Leftovers

• 2024-09-04 [Older] Slingshots

• 2024-09-02 [Older] Lava Lakes

• Herman Õunapuu ☛ I encourage you to write a blog

  This post covers the reasons why I write, how I write and some tips on how you can get started writing one yourself.

• Mike Rockwell ☛ Why Don’t More People Use Linux?

  I saw David Heinemeier Hansson recently wrote about this topic and thought I’d take a crack at the question as well.

  I’m sure there are plenty of others, but I’ve identified what I believe to be the primary reasons why more people don’t use Linux.

• Seth Godin ☛ Feeding the algorithm | Seth's Blog

  Feeding the algorithm works when you’re the only one doing it. It works when you seek to fit right into the middle of the lane. And it works if you’re willing to outfeed everyone else–at least until the algorithm changes.

  But while someone is going to win that lottery, it’s probably not going to be you.

• Soeren ☛ On To-Do Management | gluecko.se

  However, when it comes to planning the current day, I use a blank piece of paper, open the app and copy the tasks I want to do today.

• Science

  • The Register UK ☛ NASA's solar sail is tumbling, but that's part of the plan

    The 80 m2 (860 sq ft) Advanced Composite Solar Sail System (ACS3) successfully spread its sails last week. The spacecraft uses pressure produced by solar radiation to move – doing away with conventional rocket propellant. NASA is testing the sail in the hope that its design, and the materials used, are viable for future vessels.

• Education

  • APNIC ☛ APNIC 58: Thank you and farewell

    The conference brought together Internet and networking experts, industry leaders, APNIC Fellows, and other interested parties worldwide to learn, share ideas and experience, and develop policies related to Internet operations.

  • Orhun Parmaksız ☛ Why I started livestreaming as a Rust developer?

    Today, things have changed a bit, due to the fact that I eventually realized that writing code in a dark room is not enough if you want to make a name for yourself. You should also make sure that people know you and your work. This is where that you need to switch to an influencer-like mindset and do things like be active in communities, write blog posts, give talks, and so on.

    And as you might have guessed, I recently added livestreaming to this list.

  • Kev Quirk ☛ On Success

    I was recently speaking to someone in work that I mentor, and she asked me what my measure of success is. This is what I told her...

  • Crooked Timber ☛ Action list to protect universities from budget cuts

    I will respond specifically for the current Dutch case, but I think we could learn from international experience here. So if you have additional thoughts on what university staff could do to make sure the material conditions in which they need to do their work are adequate (and for public universities this means not having their public budgets cut in a way that creates inadequate funding), then please do share your suggestions.

• Health/Nutrition/Agriculture

  • Vox ☛ Study: Dead bats are linked to a spike in farm pesticides and infant mortality

    There’s a clear reason for this, according to the paper. Most North American bats eat insects, including pests like moths that damage crops. Without bats flying about, farmers spray more insecticides on their fields, the study shows, and exposure to insecticides is known to harm the health of newborns.

    “When bats that eat insects go down, farmers compensate by using more insecticides,” Frank, an assistant professor at the University of Chicago Harris School of Public Policy, told Vox. “That has adverse health consequences — full stop. The damages from their absences appear to be substantial.”

  • US News And World Report ☛ Sweden Joins Countries Seeking to End Screen Time for Children Under 2

    Sweden suggests that toddlers should not have any exposure to digital screens, including television. The recommendations ease slightly as the children age: From 2 to 5 years old, they should have a maximum of one hour a day in front of a screen, while for youngsters aged 6 to 12 it's two hours. Teenagers should have no more than three hours of screen time a day.

• Proprietary/Artificial Intelligence (AI)

  • The Washington Post ☛ Telegram’s Durov condemns arrest, says stifles innovation

    He argued that a CEO should not be responsible for misuse of a platform and that if he were held responsible, no one would ever innovate. But he conceded that the platform needs to do more to prevent criminals from using it.

    “Using laws from the pre-smartphone era to charge a CEO with crimes committed by third parties on the platform he manages is a misguided approach,” he wrote. “Building technology is hard enough as it is. No innovator will ever build new tools if they know they can be personally held responsible for potential abuse of those tools.”

  • Wired ☛ Elon Musk Has Backed Himself Into a Corner in Brazil

    Brazil’s decision to block X is the culmination of an ongoing conflict between Musk and the country’s Superior Electoral Court (TSE), a special court run by Supreme Court Justice Alexandre de Moraes that issued takedown orders on content it considers to be a threat to the integrity of its elections. Musk and X refused to comply, allowing accounts that were accused of spreading hate speech and disinformation to remain on the platform, a move that eventually triggered the ban.

