Leftovers

• El País ☛ A day on the world’s biggest small stage: How a Tiny Desk concert is recorded

  The world’s largest tiny stage is housed inside a glass building in a gentrifying Washington neighborhood. It is set up three or four times a week around noon, behind what was once host Bob Boilen’s desk in the newsroom of the American public radio station NPR. Boilen, who retired in October, came up with the idea for the Tiny Desk Concerts series after the frustrating experience of attending a concert interrupted by other people’s conversations. The intimate, improvised format has become a true global sensation, a date with live music that is watched by up to 120 million people. The videos are first broadcast on the station’s website and, within a few days, posted on YouTube, where they receive some 45 million views a month.

• Seth Michael Larson ☛ 2024 Minnesota State Fair foods

  If you didn't know, I'm from Minnesota. Minnesotans love their State Fair, and I'm not an exception! My wife and I were lucky enough to go to a State Fair preview for LuLu's Public House for fried ranch dressing among a handful of new drinks. I shared my thoughts on Mastodon and a few folks seemed interested in hearing more: so here's more!

• Science

  • Vox ☛ Scientific fraud solutions: Should research misconduct be illegal?

    The problem? Poldermans’s data was reportedly fake. A 2012 inquiry by Erasmus Medical School, his employer, into allegations of misconduct found that he “used patient data without written permission, used fictitious data and… submitted to conferences [reports] which included knowingly unreliable data.” Poldermans admitted the allegations and apologized, while stressing that the use of fictitious data was accidental.

• Education

  • Brandon ☛ the work of our hands

    I know the feeling of frustration, skepticism and cynicism from those experiences well; lately I find myself pondering something similar but from a bit of a different perspective: what happens when you leave one position to discover that all of that work and energy you put into it (which includes a lot of blood, sweat and tears) was tossed aside?

  • Harvard University ☛ Your kid can’t name three branches of government? He’s not alone.

    American students’ scores in U.S history and civics keep plummeting, according to the latest Nation’s Report Card, a situation that mirrors the declining levels of civic engagement in the nation. A 2019 survey found that only 40 percent of American adults could name the three branches of U.S. government and that 22 percent couldn’t identify a single branch.

• Health/Nutrition/Agriculture

  • “Integrative oncology” continues to integrate quackery into oncology

    As a breast cancer surgeon, I’ve long been alarmed at the infiltration of non-evidence-based treatments that have steadily been infiltrating the specialty of oncology under the guise of “integrative oncology.” Indeed, I just realized that it’s been a full decade since I managed to publish a rather long opinion piece in Nature Reviews Cancer, in which I questioned whether integrative oncology is truly, as its proponents advertise, “the best of both worlds.” (Even if they haven’t actually read the article, regular readers will readily guess what my answer to that question was. Hint: Think Betteridge’s law of headlines.) It’s also been a decade since the primary “professional” organization representing “integrative oncology,” The Society for Integrative Oncology (SIO) published a monograph that supposedly presented “evidence-based” guidelines for the specialty. (Hint: They weren’t evidence-based.) Meanwhile, here at SBM I’ve written a number of posts discussing how, unlike the vision of its proponents of combining the “best of both worlds” (science-based medicine and “holistic”/alternative medicine) for the betterment of patient care, in reality what integrative oncology does, just as the more general “specialty” of “integrative medicine” under which it falls does, is to combine unproven and disproven treatments that include even outright quackery and mysticism with conventional, boring science-based oncology while simultaneously “rebranding” accepted evidence-based interventions involving diet and lifestyle as somehow being “alternative” or “integrative,” rather than just medicine.

  • Pete Brown ☛ Stuff I should be upset about versus stuff I want to be upset about

    I could imagine some argument that the sound of speakerphone is somehow so different from the background chatter of a modestly busy bar that it is inherently disruptive but that feels like a post-hoc justification for something I want to be upset about.

  • NL Times ☛ Court convicts man for failing to help drowning friend, shooting video instead

    A judge in the District Court in Den Bosch convicted Alex S., a man with an intellectual disability, for failing to help his friend who drowned. S. was accused of shooting video when the Den Bosch man went into the water, and continuing to shoot video without interruption for about ten minutes when his friend failed to take a breath.

