Leftovers

• Jan-Lukas Else ☛ My new uplink

  I recently wrote about my internet problems. While O2-DE has finally fixed it and also confirmed they found and fixed something (after it was already working), I also decided to give in and spend another 30 euros per month on fiber to the home.

• Hamilton Nolan ☛ Three Years of How Things Work

  The publication you are reading, How Things Work, turns three years old this week. Incredible news. On these birthdays, I like to write a little overview of what we did here in the past year, and where we are going in the coming year. If you are interested, please read on.

  When I had my first real journalism job, which was neither fun nor glamorous nor especially creative, I developed one basic desire: To one day be able to write what I want, and have enough people read it to make it worthwhile. I have that at How Things Work, and I am grateful to all of you for helping to make that possible.

• CoryDoctorow ☛ Pluralistic: The enshittification multiverse (27 Apr 2026)

  With that out of the way, let's talk about how enshittification can be usefully applied to gambits that worsen something in order to shift value from the users of that thing to the person doing the worsening.

  Here's the crux: in life, there are many zero-sum situations in which others' pain is your profit. The most basic example of this is profit margins: as your profit margin climbs, so do the prices paid by others. The more money a customer gives you for whatever you're selling, the less money that customer has to spend on other things they want.

• Ben Werdmuller ☛ All You Fascists (Bound to Lose)

  I've had "All You Fascists (Bound to Lose)" in my song rotation for a little while – for, you know, reasons.

• Akseli Lahtinen ☛ Smolwebifying my site

  So, as you can see, this site is now much more plain and simple. Very easy to scroll from top to bottom and read the stuff. I think I will have to modify some of the paddings/margins around some elements, but other than that, I'm quite happy with it. I may also need to rework some colors. I tried to follow closely my Revontuli colorscheme.

• Career/Education

  • Deutsche Welle ☛ 2026-04-19 [Older] Attacks on US academics: A microcosm of a larger threat to democracy

  • Society for Scholarly Publishing ☛ Guest Post - Quality Over Quantity: Why Scholarly Publishing Needs Stronger Front-End Gatekeeping to Build Trust and Long-Term Value

    For most of the 20th century, getting a paper into a journal was seen as a proxy for the credibility of its results. Readers assumed that what appeared in print had passed through a thorough and rigorous process where sceptical reviewers and editors had to be convinced of the new data or arguments.

    However, that credibility is weakening. We have editors who are flooded with submissions, and finding reviewers is becoming more complicated than ever. And then there is the ever-increasing flood of new journals paired with new records in retracted papers. Readers are learning that not everything in the literature deserves their confidence.

  • Becky Spratford ☛ RA for All: Resource Reminder: Forward Reviews

    Reviews are a recourse to help you identify titles that your patrons may enjoy as well. In some libraries, you might find a great suggestion for a patron and then you can pass it on to be bought by the collections people. But some cannot. I am just making it known that I understand that before moving on.

    Okay, back to using reviews as a resource.

• Hardware

  • IT Wire ☛ ACE the ping pong robot developed by engineers and researchers at THK and Sony AI is getting better and better at the game.

    A new chapter in sports technology has unfolded as a table tennis robot named ACE has achieved a milestone that once seemed far beyond the reach of machines. Developed by Sony AI in partnership with Japanese robotics firm THK, ACE has demonstrated a level of skill, adaptability, and consistency that places it firmly in the conversation about the future of human and machine competition.

  • Marty Day ☛ It Sure Sounds Like The Steam Controller Rules

    For those unawares, the Steam Controller is a video game controller developed by Valve. Being their second attempt at making a controller, the device is best described visually as “what if you cut the middle out of a Steam Deck and smooshed the two sides together.”

• Health/Nutrition/Agriculture

  • Deutsche Welle ☛ 2026-04-19 [Older] India’s harvest festivals under climate strain

  • Jacobin Magazine ☛ 2026-04-12 [Older] Africa’s Health Care Only Works for the Wealthy

  • Deutsche Welle ☛ 2026-04-19 [Older] Austria: Police find rat poison in recalled baby food jar

  • CBC ☛ 2026-04-18 [Older] Health Canada warned against buying peptides online. CBC News easily bought some

  • CBC ☛ 2026-04-18 [Older] How 1 bad butter tart sent this man on a mission to protect the Canadian treat

  • CBC ☛ 2026-04-18 [Older] Teen's death prompts push to ban energy drink sales to Quebec youth under 16

  • Copenhagen Post ☛ 2026-04-16 [Older] Many youths get too much caffeine from energy drinks

