Leftovers

• Emily M Stark ☛ E2EE on the web: is the web really that bad?

  In my last blog post, I discussed why people often view the web as a uniquely unsuited platform for implementing end-to-end encryption (E2EE). This view is that the web doesn’t offer a long-term trustable notion of what the application is. In that earlier post, I explored the idea of treating the application as untrustworthy and isolating sensitive data from it. In this post, I’m going to pontificate on whether web applications are truly less trustworthy than native applications, especially in an E2EE setting, and if so, how we should bridge the gap. The gap is narrower than it appears at first glance, especially with desktop applications. To close it, though, the devil is in the (UX- and deployment-related) details.

• Michal Zelazny ☛ Misfits

  The community I was looking for, the group I wanted to be a part of, was in a different place. I changed schools, I changed jobs, I changed cities and social groups, I learned a different language (the one I’m writing here), and I found my community. I needed one thing, just one thing. I needed to mature and stop looking for any price. People who were as strange as I was, people who were willing to accept me for who I was, they were there, they were there all the time. But they weren’t waiting for me, I had to leave my cave and find them. But that’s a story for another day.

• Matt Stein ☛ Side Blogging – Matt Stein

  I started writing all over the place late last year.

  Every time I found a new blog platform I wanted to try, I started writing there. It was freeing that nobody knew where these things were, and I found myself posting more regularly because of it. I wrote without overthinking and worrying quite so much, and was happier with what I wrote. Less reluctant to publish because maybe it was strange.

• Lee Peterson ☛ Google still doesn’t know what to do with it’s products and looks a bit lost – LJPUK

  I also have no confidence in getting to use this new Gemini as I’m not sure how long Google will stay interested. Who says in six months it’s not shelved or renamed again. This reputation for not committing to anything other than search or YouTube is going to be their downfall I feel in the end.

  They have been leaderless for a while now, keynotes are full of vapourware and things that look interesting like the glasses are still nothing so I don’t see why I get excited when they disappoint.

• Juha-Matti Santala ☛ Anonymous, asynchronous friendships : Juha-Matti Santala

  When I was young, I wasn’t very social kid. I was shy, introverted and not like all the cool kids in the school. But somewhere in the early years of this millennium, I got broadband Internet and joined the Internet Relay Chat or IRC.

  It was a magical place for me. You had your nickname and the discussion happened asynchronously and anonymously. It meant that we perceived each other through our written communication only. For a shy guy with a weird voice, it was a safe haven of sorts. I could discuss and argue with others and I was treated based on the merits of my thoughts and communication and not by my looks or my background.

  A written, asynchronous communication allowed me to think about things and craft my messages with more care and I didn’t have to think on my feet in situations that normally would have been intimidating.

• The Register UK ☛ El Toco thinks future of search is Yahoo-like directories

  Interview Web search, long dominated by Google, is in play again, at least among incumbents and entrepreneurs if not frustrated web searchers.

  It's not just that Google Search has by some accounts got worse, though Google maintains its results are still better than other search engines. It's that both Google and Microsoft are betting search can be improved with the addition of generative AI, despite the risk of hallucination and misinformation. Game on.

• Science

  • European Commission ☛ We still need more women in science

    European Commission Statement Brussels, 11 Feb 2024 There is hardly a better occasion than 11 February, the International Day of Women and Girls in Science, to reflect on the EU's commitment [...]

  • Science Alert ☛ When You Got Your Period May Impact Dementia Risk, Study Finds

• Education

  • The Age AU ☛ Concern over plan to remove 50,000 books from Melbourne’s City Library

    “I am a librarian, so I understand that collections need to be weeded, but throwing away this collection will be an absolute act of vandalism on a unique and highly valuable collection,” she said.

    Bluer said the collections team at City Library had been there since its inception and had carefully curated an extremely high-quality collection that met patrons’ needs.

• Hardware

  • Hackaday ☛ Simple Magnetic Levitator

    [Stoppi] always has exciting projects and, as you can see in the video below, the latest one is a very simple magnetic levitator design. The design is classic and simple: a 5 V regulator IC, a Hall effect sensor, a 741 op amp, and a MOSFET to turn the electromagnet on and off.

  • The Register UK ☛ Nvidia reportedly forms unit to peddle IP to cloud providers

    The corporate shift comes in response to the growing number of cloud provers and hyperscalers building homegrown alternatives to Nvidia's GPUs for AI and other accelerated workloads, a Reuters report claims, citing multiple sources familiar with the matter.

  • The Verge ☛ Apple argues against right-to-repair bill that would reduce its control

    The bill in question, SB 1596, would require companies to provide the documentation, tools, and parts both customers and independent repair shops need to fix broken products. However, unlike the bill in California, it also targets parts pairing, a restriction imposed by companies like Apple that can prevent customers from repairing a device with aftermarket parts.

  • 404 Media ☛ Apple Is Lobbying Against Right to Repair Six Months After Supporting Right to Repair

    An Apple executive lobbied against a strong right-to-repair bill in Oregon Thursday, which is the first time the company has had an employee actively outline its stance on right to repair at an open hearing. Apple’s position in Oregon shows that despite supporting a weaker right to repair law in California, it still intends to control its own repair ecosystem. It also sets up a highly interesting fight in the state because Google has come out in favor of the same legislation Apple is opposing.