  • Tom's Hardware ☛ Self-learning AI algorithms improve 3D printing speed and efficiency — biomedical model printing boosted by Washington State University team

    By balancing all three, the team could 3D print organs that closely resemble the look and feel of an actual human organ without taking too long to produce. Aside from ensuring that the parts of the organ, like veins and arteries, are accurately represented, the correct density also ensures that the 3D-printed organ feels as close as possible to the actual tissue.

• Proprietary/Artificial Intelligence (AI)

  • Nick Heer ☛ Image Fakery in the A.I. Era – Pixel Envy

    Last year’s features mostly allowed users to reposition and remove objects from their shots. This still seems fine, but one aspect of my description has not aged well. I wrote, in the context of removing a trampoline from a photo of a slam dunk, that Google’s tools make it “a little bit easier […] to lie”. For object removal, that remains true; for object addition — which is what Google’s Reimagine feature allows — it is much easier.

  • Drew Breunig ☛ The Right to Confront Your AI Accuser

    If you’re on trial and evidence against you has been assembled or generated by AI, how can the providence of that evidence ever be proven?

    One of the big, latent AI legal triggers I’ve been waiting for is for a defendant to request details on how AI-generated evidence (facial recognition systems, shot-detector systems, LLM-generated data, etc) was created. Because if the court supports the request, there’s no way to deliver the goods.

  • New York Times ☛ When A.I.’s Output Is a Threat to A.I. Itself

    As A.I.-generated data becomes harder to detect, it’s increasingly likely to be ingested by future A.I., leading to worse results.

  • France ☛ Press Release: Tribunal Judiciaire De Paris, The Prosecutor of the Republic, Paris, the 26th of August 2024 [PDF]

    Pavel DUROV, founder and CEO of instant messaging and platform TELEGRAM, was arrested at Le Bourget airport in the outskirts of Paris on Saturday, the 24th of August 2024, then taken into police custody at 8 p.m.

    This measure comes in the context of a judicial investigation opened the 8th of July 2024, following a preliminary inquiry initiated by Section J3 - JUNALCO (Fight against Cybercrime) of the Paris Public Prosecutor’s Office.

  • Vox ☛ What to know about Telegram CEO Pavel Durov’s suprise detention in France

    It is unclear what Durov’s relationship, if any, is to the “person unnamed.” Unless formally charged, Durov can only be held until Wednesday.

  • India Times ☛ Pavel Durov: France's Macron says no political motive behind Telegram CEO's arrest

    A police spokesman told Reuters that Durov is under investigation by the national cyber crime and fraud offices for failing to cooperate over cyber and financial crimes on Telegram, a messaging app and social media. He is still in custody, the spokesman said.

  • Deccan Chronicle ☛ Telegram Being Probed by Indian Govt, Ban Threat Looms: Report

    According to the report, the Indian Cybercrime Coordination Centre (I4C) under the Ministry of Home Affairs and Ministry of Electronics and Information is conducting the investigation.

    This comes after the arrest of Telegram founder and CEO Pavel Durov in Paris on August 24 over the messaging app’s moderation policies. It is alleged that Telegram was used for money laundering and Drug trafficking, reported news agency PTI.

  • New York Times ☛ Arrest of Pavel Durov, Telegram Founder, Is Part of Broad Investigation in France

    The investigation is being handled by cybercrime and anti-fraud specialists, Ms. Beccuau said. “It is within this procedural framework that Pavel Durov was questioned by the investigators,” she said.

    It was unclear whether any of the charges listed by Ms. Beccuau would be held against Mr. Durov.

  • VOA News ☛ What is Telegram, why was its CEO arrested in Paris?

    Telegram offers encryption for their communications, but — contrary to a popular misconception — this feature is not on by default. Users have to switch on the option to encrypt their chats. It also doesn't work with group chats. That contrasts with rival Signal and Facebook Messenger, where chats are encrypted end-to-end by default.

    Telegram says it has more than 950 million active users. It is widely used in France as a messaging tool, including by some officials in the presidential palace and in the ministry behind the investigation into Durov. But French investigators have also found the app has been used by Islamic extremists and drug traffickers.

  • VOA News ☛ France's Macron: Arrest of head of Telegram messaging app wasn't political

    In a statement posted on its platform after his arrest, Telegram said it abides by EU laws, and its moderation is "within industry standards and constantly improving."