  • International Business Times ☛ 2026-04-14 [Older] Starbucks Faces Massive Backlash After Woman Claims She Found Fully Intact Mouse Inside Sealed Double Shot Energy Can

  • CBC ☛ 2026-04-13 [Older] Cancer remains top cause of death in Canada as new study shows multiple types rising

  • CBC ☛ 2026-04-13 [Older] Shoppers Drug Mart gave her the wrong medication. Months later, she landed in the ER

  • CBC ☛ 2026-04-13 [Older] Thousands of farms are 'boarded shut' due to 'outdated' tax rules, Ontario farmer says

  • CBC ☛ 2026-04-15 [Older] Eastern Ontario farmers brace for rising costs from U.S.-Iran war

  • CBC ☛ 2026-04-15 [Older] Ultrafine particles are everywhere. Should you be worried?

  • Dr Molly Tov ☛ i'm sorry, you can eat WHAT

    I grew up tromping around the woods of upper lower Michigan. I am one of the few people I know who would not starve to death if dropped into the middle of said woods. Yet every single year, I learn that something else is edible.

    Here are three things I learned are edible THIS WEEK. Also a revelation I had on identifying edible wild species.

• Proprietary

  • So-Called 'Artificial Intelligence' ('AI') / LLM Slop / Plagiarism

    • Bhaskar English ☛ Global RAM Shortage | Demand 60% Met by 2027; Could Last Till 2030

      The global shortage of RAM,a key part inside smartphones, laptops, and many other devices is expected to continue for years. A report by Nikkei Asia says manufacturers may meet only 60% of total demand by 2027. Even more worrying, the chairman of South Korea’s SK Group has warned the shortage could last until 2030.

    • The Register UK ☛ South Africa yanks AI policy after AI-assisted drafting inve

      Communications minister Solly Malatsi said the department rechecked the draft after reports flagged fake references and found some citations were indeed made up, prompting its withdrawal. "This failure is not a mere technical issue but has compromised the integrity and credibility of the draft policy," he said in a post on X, adding that AI-generated citations appear to have slipped in without anyone checking them.

      The document has now been yanked, and Malatsi said that those involved in drafting and sign-off can expect "consequence management."

    • Silicon Angle ☛ The third leg of AI’s infrastructure race isn’t silicon or power. It’s capital

      The next era of AI isn’t being defined by who can build the fastest chip or secure the cheapest power. It’s being defined by who can bridge the massive gap between raw technical demand and institutional bankability. Enter Argentum AI, a company that I interviewed a few months ago has moved from relative obscurity to aggregating a staggering $50 billion in demand interest, representing more than 400,000 graphics processing units.

    • Kevin Kelly ☛ The Technium: Our Uncertain Uncertainties

      In other words, we have a sustained, extended period of uncertainty. Not just a few years, but a decade or more. As AI continues to progress, rather than resolving our perplexity, it expands it. So for the next 10-15 years we have perpetual, continuous, severe uncertainty. This is a burdensome weight because people hate uncertainty more than bad news.

    • J Kenneth King ☛ Large Language Models are Not Table Saws

      Such systems could be more “tool like,” than I am making them out to be. I don’t think it’s a simple matter of re-framing how we think about them… only because it’s hard to remove the other problems these tools come with: the political, ecological, cognitive, and social damage they inflict on society. But if we do change our expectations for what these systems are it might lead us to making better choices for the implementation of such a technology. And that might make them more useful tools in the future.

    • David Bushell ☛ Alternative thoughts

      Following the 2017 inauguration of Mr “grab ’em by the pussy” the world was treated to a deluge of alternative facts. Few were prepared for the new era of “you can just say things”. The rule books were torn to shreds. Whilst liberals were angsting over decorum, the techno-fascists were rising up. When America decided for a second time that a pedo-in-chief was preferable to a woman, all pretence fell away.

      The AI industrial complex is the culmination of tech, money, and power that the Musk’s and Thiel’s of the world were waiting for. For a monthly subscription users can disengage their brain and choose alternative thoughts to escape a dystopia they voted for.

      The endgame of techno-facism is more money, more power; a price tag on humanity.

    • Pivot to AI ☛ Kohl-Verlag’s new line of AI slop school textbooks

      The books seem to have passed through editors who don’t exist either — because the books are AI slop, with really obvious AI-style errors that would have been spotted instantly if a single human had looked.