• Health/Nutrition/Agriculture

  • Modern Diplomacy ☛ 2024-02-06 [Older] COVID-19 as a Human Security Threat in Non-traditional Security Issues

  • Green Party UK ☛ 2024-02-07 [Older] Greens dismiss dental recovery plan and call for full costs of dental treatment to be covered

  • Green Party UK ☛ 2024-02-05 [Older] Reaction to Labour ditching national care service

  • BIA Net ☛ 2024-02-08 [Older] Why are HIV cases increasing in Turkey?

  • Deutsche Welle ☛ 2024-02-08 [Older] Breaking China's grip on African ores: How the US and EU offer a different partnership

  • Deutsche Welle ☛ 2024-02-08 [Older] Cholera outbreak in southern Africa: a multinational fight

  • [Old] Nathan Lineback ☛ I Don't Need A Smart Phone

    I know it is unthinkable to most people today, but I simply have zero need for a "smart" phone. I hardly see why most people would need or want one.

    Before Apple got involved, such devices were boring business tools. A long time ago, important people who had to respond instantly to life and death emergencies carried pagers around. Then the fancy business executives carried around their Personal Digital Assistants filled with their schedule of 100,000 appointments. Combine all that with a cell phone that can also browse the web and get e-mail on-the-go, and sure, you have a tool that some people might find useful.

    But it still hardly seems like something EVERYONE should be expected to have.

  • French National Center for Scientific Research ☛ French cheese under threat

    So what can be done to save Camembert? Should producers return to a “wild” population, similar to P. camemberti, and restart the long process of domestication? Could they resort to genome editing technologies in order to counter the accumulation of mutations or the loss of specific genes with a given desirable function? “People in the industry sometimes ask us whether it’s possible to modify a gene and allow a strain to sporulate in greater quantities,” Giraud reveals, quickly adding that this would not solve the problem: “Genome editing is another form of selection. What we need today is the diversity provided by sexual reproduction between individuals with different genomes.”

  • Vox ☛ These delicious French cheeses could disappear, scientists warn

    Each hunk of Camembert or smear of brie is an ecosystem, an assortment of fungi and bacteria that turn milk fats and proteins into hundreds of different compounds. Those compounds produce the flavors, smells, and textures we love.

    In recent decades, however, the genetic diversity of some of those microbes has caved. And today, some of the most famous French cheeses rely on just a single fragile strain of fungi that is at risk of dying out.

  • The Atlantic ☛ Bedbugs Are Getting Scarier

    Besides the common bedbug, Cimex lectularius, which has always made its home in the Northern Hemisphere, there are now sightings of its relative, the tropical bedbug, Cimex hemipterus, in temperate regions. Historically, this species didn’t venture that far from the equator, write the entomologists Stephen Doggett and Chow-Yang Lee in the 2023 issue of the Annual Review of Entomology. But in recent years, tropical bedbugs have turned up in the United States, Sweden, Italy, Norway, Finland, China, Japan, France, Central Europe, Spain—“even in Russia, which would have once been unthinkable,” says Lee, a professor of urban entomology at UC Riverside.

  • Futurism ☛ Lawsuit Claims Woman Burned, Killed by Surgical Robot

    Complications and additional follow up procedures ensued, and Sultzer passed away in February 2022. The lawsuit, filed by her husband Harvey Sultzer this month, claims that her death was a "direct and proximate result of the injuries she suffered," by the broadcaster.

    Harvey is seeking damages from the maker of the surgical robot, Intuitive Surgical, Inc., which has received scrutiny from the Federal Drug Administration in the past for injuries suffered during operations involving the robot.

  • New Statesman ☛ Social media companies can no longer leave children to their own devices - New Statesman

    Social media companies make profits by keeping us on their site for as long as possible. They are designed to promote continued engagement. Algorithms manipulate the feed of content to keep us glued to our screens, and “like” buttons reward us for posting even more content. Many of us will have experienced how a brief check of X, formerly known as Twitter, or Instagram can lead to hours of endless scrolling. 

    What may seem harmless at first could lead to overuse and even addictive-type behaviours among users. Algorithms can be particularly problematic. Just based on a couple of clicks, they start to learn our behaviours and interests and then push material we want to see – or material that we did not ask to see, which cannot then be unseen – and become very difficult to control. Its persuasive design deliberately reinforces digital habits; making us subconsciously reach for a device, refresh pages and profiles to check for new content.

  • [Old] National Geographic ☛ Why are so many adults just now being diagnosed with ADHD?

    A study published by the Journal of the American Medical Association shows that frequent digital media use involving social media, gaming, texting, and streaming movies, music, or TV increases one's risk of developing ADHD symptoms by nearly 10 percent. Other studies have measured the connection between technology and ADHD, including one that explores how technology use varies between men and women and research that measures the mental health consequences of frequent technology use. A large population study shows that to prevent attentional deficits related to technology use, one should limit smartphone use to 60 minutes a day.

  • Science Alert ☛ Pet Poop Can Be Much More Dangerous Than You Might Realize

    A vet explains why.

• Proprietary/Artificial Intelligence (AI)

  • International Business Times ☛ 2024-02-04 [Older] Google and Microsoft Witness £130 Billion Market Cap Decline [Ed: Microsoft did not lose billions in value. It was never worth what "the market" claims. And no, Microsoft did not become 15 "more valuable" in a decade while client business, which used to be 80% of its profits, went to nothing]

  • Futurism ☛ Elon Musk Melts Down in Baffling Answer on Tesla Supercomputer

    In fact, it calls to mind an anecdote about Musk during his time at Zip2, one of his early companies. There, according to an employee, he put a normal PC inside a giant pompous wheeled case, which he would show off to potential investors and tell them it was a "mini supercomputer."

