Leftovers

• Robert Birming ☛ Snapshot Blogging

  For me, blogging is a snapshot – even if I'm writing about something that happened a long time ago. The content might be timeless, but it still has a timestamp in the form of being written from the person I am here and now. My mood at the moment, today's events, my life situation...

• Tech Central (South Africa) ☛ How to safeguard your photos in the digital age

  There’s little reason to not make some sort of backups of photos in 2024, whether that’s on printed media, hard drives or in the cloud. The important thing is not which method to use, but to do it at all.The Conversation

• Education

  • Axios ☛ What's happened to men in the labor market

    Driving the news: The share of working-age men in the labor market has been declining for decades — particularly for those without college degrees.

• Hardware

  • Tom's Hardware ☛ Best Laser Cutters and Engravers 2024

    Laser cutters, also sometimes called laser engravers, come in all shapes and sizes, allowing you to safely work with a variety of materials, from oak to iron-on transfers. You can get one of the best low power laser cutters for as little as $220. Low-wattage lasers are cheaper and perfect for engraving images and cutting thin materials. Higher wattage machines are more expensive and can cut through thicker material in one pass. To help you choose, we’ve tested several models and listed the best laser cutters below.

  • Ruben Schade ☛ An OQO or Hand386 successor for commuting?

    My ideal commuting device is something akin to the original OQO from the 2000s, which was a little PC with a monitor that slid out to reveal a thumb keyboard. These weren’t scaled-up PDAs, they were scaled-down computers. As such, they ran real desktop x86 operating systems and software, and could connect with desktop peripherals. This made them impractical for the kinds of things we’d use a smartphone for now, but they were the perfect form factor for a handheld PC on the go.

• Health/Nutrition/Agriculture

  • KFF ☛ A Look at State Efforts to Ban Cellphones in Schools and Implications for Youth Mental Health

    Youth often use cellphones to access social media and social media is linked to poor mental health. In 2023, a survey of adolescents found that 51% reported using social media for at least four hours per day. Adolescent social media use is associated with higher rates of anxiety and depression, exposure to harmful content – the effects of which adolescents are more susceptible to – and body dissatisfaction and eating disorders, especially among girls. Excessive social media use and social media addiction are associated with sleep issues, which may result in negative neurological effects. However, social media use among youth can also be beneficial as it allows for self-expression, finding communities with shared interests, and accessing important resources, including mental health resources.

  • Lusaka ZM ☛ Zambia : Zambia’s Dead End: Why Our Future Hinges on Bold Action in Energy and Agriculture

    It is time to accept that agriculture is a science one that requires a deep understanding of soil health, climate conditions, and plant biology. Merely providing farmers with bags of fertilizer and seed, or even offering mechanization solutions like tractors, will not solve the problem. Plants need more than just nitrogen, phosphorus, and potassium; they require a balanced array of nutrients and, critically, proper soil pH. Without addressing these scientific realities, we are effectively malnourishing our crops and setting our farmers up for failure.

  • Science Alert ☛ Psychologist Explains How to Stop Using Food as a Coping Mechanism

    Emotional eating be gone.

  • CS Monitor ☛ How to fight urban warming? Detroit chooses to plant green spaces.

    Urban areas trap heat due to heat-absorbing surfaces like asphalt and concrete. More cities are adding trees and green spaces to cool the air temperature while heat waves become longer and hotter.

• Security

  • Privacy/Surveillance

    • The Scotsman ☛ Police Scotland must adhere to 200-year-old Peelian Principles when considering AI surveillance tech

      The concept of “policing by consent” is a historic one. The so-called ‘Peelian Principles’ – named after Prime Minister Robert Peel and first adopted in 1829 – included a recognition that the “power of the police to fulfil their functions and duties is dependent on public approval of their existence, actions and behaviour and on their ability to secure and maintain public respect”.

      Given the approach of its 200th anniversary, this idea has more than stood the test of time, with policing by consent now regarded as “a fundamental principle that underpins modern democratic societies”, to quote the UK Justice Ministry.