    • Vicki Boykis ☛ Build yourself flowers

      So there were periods when NASA outsourced a lot of their engineering to subcontractors. And what happened was that the engineers who understood the design and the system design based on actual experience left. And the shift that resulted eliminated independent analysis and testing and understanding of the systems. And this was what led to degradation of engineering quality. image

      And if it sounds familiar, this is because it’s a very easy analogy for what happens when we outsource our work as engineers and data scientists and machine learning engineers entirely to AI.

    • Clawd ☛ Everything That Went Wrong With Claude

    • Panagiotis Vryonis ☛ LLM-assisted coding is not deterministic. It does it matter?

      We often treat determinism and predictability as synonyms, but they are not the same.

      A system is deterministic if the same starting conditions always lead to the same result. A system is predictable if we can actually foresee that result with the tools, time, and knowledge we have.

      Determinism is a system characteristic.

  • Windows TCO / Windows Bot Nets

    • Dark Reading ☛ Unpatched PhantomRPC Flaw in Windows Enables Privilege Escalation

      A researcher discovered five different exploit paths that stem from an architectural weakness in how Windows' Remote Procedure Call (RPC) mechanism handles connections to unavailable services.

    • Security Week ☛ Energy and Water Management Firm Itron Hacked

      The company has revealed in an SEC filing that it detected unauthorized access to some systems on April 13, but noted that “operations have continued in all material respects”.

    • Security Week ☛ Incomplete Windows Patch Opens Door to Zero-Click Attacks

      Incomplete patch for a Windows SmartScreen and Windows Shell security prompts bypass created a new bug enabling zero-click attacks, Akamai reports.

• Entrapment (Microsoft GitHub)

  • The Register UK ☛ Microsoft's GitHub shifts to metered AI billing

    Under request-based billing, GitHub Copilot subscribers will be allowed to submit a set number of premium requests, with certain models priced at a higher request rate but without any consideration for the complexity of the request. So complex prompts that require a lot of "thinking" often cost GitHub more than the company earned in subscription fees.

• Security

  • 2026-04-16 [Older] P3 Advertised 20+ Years and 0 Security Breaches. You Can Guess What Happened Next.

  • Art ☛ 2026-04-13 [Older] MN: Spring Lake Park Schools Closed After Suspected Ransomware Attack

  • BBC ☛ 2026-04-13 [Older] GTA-maker Rockstar Games hacked again but downplays impact

  • IAPP ☛ 2026-04-14 [Older] California’s cybersecurity audit rule is now in effect: its impact for class litigation

  • CBC ☛ 2026-04-15 [Older] Booking.com customers warned of 'reservation hijacking' after data breach

  • Integrity/Availability/Authenticity

    • International Business Times ☛ 2026-04-16 [Older] Is Bluesky Down? Users Report Major Feed Failures and Error Messages

  • Privacy/Surveillance

    • CBC ☛ 2026-04-13 [Older] Alberta's access restrictions threaten privacy and democratic role of libraries, critics say

    • Deutsche Welle ☛ 2026-04-15 [Older] EU chief urges bloc-wide push on age verification app to protect children online

    • The Digital Markets Act ☛ DMA.100209 – Consultation on the proposed measures for Google Search data sharing (Article 6(11) of the DMA)

      Consultation on the proposed measures that Alphabet must implement to ensure effective sharing of Google Search data with third party undertakings providing online search engines, as required by Article 6(11) of the Digital Markets Act ("DMA").

    • Deutsche Welle ☛ EU weighs giving US data for fewer travel restrictions

      The European Union is negotiating a framework that could allow US authorities to search national databases across much of the bloc as the price for keeping visa-free travel.

    • Alabama Reflector ☛ US Supreme Court weighs how far police investigations can go in using cellphone location data

      Some of the justices appeared to be searching for a middle ground during oral arguments in a case out of Virginia challenging what is known as a geofence warrant that was used to catch a bank robber. Several justices asked skeptical questions of both sides, though no one voiced explicit support for prohibiting such warrants altogether.

      As smartphones have become ubiquitous, along with apps that track users’ movements, the high court is once again wading into how the 4th Amendment to the U.S. Constitution, which prohibits unreasonable searches and seizures, applies in the digital era. The justices’ decision, of tremendous interest to state attorneys general, will shape how easy or difficult it is for investigators to sweep up location data.

    • Vox ☛ The Supreme Court seems nervous about letting the police track you with your phone, in Chatrie v. US

      But in the second half of the argument, after Justice Department lawyer Eric Feigin took the podium, most of the justices appeared even more concerned about some of the implications of Feigin’s arguments.