    "It is absurd to claim that a platform or its owner are responsible for abuse of that platform," Telegram's post said. "Almost a billion users globally use Telegram as means of communication and as a source of vital information. We're awaiting a prompt resolution of this situation. Telegram is with you all."

  • Wired ☛ Telegram CEO Pavel Durov’s Arrest Linked to Sweeping Criminal Investigation

    Telegram did not respond to multiple requests for comment about the investigation but asserted in a statement posted to the company's news channel on Sunday that Durov has “nothing to hide.”

    “Given the existence of several preliminary investigations in France concerning Telegram in relation to the protection of minors' rights and in cooperation with other French investigation units—for instance, on cyber harassment—the arrest of Durov, does not seem to me like a highly exceptional move,” says Cannelle Lavite, a French lawyer who specializes in free-speech matters.

  • RFERL ☛ Explainer: The Dark Side Of Telegram

    The spotlight has fallen on Telegram after the arrest in Paris on August 24 of Pavel Durov, its co-founder. According to French media reports, this was done at the request of a special unit within France's Interior Ministry in charge of investigating crimes against minors.

    Durov has not been formally charged. A statement by the Paris prosecutor's office was due later on August 26.

  • The Guardian UK ☛ Telegram founder arrest part of cybercrime inquiry, say prosecutors

    On Sunday the investigating magistrate extended Durov’s detention from 24 to up to 96 hours. By that deadline, the magistrate must either charge him with a crime and continue his detention or set him free.

  • Meduza ☛ The Kremlin is struggling to decide how best to spin Telegram founder Pavel Durov’s arrest, but it’s sure of one thing — Europe is to blame

    Telegram founder Pavel Durov was arrested on August 24 after his plane landed in Paris. According to French media reports, Durov likely faces charges for a range of offenses related to his failure to moderate illegal activities on the platform, although so far, French prosecutors have only stated that he is being questioned. While many Russian politicians and elites were swift to denounce Durov’s arrest, the reasons they gave were notably inconsistent. Meduza special correspondent Andrey Pertsev spoke with Kremlin insiders, officials, and a state-media employee to find out how the Kremlin might spin Durov’s arrest and why it’s taking so long to establish a consistent narrative.

  • Deutsche Welle ☛ Who is Telegram's billionaire founder Pavel Durov?

    The unexpected arrest of Pavel Durov in France has sent out shockwaves through his digital empire, the Telegram messaging app, which boasts over 900 million active users.

    The Russian-born billionaire created the app together with his older brother, gifted mathematician and programmer Nikolai Durov.

  • India Times ☛ Telegram may be banned in India if 'these charges come true'

    According to the report, "The government is investigating Telegram over its alleged misuse in criminal activities such as extortion and gambling, a government official said, adding the messaging app could even be banned depending on the probe’s findings."

  • RTL ☛ Controversial messaging platform: Telegram: The global rise of libertarian chat app

    Durov, who has a net worth of $15.5 billion according to Forbes, told the Financial Times in March he planned to improve the moderation mechanisms.

  • Wired ☛ Pavel Durov’s Arrest Leaves Telegram Hanging in the Balance

    Durov is reportedly in the crosshairs of French authorities due to both a lack of moderation on Telegram and a lack of cooperation with police requests. Reuters reported that a cybersecurity gendarmerie unit and France's national antifraud police unit were leading the investigation. The investigative judge is also specialized in organized crime.

  • The Washington Post ☛ Who is Telegram CEO Pavel Durov, detained in France?

    But some experts point to misunderstandings over Telegram’s encryption services. “Telegram is often seen as an ‘encrypted messenger,’ but for many users, it functions a lot more like an unencrypted social network,” John Scott-Railton, a senior researcher at Citizen Lab at the University of Toronto, wrote on X. Most features on Telegram, including chats and groups, are not end-to-end-encrypted, he said, until users opt for the encryption.

  • NPR ☛ Telegram CEO Pavel Durov arrested in France, reports say

    "Telegram's CEO Pavel Durov has nothing to hide and travels frequently in Europe," Telegram said in a statement on Sunday. "It is absurd to claim that a platform or its owner are responsible for abuse of that platform."

    The company also said it abides by European Union laws and that its "moderation is within industry standards and constantly improving."