    • PC World ☛ How often should you turn off your phone? Here's what the NSA says

      The simple answer from security experts as to how often a phone should be turned off completely is: at least once a week. And not just for the protection it provides! In addition to eliminating the security risk, regular reboots also allow the smartphone’s operating system to run all functions smoothly.

• Defence/Aggression

  • Deutsche Welle ☛ 2024-09-21 [Older] US soldier who fled to N. Korea released after guilty plea

  • France24 ☛ Trojan cars: Why the US fears Chinese cyberattacks on electric vehicles

    But so far, most examples of vehicles being hacked do not indicate they are tools of international espionage. “For the moment, we essentially have cases of hacking in order to bypass vehicles’ security systems in order to steal them,” Vitu says.

    But the danger is not just theoretical. “There have been demonstrations of connected vehicles being controlled remotely,” says Sébastien Viou, director of cybersecurity for French company Stormshield.

    Connected vehicles also offer multiple entry points for hackers – largely via the software targeted by the latest US ban.

  • VOA News ☛ Attacks by Islamic extremists are rampant in Africa's Sahel

    Extremist attacks in Sahel, an arid swath of land south of the Sahara in Africa, have proliferated in recent months: Last week, Islamic militants attacked Bamako, the capital of Mali, for the first time in almost a decade, demonstrating their capacity to carry out large scale assaults. And last month, at least 100 villagers and soldiers were killed in central Burkina Faso during a weekend attack on a village by al-Qaida-linked jihadis, as they were forcibly helping security forces dig trenches to protect security outposts and villages.

    Here's what we know about the security situation in Sahel: [...]

  • VOA News ☛ Sexual violence used as weapon of war throughout conflict in Sudan

    U.N. Women is calling for urgent action to protect women and girls and to provide them with access to food, safe water, and sexual and reproductive health services.

  • Russia, Belarus, and War in Ukraine

    • LRT ☛ Lithuania’s Sabonis stars in new DRM spreader Netflix series about NBA

      Domantas Sabonis attended the premiere of the DRM spreader Netflix series Starting Five on Tuesday night in anticipation of the start of the NBA season. The 28-year-old was joined on the red carpet by LeBron James (Los Angeles Lakers), Anthony Edwards (Minnesota Timberwolves), Jimmy Butler (Miami Heat), and Jayson Tatum (Boston Celtics).

    • The Strategist ☛ As important as Ukraine is, a Taiwan war must be Australia’s biggest worry

      Other than the Middle East, the world faces the possibility of two major wars escalating in Europe and East Asia, over Ukraine and Taiwan.

    • France24 ☛ Austria's far-right Freedom Party comes out ahead in legislative election

      Vote projections showed that Austria’s far-right Freedom Party won national legislative election for the first time on Sunday. The far right has benefited from voters’ anxieties about immigration, inflation, Ukraine and other concerns.

    • France24 ☛ Russia says it downed more than 100 Ukrainian drones in one of the war's largest barrages

      Moscow said on Sunday that its air defences downed 125 Ukrainian drones overnight, in one of the largest barrages seen in Russia since it invaded Ukraine in February 2022. In Ukraine, more than a dozen civilians were injured in an overnight barrage of Russian guide bombs on the southern city of Zaporizhzhia, as the Ukrainian military warned that Russia could be preparing for an offensive in the wider region.

    • France24 ☛ Chinese exports fuel Russia's 'war machine' in Ukraine, Blinken says

      US Secretary of State Antony Blinken expressed doubts Friday about China's efforts to pursue a peace deal in Ukraine, saying Beijing's exports to Russia were fuelling Moscow's "war machine". China and Brazil have been trying to rally the world's emerging powers on the sidelines of the UN General Assembly to support a "comprehensive and lasting settlement" through negotiations between Moscow and Kyiv.

