Bonum Certa Men Certa

Links 16/2/2012: Netrunner 4.1, More Ubuntu 12.04 Previews





GNOME bluefish

Contents





GNU/Linux



Free Software/Open Source



Leftovers

  • My life with Coherent, part 1
    Coherent is a full fledged Unix that runs on a simple 386 with a few megabytes of memory - incredible, but true. The kernel is just a few hundred KB, so it boots in an instant. It lived happy together with MS-DOS in its own 40 MB partition. But the best thing was its price: only $100. Needless to say I spend a lot of hours with that little beast, porting my C programs and UUCPing with that "monster" machine back at work.


  • Security





  • Finance

    • Goldman Analyst Is Said to Face Insider Trading Inquiry
      A Goldman Sachs stock analyst has been drawn into the government’s sweeping investigation into insider trading at hedge funds.

      Federal investigators are examining whether Henry King, a senior technology industry analyst for Goldman based in Asia, provided confidential information to the bank’s hedge fund clients, according to a person with direct knowledge of the matter who requested anonymity because he was not authorized to discuss it publicly.




  • Censorship

    • Online Copyright: EU Court of Justice Rules Out Private and Automatic Censorship
      Paris, February 16th, 2012 – The European Court of Justice rendered another decision in defence of freedoms online. In the SABAM vs. Netlog case, it declares that forcing a hosting service to monitor and filter online content violates EU law. This is a crucial and timely ruling, just when initiatives such as ACTA and the revision of the IPRED directive aim to generalise private and automatic online censorship to enforce an outdated copyright regime.




  • Privacy

    • Social Networks and Privacy in the Eyes of Richard Stallman
      From the earliest days of Usenet to the huge leaps of the last decade, online socialization has come a long way, bringing with it interesting redefinitions of words that are part of everyday speech. If you hate an organization, you still have to hit ‘Like’ to get updates in your Facebook newsfeed to know what they’re up to. Someone “befriending” you can mean different things, often pretty much removed from reality.




  • Internet/Net Neutrality

    • AT&T throttling users at just over 2GB of data?


    • Democrats’ cyber bill still looms large
      Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid, following a recent anti-piracy legislative debacle with SOPA and PIPA, will lead his second effort of 2012 to push Internet-regulating legislation, this time in the form of a new cybersecurity bill. The expected bill is the latest attempt by the Democrats to broadly expand the authority of executive branch agencies over the Internet.

      Details about the bill remain shrouded in secrecy. Clues available to the public suggest that the bill might be stronger than President Barack Obama’s cybersecurity proposal, which was released in May 2011. Reid said that he would bring the bill — expected to come out of the Senate Homeland Security and Government Affairs Committee, chaired by Connecticut independent Sen. Joe Lieberman — to the floor during the first Senate work period of 2012.




  • Intellectual Monopolies



    • Copyrights

      • You Can’t Watch SNL’s Hilarious “Downton Abbey” Sketch Legally Online, So NBCUniversal Pirates Itself
        All I wanted to do was share a funny “Downton Abbey Meets Spike TV” skit that was on Saturday Night Live this week. Unfortunately, there’s no authorized version of the sketch online from NBCUniversal. That made me hesitate, but apparently it wasn’t a problem for iVillage, an NBCUniversal-owned site. Nor was it an issue for Time, owned by internet piracy hating Time Warner. Come along. This is a sad tour of failure all around.


      • Could SOPA Pervade Canadian Copyright Law?
        The battle over the Stop Online Piracy Act in the United States may have concluded with millions of Internet users successfully protesting against the bill, but many Canadians are buzzing about the possibility that some of its provisions could make their way into a copyright bill currently before the House of Commons.