    In other words, it sounds a lot like Musk is the same as he's always been: a talented marketer who leads with the hype, adjusting the story as he goes in response to reality. Remember when he first showed off a Tesla "robot" called Optimus, except that it was just a person in a suit?

  • arXiv ☛ [2307.03826] How does AI chat change search behaviors?

    Generative AI tools such as chatGPT are poised to change the way people engage with online information. Recently, Microsoft announced their "new Bing" search system which incorporates chat and generative AI technology from OpenAI. Google has announced plans to deploy search interfaces that incorporate similar types of technology. These new technologies will transform how people can search for information. The research presented here is an early investigation into how people make use of a generative AI chat system (referred to simply as chat from here on) as part of a search process, and how the incorporation of chat systems with existing search tools may effect users search behaviors and strategies.

  • Tech Central (South Africa) ☛ Actually, AI is coming for your job - TechCentral

    What should be done? Three ideas seem worth pursuing. One is to keep a tight regulatory leash on the top providers of AI who dominate this “uniquely exploitative” technology, as former StabilityAI exec Ed Newton-Rex puts it, to avoid workers’ data getting unduly hoovered up by the machine. The second is to create new tasks around AI to spread its gains, perhaps by onshoring its supply chain such as the making of the chips that power it. The third is to ensure there’s a social safety net for those who need it, such as universal basic income.

  • Layoffs Hit Orange County: More Than 400 Employees Affected at Video Game Company

    The notice to California employment officials did not provide details on the individuals impacted by the reductions. These job cuts seem to be the most significant in the tech industry in Orange County for quite some time.

  • “The world of video games is currently a disaster”, with layoffs, some figures in the industry no longer believe in the future

    As we know, the video game industry is going through a major crisis as reflected in the significant wave of mass layoffs that began last year. Last January, the layoffs during the month represented about 60% of the total layoffs for 2023. The year started off a nightmare, as major companies like Microsoft, Riot Games, Unity, Twitch and Sega announced thousands of layoffs. In total, more than 6,000 people have lost their jobs by 2024. A terrible crisis, which leads to the cancellation of numerous projects. A situation that greatly affects actor Elias Toufexis.

  • PlayStation 5 Outpaces Xbox Series X|S in Console Sales

    Recent sales data sheds light on the comparative success of Sony’s PlayStation 5 and Microsoft’s Xbox Series X and Series S, indicating a substantial lead for the former with an estimated 2:1 margin. While the dominance of Sony’s console was already recognized, this latest revelation provides a clearer picture of the competitive landscape between the two gaming giants.

    [...]

    ...Microsoft’s recent layoffs, including 1,900 employees from the gaming division, have raised questions about the company’s long-term plans...

  • Game Rant ☛ Rumor: Microsoft Held Internal Meeting Over Xbox Console Future

    Microsoft appears to disagree with that sentiment even though it has so far done little to dispel the multi-platform publishing rumors. That's suggested by a recent report from journalist Shannon Liao, which states that the company held an internal townhall meeting that saw Microsoft Gaming CEO Phil Spencer personally assure employees the tech giant will keep making Xbox hardware. The executive specifically said that Xbox consoles will continue to play part in Microsoft's multi-device gaming strategy, as per the same source.

  • Poll: Are you concerned about the future of Xbox?

    We've also seen mass layoffs at Microsoft, who has cut around 1,900 jobs across Xbox Game Studios, Activision Blizzard, and ZeniMax. As part of those layoffs, it was reported that Xbox had shut down departments dedicated to bringing physical Xbox games to retail. We've also seen these layoffs hit Crash Bandicoot and Spyro developer Toys for Bob pretty hard, with a reported 86 staff being let go. The mass layoffs also caught the eye of the Federal Trade Commission (FTC), which filed a complaint about the job cuts, saying they contradicted statements Microsoft made in court about how Activision Blizzard and Xbox would be run after the acquisition. Microsoft argues the layoffs were already planned at Activision Blizzard before the takeover.

  • Hindustan Times ☛ Cisco layoffs: Thousands to lose jobs as company focuses on ‘high-growth’ areas

    Amid the recent layoffs by multiple tech and retail giants, Cisco has also decided to cut jobs. As a part of its restructuring program, the multinational network corporation has announced its decision to axe thousands of jobs, per Reuters. The San Jose-based company, which has a total employee count of 84,900, is seeking to focus on “high-growth” areas.

  • India Times ☛ Cisco plans restructuring, may cut thousands of jobs

  • HT Digital Streams Ltd ☛ Cisco to layoff thousands of employees in a fresh round of job cuts: Report

    The company is currently in the process of determining the exact number of employees who will be affected by the impending layoffs.

• Security

  • Integrity/Availability/Authenticity

    • JURIST ☛ FCC prohibits the use of AI-generated voices in robocalls

      Aiming to combat fraud and prevent election interference, the decision expands upon the Telephone Consumer Protection Act (TCPA) of 1991 to explicitly prohibit AI voice-cloning technologies. The FCC now has the authority to impose penalties on entities responsible for unlawful robocalls. Carriers are mandated to block these calls, and the act empowers consumers and organizations to seek legal redress. State Attorneys General also have additional enforcement mechanisms under the TCPA to combat and penalize the illicit use of robocall technology.