  • RFERL ☛ Telegram Founder Durov Says French Investigation, Arrest 'Misguided'

    He was charged on August 28 with several crimes related to alleged illicit activity on the messaging app but avoided jail after posting a $5.5 million bail and was released on the condition that he remain in France and report to a police station twice a week.

  • The Guardian UK ☛ Telegram to shake-up features; markets slide after US job creation misses forecasts – as it happened

    Telegram boss Pavel Durov announces a new approach towards moderating content and will remove some features that had been abused for illegal activity.

  • India Times ☛ Pavel Durov says Telegram will take new approach towards moderation

    "While 99.999% of Telegram users have nothing to do with crime, the 0.001% involved in illicit activities create a bad image for the entire platform, putting the interests of our almost billion users at risk," Durov wrote on Telegram.

    "That's why this year we are committed to turn moderation on Telegram from an area of criticism into one of praise."

• Security

  • Privacy/Surveillance

    • PC World ☛ Do smartphones eavesdrop on conversations? New evidence says yes

      Well, journalists from 404 Media recently found evidence that companies like Amazon and Google do listen in on everything.

    • EPIC ☛ EPIC Urges European Commission to address surveillance gaps in First Periodic Review of EU-US Data Privacy Framework

      The Commission adopted an adequacy decision for the EU-US Data Privacy Framework in July 2023 despite the US Intelligence Community’s ability to engage in mass surveillance of EU residents. The adequacy decision provides a period of public review to take place within one year of the decision. Congress’ recent passage of the Reforming Intelligence and Securing America Act (“RISAA”) reauthorizing and expanding FISA Section 702 and the Biden Administration’s Executive Order 14086 implementing the Privacy Framework continue to undermine EU residents’ privacy rights under the GDPR.

    • Wired ☛ Therapy Sessions Exposed by Mental Health Care Firm’s Unsecured Database

      Video and audio of therapy sessions, transcripts, and other patient records were accidentally exposed in a publicly accessible database operated by the virtual medical company Confidant Health.

    • EFF ☛ School Monitoring Software Sacrifices Student Privacy for Unproven Promises of Safety

      The companies making the software claim it’s all done for the sake of student safety: preventing self-harm, suicide, violence, and drug and alcohol abuse. While a noble goal, given that suicide is the second highest cause of death among American youth 10-14 years old, no comprehensive or independent studies have shown an increase in student safety linked to the usage of this software. Quite to the contrary: a recent comprehensive RAND research study shows that such AI monitoring software may cause more harm than good.

      That study also found that how to respond to alerts is left to the discretion of the school districts themselves. Due to a lack of resources to deal with mental health, schools often refer these alerts to law enforcement officers who are not trained and ill-equipped to deal with youth mental crises. When police respond to youth who are having such episodes, the resulting encounters can lead to disastrous results. So why are schools still using the software–when a congressional investigation found a need for “federal action to protect students’ civil rights, safety, and privacy”? Why are they trading in their students’ privacy for a dubious-at-best marketing claim of safety?

      Experts suggest it's because these supposed technical solutions are easier to implement than the effective social measures that schools often lack resources to implement. I spoke with Isabelle Barbour, a public health consultant who has experience working with schools to implement mental health supports. She pointed out that there are considerable barriers to families, kids, and youth accessing health care and mental health supports at a community level. There is also a lack of investment in supporting schools to effectively address student health and well-being. This leads to a situation where many students come to school with needs that have been unmet and these needs impact the ability of students to learn. Although there are clear and proven measures that work to address the burdens youth face, schools often need support (time, mental health expertise, community partners, and a budget) to implement these measures. Edtech companies market largely unproven plug-and-play products to educational professionals who are stretched thin and seeking a path forward to help kids. Is it any wonder why schools sign contracts which are easy to point to when questioned about what they are doing with regard to the youth mental health epidemic?

• Defence/Aggression

  • New York Times ☛ Carl Icahn, Activist Investor, Faces Intense Scrutiny From Wall Street

    But now Mr. Icahn is under intense scrutiny from Wall Street investors, who are rapidly selling his company’s stock. In the past year and a half, shares of Icahn Enterprises, his publicly traded investment company, have dropped more than 75 percent, losing nearly $20 billion of value. After dropping more than 30 percent since mid-August alone, it now trades at about $11 a share, its lowest level in more than two decades.

  • Alabama Reflector ☛ Trump’s Jan. 6 case to extend beyond Election Day under timeline laid out by judge

    Trump is charged with conspiracy to defraud the United States; conspiracy to obstruct an official proceeding; obstruction of, and attempt to obstruct, an official proceeding; and conspiracy against rights for his alleged role in conspiring to create false electors from seven states and spreading knowingly false information that whipped his supporters into a violent attack on the U.S. Capitol on Jan. 6, 2021.