  • Danny O'Brien ☛ Pavel Durov and the BlackBerry Ratchet

    Importantly, though, a lot of this encrypted security was optional, and protected these comms at the organizational, not individual, level. Companies could turn message privacy on and off. Even when turned on, the company itself could decrypt all the messages sent over their network if they needed to. Useful if you’re a heavily-regulated industry, or in the government or military.

• Security

  • Privacy/Surveillance

    • Texas State Police Gear Up for Massive Expansion of Surveillance Tech

      DPS plans to spend millions in taxpayer dollars on a controversial software, used first as part of Governor Abbott’s border crackdown, to “disrupt potential domestic terrorism.”

    • New York Times ☛ Uber Fined $324 Million by Dutch Watchdog Over Driver Data Protection

      The authorities in the Netherlands said the ride-hailing company had violated European data protection laws when it sent sensitive information to the United States.

    • Tech Central (South Africa) ☛ Uber hit by R5.8-billion fine

      The Dutch Data Protection Authority said Uber was collecting information of drivers from Europe, such as taxi licenses, location data, and in some cases criminal and medical data, and retaining them on servers in the US.

      The fine is the highest penalty ever issued by the Dutch watchdog against any company, a spokesman said by e-mail. It’s also the biggest fine Uber received globally.

    • Techdirt ☛ Whoops: FlightAware Exposes Sensitive Personal Data Of Millions Of Users, Pilots, And Plane Owners

      Popular flight tracking app FlightAware says that they accidentally leaked the personal data of its 10,000 aircraft operators and 12 million users. According to an announcement by the company sent to users, “a configuration error” resulted in the company exposing user usernames, passwords, email addresses, names, billing addresses, telephone numbers, birth dates, aircraft ownership records, user data, and more.

  • Confidentiality

    • The Register UK ☛ Watchdog warns FBI is very sloppy on safe data storage

      The FBI has made serious slip-ups in how it processes and destroys electronic storage media seized as part of investigations, according to an audit by the Department of Justice Office of the Inspector General.

      Drives containing national security data, Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act information and documents classified as Secret were routinely unlabeled, opening the potential for it to be either lost or stolen, the report [PDF] addressed to FBI Director Christopher Wray states.

• Defence/Aggression

  • Marcy Wheeler ☛ The Proud Boys' Reliance on Telegram Didn't Save Them, But It Thwarted Preventing the Attack

    Because of the way Telegram persists on individual phones, it didn’t work. Two years later, that text was introduced as evidence against the Proud Boys to show that already on January 4, they knew they had something to hide.

  • Task And Purpose ☛ Hawaii soldier earns rare triple tab: Ranger, Sapper, Jungle

    1st Lt. Mackenzie Corcoran completed the triple-training journey when she graduated from Ranger School at Fort Moore. She is the 135th woman to graduate from Ranger School since 2015, and just became the 8th woman to also finish Sapper school.

  • JURIST ☛ Germany prosecutor issues arrest warrant in knife attack being treated as terrorism

    Issa Al H. will face charges as a suspected member of a foreign terrorist organization under sections 129a and 129b of the German Criminal Code. He is also accused of three counts of murder, attempted murder, and dangerous bodily harm in eight other cases under sections 211, 223, 224, 22, and 23 of the Criminal Code.

  • The Atlantic ☛ The conservatives who sold their souls for Trump

    Many journalists are reluctant to report on Trump’s obvious instability and disordered personality—the “bias toward coherence” that The Atlantic’s editor in chief, Jeffrey Goldberg, has cautioned about. But Lowry’s article was different. I cannot know the actual thinking at the Times, although I suspect the paper accepted the article to offer a pro-Trump contributor as a way of displaying a diversity of views. The plunge that Lowry and others have taken into the muck of Trumpism, however, is not new, and has origins that are important to consider in the coming months of the 2024 election.

  • VOA News ☛ Security, not ‘Russophobia’ spurred Czech Republic’s biometric passport requirement for Russian citizens

    In July, the Czech Republic introduced a requirement that Russian citizens entering or staying in the country have a biometric passport, which includes readable information like facial, iris and fingerprint data, helping authenticate the passport holder’s identity.

  • TruthOut ☛ From Weapons to Fossil Fuels — 10 Firms Control $50 Trillion of Global Wealth

    In his new book out this September, Titans of Capital: How Concentrated Wealth Threatens Humanity (The Censored Press & Seven Stories Press), Peter Phillips takes us deep into the world of these transnational asset management firms and the people who run them: the “Titans.” He shows how they constitute a new global elite who wield nearly unchecked power.