Recent Techrights' Posts

Intercontinental Brigading - Part V - Keeping Linux Under Users' Control, Not Microsoft's (NSA) Control, Leads to Weaponisation of Cops (Killing the Messengers)
Transatlantic lawfare
UK's Competition and Markets Authority (CMA) Says Microsoft is Still Abusive
Today, ahead of the latest fake 'results' [...] Microsoft cheats the system everywhere it can
Fridges Do Not Need an Internet Connection
Keep it simple, stupid (KISS)
 
Another Friday 'Litter' of IBM Workers, Discarded and Sometimes Replaced to Cut Costs
The little that IBM earns is spent buying companies to pretend there's "growth" and headcount stability
Gemini Links 16/10/2026: Carrie, Games, and Slop
Links for the day
Links 16/10/2026: Election Interference by Slop; White House Backs Russia, Not Ukraine
Links for the day
The Register MS Has New 'Article' That Has "AI" 20 Times. "SPONSORED POST" As Usual.
At the end, both the media and the pyramid scheme will collapse
Links 16/10/2026: "Data Centers Are Driving Conservative Rural Voters to The Democratic Party En Masse" and Slop Bros Bribe Candidates "for Congress"
Links for the day
Deplatforming People You Disagree With Is a Losing Strategy
Trying to deplatform people you don't agree with is oppressive and petty
Microsoft Cannot Pay Salaries
Microsoft is deep in debt
IBM "support that is USA based will migrate over 4 years to Indian based just because it lowers costs substantially."
IBM is not capable of growing, so it tries to find ways to shave off costs
Gemini Links 16/10/2026: Publishing and Licensing, Going to Movies, and Nature/Seasons Change
Links for the day
Microsoft's OSI Calling Slop "Open Source AI" (Microsoft Paid OSI to Do This) Has Helped Associate "Open Source" With Pedophilia
Microsoft deflecting?
Wikileaks Still Matters
The world needs more sites like these
'Cocaine King' Campinos Should 'Get the Message', Pack Up His Things and Go Already
His staff is constantly on strike and engaged in various industrial actions
We Don't Do Slop
People tend to appreciate genuine work, not fakes
On Lying With Confidence
LLMs are hype
Market Share of Windows in the United Kingdom is Shockingly Low
Microsoft's losses are very profound
Over at Tux Machines...
GNU/Linux news for the past day
IRC Proceedings: Thursday, October 15, 2026
IRC logs for Thursday, October 15, 2026
Microsoft Can Barely Afford to Colonise Africa Any Longer (Too Much Debt)
"Before the announcement, former Microsoft employees publicly described staff being placed on performance improvement plans or offered “voluntary” exits."
Intercontinental Brigading - Part IV - Harassment Registered With the Police Before Projection Attempts Made From America
The thing one gets subjected to for opposing back doors in Linux
Gemini Links 16/10/2026: Dogs, Slop, and Blogging
Links for the day
The Fate of "Alicante Mafia" at the EPO Yet to Be Determined
It'll be interesting to hear what they say about the secret meeting regarding the future of Campinos
Gemini Links 15/10/2026: Medical Difficulty, Science Fiction, and Playstation 3 Dies
Links for the day
Links 15/10/2026: Cuts to Public Health and Misuse of License Plate Data for Social Control
Links for the day
Links 15/10/2026: ALPRs Are Mass Surveillance, GAFAM Front Group ('New' EFF) Asks the Wisconsin Supreme Court to End Warrantless ALPR Searches
Links for the day
IBM RAs: "It's on Me"
IBM has no respect for the workers and it tries to hide the layoffs
Gemini Links 15/10/2026: Literature, Funerals, and Devices
Links for the day
The Efforts to Criminalise Opposition to a Ponzi Scheme Sold as "Super Intelligence" (Plagiarism Engines, Disinformation Generators)
Cops are becoming combatants for slop bros, i.e. they use power to promote a Ponzi scheme
Clownflare Sees Most Requests in Africa Coming From Android (Linux)