    A federal grand jury handed up a revised indictment Aug. 27 in an effort to tailor the charges to the Supreme Court’s July 1 immunity ruling. The fresh indictment omitted any references to Trump’s alleged pressure campaign on Justice Department officials to meddle in state election results.

    But the document added emphasis on Trump’s personal use of social media outside of his actions as president, and said he and several co-conspirators schemed outside of his official duties. The new indictment also stressed Trump’s pressure on Pence to accept the fake electors in his role outside of the executive branch as president of the Senate.

  • Vox ☛ Tucker Carlson World War II interview: what Republicans miss

    The interview poses a major test to the Republican Party. Though Carlson has been off of Fox News for over a year, broadcasting on Twitter/X instead, he remains influential in the party. He delivered a primetime speech at the 2024 RNC and reportedly played a major role in the JD Vance vice presidential pick. Now that he’s crossing the reddest of red lines — actively apologizing for Adolf Hitler — can the party cut ties?

  • BIA Net ☛ ‘The racist hatred that could enable new pogroms is deeply present in Turkey’

    We spoke with Foti Benlisoy on the anniversary of the 6-7 September Pogrom, discussing the 1955 attacks on Greek, Armenian, and Jewish communities, as well as new manifestations of societal violence in Turkey.

  • LRT ☛ ‘All friendships are over’: Lithuania fortifies border with Russia’s Kaliningrad

    Permanent counter-mobility measures are being set up on parts of Lithuania’s border with Russia’s Kaliningrad. This is not only a signal to Russia but also a way to immediately protect areas that could be vulnerable, says Defence Minister Laurynas Kasčiūnas.

  • The Strategist ☛ A diplomat’s tantrum shows China’s insecurity in the Pacific

    Although Qian clocked a minor victory in removing the line, there’s more meaning in his behaviour. He was right ‘that 15 out of the 18 Forum countries [have] diplomatic relations with China’ and ‘abide by the one China principle’, yet China remains stymied by Palau, the Marshall Islands, and Tuvalu, which maintain ties to Taiwan. In a forum that relies on consensus, they blocked an attempt by the Solomon Islands—likely acting as a proxy for China’s interests—to revoke Taiwan’s status as a development partner.

  • Futurism ☛ Elon Musk Deletes Nazi Apologist Tweet After Near-Universal Backlash

    The flailing executive deleted a quote-tweet in which he called a Tucker Carlson podcast featuring a Nazi apologist "very interesting" and "worth watching" after near-universal backlash.

    In the original Carlson post, which is still live, the ex-Fox pundit interviews purported historian Darryl Cooper, an apparent Holocaust denier who says, among other things, that then-UK Prime Minister Winston Churchill was the "chief villain" of World War II.

  • Marcy Wheeler ☛ Trump Will Have to Defend His Attempt to Assassinate Mike Pence Before the Election

    Judge Chutkan has issued her scheduling order for the next developments in Trump’s January 6 trial.

    Rather than scheduling Trump’s frivolous attempt to challenge Jack Smith’s Special Counsel appointment first, Chutkan will instead deal with immunity first, with all briefing due a week before the election.

  • Haaretz ☛ Israel, U.S., Britain and European Countries Sign Landmark International AI Treaty - World News - Haaretz.com

    The AI Convention requires companies to protect human rights and democratic institutions while maintaining transparency, privacy and equality, and will apply mainly in the public sector

  • Russia, Belarus, and War in Ukraine

    • CISA ☛ 2024-09-05 [Older] FBI, CISA, NSA, and US and International Partners Release Advisory on Russian Military Cyber Actors Targeting US and Global Critical Infrastructure

    • US News And World Report ☛ 2024-09-05 [Older] Senate Panel to Question US Semiconductor Firms on Russian Weapons

    • US News And World Report ☛ 2024-09-05 [Older] US Calls on Big Tech to Help Evade Online Censors in Russia, Iran

    • US News And World Report ☛ 2024-09-05 [Older] US Indicts Russian Intelligence Officials Over Cyberattacks Targeting Ukraine

    • CPJ ☛ 2024-09-03 [Older] CPJ joins call urging Apple to reinstate VPNs in Russia after removals

    • CPJ ☛ 2024-09-03 [Older] Russia labels exiled journalist Galina Timchenko a ‘foreign agent’

    • Scheerpost ☛ 2024-09-05 [Older] Ray McGovern: Conditioning Americans for War With Russia

    • Deutsche Welle ☛ 2024-09-05 [Older] Ukraine updates: Putin says Russia ready for talks with Kyiv