  • NL Times ☛ Terrorism suspect's "jihadist ideology" a possible motive in Utrecht cemetery vandalism

    He "scribbled" jihadist texts on the walls of his holding cell, where he is being kept in pre-trial detention, the prosecutor alleged on Monday. A co-defendant in the case has given a statement indicating that B.'s terrorist ambitions have not diminished at all.

  • Greece ☛ Is Turkey a Trojan horse inside NATO?

    Endy Zemenides, the Executive Director of the Hellenic American Leadership Council, joins Thanos Davelis to break down how the roadblocks Turkey is putting up with regard to NATO’s largest air exercise set to take place in Greece are not only putting the exercise at risk, but also the alliance itself, and should serve as a wake up call for NATO members.

  • Kansas Reflector ☛ Project 2025 would pillage our rights and institutions. Kansans want to fight back.

    I was part of a panel digging into the specifics Tuesday in Lenexa, brought together by the nonprofit Mainstream Coalition. We spoke to a capacity crowd of more than 200 everyday folks who wanted to know all the gory details. What became clear over the hour and a half was how these plans could upend institutions and plans right here in Kansas.

  • FAIR ☛ NYT Uncritically Reported Israel’s Version of Golan Bombing

    Israel and the US immediately blamed the Iran-backed Lebanese organization Hezbollah for the strike—citing Israeli intelligence reports of an Iranian Falaq-1 missile being found at the soccer field (BBC, 7/28/24).

  • Russia, Belarus, and War in Ukraine

    • Insight Hungary ☛ "Active information warfare". Orban's propaganda targeting our consortium

      Hungary's pro-government media machine has recently launched a massive smear campaign against 444.hu and Bellingcat (NL), while also targeting their international partners, PressOne (RO), Gazeta Wyborcza (PL), and SME (SK). These outlets cooperate in a cross-border journalistic project, The Eastern Frontier Initiative (TEFI) covering regional security, co-financed by the European Commission.

      The smear attack applies components and techniques of long-circulated Russian disinformation campaigns. Consortium members are accused of carrying out "active information warfare", allegedly financed and orchestrated by foreign powers (namely the US and the UK) and their intelligence services. According to the accusations the aim is no less than undermining trust in the Hungarian government’s actions, such as recent military buildup programs and the peace efforts of the Hungarian state regarding Russia’s war on Ukraine. 

• Transparency/Investigative Reporting

  • Nick Heer ☛ When Elon Musk Turned Blue

    Kate Conger and Ryan Mac, in an excerpt from their forthcoming book “Character Limit” published in the New York Times: [...]

  • Tor ☛ Wikileaks: A case study on journalism and encryption

    Earlier this year I was asked to join the Intercept Brasil as a contributor to write about the intersection of technology and human rights. Like dozens of other news sites around the world, Intercept Brasil uses Tor-powered tools and other encrypted services for their journalistic work. This is a summary of an article that was originally published under the headline Como a criptografia e a segurança de dados salvaram Julian Assange e o Wikileaks (How encryption and data security saved Julian Assange and Wikileaks), in which I reflect on the role of encryption and some of Tor's contributions to modern investigative journalism.

    Julian Assange is finally free in his homeland of Australia. The journalist, who spent years under persecution for exposing war crimes committed by the United States, shaped investigative journalism by utilizing encrypted technologies to safeguard sources, their information--and journalism itself.

• Environment

  • The Hindu ☛ Frequent mass wasting in Tibet a cause for worry in India

    A new study on the high frequency of mass wasting events in the Sedongpu Gully of the Tibetan Plateau since 2017 and the rapid warming of the area, which rarely experienced temperatures beyond 0º C before 2012, could be bad signs for India, specifically the country’s Northeast.

    A geological event, mass wasting is the gravity-influenced movement of rock and soil down a slope. A gully is a landform created by erosion from running water, mass movement or both.