    • Hong Kong Free Press ☛ China warns against ‘expansion’ of Ukraine war

      China’s Foreign Minister Wang Yi warned on Saturday against the expansion of the conflict in Ukraine, which has accused Beijing of assisting Russia in its war. Kyiv has been particularly scornful of Beijing’s calls for talks to resolve the conflict, but Wang reiterated China’s offer to help broker an end to fighting.

    • RFERL ☛ Ukrainian Drones Reach Deeper Into Russia As Biden Says Kyiv 'Will Win This War'

      Ukraine reported multiple injuries from overnight Russian drone attacks in a handful of regions on September 29, while Russian defense officials claimed to have shot down 125 Ukrainian drones in the latest reflection of Kyiv's increasing efforts to take the 2 1/2-year-old war to Russian territory.

    • France24 ☛ Trojan cars: Why the US fears Chinese cyberattacks on electric vehicles

      The White House announced a plan this week to ban the sale or import of connected vehicles containing “specific pieces of hardware and software” that could be made in China or Russia, citing national security fears. While the threat of cyberattacks on connected vehicles is very real, the timing of the US announcement is unusual.

    • JURIST ☛ South Korea accuses Russia of illegal arms trade with North Korea at UN

      South Korean Foreign Minister, Tae-yul Cho accused Russia of engaging in illegal arms trading with North Korea on Saturday during the 79th session of the General Assembly of the United Nations, reiterating that North Korea continues to pose a threat to peace on the Korean peninsula with its ongoing development of nuclear weapons.

    • RFERL ☛ Russian PM Mishustin To Travel To Iran For Meeting With Pezeshkian

      Amid growing tensions in the Middle East, the Kremlin announced that Prime Minister Mikhail Mishustin will travel to Tehran to meet with Iranian President Masud Pezeshkian on September 30.

    • New York Times ☛ Put Vladimir Putin on Trial for War Crimes? That’s One Lawyer’s Demand.

      The human rights barrister Geoffrey Robertson argues that even a trial in absentia would have impact and could vindicate international law.

    • France24 ☛ Russia to formalise revised nuclear doctrine in warning to the West

      Amendments to Russia's nuclear doctrine have been prepared and "will now be formalised", the Kremlin said Sunday, days after President Vladimir Putin warned that Russia could use nuclear weapons if it was struck with conventional missiles and would consider any attack backed by a nuclear power to be an attack by that nuclear power.

• Transparency/Investigative Reporting

  • The Verge ☛ Meta blocks links to the hacked JD Vance dossier on Threads, Instagram, and Facebook

    Meta is restricting links on Threads, Instagram, and Facebook that lead to Ken Klippenstein’s newsletter containing a JD Vance dossier that was allegedly nabbed in an Iranian hack of the Trump campaign. The company has apparently removed posts containing the link and is seemingly blocking links to PDFs of the dossier being hosted elsewhere.

• Environment

  • Vox ☛ Climate Change: What If We Get It Right? A new book on optimizing in facing the climate crisis.

    According to Johnson, there are already many concrete climate solutions. If we were motivated by a belief in a better tomorrow — not a worse one — we would implement more of those solutions (and find new ones).

    So, if you’re someone looking for inspiration, or reasons to feel hopeful — or, even better, for guidance on what to do and where to start — then this book, and this conversation with Johnson, is for you.

    This interview has been edited for length and clarity.

  • Energy/Transportation

    • Deutsche Welle ☛ 2024-09-20 [Older] Decoding China: Beijing's delicate EV mission in Europe

    • El País ☛ Instructions for making the Sun: How the race for nuclear fusion has accelerated

      Germany has launched a €1 billion ($1.11 billion) research plan through 2028 that integrates both magnetic and inertial pathways for the first time. Its goal is to have a fusion power plant ready by 2040. The United Kingdom wants to have its own STEP plant ready in the same decade, to be built on a former coal-fired power station in West Burton, central England. China, which spends around $1.5 billion a year on the sector, plans to have its first industrial prototype of a fusion reactor, dubbed the “artificial sun,” by 2035 and begin large-scale commercial production by 2050. The U.S. Congress approved a record investment of $1.48 billion this year.