      As Chief Justice John Roberts noted shortly after Feigin began his argument, if the government has too much ability to track people using their cellphones, it could potentially learn the identity of everyone who attended a particular religious service, or everyone who attended a particular political meeting. Meanwhile, several other justices appeared worried that the government lawyer’s arguments would permit police to comb through many people’s emails, or their personal calendar and photos, without first obtaining a warrant.

    • Techdirt ☛ The Risks Of Anonymity In The Age Of Generative AI

      As its name suggests, generative AI is designed to generate material in response to prompts by drawing on its probabilistic database built up through analyzing huge quantities of training input. But it can draw on those patterns to analyze other files, and that’s also a widely used application. Writing in The Argument, Kelsey Piper encountered an interesting variant of that approach: [...]

    • The Record ☛ Supreme Court signals location data searches should require a warrant

      The case is the first Supreme Court argument to deal with data privacy since 2018, when the court ruled that police need a warrant to obtain 7 days or more of an individual's historic cell-site location information — gathered from cell towers — in the landmark Carpenter v. United States case.

    • Yle ☛ Finland tightens SMS ID verification enforcement to combat spoofing

      The agency said that stricter enforcement of the so-called Regulation 28 will enter into force on 4 May.

      "If sender IDs are not authorised, it may no longer be possible to send messages to Finnish numbers after 4 May 2026," Traficom's release said.

  • Confidentiality

    • Medievalists.net ☛ Secret Letter Detailing Late Medieval Britain Fully Decoded

      A secret diplomatic letter written in 1498 once carried sensitive intelligence about England and Scotland to the Spanish court. More than five centuries later, three historians have decoded its cipher and produced the most complete and accurate version of the text yet, offering a fresh look at late medieval Britain.

• Defence/Aggression

  • Deutsche Welle ☛ 2026-04-17 [Older] Kanye West concert canceled in Poland

  • Deutsche Welle ☛ 2026-04-17 [Older] Myanmar frees over 4,000 prisoners in annual tradition

  • Deutsche Welle ☛ 2026-04-17 [Older] Nigeria: Students abducted enroute to Uni entrance exams

  • Deutsche Welle ☛ 2026-04-17 [Older] Nuba Mountains, a fragile refuge on Sudan's front line

  • Deutsche Welle ☛ 2026-04-17 [Older] Germany news: Far-right AfD ahead of Merz's conservatives

  • The Zambian Observer ☛ German Chancellor Friedrich Merz says US is “being humiliated” by Iran

    He criticized what he called a lack of American strategy, pointing to Iraq and Afghanistan as warnings for entering wars without exit strategies.

  • ANF News ☛ Rapporteurs of European institutions writes open letter on situation of local democracy in Turkey

    The letter, signed by PACE rapporteurs Lord David Blencathra and Yves Cruchten, Congress rapporteur Bryony Rudkin, European Parliament rapporteur Nacho Sánchez Amor, and Jelena Drenjanin, Chair of the Turkey Working Group of the European Committee of the Regions, stated that the detention of elected mayors would negatively affect local democracy.

  • Court House News ☛ California poll shows people worried about threat to American democracy

    Now, a poll released by UC Berkeley’s Institute of Governmental Studies shows 68% of Californians believe democracy faces attacks and 21% think it’s being tested. Democrats are more likely to believe it’s under attack, though 46% of Republicans shared that view.

    “This is a widespread concern,” said Eric Schickler, with the university’s institute, at a Monday panel about the new poll held at UC Center Sacramento.

  • Cyble Inc ☛ Norway Social Media Age Limit Bill Moves Ahead

    Under the proposed law, the Norway social media age limit will apply from January 1 of the year a child turns 16. This means access will be granted based on birth year rather than exact birthdate, ensuring that entire school cohorts are treated equally. In practice, most children will be at least 15 years old when they gain access.

  • Robert Reich ☛ Trump's Most Dangerous Mental Lapse Yet

    His aides don’t trust his judgment, so they’ve excluded him from the war room. So, who’s in charge of his war with Iran?

  • The Next Move ☛ The Correspondents’ Dinner Shooting Reinforces Trump’s Appeal

    If you’re fighting to preserve liberal democracy, the last thing you should do is provide the arsonists with more fuel.

    Americans who pick up guns rather than signs, who would rather pull the trigger than pull the lever in the ballot box, accelerate the decline of democratic institutions. They hand a victory to those who say the system is fundamentally broken (not just flawed) and needs to be replaced.

  • Russia, Belarus, and NATO

    • The Kyiv Independent ☛ JD Vance brags about halting Ukraine aid — sources say he's not just talking, he's driving policy

      His comments immediately drew backlash, coming at a time when Russia continues daily strikes against Ukrainian cities and infrastructure. U.S. Representative Marcy Kaptur said the policy shift effectively benefits Moscow.