  • Energy/Transportation

    • DeSmog ☛ Canada’s New Greenwashing Law Hasn’t Stopped Politicians’ CCS Claims

    • Wired ☛ ‘Should Art Be Regulated by the SEC?’: NFT Artists’ New Lawsuit Seeks Answers

      Both projects had, per the SEC, conducted “an unregistered offering of crypto asset securities in the form of purported nonfungible tokens.” In other words, the SEC, which had never provided clear rules surrounding art or NFT sales, had in short order designated some NFT-connected digital art pieces as securities, meaning they’d have to be registered with the commission. Its decisions could shake up how the centuries-old art business operates, argues Mann.

  • Overpopulation

    • Science Alert ☛ Predicted Drop in Population Mightn't Be Enough to Save The Environment After All

      Right now, human population growth is doing something long thought impossible – it's wavering. It's now possible global population could peak much earlier than expected, topping 10 billion in the 2060s. Then, it would begin to fall.

      In wealthier countries, it's already happening. Japan's population is falling sharply, with a net loss of 100 people every hour. In Europe, America and East Asia, fertility rates have fallen sharply. Many middle or lower income countries are about to drop too.

    • Deutsche Welle ☛ What is groundwater?

      Experts sometimes describe groundwater as mankind's savings account. Groundwater supplies about half of the world's drinking water, 40% of the water used for agriculture and 30% of industrial water needs.

      It is often the only source of water, particularly in arid regions. Oases and natural springs that support plants and animals in such areas are fed solely by this out-of-sight resource.

      But in some parts of the world, people face severe water scarcity because groundwater is being depleted faster than it is naturally replenished.

• AstroTurf/Lobbying/Politics

  • India Times ☛ IBM is shutting down research labs in this country, to layoff 1000 employees

    IBM has reportedly shut down its research and development (R&D) operations in China, adding its name to a growing list of major tech companies scaling back their mainland presence due to geopolitical challenges. As per a report by a Chinese publication, IBM ceasing its China Development Lab and China Systems Lab, is resulting in layoffs of over 1,000 employees in cities like Beijing, Shanghai, and Dalian.

  • The North Lines IN ☛ Elon Musk shuts down San Francisco headquarters of Twitter successor X, moves operations elsewhere

    In a move that seems to please city authorities, the tech billionaire Elon Musk is shutting down operations of his social media conglomerate X in downtown San Francisco and shifting focus to other locations across California and Texas. The exodus marks the end of what was once a fruitful alliance between the fast-growing platform and the city it called home.

  • Misinformation/Disinformation/Propaganda

    • Boston Herald ☛ Social platform X edits AI chatbot after election officials warn that it spreads misinformation

      Grok is available only to subscribers of the premium versions of X. But the five secretaries of state who signed the letter said election misinformation from Grok has been shared across multiple social media platforms, reaching millions of people. Grok continued to repeat the false information for 10 days before it was corrected, the secretaries said. The platform did not respond to a request for comment.

    • The Washington Post ☛ Secretaries of state urge Musk to fix AI chatbot spreading false election info

      Within hours of President Biden’s announcement that he was suspending his presidential campaign on July 21, “false information on ballot deadlines produced by Grok was shared on multiple social media platforms,” the secretaries wrote.

    • Newsweek ☛ Elon Musk's AI Chatbot Spreads Misinformation, Secretaries of State Say

      According to the AP, the secretaries of state said that Grok provided incorrect ballot deadlines that were then shared across various social media platforms and reaching millions of people. In their letter, the officials added that Grok continued to repeat the false information for 10 days before it was corrected.

    • CBS ☛ Minnesota secretary of state joins call for Elon Musk to fix X's AI chatbot from spreading election lies

      Since Musk bought Twitter in 2022 and renamed it to X, watchdog groups have raised concerns over a surge in hate speech and misinformation being amplified on the platform, as well as the reduction of content moderation teams, elimination of misinformation features and censoring of journalists critical of Musk.

      Experts say the moves represent a regression from progress made by social media platforms attempting to better combat political disinformation after the 2016 U.S. presidential contest and could precipitate a worsening misinformation landscape ahead of this year's November elections.

    • Alabama Reflector ☛ X fixes AI chatbot after secretaries of state complained it spread election misinformation

      Grok incorrectly said the deadlines to change ballots in some states had passed, and officials were unable to change the candidates who are listed on the ballot.