    • LastPass ☛ Warning: Fraudulent App Impersonating LastPass Currently Available in Apple App Store

      LastPass would like to alert our customers to a fraudulent app attempting to impersonate our LastPass app on the Apple App Store. The app in question is called “LassPass Password Manager” and lists Parvati Patel as the developer. The app attempts to copy our branding and user interface, though close examination of the posted screenshots reveal misspellings and other indicators the app is fraudulent.

  • Privacy/Surveillance

    • Chris McLeod ☛ Some Words on Webmentions — Chris McLeod

      However, there are pretty significant problems with Webmentions as they stand. Wouter lists a bunch of issues he came across, and I can empathise with all of them, even if I haven’t experienced each and every item on the list. The points about microformats and Brid.gy (4 & 5) definitely hit home.

    • Rob Knight ☛ Mastodon Webmentions and Privacy

      Until this point I also hadn't considered the privacy aspect of using webmentions like this. Assume someone, @userX for example, replies to one of my toots about a post I've written. Bridgy will pull in that reply with the avatar, username, and the reply content for me to display on that post as a reply. As it's setup right now, that reply will live forever on my post regardless of what @userX does with their original version of the reply. Should I be periodically checking if a reply has been deleted (or edited for that matter)? In theory, that could be hundreds or thousands of links to check.

    • Tech Central (South Africa) ☛ South Africa's proposed new spying law is deeply flawed - TechCentral

      The court found that there was no law authorising the practice of bulk surveillance and limiting its potential abuse. It ordered that the agency cease such surveillance until there was.

  • Confidentiality

    • New York Times ☛ David Kahn, Leading Historian of Codes and Code Breaking, Dies at 93 - The New York Times

      David Kahn, whose 1967 book, “The Codebreakers,” established him as the world’s pre-eminent authority on cryptology — the science of making and breaking secret codes — died on Jan. 24 in the Bronx. He was 93.

• Defence/Aggression

  • CBC ☛ 2024-02-07 [Older] A major U.S. national-security bill is on the brink of spectacular collapse. What happens next?

  • NL Times ☛ 2024-02-05 [Older] Dutch shipping companies want armed security on board for Red Sea voyages

  • Modern Diplomacy ☛ 2024-02-03 [Older] Turkey expands military presence in Cyprus with bases and radar installations

  • Omicron Limited ☛ 'A deeply troubling discovery': Earth may have already passed the crucial 1.5°C warming limit

    Using this new baseline, a very different picture of global warming emerges. It shows human-caused ocean warming began at least several decades earlier than previously assumed by the IPCC.

  • The Hill ☛ Israel says Hamas had command tunnel under UN’s headquarters in Gaza | The Hill

    “The forces located electrical infrastructure inside the tunnel connected to UNRWA’s main headquarters, under which the underground tunnel was located, indicating that UNRWA’s facilities supplied the tunnel with electricity,” IDF and ISA said in a joint statement obtained by The Hill.

    They also claimed they found weapons inside the rooms. Further, the joint investigation concluded that the office of the UNRWA was used by Hamas.

  • Mint Press News ☛ TikTok Chinese Trojan Horse Run By Former CIA [Ed: TikTok is controlled by Beijing's CPC (via Bytedance), not CIA. CIA does not control CPC.]

    TikTok is once again under public scrutiny, this time for concerns about child safety. Yet a much bigger issue is being swept under the rug: that it is increasingly controlled by the US national security state.

  • Russia, Belarus, and War in Ukraine

    • Meduza ☛ Zelensky names new deputies to freshly appointed AFU Commander-in-Chief Oleksandr Syrskyi — Meduza

    • Off Guardian ☛ What NO ONE is saying about Tucker Carlson’s Putin Interview

      Everyone is talking about Tucker Carlson’s interview with Russian President Vladimir Putin. The two-hour long conversation was live-streamed on twitter. Every major news outlet has had some form of coverage.

    • France24 ☛ Deadly Russian drone attack hits Kharkiv petrol station

      An overnight Russian drone attack on a petrol station in Ukraine's second city Kharkiv killed seven people, including three children, local authorities said Saturday.

    • JURIST ☛ Human rights organizations release report alleging mass civilian casualties during Russia siege of Mariupol, Ukraine

      Human Rights Watch (HRW), SITY Research and Truth Hounds released a report Thursday on the Russian military assault on the Ukrainian city of Mariupol between February and May 2022, alleging numerous civilian casualties, with some resulting from potentially illegal attacks and hundreds of thousands left without essential services for weeks.

    • RFERL ☛ EU Readies New Sanctions Targeting Foreign Companies Helping Russia's War Effort

      The European Union is preparing to sanction military and tech firms from China, Kazakhstan, Serbia, and other countries helping Russia’s war effort, according to a document seen by RFE/RL, as the bloc steps up efforts to curtail evasion.

    • RFERL ☛ 'Our Grandchildren Will Never Forgive Us': Walesa Says World's Moment To Forge Russia's Future Is Now

      Former Polish President Lech Walesa, who was in the U.S. capital this week with a message for Americans about the importance of continuing their support for Ukraine, says the world currently has a unique opportunity to force political change in Russia and should not let it pass.

    • RFERL ☛ Ukraine's Deputy Defense Minister Dismissed Amid Military Reshuffle

      Ukraine's First Deputy Defense Minister Oleksandr Pavlyuk has been dismissed from his post, the government announced on February 10, the latest of major personnel changes at the top of Ukraine's army after President Volodymyr Zelenskiy said the military needed a "reset."