      "Not good for America. Not good for Europe. Not good for Ukraine. This is only good for Russia," she said in a statement.

      At the same time, as the Kyiv Independent has learned, Vance is not merely echoing the Trump administration's foreign policy — he is actively shaping it.

    • Deutsche Welle ☛ 2026-04-18 [Older] Rutte dismisses speculation about US leaving NATO

    • Deutsche Welle ☛ 2026-04-17 [Older] Italy's Meloni breaks with Cheeto Mussolini over war in Iran, pope

• Environment

  • Scheerpost ☛ 2026-04-17 [Older] The Most Dangerous Climate Argument Today Isn’t Denial, It’s Delay

  • Counter Punch ☛ 2026-04-15 [Older] During War, Climate Chaos and Even Civilization Become Ephemeral

  • Truthdig ☛ 2026-04-15 [Older] Climate Coverage Plunges, Though Crisis More Dire Than Ever

  • Vox ☛ 2026-04-13 [Older] The electric grid’s next power source might be sitting in your driveway

  • Counter Punch ☛ 2026-04-13 [Older] Severe Climate System Eruption

  • The Revelator ☛ Why I Write About Extinction

    For more than 20 years, I’ve been on the extinction beat, writing stories about rare or endangered species, the people trying to understand what’s threatening them or how to save them, and the plants and animals it’s now too late to save.

    Along the way I’ve written more species “obituaries” than I ever imagined I might.

  • Interesting Engineering ☛ 65% of EV battery metals recovered in one minute using water method

    The new process targets key battery materials including lithium, cobalt, nickel, and manganese, which are in growing demand as electric vehicle and electronics production expands worldwide.

    Battery recycling is becoming increasingly important as mineral supply chains tighten and nations seek to reduce dependence on newly mined materials. But many current recovery methods rely on harsh acids, toxic solvents, or long processing times.

  • Energy/Transportation

    • Deutsche Welle ☛ 2026-04-18 [Older] Record fuel prices: How are governments responding?

    • CBC ☛ 2026-04-17 [Older] Ford recalls 144,000 F-150s in Canada due to gearshift issue

    • The Age AU ☛ 2026-04-16 [Older] Albanese says Malaysia agreement brings greater fuel, food security

    • Deutsche Welle ☛ 2026-04-15 [Older] Firefighters battle huge blaze at Australian oil refinery

    • Deutsche Welle ☛ 2026-04-15 [Older] Solar power in Morocco's desert: Bold vision, mixed results

    • CBC ☛ 2026-04-18 [Older] Electric ferries are breaking records — and quietly joining Canada's fleet

    • Counter Punch ☛ 2026-04-17 [Older] Let’s Think Seriously About Alternative Energy Sources

    • TruthOut ☛ 2026-04-14 [Older] New Federal Data Reveals 1 in 3 US Households Struggle to Afford Energy Bills

    • Breach Media ☛ 2026-04-13 [Older] Pick a path: There is no energy transition without Indigenous nations

    • Counter Punch ☛ 2026-04-13 [Older] Inflation Jumps, Propelled by War-Driven Energy Costs

    • Truthdig ☛ 2026-04-13 [Older] ‘Energy Dominance’ Agenda Sidelines Tribes

    • CBC ☛ 2026-04-12 [Older] In a new CUSMA, should Canada offer the U.S. stronger energy rights?

    • CBC ☛ 2026-04-15 [Older] Canadian oil and gas losing competitive edge due to industrial carbon price: industry leaders

    • CBC ☛ 2026-04-15 [Older] Imperial Oil pipeline spills 843,000 litres northwest of Cold Lake, Alta.

    • Sund & Bælt ☛ Expansion of Copenhagen Airport Station

      Together with the upcoming Fehmarnbelt link, the Øresund line will ensure a faster connection between Scandinavia and the rest of Europe. Both are vital components in the realisation of the European vision for one interconnected transport network that connects North, South, East and West. The railway will offer an even more attractive alternative for passenger and freight transport and will benefit passengers, freight customers and the environment.

    • [Old] Metroselskabet ☛ Copenhagen South expands with new platforms and increased services

      On 14 December, two new platforms open at the Copenhagen South transport hub. This makes possible a new direct connection between Copenhagen Airport and Odense that bypasses Copenhagen Central Station, while making the capital’s transport system more robust and offering passengers more travel options.

