for 51 percent of the time people in Finland spent listening to the radio last year, according to the National Radio Survey.

      The public broadcaster's listenership remained unchanged from 2022.

    • BIA Net ☛ Journalist Kibriye Evren detained in morning raid

      In an early morning raid, journalist Kibriye Evren was detained in her home, where a search was conducted, and her phone was confiscated.

    • Hong Kong Free Press ☛ Hong Kong paper Apple Daily played up Beijing Covid cover-up fears, court hears in Jimmy Lai’s national security trial

      Jimmy Lai, the founder of pro-democracy newspaper Apple Daily, thought the Chinese government had covered up the Covid-19 epidemic, a former publisher at the paper said as she continued testifying against her former employer in his national security trial.

  • Civil Rights/Policing

    • The Washington Post ☛ Police shootings database 2015-2024: Search by race, age, department

      As part of its investigation, The Post began in 2015 to log every person shot and killed by an on-duty police officer in the United States. Since then, reporters have recorded thousands of deaths. In 2022, The Post updated its database to standardize and publish the names of the police agencies involved in each shooting to better measure accountability at the department level.

    • RFA ☛ Tibetan tourists flock to Lhasa amid easing travel rules aimed at jolting economy

      Tibet’s regional capital of Lhasa is seeing a flurry of Tibetan visitors for Losar, the Tibetan New Year, thanks to a relaxation in travel restrictions announced by Beijing in an effort to revive the slumping economy, three sources from inside Tibet said.

    • Reason ☛ Iowa Cops Arrested Him for a Fictitious Traffic Violation Because He Flipped Them Off

      After the cops followed Fugenschuh for several blocks, he expressed his irritation at the unjustified attention by giving them the finger. Steinkamp and Minnehan did not like that, so they continued following Fugenschuh and pulled him over for an invented traffic violation. During the stop, the officers handcuffed Fugenschuh, roughed him up, searched his car, and arrested him for the alleged traffic infraction. They also charged him with marijuana possession after the car search turned up a bit of pot and a portable phone charger that they mistakenly thought was a digital scale.

    • JURIST ☛ India state passes uniform civil code amid criticism from Muslim community

      Muslim bodies across the country, including the All India Muslim Personal Law Board (AIMPLB) have voiced their concerns regarding the Uniform Civil Code as it does not align with the Quran on issues of polygamy and inheritance. The Quran permits polygamous marriage under certain conditions, if men are able to provide for their wives fully and treat all wives equally. The Quran also specifically regulates how much and to whom an estate is to be divided amongst for inheritance purposes.

    • Quartz ☛ TikTok exec sues, says ByteDance chair Lidong Zhang discriminated

      The complaint, which was filed Thursday in federal court in New York, claims that the executive, Katie Ellen Puris, was fired because ByteDance Chairman Lidong Zhang and other corporate executives determined she “lacked the docility and meekness specifically required of female employees.”

    • University of Michigan ☛ UMich RAs will vote to unionize

      Resident Advisors at the University of Michigan plan to unionize for higher pay stipends for Resstaff Coordinators, legal harassment protections and free laundry for all residents. According to a resolution approved by the U-M Board of Regents in June 2020, RAs will be recognized as a labor union if the majority of employees support unionizing. The RAs plan to vote to unionize by late February.

    • NDTV ☛ Ex TikTok Executive Claims She Was Fired For Reporting Sexual Harassment

      Katie Puris said in a complaint filed in Manhattan federal court that her 2022 firing was the culmination of a series of incidents where she reported bias and, in one case, sexual harassment to supervisors and human resources.

      Puris, who was nearing 50 when she was fired, claims she was subjected to derogatory comments about her age and that ByteDance chairman Zhang Lidong believed women "should remain quiet and humble at all times" and preferred "docility and meekness" in female employees.

    • The Nation ☛ It’s Known as “Death by Incarceration.” These People Want to End It.