    • US News And World Report ☛ 2024-09-05 [Older] US Charges Former Trump 2016 Campaign Adviser Dimitri Simes Over Work for Sanctioned Russian TV

    • US News And World Report ☛ 2024-09-05 [Older] US Widens Indictment of Russians in 'WhisperGate' Conspiracy to Destroy Ukrainian and NATO Systems

    • US News And World Report ☛ 2024-09-05 [Older] Death Toll From Russian Strike on Ukraine's Poltava up to 55

    • US News And World Report ☛ 2024-09-05 [Older] Poland Backs off Claim Drone Violated Airspace During Russian Attack on Ukraine

    • US News And World Report ☛ 2024-09-05 [Older] Russians Mock US Election Allegations as Putin Teasingly Says He Supports Harris

    • US News And World Report ☛ 2024-09-05 [Older] Ukraine Gets a New Chief Diplomat as the War With Russia Enters a Critical Phase

    • US News And World Report ☛ 2024-09-05 [Older] US Charges Russian TV Contributor Dimitri Simes With Sanctions Violations

    • Deutsche Welle ☛ 2024-09-04 [Older] Ukraine updates: Russia launches fresh strikes on Kyiv, Lviv

    • US News And World Report ☛ 2024-09-04 [Older] US Accuses Russia of Using State Media to Spread Disinformation Before the November Election

    • US News And World Report ☛ 2024-09-04 [Older] Lavrov Warns US Not to Mock Russia's 'Red Lines'

    • US News And World Report ☛ 2024-09-04 [Older] Russian Lawmaker Butina Calls US Election Meddling Claims 'Pure Rubbish'

    • US News And World Report ☛ 2024-09-04 [Older] US Sanctions Russian State Media Editors Over 2024 Election Interference

    • CBC ☛ 2024-09-03 [Older] At least 51 killed in Russian airstrikes on central Ukraine city, Zelenskyy says

    • The Age AU ☛ 2024-09-03 [Older] Russian strike on Ukrainian city kills at least 41, Zelensky says

    • US News And World Report ☛ 2024-09-03 [Older] IAEA Chief Discusses Ukraine, Russia Nuclear Plants With Zelenskiy, Says Situation Fragile

    • US News And World Report ☛ 2024-09-03 [Older] IMF to Conduct First Mission to Russia Since COVID, Moscow Says

    • US News And World Report ☛ 2024-09-03 [Older] Russia Extends Custody of Frenchman Accused of Gathering Military Data

    • US News And World Report ☛ 2024-09-03 [Older] Russian Missiles Kill 50 in Strike on Ukrainian Military Institute

    • US News And World Report ☛ 2024-09-03 [Older] Russian Missiles Blast Ukrainian Military Academy and Hospital, Killing More Than 50, Officials Say

    • US News And World Report ☛ 2024-09-03 [Older] Sanctioned Former Central Banker to Become Russia's IMF Representative

    • US News And World Report ☛ 2024-09-03 [Older] Zelenskiy Asks Trudeau to Back Partners' OK for Strikes Deep Into Russia

    • CBC ☛ 2024-09-01 [Older] Ukraine unleashes mass drone attack while Russia strikes Kharkiv and Sumy

    • Insight Hungary ☛ Hungarian shell company appears in indictment of the two RT employees

      The U.S. government has made serious accusations against Russia, alleging a deliberate attempt to manipulate American public opinion through a network of misinformation. This operation involves media outlets and fabricated online profiles to sway the upcoming presidential election. The Treasury Department has imposed sanctions on the heads of RT, the Russian state-controlled propaganda outlet.

      The Department of Justice has indicted two RT employees—31-year-old Kostyantin Kalashnikov, and 27-year-old Elena Afanasieva—on charges of conspiring to breach the Foreign Agents Registration Act (FARA) and money laundering. Radio Free Europe reported that the indictment also mentions a Hungarian company.

    • Meduza ☛ ‘I wanted to fight this horror’: The growing number of Russian teenagers going to prison on sabotage charges — Meduza

• Transparency/Investigative Reporting

  • Jamie Zawinski ☛ Remember, kids: technically true is the best kind of true.

  • Raw Story ☛ ‘Battening down the hatches’: Trump campaign ‘in crisis’ say experts after latest leak

    Whether the memo warning against leaks was forward-looking or hindsight, it comes in the same day as a massive U.S. Dept. of Justice indictment. That bombshell includes allegations that several top pro-MAGA influencers with millions of followers were covertly and unwittingly paid by a Russia-funded media company in the U.S., as part of a Kremlin disinformation campaign to influence voters in the November election, in support of the Trump campaign.