Android is the dominant platform
IBM's "RA Season" is Nearly Upon Us, But Tens of Thousands Are Already Marked for Removal With PIPs (as "Low Performers")
IBM is a dying company
Microsoft Has Confirmed It Had a Plan to Cut Azure (or Azure Costs) by 20%
So basically... yes! Microsoft did have a plan to slash Azure.
No Noticeable Libera Chat Exodus After Code of Censorship (CoC) Scandal Earlier This Month
Libera Chat pissed off some people by unmasking the CoC's real purpose
Red Hat Silent Layoffs Seem to Carry on Throughout This Month
How much longer will these silent layoffs (e.g. PIPs) carry on for?
Over at Tux Machines...
GNU/Linux news for the past day
IRC Proceedings: Wednesday, October 14, 2026
IRC logs for Wednesday, October 14, 2026
Netflix and Its Newest Rival Carry 100 Billion Dollars in Debt
What sort of economy is this?
Egypt: GNU/Linux Still Measured at About 5%
Egypt is a prominent African nation and economy
Gemini Links 14/10/2026: Time Allocation, English as a Fourth Language, and "Reading News Sources" in Geminispace
Links for the day
DRM Giant Announces Giant Layoffs (Netflix’s Debt is Huge)
It's not like operational costs are decreasing, they're climbing fast.
Intercontinental Brigading - Part III - Reporting Harassment From America to British Police
Why are they so hostile towards (and afraid of) cops?
The Local Staff Committee Munich (LSCMN) Speaks of Deterioration of Working Conditions at the European Patent Office (EPO)
"At least 3 days per week in the Office for an allocated office"
Gemini Links 14/10/2026: GemPub, Randogoth Forge F-Droid Repo, Oddμ, and Kolibri
Links for the day
Bluewashing as Silent RAs: A "journey that began at Neudesic [...] and continued as part of IBM" inevitably came "to a close"
IBM can be antagonistic and reckless with whatever it buys
Links 14/10/2026: Houthi Attacks on KSA and Airstrikes Near Sudan-Egypt Border
Links for the day
No Coronation for 'Cocaine King' Campinos (Not Yet Anyway)
A flash update suggests perils exist and we must all wait until December as the position for EPO President may open
In Reddit, Moderators of IBM Subs Are Allegedly on IBM's Payroll (IBM Can Censor Discussions About IBM)
There also seem to be PIP layoffs in India
If Worthless Companies Are Valued at a Billion Dollars in the Slop Industry, Then What Is the True Worth of 'Trillion-Dollar' Companies?
Definitely not a bubble!
It Sounds Like Microsoft Plans to Lay Off Over 2,000 Azure (Microsoft) Workers as the Datacentre Business Brings Nothing But Epic Debt
Trillions in losses is not a solid business plan
IBM's Anderon is Like Theranos, But Will Anybody at IBM or Anderon Be Imprisoned for This Billion-Dollar Scam?
Will anyone ever be held accountable for it?
Microsoft XBox Won't Survive, Microsoft's CEO for This Perishing Business Turns to Slop
What the founder or father of XBox said about Asha Sharma earlier this year turns out to be accurate
Links 14/10/2026: So-called 'AI' Giants Go Bankrupt, "Military Will Hack the Election"
Links for the day
Indoor Season
we have more planned in order to improve navigation, accessibility, and workflows
Microsoft Demands That Staff Keeps Silent About the Mass Layoffs
Way to cause anger and ensure whistleblowers will go to the media
Microsoft Has Had Mass Layoffs in Azure Every Year Since 2020 and the Bleeding Continues Because It Misreports Earnings There
This is a bad week for Microsoft
Microsoft's International Mass Layoffs (Asia, Europe, Africa), Now Vietnam
A crisis that Microsoft is unable to hide
Over at Tux Machines...
GNU/Linux news for the past day
IRC Proceedings: Tuesday, October 13, 2026
IRC logs for Tuesday, October 13, 2026
Gemini Links 14/10/2026: Ceiling Fan, Fascism, Democracy, and Slop Being a Huge Bubble
Links for the day