    • Lusaka ZM ☛ Zambia : Zambia’s power, cost of living crisis

      The power deficit, caused by a severe El Nino induced drought that has incapacitated the country’s 86% hydro dependent electric generation capacity, has greatly exacerbated the woes of the majority of citizens, a cost of living crisis foremost amongst them, leaving the 3 year old UPND administration deeply unpopular. Paradoxically, the ruling party continues to win local government by elections, a situation the opposition attributes this to rampant vote buying in predominately poverty stricken wards with high levels of illiteracy and ignorance. Of 58 y elections held since the 2021 general elections, the UPND have won over 50, gaining significant inroads in opposition strongholds along the way.

  • Wildlife/Nature

    • The Hindu ☛ New study reveals five genetically-distinct population of Asian elephants in India

      The research identified five elephant populations spread across Northern, Central, and Southern India. Two populations in the north and three in the south. Historically, elephants migrated from the north to the south, but with each migration, their genetic diversity declined.

• AstroTurf/Lobbying/Politics

  • Deutsche Welle ☛ 2024-09-20 [Older] EU Parliament recognizes Maduro rival as Venezuela president

  • India Times ☛ OpenAI is growing fast and burning through piles of money

    But it expects to lose roughly $5 billion this year after paying for costs related to running its services and other expenses such as employee salaries and office rent, according to an analysis by a financial professional who has also reviewed the documents. Those numbers do not include paying out equity-based compensation to employees, among several large expenses not fully explained in the documents.

  • India Times ☛ Cisco opens manufacturing facility in Chennai

    Cisco has partnered with Flex for building the Chennai factory to produce advanced telecom technologies. The facility will initially focus on Cisco’s Network Convergence System (NCS) 540 Series of routers, representing the first phase of the company’s multi-year investment plan.

  • Misinformation/Disinformation/Propaganda

    • Deutsche Welle ☛ 2024-09-20 [Older] Fact check: No iPhones, solar panels, laptops exploded in Lebanon

    • Deutsche Welle ☛ 2024-09-20 [Older] Fact check: Did Clinton call for jail over misinformation?

    • VOA News ☛ Russian pushes baseless 'Ukraine ties' narrative in Trump assassination attempt

      Former Russian President Dmitry Medvedev suggested in his September 16 post on X that Ukraine "hired" Routh to assassinate Trump. The fact-checking outlet News Guard's Reality Check debunked Medvedev's claim as "baseless."

    • New York Times ☛ Can Mainstream Media Save Itself?

      “By and large, young adults are getting their news [sic], if they get it at all, from social media,” Ms. Amazeen said. As far as they’re concerned, “social media is exciting and it’s accessible,” because there’s little effort or expense required: just a scroll down a smartphone screen.

      This practice — which Ms. Amazeen called “passive news consumption” — is among a variety of factors plaguing the mainstream media.

• Censorship/Free Speech

  • The Guardian UK ☛ Harrods must reveal all NDAs signed by Mohamed Al Fayed’s victims, say lawyers

    Lawyers acting for women attacked by Mohamed Al Fayed say Harrods must reveal how many people were silenced by non-disclosure agreements after its new owners pledged not to enforce any signed during his ownership.

    Fayed covered up his sexual abuse by intimidating victims into signing NDAs in exchange for money, as well as taking libel action against media outlets that tried to expose him.

  • Jacobin Magazine ☛ For Ken Klippenstein, Against Censorship

    Back then, many left-of-center commentators ignored the scandal or even justified Twitter’s actions — after all, the story was seen as an eleventh-hour election boost to Trump. Not so now, when even the most hard-line Democratic partisans are outraged about Twitter’s censorship, since the shoe is on the other foot. (Amusingly, as part of this mindless partisan do-si-do that’s core to US political discourse, the same Right that complained about the Post being censored has now taken up its opponents’ rhetoric in support of censorship here, almost verbatim).

  • Deutsche Welle ☛ Dark web: Is the Tor browsing network still secure?