• Environment

  • The Revelator ☛ No Wave Is Insurmountable

  • The Register UK ☛ Datacenters to emit 3x more carbon dioxide because of genAI

    The research, "Global Data Centers: Sizing & Solving for CO2," estimates the total global emissions for datacenters across Scope 1, 2 & 3 between now and the end of the decade, and concludes that construction of new facilities combined with their electricity needs will hit 2.5 billion tonnes of CO2-equivalent, or about 40 percent of the entire current annual emissions from the United States.

  • The Scotsman ☛ Why climate change is an 'existential threat to sport'

    Since the last time the Olympics were held in Paris 100 years ago, the average temperature in France’s capital has risen by more than three degrees Celsius, with Europe now the fastest warming continent on the planet.

  • The Barents Observer ☛ Trouble vessel has departed Tromsø, but future uncertain

    Concern spread in Tromsø as it became known that the large bulk carrier docked to the industrial port was loaded with potentially dangerous ammonium nitrate. Although the local fire department assured to the Barents Observer that no immediate danger existed, others were worried.

  • MIT Technology Review ☛ How plants could mine metals from the soil

    Seven phytomining projects just received $9.9 million in funding from the US Department of Energy’s Advanced Research Projects Agency for Energy (ARPA-E). The goal is to better understand which plants could help with mining and determine how researchers can tweak them to get our hands on all the critical metals we’ll need in the future.

  • Semafor Inc ☛ Fossil fuel funding for universities may be slowing green transition

    Bias in published research resulting from studies funded by industries like tobacco and alcohol is well documented, but the potential influence of the fossil fuel industry on science is not as well understood. The new study reviewed existing research to show some bias in research funded by fossil fuels that, the authors suggested, could affect academia, and also shape climate litigation and policy.

  • Harvard University ☛ Did lawmakers know role of fossil fuels in climate change during Clean Air Act era?

    With a new paper in the Ecology Law Quarterly, Naomi Oreskes and a team of science historians detail more than a century of research connecting carbon dioxide emissions with global temperature rise. The findings illuminate what Congress knew, and what it intended, when targeting “air pollution” with the 1970 Clean Air Act, questions that arose during a landmark 2022 Supreme Court ruling limiting the power of federal agencies to enforce the law.

    “We found a universe of scientific work that got lost, forgotten, or buried,” said Oreskes, the Henry Charles Lea Professor of the History of Science.

  • Hakai Magazine ☛ For the First Time, Part of the Ocean Has Been Granted Legal Personhood

    The Brazilian city of Linhares has legally recognized its waves as living beings, marking the first known time part of the ocean has been granted legal personhood.

    In early August 2024, the coastal municipality passed a new law that gives the waves at the mouth of the Doce River, which runs to Brazil’s Atlantic coast, the intrinsic right to existence, regeneration, and restoration. This means the waves should continue to form naturally and their water must be clean.

  • Hamilton Nolan ☛ Cars Have Fucked Up This Country Bad

    America’s collective decision in the 20th century to make cars and the roads serving them the bedrock of all urban and regional planning will go down in history as just another of our nation’s awful, ruinous ideas that we nevertheless clung to for generations, like slavery or lead paint. Cars, of course, have a way of making themselves very hard to progress away from. Once you build the towns and cities around the road patterns for cars, and allow the interstate highway system to determine development patterns, the entire system gets locked in in a way that is difficult to change. Even as ever-widening highways and air pollution and the immense parking lots destroy ever larger swaths of peace and scenery, they also represent ever larger sunk costs from consumers and governments, which make everyone more reluctant to try to break away from them.

  • Energy/Transportation

    • DeSmog ☛ Massive CP2 LNG Export Facility Faces New Legal Hurdle Over FERC Approval

    • CBC ☛ Why doesn't Canada have more electric school buses?

      E-school buses are cheaper to operate and can pay for themselves over the long run. But their initial price tag is double what diesel replacements cost. The short-term contracts of private service providers, which supply most of the bus service across Canada, don't always provide incentives for longer-term change without government subsidies.

    • H2 View ☛ EU to invest over €50m in Namibia’s green hydrogen industry

      The European Commission will support the development of the Namibian green hydrogen industry with three EU-funded programmes worth €53.9m ($59.7m).

  • Wildlife/Nature

    • US News And World Report ☛ 2024-09-01 [Older] A Celebrity 'Russian Spy' Whale Spotted With Harness Found Dead in Norwegian Waters

    • CS Monitor ☛ Charley the African elephant gets moved to new sanctuary

      Zoo officials decided he should be “retired” to a place more fitting for a big old tusker – a large private game reserve some 200 kilometers (120 miles) away where there’s a chance he might make some new elephant friends.