    • RFERL ☛ At Least 8 People, Including 3 Children, Killed In Fresh Wave Of Russian Strikes On Ukraine

      At least eight people were killed and several others wounded in a fresh round of Russian drone strikes and shelling on February 10 that also damaged port infrastructure critical for Ukraine's food exports, the military and regional officials said.

    • New York Times ☛ Short on Soldiers, Ukraine Debates How to Find the Next Wave of Troops

      A potential expansion of the nation’s military draft to replenish the exhausted, battered army has become an emotional, politically charged issue.

    • New York Times ☛ Russian Drone Strike on Kharkiv Causes Deadly Fire

      Seven people from two families died in the inferno in Kharkiv on Friday night, as burning oil flowed like lava. “People were doomed,” an official said.

    • Meduza ☛ Ukraine dismisses Oleksandr Pavliuk as first deputy defense minister amid media reports he may head Ukrainian Ground Forces after Syrskyi’s departure — Meduza

    • Meduza ☛ Moscow terminates lease agreement for Ukrainian Embassy land — Meduza

    • RFERL ☛ Russia To Create Blacklist Of YouTube Vloggers Who Refuse To Join Kremlin-Backed Platform

      Russia plans to create a blacklist of YouTube vloggers who refuse to join a Kremlin-backed alternative to the U.S. video platform as it seeks to tighten its grip on information.

    • New York Times ☛ Voters in Finland Will Choose a President to Shape a New NATO Era

      The role is responsible for foreign policy in an era of rising wariness of neighboring Russia.

    • Meduza ☛ Five people arrested in Yekaterinburg, Russia at flower-laying demonstration against mobilization — Meduza

    • Meduza ☛ Russian presidential hopeful Boris Nadezhdin says 400,000 copies of campaign newspaper confiscated by police — Meduza

    • Meduza ☛ Russia’s Investigative Committee reportedly suspends investigation into sinking of Russian missile cruiser Moskva — Meduza

• Environment

  • Counter Punch ☛ 2024-02-02 [Older] Nuclear War? Climate Collapse? No Worries. WEF Says Disinformation is Humanity’s Most Immediate Threat

  • Truthdig ☛ 2024-02-03 [Older] Six Lessons for Climate Activists in Turbulent Times

  • Modern Diplomacy ☛ 2024-02-04 [Older] EU climate chief rebuts business fears that green policies hit competitiveness

  • US News And World Report ☛ 2024-02-06 [Older] How Climate Change Made Chile's Wildfires So Deadly

  • Vox ☛ 2024-02-07 [Older] The Earth is getting greener. Hurray?

  • Counter Punch ☛ 2024-02-07 [Older] Radical Spectacles: the Strategies Driving the New Climate Activism

  • Green Party UK ☛ 2024-02-07 [Older] Labour ditch £28 billion green investment plan - a massive backward step for climate and economy

  • Jacobin Magazine ☛ 2024-02-07 [Older] China’s Climate Pledge Is Historic in Scale, but Wobbling

  • University of Michigan ☛ 2024-02-07 [Older] Competition seeks to turn climate anxiety into action

  • Vox ☛ 2024-02-08 [Older] What to do when you’re completely overwhelmed by climate anxiety

  • US News And World Report ☛ 2024-02-08 [Older] Jury Awards Climate Scientist Michael Mann $1 Million in Defamation Lawsuit

  • Deutsche Welle ☛ 2024-02-08 [Older] Did humanity just break the Paris Agreement on climate change?

  • TruthOut ☛ 2024-02-08 [Older] Climate Scientists Record First 12-Month Stretch Over 1.5 Degrees Celsius Target

  • Energy/Transportation

    • Truthdig ☛ 2024-02-02 [Older] The Promise and Perils of Hawaii’s Renewable Energy Revolution

    • Science Alert ☛ NASA Plan to Put a Nuclear Reactor on The Moon Edges Closer to Reality

      And Mars is next.

    • Science Alert ☛ Scientists Slowed Down Light by 10,000 Times in an Experiment

    • Deutsche Welle ☛ 2024-02-03 [Older] Can Germany meet its ambitious wind energy targets?

    • Jacobin Magazine ☛ 2024-02-05 [Older] Why Private Investment Isn’t Driving a Rapid Green Transition

    • Deutsche Welle ☛ 2024-02-05 [Older] Croatia: Citizens push hard to kick-start energy sharing

    • Gizmodo ☛ 2024-02-08 [Older] Nuclear Fusion Machine Smashes Energy Record, Clean Energy Now 'Closer Than Ever'

    • Engadget ☛ 2024-02-07 [Older] The Biden administration now requires large cryptocurrency miners to report their energy use

    • University of Michigan ☛ 2024-02-07 [Older] Ann Arbor City Council talks emergency services, accepts solar energy grant

    • US News And World Report ☛ 2024-02-07 [Older] Fossil-Dependent Puerto Rico Can Fully Shift to Clean Energy by 2050, a Two-Year Federal Study Says

  • Wildlife/Nature

    • RFA ☛ India is home to at least 718 snow leopards: survey

      The survey, conducted between 2019 and 2023, covered 120,000 square kilometers (46,332 square miles) with more than 2,000 camera traps across the Himalayas from Ladakh and Jammu and Kashmir, the northern states of Himachal Pradesh and Uttarakhand, and the northeastern states of Sikkim and Arunachal Pradesh.

    • YLE ☛ Fewer trees were cut down last year, and that's good for Finland's carbon sink

      An update on how much carbon Finland's forests absorbed last year is due in May.