    Such a system is particularly important for people in countries like China, Russia or Iran, where governments have installed Internet censors or surveillance. A graphic explaining how to access DW's website through a Tor browser How to access DW's website through a Tor browser

    The Tor network allows people in these countries to freely communicate on the Internet without fear of government surveillance systems recognizing them. This also allows journalists, activists and whistleblowers to protect their sources and exchange information securely.

    Additionally, Tor browsers can access websites like Deutsche Welle's from countries where they are banned. DW has made its website accessible to Tor to allow users to circumvent Internet censors and access DW content.

• Freedom of Information / Freedom of the Press

  • India Times ☛ AFP targeted in cyberattack

    After the attack was detected on Friday, "AFP's technical teams are working on the incident with the support of the French National Agency for IT Systems Security (ANSSI)," AFP said in a statement.

  • The Hindu ☛ 2 mediapersons manhandled

    The Kerala Union of Working Journalists (KUWJ) district committee protested against the attack on the mediapersons.

  • VOA News ☛ Kazakh journalists worry as new media rules come into force

    Media watchdogs and journalists in Kazakhstan have raised fears that new regulations governing reporters, adopted outside a new media law, leave room for authorities to obstruct access to information and limit journalists’ ability to work.

• Civil Rights/Policing

  • Kev Quirk ☛ The Right to Remain Silent

    I've recently been down a YouTube rabbit hole about Police who abuse their position. If you were stopped by an officer, would you exercise your right to remain silent?

    Ok, so I'm browsing YouTube, as one often does, and I end up down this rabbit hole of videos about "corrupt cops" and how they basically bully people into either a) giving them their ID etc. or b) being arrested for nothing.

  • Vox ☛ Why does poverty persist in the United States?

    America has gone through many ups and downs since the civil rights era, but one thing has remained remarkably constant: In 1970, 12.6 percent of Americans were considered poor; in 2023, that number was 11.1 percent — or 36.8 million people. “To graph the share of Americans living in poverty over the past half-century amounts to drawing a line that resembles gently rolling hills,” the sociologist Matthew Desmond wrote last year.

  • Michigan Advance ☛ Some states want to make it easier to cancel subscriptions

    When Tennessee state Rep. Bob Freeman, a Democrat, studied his cable and internet bill last year, he kept seeing recurring charges for app subscriptions he didn’t recognize. Turned out, his 14-year-old daughter had been signing up for subscriptions with introductory rates and never canceling when they rolled over to the full price.

    “I would question her bills, and she said, ‘Oh, it’s only $1.99.’ Those were teaser rates,” he said in an interview. To actually cancel, he said, he had to send an email to the company for a follow-up phone call, during which the company representative would try to talk him out of it.

    “It was clear it was not meant for convenience. … It was clear it was predatory,” he said.

• Digital Restrictions (DRM)

  • Tom's Hardware ☛ HP ink cartridge DRM bypass demonstrated using physical man-in-the-middle-attack

    Ink cartridge hacks have proliferated in the ink cartridge markets, especially as HP and other printer manufacturers sell their ink at exorbitant prices (presumably to recoup their initial investment in their printers) which they reportedly sell at a loss. Because of these high prices, many have resorted to using third-party cartridges, which printer makers have attempted to stop by embedding chips.

Monopolies/Monopsonies

• David L Farquhar ☛ When Internet Explorer passed Netscape for the first time

  It was on September 28, 1998 that Internet Explorer passed Netscape in market share for the first time. It took just under three years for it to go from an afterthought in the Microsoft Plus pack to the dominant browser. And that was the beginning of the end for Netscape. It held the position until May 14, 2012.

• India Times ☛ Amazon: UK clears Amazon's AI partnership with Anthropic

  Britain's competition regulator said on Friday Amazon's artificial intelligence partnership with startup Anthropic will not be referred for a deeper probe as it did not raise competition concerns.