      How to get him there? Dr. Khalil, an animal rescue specialist at the Four Paws wildlife welfare organization, was an obvious choice for this latest mammoth job.

• Finance

  • FAIR ☛ Dedrick Asante-Muhammad & Algernon Austin on the Black Economy

• AstroTurf/Lobbying/Politics

  • The Register UK ☛ Salesforce snaps up Own Company in $1.9B bargain hunt

    By coughing up significantly less than the nominal $3.35 billion valuation calculated in a 2021 VC funding round, the CRM giant has ended its self-imposed abstinence from major acquisitions after it gulped down office collaboration platform Slack for $27 billion in 2021.

  • India Times ☛ Qualcomm has explored acquiring pieces of Intel chip design business

    Qualcomm has explored the possibility of acquiring portions of Intel's design business to boost the company's product portfolio, according to two sources familiar with the matter.

    The mobile chipmaker has examined acquiring different pieces of Intel, which is struggling to generate cash and looking to shed business units and sell off other assets, the people said.

  • CS Monitor ☛ Criminal courts take on social media as governments hold back

    Their actions have refocused attention on the one major international effort underway to regulate the giant social media sites – the European Union’s 2022 Digital Services Act, which requires online operators to show they are limiting disinformation.

    No company has yet been prosecuted under this act. The EU too seems to believe, for now, that the well-targeted use of national law is more impactful.

  • Misinformation/Disinformation/Propaganda

    • Vox ☛ The RealPage DOJ lawsuit explained: why this algorithm could be driving your rent higher

      The company is a service provider that serves landlords. We’re basically talking very big landlords — corporate landlords that own many properties, generally speaking. The RealPage service is very expensive, so it’s for bigger entities, more or less, and they’re very sophisticated. Whether they use RealPage or not, they would be sophisticated data crunchers who are into using management expertise to maximize the money they can make.

      [RealPage] is really a software service provided to landlords, a management service that’s tech-based, and the business end of that service is: RealPage collects a very large amount of confidential, sensitive data that’s very useful to landlords in figuring out what their competition is doing, and therefore choosing how to set their own behavior to maximize their own profits.

    • Matt Birchler ☛ Imagine if you learned 90% of your revenue came from Russian state media 😬

      You should read the press release because it really is a crazy story.

    • India Times ☛ YouTube: YouTube terminating Tenet Media channel after US indictment

      Alphabet's YouTube said on Thursday it was terminating the Tenet Media channel and four channels operated by Tenet owner Lauren Chen, following an indictment from the U.S. Department of Justice.

      The Justice Department on Wednesday filed money-laundering charges against two employees of Russian state media network RT for what officials said was a scheme to hire an American company to produce online content to influence the 2024 presidential election.

    • teleSUR ☛ U.S. Sanctions RT for Alleged Russian Interference in Elections - teleSUR English

      At a press conference on Wednesday, the US Attorney General Merrick Garland stated that the charges against Kalashnikov and Afanasyeva, as well as another alleged Russian plan to disseminate anti-Ukrainian content on the Internet, «They make clear how far the Russian government is willing to go, even at the highest levels, in order to undermine our democratic process.»

• Censorship/Free Speech

  • The Barents Observer ☛ The new "terrorists": Man gets 3 years jail for posting 'illegal song' on social media

    The young man was on the 7th of August sentenced to three years of prison on charges of terrorism, the Russian version of the Barents Observer reports. According to the Northern Fleet Military Court, the sentence is based on a song that Kovtonyuk posted on social media VK in October 2022.

    It is not clear which is the song in question, but it is likely to relate to Ukraine.

• Freedom of Information / Freedom of the Press

  • The Dissenter ☛ Unauthorized Disclosure: UK Police Raid Journalist's Home, Scatter Mother's Ashes

  • VOA News ☛ Azeri media confront legal threats, harassment, report finds

    The London-based Justice for Journalists Foundation recorded 147 cases of attacks and threats against journalists, media workers and bloggers in Azerbaijan in 2023.

  • VOA News ☛ Death of persecuted journalist brings attention to Turkmenistan’s media repression

    Known as one of the most closed-off countries, Turkmenistan has little space for independent reporting. Nearly all media outlets are state-owned, and ministries monitor content, according to watchdogs. Journalists such as Allashov who try to report independently — and their families — are subject to arrest and harassment, according to Reporters Without Borders, or RSF.

  • Tech Central (South Africa) ☛ Larry Ellison, media mogul

    Paramount Global, the parent of US broadcaster CBS, will be controlled by software billionaire Larry Ellison after a group led by his son David completes its purchase of the Redstone family’s interest in the film and TV company, according to a regulatory filing.