    • Michigan Advance ☛ X fixes AI chatbot after secretaries of state complained it spread election misinformation • Michigan Advance

      Simon in a statement said that X informed his office last week that Grok will now direct users who ask election-related questions to vote.gov, the federal government’s nonpartisan election website. Earlier this month, Simon spearheaded a letter to Elon Musk — the billionaire, Trump-backing owner of X — requesting that he make changes to the AI chatbot to ensure voters receive accurate information this election cycle.

      In the letter, Simon — along with Secretaries of State Al Schmidt of Pennsylvania, Jocelyn Benson of Michigan, Steve Hobbs of Washington and Maggie Toulouse Oliver of New Mexico — said that within hours of President Joe Biden’s announcement last month that he would not seek reelection, Grok generated false headlines that Vice President Kamala Harris was ineligible to appear on the presidential ballot in multiple states.

    • Atlantic Council ☛ After a failed attack, Hezbollah's propaganda seeks to prevent a wider war with Israel

      Therefore, though Hezbollah opted for the riskiest retaliatory option—a massive individual strike—it once again deployed its propaganda machine to bridge the gap between reality and the image it wants to project to its followers and claim success. It can thus tread the very fine line of settling the score for Shukr, appearing strong before its base but not granting Israel sufficient justification or legitimacy to initiate a full war.

• Censorship/Free Speech

  • RFERL ☛ Moscow Court Issues Warrant For Another Member Of Navalny's Team

    A Moscow court issued an arrest warrant on August 26 for Aleksandra Frolova, a self-exiled member of late opposition politician Aleksei Navalny's team. [...]

  • Digital Music News ☛ Spotify, Apple Music Reportedly Removing 'Glory to Hong Kong'

    Now a report from Radio Free Asia suggests that the anthem is being removed from Spotify and Apple Music in countries like Taiwan, the United Kingdom, and Canada.

    Some remixes and cover versions of the song still appear, but the original anthem has been removed. YouTube also blocked access to dozens of videos featuring the song in May, citing the court’s ruling. DGX Music also complained in June that an a capella version of the song was removed by U.S. distributor Distrokid, with no response to DGX Music’s questions about its removal. Scotland’s Emubands clarified that it removed the song from distribution precisely because of the Hong Kong court injunction.

• Freedom of Information / Freedom of the Press

  • US News And World Report ☛ Venezuelan Journalist Released After Being Charged With Terrorism, Union Says

    A well-known Venezuelan entertainment journalist arrested in Caracas over the weekend has been released, a media union said on Monday, but she faces terrorism charges as the fallout from the country's disputed July 28 presidential election widens.

  • ANF News ☛ Gülistan Kılıç Koçyiğit: Turkey committed a war crime by massacring journalists

    Koçyiğit also commented on the killing of journalists Gulistan Tara and Hêro Bahadîn in an UCAV attack carried out by the occupying Turkish state against a vehicle carrying Kurdish journalists in Seyîdsadiq district of Sulaymaniyah on 23 August.

  • ANF News ☛ Women journalists in South Kurdistan: Turkish occupiers fear the power of women

    Journalists Peryan Ehmed and Bêrîvan Bergareyî spoke to ANF about the ongoing protests condemning the killing of their two colleagues.

  • CS Monitor ☛ One NPR station tries to rebuild trust with conservative listeners who see media bias

    Amid a national crisis of trust in journalism, he and his colleagues at WITF have realized that they have significant work to do in engaging with the largely conservative swath of Pennsylvania where they broadcast. That is part of a broader effort to make their news coverage more trusted and relevant to communities by involving local listeners in helping determine what to cover, how to cover it, and whose voices to include.

  • BIA Net ☛ Turkey’s aid agency supports Taliban media with equipment

    An opposition deputy has criticized the technical assistance provided to the media outlets “enabling the Taliban’s gender discrimination and censorship.”

• Civil Rights/Policing

  • JURIST ☛ India PM Modi reiterates call for secular civil code

    Prime Minister of India Narendra Modi reaffirmed on Sunday his call for a “secular civil code,” underscoring the strong support his administration demonstrated for the introduction of the code since the commencement of his term.

  • VOA News ☛ New law allows Australians to ignore after hours work calls and emails 

    Australian employees now have the right to ignore their bosses outside working hours thanks to a new law which enshrines the "right to disconnect." The legislation, which passed in February and came into force Monday, protects workers who refuse to monitor, read or respond to contact from their employers after the hours of work. More than 20 countries, including France, have brought in similar laws.