• India Times ☛ Google: How Google defended itself in the ad tech antitrust trial

  Google's lawyers wrapped up their arguments in the case on Friday, and the government will now offer a rebuttal. Judge Leonie Brinkema of the US District Court for the Eastern District of Virginia, who is presiding over the nonjury trial, is expected to deliver a ruling by the end of the year, after both sides summarize their cases in writing and deliver closing arguments.

  The government last week concluded its main arguments in the case, US et al. v. Google, which was filed last year and accuses Google of building a monopoly over the technology that places ads on websites around the [Internet].

• Patents

  • Software Patents

    • DPK.land ☛ The Public Domain Problem

      In many countries, mathematical formulas and proofs are supposed to be unpatentable. Since a computer algorithm is just a series of formulas, and a computer program is mathematically equivalent to a proof, computer algorithms and programs are supposed to be unpatentable. Unfortunately, dysfunctional regulatory systems around the world have been bamboozled into allowing patents on software ideas anyway. This may happen infrequently or it may be considered quite normal, depending which country it is.

      In most countries, patents are published as soon as they are applied for, so everyone knows what might be subject to a patent claim in the future. In other countries, patents sometimes remain a secret until they are actually granted. This means that someone can apply for a patent, publish software which uses it, and then only once the patent is granted start to wring people out for patent licence fees, although nobody could have had any idea when they started using the software that it was covered by a patent.

      The free software community perceives a great threat from software patents. We’ll look at how they have responded to that threat below, but unlike trademarks, the consensus is that software which implements ideas that are known to be patented is not really free software. At most, it’s free software but with a dangerous asterisk attached to it. Despite this, most free software licences do not explicitly mention patents.

    • [Old] Dan Bricklin ☛ Patents and Software

      With the law interpreted one way for so long, and an entire industry structuring itself around that interpretation, allowing the patenting and enforcement of patents of pure software this late in the life of the art is an unusual hardship for a thriving industry that is crucial to the world's economy. While it may theoretically have been appropriate to have pure software patents, the opportunity has passed. Imagine if the aircraft or radio industries had gone 50 years without patents, and then suddenly patents were allowed, with little prior history kept in legal records. Chaos would come about. We do not need that in the software industry.

    • [Old] Dan Bricklin ☛ Patenting VisiCalc

      [...] The patent attorney explained to us the difficulty of obtaining a patent on software, and estimated a 10% chance of success, even using various techniques for hiding the fact that it was really software (such as proposing it as a machine). Given such advice, and the costs involved, we decided not to pursue a patent. Copyright and trademark protection were used, and vigorously pursued. [...]

• Copyrights

  • The Verge ☛ YouTube pulls songs from Adele, Nirvana, and others due to SESAC dispute

    Many hit songs are missing from YouTube and YouTube Music as it negotiates a new deal with the performing rights organization SESAC.

  • Variety ☛ Adele, Bob Dylan Songs Blocked by YouTube in Legal Dispute

    Songs by Adele, Bob Dylan, Green Day, R.E.M., Burna Boy, Rush and many others are currently unplayable on YouTube in the U.S. due to a legal dispute between the platform and the performing rights organization SESAC.

    Attempts to play many, but not all, songs by those artists on Saturday met with the following message: “This video contains content from SESAC. It is not available in your country.”

  • Baldur Bjarnason ☛ An interesting analysis of fair use and generative models

    It’s interesting to see how the opinions of legal scholars on the applicability of fair use to generative model training has shifted over time as more accurate explanations of how the technology works become more accessible.

    For these and other reasons, each of the four factors of section 107 of the Copyright Act weighs against AI’s claim of fair use, especially when considered against the backdrop of a rapidly evolving market for licensed use of training materials.

    The conclusion is quite damning.

  • Torrent Freak ☛ Pirate IPTV Subscribers Warned They Face "Automated Fines"

    The head of telecoms regulator AGCOM confirmed this week that a memorandum of understanding between the Prosecutor's Office, Guardia di Finanza, and AGCOM, heralds a new stage in Italy's fight against IPTV piracy. Massimiliano Capitanio said that automatic information exchange between the parties will enable subscribers of pirate IPTV services to be automatically fined.