  • ANF News ☛ Kurdish journalists protest in front of the Embassy of Iraq in Brussels

    In a statement read in several languages, the Kurdistan Women Journalists Union (ROJIN) and the Kurdistan Journalists' Initiative called on the Iraqi government to ensure the safety of journalists and the conditions for them to practise their profession, and to sentence the murderers of journalists.

  • Hong Kong Free Press ☛ Newspaper Epoch Times to stop printing, distributing Hong Kong edition

    The newspaper made the announcement on its website on Friday afternoon, citing difficulties in securing a lease for a printing facility. Its final print edition will be distributed in Hong Kong on September 17, but its website will keep on covering the city’s news.

  • CPJ ☛ Kyrgyz authorities threaten to block 2 news outlets over report on president

    “By issuing threats against Radio Azattyk and Novye Litsa over reports looking into President Sadyr Japarov’s alleged political strategists, Kyrgyz authorities have once again demonstrated that the ‘false information’ law is used for shielding the reputations of top state officials, not for countering disinformation,” said Gulnoza Said, CPJ’s Europe and Central Asia program coordinator. “Defamation allegations should be weighed against evidence— not the opaque whims of officials sitting in the halls of power. The false information law must be repealed.”

  • Techdirt ☛ Gannett’s ‘AI’ Scandals Result In Closure Of Wirecutter-esque Review Website, Layoffs

    You might recall how Gannett, which owns USAToday (and probably the half-assed remains of whatever’s left of your town’s local newspaper), spent much of last year mired in a major “AI” scandal. Company executives apparently thought it would be a good idea to use half-cooked automation to create fake journalists and lazy clickbait without telling employees this was happening.

• Civil Rights/Policing

  • Papers Please ☛ Planned new European travel restrictions follow US precedents and pressure

    Citizens of the USA and some other most-favored nations have long been able to travel to many European countries for tourism or business without visas or prearrangements and with minimal border formalities, as long as they didn’t stay too long or seek local residence or employment.

    This is scheduled to change with the imposition of new controls on foreigners — including US citizens — visiting Europe starting in November 2024. This is to be followed by a further ratcheting up of control and surveillance of  foreign travelers to Europe scheduled for some time in 2025.

    Some US citizens are likely to be shocked and humiliated — as any traveler anywhere in the world should be, regardless of their citizenship — to be subjected to fingerprinting and mug shots and additional questionning on arrival in Europe and, starting next year, a de facto visa by another name that they will have to apply and pay for and have approved before they can board a flight (or international ferry or train) to any European destination.

  • Federal News Network ☛ EPA union calls for temporary situational telework option

    A federal union is calling for temporary work-from-home options for staff at the Environmental Protection Agency. The push from the American Federation of Government Employees comes after reports of Legionella outbreaks at several EPA facilities across the country. The affected EPA buildings are located in D.C., Boston, Houston and Chicago. The union called it “completely unacceptable” to continue letting EPA employees into the buildings in those areas. Using situational telework would let EPA staff continue their work safely, AFGE said, until the Legionella outbreak is under control.

  • CS Monitor ☛ Iraqi women protest child brides as parliament considers changing law

    The proposed amendments would allow Iraqis to turn to religious courts on issues of family law, including marriage, which currently are the sole domain of civil courts.

  • Atlantic Council ☛ Iraq’s new family law amendment could potentially legalize child marriage—and fracture the country

    Alarmingly, the Iraqi parliament recently proposed an amendment to its Personal Status Law (PSL) that could potentially legalize child marriage for girls as young as nine, thereby further restricting women’s rights.

Monopolies/Monopsonies

• New York Times ☛ Remedies to Google’s Search Monopoly Will Be Decided by August 2025, Judge Says

  Last month, Judge Mehta declared Google a monopolist in internet search. He said Google had established and cemented its more than 90 percent share of the search market through exclusive contracts with companies like Apple to feature Google instead of other search engines.

  A decision on how to fix Google’s monopoly could help set a precedent for other federal antitrust cases brought against Amazon, Apple and Meta, which owns Facebook and Instagram. Regulators in recent years have sued the companies over allegations that they created monopolies that affect public discourse, commerce and entertainment.

• The Verge ☛ The DOJ wants info on Google’s AI strategy to bust up its search monopoly

  The request came during a hearing on Friday in a federal court in Washington, DC, where Google and the DOJ met before Judge Amit Mehta, who recently ruled in favor of the DOJ and agreed that Google is an illegal monopolist. Mehta’s decision officially ended the first phase of the trial, which focused on whether Google is liable under antitrust law. Now the parties are moving onto the remedies phase, where the government will propose solutions to correct the illegal behavior and restore competition to the market.