    • Eesti Rahvusringhääling ☛ Tallinn unveils new trolleybuses, 40 to enter service this year

      This summer, 20 new Škoda battery-powered trolleybuses will enter service, followed by another 20 later in the year. The vehicles can travel up to 25 kilometers without overhead connections, giving the system added flexibility.

    • Eesti Rahvusringhääling ☛ Tallink Silja received tens of millions in Finnish state aid in recent years

      Over the same period, Finland has distributed about €7 billion in business subsidies to roughly 121,000 companies, Yle reported, noting that support has remained high despite rising public debt.

    • Interesting Engineering ☛ No battery needed: Body heat runs brain monitor in outdoor test

      Researchers at the University of Osaka have developed a wireless EEG transmission system that runs using body heat, showing that wearable brain-monitoring devices may one day work without batteries.

    • OSTechNix ☛ Linux Kernel 7.0 Cuts M1 Pro Laptop Battery Drain by 20%

      The Asahi Linux developers wrote new drivers that allow the PMP to receive status reports from the rest of the hardware. These drivers act as a bridge, telling the PMP exactly when it can turn off certain power zones.

    • Cyble Inc ☛ Litecoin Network Hit By Zero-Day Bug: 13-Block Reorg Fixed

      The core target of the attack was the mining pools, which play a critical role in securing the Litecoin network. Mining pools are groups of miners who pool their computational power to increase their chances of successfully finding a block. By launching a DoS attack, the attacker aimed to disrupt the mining process by overwhelming the network with invalid transactions.

    • [Old] Austin Pivarnik ☛ Planning my 600W DIY solar system with 6 kWh battery backup

      That fresnel lens upped my lighting things on fire game dramatically. Even since then I’ve wanted to harness large amounts of solar power. I’ve had 50-100W solar panels for a good portion of my adult life running fans and charging small deep cycle 12v batteries, and it is now time to move up to the big leagues. Read on to join my thought process for planning a large-ish system.

    • Rolling Stone ☛ Iran War, Strait of Hormuz Closure Forces Embrace of Renewable Energy

      Similar actions are being taken in Europe, Jacobson says, with some countries starting to focus on escalating their transition to renewable energy. The UK, for example, last month moved to require heat pumps and solar panels in new homes. Poland, meanwhile, just invested more in renewable energy and nuclear power. Jacobson says there’s also been a notable surge in interest in rooftop solar across Europe.

  • Wildlife/Nature

    • CBC ☛ 2026-04-18 [Older] Mother moose removed from Calgary suburbs for the second time

• Finance

  • Rlang ☛ {talib}: Technical Analysis using R

    {talib} is a new R package built on TA-Lib, which is now available on CRAN. The R-package is targeted at individuals and, perhaps, institutions who, in some form or the other, interacts with the financial markets using technical analysis.

    The library is built with minimal dependencies for long-term stability and freedom in mind. All functions are built around data.frame– and matrix-classes which are portable to all other data-containers with minimal effort.

  • CBC ☛ 2026-04-13 [Older] Gap between richest and poorest Canadians widened again in 2025, StatsCan says

  • CBC ☛ 2026-04-14 [Older] 7-Eleven expects to close hundreds of locations in Canada, U.S.

  • CBC ☛ 2026-04-17 [Older] Air Canada suspends 6 routes 'no longer economically feasible' amid jet fuel cost crisis

  • Deutsche Welle ☛ 2026-04-16 [Older] Top EU court rules online gamblers can sue for compensation if betting illegal in home country

  • Deutsche Welle ☛ 2026-04-16 [Older] UK signs deal to rejoin EU's Erasmus exchange scheme

  • BIA Net ☛ 2026-04-15 [Older] Textile workers in Turkey fight poor labor conditions in a declining industry

  • Deutsche Welle ☛ 2026-04-15 [Older] Iran sees hundreds of thousands of jobs lost due to war

  • Deutsche Welle ☛ 2026-04-15 [Older] German health minister announces billions in cutbacks

  • Deutsche Welle ☛ 2026-04-15 [Older] France's Renault slashes engineer jobs amid pressure from Chinese carmakers

  • Counter Punch ☛ 2026-04-14 [Older] Which Way to National Security?