      That sentence, which advocates call “death by incarceration,” means that, no matter how much time has passed or what a person does to transform their life, they have virtually no chance of leaving prison alive. Nearly 80 percent of those sentenced to life without parole in Pennsylvania were, like Lee, under 30 when they were sent to prison—53 percent were between ages 18 and 25

  • Internet Policy/Net Neutrality

    • The Register UK ☛ 250 million-plus reserved IPv4 addresses could be released

      The unused addresses are known as the “240/4” block and comprise most of the IPv4 addresses from 240.0.0.0 to 255.255.255.254 – a space that encompasses upwards of 268 million addresses, or about six percent of the entire IPv4 number space. For some perspective on the magnitude, at market rates, the addresses are worth around $7 billion

  • Digital Restrictions (DRM)

    • Cory Dransfeldt ☛ Renting your music means accepting that it will disappear

      When I was using Apple Music I had a smart playlist that would surface music that was no longer available on the service and having to do that sums up one of the many problems with music streaming services. It's not really your collection — you're renting it and your collection only exists on that service. If it disappears, your collection disappears.

      I have a similar fear about albums I've purchased on Bandcamp disappearing after the company was sold (yet again). I've developed the habit of downloading my purchases there as 320kbps mp3s and FLAC files for archiving. That archive lives on a hard drive velcroed to the back of my monitor and gets mirrored to a remote backup. I worry about that drive failing, but I'll have the backup.

    • Digital Music News ☛ Spotify Music Industry Payments Topped $9 Billion During 2023

      Also as highlighted, 2023 delivered a record $9 billion in industry payments from Spotify – a figure that has by the service’s calculation “nearly tripled over the past six years.” (Bearing in mind the points, Spotify has for some time been working to expand its revenue base through non-music offerings, among them two-sided marketplace initiatives, audiobooks, podcasts, and more.)

  Monopolies/Monopsonies

  • Patents

    • Dennis Crouch/Patently-O ☛ Broad Bayh-Dole March-In Licensing Rights Affirmed in Alzheimer’s Mouse Patent Dispute

      The Federal Circuit recently upheld the US government’s royalty-free license rights over an Alzheimer’s disease research patent monopoly under the Bayh-Dole Act. University of South Florida Board of Trustees v. United States, 22-2248 (Fed. Cir. February 9, 2024). The decision confirms the broad scope of the government’s licensing rights under the Act — namely that it can include work that predates the funding agreement. It also comes at a salient time, as the Biden Administration weighs the idea of more aggressively exercising “march-in rights” under the Act to promote affordability of taxpayer-funded inventions. Read the Decision.

      The dispute centered on U.S. Patent No. 5,898,094, which covers transgenic mice expressing mutated genes linked to Alzheimer’s. Scientists at the University of South Florida (USF) and Mayo Clinic developed the mice with partial funding from a National Institutes of Health grant. USF sued the government for infringement after a government contractor used the patented mice without authorization.

  • Copyrights

    • The Kent Stater ☛ 2024-02-05 [Older] OPINION: TikTok vs. music giant: What the future holds

    • Digital Music News ☛ Mdundo MAUs Topped 30 Million in 2023, Earnings Report Shows

      Mdundo just recently shed light upon its performance specifics for July through December of 2023, when revenue, notwithstanding the mentioned 30.8 million MAUs (up 16 percent from June 30th), is said to have declined by double digits from the same stretch in 2022. Underscoring the historical difficulties associated with monetizing streaming in emerging markets, the dip was followed by lowered guidance for the entirety of the company’s fiscal year.

    • Creative Commons ☛ What does the CC Community Think about Regulating Generative AI?

      In the past year, Creative Commons, alongside other members of the Movement for a Better Internet, hosted workshops and sessions at community conferences like MozFest, RightsCon, and Wikimania, to hear from attendees regarding their views on artificial intelligence (AI).

    • Torrent Freak ☛ City Council Unwittingly Approves Pirate IPTV Scheme and Documents Everything

      Mapleton, Utah, is one of the most idyllic cities imaginable. Its crime rate is 80% below average, and its council operates with complete transparency. Public meetings are streamed live on YouTube, and details of every meeting appear on the city's website. That's also how we know that the council inexplicably approved a pirate IPTV scheme for residents and local businesses, that would unwittingly render itself an illegal subscription reseller set to profit from them all.

    • Torrent Freak ☛ Appeals Court Hears RIAA and Yout in 'High Stakes' Stream-ripper Case

      Do online services that allow users to download content from YouTube break the law? This question is at the center of a legal battle between Yout.com and the RIAA. Last year, the district court dismissed the case in favor of the music group, before getting properly started. The dispute is now at the Court of Appeals where YouTube's absence in this "big stakes" matter was repeatedly mentioned.