    • Kev Quirk ☛ Mow Is Me

      And once again, the mower has shit the bed and I'm having to spend what little spare time I have fixing it. At least this time it isn't a belt...

      Winter is coming to an end and the grass will start growing again soon, which means the our plucky little ride-on mower needs to come out of hibernation for another summer of hard work.

• Finance

  • Scheerpost ☛ 2024-02-06 [Older] What’s the Fate of Social Security in a Brutally Unequal America?

  • US News And World Report ☛ 2024-02-04 [Older] Iraq Bans 8 Local Banks From US Dollar Transactions

  • US News And World Report ☛ 2024-02-05 [Older] Turkey Has Another New Central Bank Leader. Here's What It Means for the Battered Economy

  • BIA Net ☛ 2024-02-07 [Older] Report: 2023 earthquakes cost Turkey 150 billion dollars

  • CBC ☛ 2024-02-06 [Older] 1 year after Turkey earthquake, streets are littered with rubble and people live in tents

  • New York Times ☛ China Keeps Building Stadiums in Africa. But at What Cost?

    This year’s Africa Cup of Nations, like several previous editions, played out in Chinese-built arenas. It will end with familiar questions about their legacy.

  • RFA ☛ Eight songs that didn't make it into China's Lunar New Year gala

    Despite a ‘good news’ propaganda drive, songs about economic hardship are going viral this year.

  • YLE ☛ Fitch Ratings foresees modest recovery for Finnish economy in 2024

    The credit agency Fitch Ratings has kept Finland's rating in its second-best category, citing its administrative functionality, solid pension fund investments and green investments.

• AstroTurf/Lobbying/Politics

  • New York Times ☛ Shocking Opposition Victory Throws Pakistan Into Chaos - The New York Times

    The party of the imprisoned former prime minister of Pakistan, Imran Khan, won the most seats in parliamentary elections this week, delivering a strong rebuke to the country’s powerful generals and throwing the political system into chaos.

    While military leaders had hoped the election would put an end to the political turmoil that has consumed the country since Mr. Khan’s ouster in 2022, it has instead plunged it into an even deeper crisis, analysts said.

  • Neil Selwyn ☛ The ‘enshittification’ of the digital (Cory Doctorow)

    Do you ever get the feeling that digitisation is simply leading to a diminished, down-graded and (to put it bluntly) crappier world? Cory Doctorow (2024) has described this as the ‘enshittification’ of the digital – a term intended to describe how the defining digital platforms and systems in our lives are decaying in ways that drive the steady degradation of key services and our overall living conditions. According to Doctorow, this happens primarily because of the dominant Silicon Valley business model over the past 20 years – establish an apparently ‘free’ service to draw in huge numbers of users, establish an economy of scale, and then steadily monetise and extract value from this platform to claw back value until the original essence of whatever made the service attractive to people has been hollowed out.

  • Michael Geist ☛ The House of Cards Crumbles: Why the Bell Media Layoffs and Government’s Failed Media Policy are Connected

    Bill C-11, the online streaming law that is now before the CRTC, was never really designed to address Bell’s broadcasting concerns. Indeed, the company made clear what it wanted: access to cheap U.S. programming. When the company appeared before committee back in 2022, it said its primary risk was competition from foreign streaming services accessing the Canadian market directly and by-passing Canadian broadcasters. This challenge has been readily apparent for years. In fact, in 2011 I wrote about how this was likely to become a major issue for Canadian broadcasters dependent on licensing U.S. programming to profitably fill their broadcast schedules:

  • India Times ☛ OpenAI: AI is a global issue, we need a global approach to govern it: OpenAI's Jason Kwon

    Kwon also announced that OpenAI will hold a number of developer summits in India this year. It plans to foster collaboration between Silicon Valley developers and local developers that will “put us on a path for building the tools and define our future”.

  • NL Times ☛ 2024-02-05 [Older] Dutch government considering ditching Facebook

  • Gizmodo ☛ 2024-02-05 [Older] Zuck Brags About How Much of Your Facebook, Instagram Posts Will Power His AI

  • Engadget ☛ 2024-02-06 [Older] The Morning After: Meta Oversight Board says manipulated Biden video can stay on Facebook

  • Engadget ☛ 2024-02-06 [Older] Maliciously edited Joe Biden video can stay on Facebook, Meta's Oversight Board says

  • Misinformation/Disinformation/Propaganda

    • University of Michigan ☛ This professor is preparing for a busy election season of political deepfake detection | University of Michigan-Dearborn

      Malik, who’s been working with deepfakes since 2015, estimates he received about a hundred such requests for analysis last year, mostly from journalists. In some ways, he’s not surprised: He forecasted that such faked audio and video, particularly of public figures and decision makers, would become a problem long before most people knew what a deepfake was. But in some ways, he says his doom-and-gloom predictions still fell short. “One thing I didn’t anticipate was the commercial scale of both deepfake generation and deepfake detection that exists today,” Malik explains. “There are basically many off-the-shelf options, both free and commercial, for generating deepfakes, which means you don’t have to be an expert anymore to do this stuff. Basically anyone can do it.”