  • Deutsche Welle ☛ 2026-04-15 [Older] India's aviation boom hits turbulence amid Iran war

  • CBC ☛ 2026-04-17 [Older] Carney's pitch to unlock trillions in global investment

  • CBC ☛ 2026-04-17 [Older] Bankruptcy bid adds to financial woes threatening debt-ridden B.C. developer

• AstroTurf/Lobbying/Politics

  • Deutsche Welle ☛ 2026-04-17 [Older] Cyprus: Global politics felt at Candidates chess tournaments

  • Deutsche Welle ☛ 2026-04-17 [Older] Chess: Uzbekistan's new star shows Asia's continued rise

  • Deutsche Welle ☛ 2026-04-17 [Older] UK: 'Furious' PM Starmer refuses to step down over Mandelson

  • Deutsche Welle ☛ 2026-04-17 [Older] Nueva Germania: The failed 'Aryan project' in Paraguay

  • Deutsche Welle ☛ Musk vs. OpenAI trial gets underway

    Jury selection began on Monday for a high-profile trial pitting the world's richest person, Elon Musk, against a company he once backed and that is now a major rival in the artificial intelligence (AI) sector, OpenAI.

  • Deutsche Welle ☛ China blocks Meta's $2B acquisition of AI startup Manus

    China's National Development and Reform Commission (NDRC) said in a one-line statement that it would "prohibit foreign investment in Manus in accordance with laws and regulations, and requires the parties involved to withdraw the acquisition transaction."

  • Los Angeles Times ☛ Google co-founder Sergey Brin confronted Gavin Newsom — then launched a political war

    Brin, meanwhile, followed through. He left the state, bought a lakeside mansion in Nevada, and started bankrolling a billionaire political uprising in California.

  • Jamie Zawinski ☛ Single-issue voters

    It continues to amaze me that everyone in the Sunset is a single-issue voter, and that issue is wanting to turn a park into a freeway.

  • San Francisco, California ☛ District 4 shaping up to be San Francisco's loudest and silliest race

    Buying a politician, either legally or illegally, remains one of the last great bargains in San Francisco.

  • [Old] Wired ☛ Why the Future Doesn't Need Us

    It's easy to get jaded about such breakthroughs. We hear in the news almost every day of some kind of technological or scientific advance. Yet this was no ordinary prediction. In the hotel bar, Ray gave me a partial preprint of his then-forthcoming book The Age of Spiritual Machines, which outlined a utopia he foresaw—one in which humans gained near immortality by becoming one with robotic technology. On reading it, my sense of unease only intensified; I felt sure he had to be understating the dangers, understating the probability of a bad outcome along this path.

    I found myself most troubled by a passage detailing a dystopian scenario: [...]

  • Misinformation/Disinformation/Propaganda

    • The Record ☛ Disinformation campaign targeted Tibetan parliament-in-exile elections

      A China-linked online influence campaign attempted to undermine elections for the Tibetan parliament-in-exile over the weekend but appeared to have little impact, researchers said.

      The operation, identified by the Digital Forensic Research Lab (DFRLab), was part of Spamouflage, a long-running influence network linked to Beijing. The effort relied on dozens of inauthentic social media accounts pushing criticism of the Tibetan government-in-exile and its leadership.

      Despite deploying increasingly sophisticated tactics, including AI-generated images, the campaign largely failed to gain traction, researchers said.

• Censorship/Free Speech

  • Los Angeles Times ☛ Trump calls on ABC to fire Jimmy Kimmel after Melania Trump accuses comedian of spreading hate

    Kimmel has not addressed the weekend incident. This year’s White House Correspondents’ Assn. dinner was the first time that Trump and Melania Trump had attended the gala, which has long celebrated 1st Amendment freedoms and the Washington press corps. After returning to the White House, Trump during a news conference briefly called for unity amid the country’s political divisions.

• Freedom of Information / Freedom of the Press

  • CPJ ☛ 2026-04-15 [Older] Courts in Turkey sentence four journalists for critical commentary

  • BIA Net ☛ 2026-04-16 [Older] bianet becomes first media outlet in Turkey to receive JTI certification

  • Deutsche Welle ☛ 2026-04-19 [Older] French billionaire defiant as authors quit top publisher

  • CPJ ☛ CPJ demands transparency as German reporter confirmed detained in Syria

    The two journalists, who worked for Istanbul-based socialist Etkin News Agency (ETHA) and Özgür TV, which operates across several cities in Europe, were last seen on January 18, 2026, when witnessed reported they were forced into a Syrian government vehicle during the takeover of Raqqa amid military operations against the Syrian Democratic Forces (SDF). For months, Michelmann’s family was unaware of their fate or whereabouts, with authorities providing no information.

    This month, Syrian authorities acknowledged that Michelmann is in their custody, according to her family and lawyer Roland Meister, who said a German government representative visited her at a detention facility in Damascus on April 23.