• The Washington Post ☛ Judge sets hearings on penalties for Google’s search monopoly

  In the initial phase of the Justice Department’s monopoly trial against Google’s search business — the first such case against a major tech company in decades — Judge Amit P. Mehta of the U.S. District Court for the District of Columbia ruled last month that the Alphabet unit violated antitrust law through business practices spanning more than a decade that helped ensure its search engine remained No. 1.

• The Korea Times ☛ Google abusing power over website ads, UK regulator says

  The Competition and Markets Authority (CMA) said it believed Google was using anti-competitive practices in open display ad tech through the preference of its own ad exchange, which could be harming thousands of British publishers and advertisers.

  "We've provisionally found that Google is using its market power to hinder competition when it comes to the ads people see on websites," said Juliette Enser, the CMA's interim executive director of enforcement.

• Silicon Angle ☛ Verizon acquires Frontier for $20B to expand fiber network services

  The Wall Street Journal initially reported the upcoming deal on Wednesday, which the two companies confirmed today. According to the agreement, Verizon is set to purchase Frontier for $38.50 per share in cash [sic].

• Techdirt ☛ Press Happily Parrots Verizon’s Claim That Its $20 Billion Purchase Of Frontier Will Be A Huge Boon To Consumers

  Tell me if you’ve heard this one before: a major U.S. regional telecom monopoly is looking to buy another major U.S. regional telecom monopoly in a massive transaction that both companies insist holds vast benefits for American consumers.

  This time it’s Verizon stating it intends to purchase Frontier in a massive $20 billion deal that would transfer ownership of Frontier’s fiber, voice, and DSL networks back to Verizon. The deal, Verizon insists in a press release, will make U.S. broadband better and (somehow) more competitive: [...]

• Patents

  • Software Patents

    • Motor Trend Group LLC ☛ Ford Patents In-Car System That Eavesdrops So It Can Play You Ads

      The patent, in a roundabout sort of way, acknowledges that in-car advertising might be received poorly by occupants. For one, there’s a recognition that an occupant’s “natural inclination to seek minimal or no ads” should be balanced with “maximum opportunity for ad-based monetization.” The patent, basically, says that it will use a few different algorithms to bypass occupants’ preference for zero ads by playing ads at certain times, attempting to minimize disruption by understanding the context.

    • Car Scoops ☛ Ford Wants To Patent Ad Serving Infotainment System That’ll Eavesdrop On You | Carscoops

      • A new patent application from Ford leverages interior microphones to serve relevant ads.

      • It could, in theory, also use information like voice commands and navigation directions for the same purpose.

    • [Old] Justia ☛ US Patent Application for IN-VEHICLE ADVERTISEMENT PRESENTATION SYSTEMS AND METHODS Patent Application (Application #20240289844 issued August 29, 2024)

      Advertisements can be presented to users in their vehicles through various means. For example, some advertisements can be presented visually and/or auditorily using an in-vehicle infotainment system or other similar human-machine interfaces (HMI). Advertisements can be presented through voice or audio systems in the vehicle. A user's preferences for advertisements can also be influenced by driving conditions or other contexts.

• Copyrights

  • Torrent Freak ☛ That's All Folks: KimCartoon's 120m Visit Piracy Caper Ends in a DMCA Disaster

    KimCartoon, a pirate site dedicated to all things cartoon, surprised users this week with a sudden "That's All Folks" before shutting itself down. With an estimated 120 million visits over the last 12 months alone, KimCartoon was a very busy site and with that kind of traffic, life can get complicated. The site's operator says the site was shut down "due to DMCA" but, after weathering many storms over the years, maybe there's a little bit more to it than that.

  • Torrent Freak ☛ Man Arrested for Sharing Copyright Infringing Nude Scenes Through Reddit

    Danish police have arrested a 39-year-old man who shared nude scenes of more than a hundred female actors through Reddit and porn sites. The suspect has been charged with copyright infringement. While posting small clips from movies or TV-shows typically doesn't result in criminal action, taking nude clips out of context is considered a breach of actors' and filmmakers' integrity.

  • Digital Music News ☛ Bandcamp Fridays Are Returning — $120M Generated for Artists

    Bandcamp Fridays are returning as a way for the platform to give back to artists. The platform says the promotion has resulted in millions of fans paying over $120 million directly to labels and musicians they love.

  • Greece ☛ Internet Archive loses court appeal in fight over online lending library

    In its appeal, the nonprofit argued that its Free Digital Library was protected by so-called fair use laws, and that scanning the books was a transformative use of the material done in the public interest. The court firmly rejected that claim.