      The result is that deepfakes have exploded across the [Internet], particularly in the past year. Some are harmless — and amazing — like the videos on the @DeepTomCruise TikTok account, which feature a spookily authentic-looking, youngish, Tom Cruise doing weird but ordinary things, like dancing in a bathrobe or washing his hands. More often, though, the intent is malicious. Aside from political disinformation, deepfake porn and financial scams are some of the biggest emerging threats. One recent study estimated the number of nonconsensual deepfake porn videos grew by more than 50% in the first nine months of 2023 compared to 2022. And financial attacks are targeting everyone from ordinary people to company CEOs. Last year, for example, in the biggest attack of its kind, cloned audio of a company director’s voice was used to dupe an employee into wiring $35 million into a scammer’s account.

    • VOA News ☛ Putin's Talk with Tucker Carlson... and America: A Mixture of Blunt Lies and Toxic Propaganda

      Facing nearly two years of Russian aggression that killed hundreds of thousands of people, destroyed entire towns and cities, and displaced millions, Ukrainians increasingly cherish their unique national identity.

      Opinion polls conducted in Ukraine over the years show that the vast majority of Ukrainians consider Russians a different ethnic group. Russia’s initial intervention in 2014, followed by a full-fledged invasion in February 2022, sharpened the Ukrainians’ national identity as separate people and increased negative sentiments toward the invading Russian nation.

• Censorship/Free Speech

  • Truthdig ☛ 2024-02-02 [Older] Free Speech Under Fire in Bukele’s El Salvador

  • Project Censored ☛ 2024-02-06 [Older] Villainizing Media Literacy at the World Economic Forum: Time to Mandate it in US Schools

  • Green Party UK ☛ 2024-02-08 [Older] Greens respond to new plans to clampdown further on protests

  • Jason Becker ☛ Self-censorship

    For most of human history, an individuals’ thoughts and opinions rarely left a small circle of people who were essentially kin. Not sharing all of your opinions in public isn’t self-censorship— it’s wise.

    In my opinion, there are three types of opinions people share that result in having a pretty bad time.

  • RFERL ☛ Russia To Create Blacklist Of YouTube Vloggers Who Refuse To Join Kremlin-Backed Platform

    Russia plans to create a blacklist of YouTube vloggers who refuse to join a Kremlin-backed alternative to the U.S. video platform as it seeks to tighten its grip on information.

    Aleksandr Malkevich, a member of Russia’s Civic Chamber, told a conference on February 10 dedicated to the topic of blogging that the list would target those individuals focusing on a Russian audience.

  • Bloody Elbow ☛ Turns out Gina Carano isn't the only star Disney has silenced

    Let us begin in the past. Many years ago a website called Gawker published a video of WWE wrestler Hulk Hogan having sex with his friend, Bubba the Love Sponge’s wife. Hogan sued the publication and ultimately won a hefty $140 million judgement. The curious part of this whole situation was that Hogan’s lawsuit was financed by billionaire tech bro Peter Thiel in the amount of $10 million dollars.

    Thiel is thought to have harbored a grudge against the media outlet after a 2007 article outed him as gay. Elon Musk is another tech bro with a long standing grudge against everything and anything he deems ‘woke,’ and it appears he wishes to use Gina Carano’s firing from her acting gig on The Mandalorian as his cause célèbre. Musk is again living out the Mark Twain observation that there is no such thing as an original idea.

• Freedom of Information / Freedom of the Press

  • The Dissenter ☛ Countdown To Day X: CIA Reportedly Plotted To Kill Assange

  • New Yorker ☛ Is the Media Prepared for an Extinction-Level Event?

    “Publishers, brace yourselves—it’s going to be a wild ride,” Matthew Goldstein, a media consultant, wrote in a January newsletter. “I see a potential extinction-level event in the future.” Some of the forces cited by Goldstein were already well known: consumers are burned out by the news, and social-media sites have moved away from promoting news articles. But Goldstein also pointed to Google’s rollout of A.I.-integrated search, which answers user queries within the Google interface, rather than referring them to outside Web sites, as a major factor in this coming extinction. According to a recent Wall Street Journal analysis, Google generates close to forty per cent of traffic across digital media. Brands with strong home-page traffic will likely be less affected, Goldstein wrote—places like Yahoo, the Wall Street Journal, the New York Times, the Daily Mail, CNN, the Washington Post, and Fox News. But Web sites that aren’t as frequently typed into browsers need to “contemplate drastic measures, possibly halving their brand portfolios.”

  • [Old] Bloody Elbow ☛ The New Bloody Elbow Starts Now

    As the first step of that process, we are launching a Substack newsletter.

    The existing BloodyElbow.com will stay on Vox’s Chorus platform at least through the end of March. After that we’ll be relaunching Bloody Elbow 2.0.

• Civil Rights/Policing

  • US News And World Report ☛ 2024-02-07 [Older] As DEI Policies Come Under Legal Attack, Philanthropic Donors Consider How to Adapt

  • Hong Kong Free Press ☛ BASF to speed up exit from Xinjiang ventures after Uyghur abuse reports

    German chemicals giant BASF said Friday it would accelerate its exit from two joint ventures in China’s Xinjiang region after allegations that its local partner violated the rights of the Uyghur minority.

  • Terence Eden ☛ Forget Technocrats – Let’s Get Some Realitycrats

    I am fundamentally against privatisation on an ideological level. But I can't ignore that it is useful to be able move to a provider which better fits my needs. I like that I can choose to pay more for something which matters to me. And the same is true of broadband, parcel delivery, supermarkets, travel agents and lots of other services. This isn't universal. Water privatisation hasn't worked. Trains aren't well suited to competitive pressures. I don't think the NHS should be further privatised. But, in some cases, privatisation has worked and I would be a fool not to adjust my political biases to take account of reality.