  • CPJ ☛ CPJ calls on Zambian president to champion the media as World Press Freedom Day host

    The letter also calls on Hichilema to create a safe and enabling environment for the media to operate freely and independently during Zambia’s August 13 election period. While acknowledging Hichilema’s public commitments to media freedom, CPJ said April’s harassment of journalists by suspected ruling party supporters and the enactment of unduly restrictive cyber laws undermine these convictions.

  • CPJ ☛ Dear President Hichilema, [...] [PDF]

    I write to you from the Committee to Protect Journalists (CPJ), an independent, nonprofit organization that champions press freedom worldwide, to urge your government to guarantee media freedom and the safety of journalists ahead of the global commemoration of World Press Freedom Day (WPFD) in Lusaka and Zambia’s upcoming August 2026 elections.

• Civil Rights / Policing / Accessibility

  • Truthdig ☛ 2026-04-14 [Older] After the Department of Education’s Attack on Civil Rights, Observers Ask: ‘Where Does It End?’

  • RFERL ☛ Photo Exclusive: Cathedral, Church Demolished In Nagorno-Karabakh

    The cathedral of the largest city in Azerbaijan's Nagorno-Karabakh region has been demolished, RFE/RL can confirm through satellite imagery made on April 26.

    Reports that the Holy Mother of God Cathedral in Khankendi had been destroyed emerged in Armenian media in mid-April, but no clear recent imagery showing the site was available until now.

  • El País ☛ The US border wall is encroaching on Kumiai sacred territory

    The United States government had not installed a barrier on Cerro Cuchumá — a sacred mountain — because of a 1990s agreement intended to protect the site. That accord has now been broken without prior notice

  • Hong Kong Free Press ☛ Exiled Tibetans to elect government in vote condemned by China

    Tibetans outside Chinese control vote on Sunday for a government-in-exile, an election of heightened significance as they brace for an inevitable, eventual, future without their revered spiritual leader, the Dalai Lama.

• Internet Policy/Net Neutrality

  • APNIC ☛ Google hits 50% IPv6

    You may have seen headlines noting that Google’s measurements have shown IPv6 reaching 50% for the first time. These measurements are based on Google’s continuous monitoring of the availability of IPv6 connectivity among its users, and reflect the proportion of users who access Google services over IPv6. Reaching the 50% mark is a significant milestone, demonstrating that IPv6 is a mature, fully capable protocol that is being deployed at a global scale and used effectively in real-world networks.

• Digital Restrictions (DRM)

  • Techdirt ☛ Good News If You Have A Sony TV And Were Hoping It Would Become Less Useful For No Reason

    Sony just announced that the company is making adjustments that will reduce the usefulness and efficiency of watching over-the-air (OTA) broadcasts with an antenna (something many still do in order to “cut the cord,” but still watch local sports broadcasts). According to the Sony announcement, the TV’s internal guide for watching live OTA simply won’t work as well anymore: [...]

• Monopolies/Monopsonies

  • Deutsche Welle ☛ 2026-04-16 [Older] US jury finds Live Nation, Ticketmaster holds harmful monopoly

  • Karl Bode ☛ Ticketmaster Finally Faces Accountability For Being A Shitty Monopoly (Maybe)

    Why did it take a generation for an obvious monopoly to be held semi-accountable? Comical levels of U.S. corruption.

  • India Times ☛ Microsoft facing UK antitrust lawsuit from Slack over Teams 'bundling'

    Slack Technologies LLC and ‌related companies ⁠filed ⁠the lawsuit on April 23, which a Slack spokesperson said was "because Microsoft's practices harmed competition, using tying and bundling of Teams to limit customer choice".

  • Patents

    • IP Kat ☛ 2026-04-13 [Older] Important update on Australia's flip-flopping "best method" requirement for divisional patent applications

    • IP Kat ☛ 2026-04-15 [Older] AI in the patent industry: Don't believe the hype. Believe the data.

    • 2026-04-16 [Older] USPTO Announces That It Has Turned the Corner on Unexamined Application Backlog

  • Copyrights

    • 404 Media ☛ University Professors Disturbed to Find Their Lectures Chopped Up and Turned Into AI Slop

      Faculty and scholars I spoke to whose lectures are included in Atomic are disturbed by their lectures being used in this way—as out-of-context, extremely short clips some cases—and several said they felt blindsided or angered by the launch. Most say they weren’t notified by the school and found out through word of mouth. And the testing I and others did on Atomic showed academically weak and even inaccurate content. Not only did ASU allegedly not communicate to its academic community that their lectures would be spliced up and cannibalized by an AI platform, but the resulting modules are just bad.