    Millions of Australians can now break free from the stress of after-hours calls and emails from work.

  • ANF News ☛ 732 Yazidis return to their homes from camps in Duhok

    According to estimates by the Yazda organization, around 2,700 Yazidis are still missing today, including around 1,300 who were children at the time of their abduction. Many of them are still systematically raped and kept and sold as slaves. Therefore, this genocide in its form also represents a femicide. The organization Nadia's Initiative assumes that 300 to 400 girls and boys under the age of 18 are still in the hands of ISIS. More than 3,500 Yazidi have been rescued, including 2,000 children.

  • Bruce Schneier ☛ US Federal Court Rules Against Geofence Warrants - Schneier on Security

    This is a big deal. A US Appeals Court ruled that geofence warrants—these are general warrants demanding information about all people within a geographical boundary—are unconstitutional.

• Digital Restrictions (DRM)

  • Techdirt ☛ Peloton Combats Sagging Bike Sales By Making Them Less Valuable On The Secondary Market

    It’s no secret that Peloton, one of the corporate darlings of the pandemic, has since been viewed as a company in serious decline. While the company has had to contend with several IP disputes, it has also been subject to cybersecurity incidents and product safety recalls due to its treadmills occasionally deciding to eat human beings. Hardware sales have sagged significantly, leading to a precipitous drop in its stock value from its peak in 2020 when it was at $162 per share to its current value of just under $5 per share. Stock prices like that are not the way that corporate leadership keeps its jobs.

  • India Times ☛ Apple: Apple rethinks its movie strategy after a string of misses

    Apple does not publicly disclose subscriber or viewing numbers.

Monopolies/Monopsonies

• Patents

  • Kangaroo Courts

    • JUVE ☛ So far third-party access to documents only for settled UPC cases [Ed: UPC is illegal and unconstitutional, so this is an ongoing farce and a fake court doing procedures in Europe while bribed press hails it as a success]

      In November last year Mathys & Squire had filed a request for documents under Rule 262.1 (b) of the UPC Rules of Procedure regarding the proceedings between Astellas and Healios, Riken and Osaka University (case ID: UPC CFI 75/2023 and ACT 464985/2023).

• Trademarks

  • Right of Publicity

    • TMZ ☛ Jenna Ortega Deleted Twitter Account Over NSFW AI Images of Herself

      Jenna, who's 21 now, says the visual assault started years ago when she was in her teens, and was encouraged to get on then-Twitter to boost her profile as an actor -- but it immediately became a nightmare.

• Copyrights

  • Torrent Freak ☛ Pssst... Want to Snitch on Sellers of Pirate Streaming Services?

    Do you know someone who sells dodgy streaming boxes or pirate IPTV streams? In Ireland, anti-piracy group FACT in partnership with Crimestoppers would like you to 'report' this activity. These 'snitch' initiatives are not widely embraced by the public but with a six-week social media push, the campaign aims to identity new enforcement targets.

  • Torrent Freak ☛ Piracy Shield 2.0 in Doubt For 2024 , TV Manufacturers Urged to Ban VPN

    Claims that Italy will launch Piracy Shield 2.0 at the end of the year appear to be overly optimistic. With just four months left of 2024, a software supplier hasn't even been chosen yet. With the current system falling over, previously blocked domains and IP addresses are being unblocked to make room for new ones, something that the law has no provision for. Meanwhile, smart TV manufacturers will soon be asked to ban a VPN app from their sets.

  • The Verge ☛ Martin Shkreli must surrender his Wu-Tang album copies

    Shkreli played fast and loose with Wu-Tang’s purchase conditions that restricted him from commercially benefiting from the album until 2103, once listing it on eBay, as NME notes.

  • Artnet Worldwide Corporation ☛ Fraudster Martin Shkreli Must Surrender His Copies of the Wu-Tang Clan’s Unique Art Album

    Back in 2015, the Wu-Tang Clan had sold the unique album via the online auction site Paddle8. The idea of selling an album-as-artwork was part of an attempt to forge a new model of support for pop music, modeled on the art world. “In order to take it a few steps forward, why not take it 400 years worth of steps back to the Renaissance age, and look at music as a commissioned commodity, from creation to exhibition to sale,” album producer Tarik “Cilvaringz” Azzougarh said at the time.