  • RFA ☛ Eight songs that didn't make it into China's Lunar New Year gala

    Most of these songs first emerged on social media and became quite popular – until censors blocked many of them. But people are still able to see and hear them using virtual private networks, or VPNs, or finding other ways to circumvent China’s “Great Firewall.” Some are still viewable on Bilibili, the Chinese version of YouTube, or other social media platforms.

  • Hindustan Times ☛ ‘Has stereotypical views on women’: Ex-TikTok official on ByteDance chairman - Hindustan Times

    Lidong Zhang, the chairman of TikTok's Beijing-based parent ByteDance, has an ‘employee kill list’ and a ‘stereotypical way of how women should behave,’ an ex-managing director at TikTok has claimed in her lawsuit against the company and its parent firm.

    Katie Ellen Puris, who joined TikTok in 2019 and was terminated in September 2022 for ‘performance reasons,’ filed the lawsuit in a New York federal court on Thursday, accusing ByteDance of ‘discrimination and retaliation.’

  • RFERL ☛ Iranian Prisoner Has 4 Fingers Amputated For Theft Charge He Denies

    "Amputating a man's fingers for the alleged theft of a few sheep by a corrupt regime whose officials compete in billion-dollar thefts and embezzlement, demonstrates the utmost cruelty and immorality of this system," said Mahmud Amiri Moghadam, the director of the Iran Human Rights organization.

• Internet Policy/Net Neutrality

  • Lusaka ZM ☛ Zambia : Internet Access In Rural Areas To Improve Service Delivery - Mucheleka

    Permanent Secretary for Special Duties under Cabinet Office Patrick Mucheleka says the presence of [Internet] access in rural parts of the country will help clear some wrong perceptions peddled by certain quarters of society about Government. Mr Mucheleka says some Zambians are easily deceived because of the information gap created by lack of [Internet] especially in rural parts of Zambia.

  • Ubuntu Pit ☛ 14 Best Torrent Apps for Android | Safer, Faster Download

    We often don’t find video files of our favorite movies, TV shows, music, and other content on YouTube and other video-playing sites. Going for a torrent is the only way in that situation. A torrent website contains a huge database where we can find video files very easily.

• Digital Restrictions (DRM)

  • The Verge ☛ Google One hits 100 million subscribers

    The company had said it was close to the 100 million mark when it released its fourth-quarter earnings last month and revealed the billions it spent on layoffs and noted that again last week while launching an AI Premium Plan tier.

Monopolies/Monopsonies

• Trademarks

  • IP Kat ☛ 2024-02-05 [Older] Four rings on a car grille infringe Audi’s trade mark

• Copyrights

  • Torrent Freak ☛ 'Pirate Site Blocking is a Privatized Paid Service in Egypt'

    Pirate site-blocking schemes have become more common around the world but there are some notable regional differences. In Egypt, not all rightsholders are happy with the local implementation. According to sports broadcaster beIN, pirate site blocking is privatized in Egypt with the 'licensed' party requesting a blocking fee that's not proportional to what's being offered.

• Gemini* and Gopher

  • Personal/Opinions

    • A problem player?

      I kicked out a “problem player” once, someone I thought was a “that guy”. Strange thing was that the very next session, another player immediately took up the mantle, and I realized that the supposed “that guy” had been expressing issues the entire party was feeling. They didn’t speak up because he was, they didn’t feel they have to, until he was gone.

  • Technology and Free Software

    • Steam Next Fest - Day 6

      The game opens up to pixel art UI. Didn't expect that, especially since I recall the screenshots not looking like pixel art at all. I'm intrigued if this will hit its mark with me, visually.

    • License Kerfuffles

      xscreensaver has been patched on various OS (especially on stable branches that are maintained for some amount of time) to not include a timebomb nagware message; however, the author wishes that this timebomb nagware always be included; however, the software is open source, so in theory patches that remove undesirable behaviors should be okay?

      In a similar case the IPFilter author argued against modifications of the source code; this caused IPFilter to be removed from OpenBSD, and prompted a license audit, which in turn caused various removals, clarifications, and other such activity.

    • Computers and... stuff I guess?

      "Hello bartender" a man says as he enters the bar. He sits down, his head wandering around the bar. "I think I'll have something light... don't feel like getting drunk tonight yet I don't want water"

      This is kinda weird to say out loud but I have a deep appreciation for this site and sites like this one in general. They've helped me learn a lot of things I didn't even know about. I've always been fascinated with how old stuff works and thanks to sites like this one, nightfall.city, and basically any project m15o makes help teach me about stuff like internet protocols, netcat, shell, git, etc. etc.

    • muttrc tweaks

      It’s been driving me nuts that I don’t see the date in my list of email. Sure, I see a month and a day, but when I’m searching through email I don’t know what the year is. Maybe it’s a sign that I need to delete more messages?

    • Internet/Gemini

      • Which search engine do you use, today ?

        Last few days, I try Kagi, but for my only personal usage I cannot stay with the Starter plan, and I am not sure if I want to pay $108 per year for the Professional plan.

      • Currently inked: February

        I still remember this exists...

        Anyway, I just refilled some pens, so here's what I'm currently dealing with for this month. And probably a few months after that.

        [...]

        I recently emptied this pen out at last. I thought long and hard about what to put in it next... and ended up refilling it with the same ink it had before. This color is unbeatable, and it looks like a million bucks out of a wet writer like the Eco. So we will continue using it for another few months!