Leftovers

• Ruben Schade ☛ Betty Abah on great society

  Via Wikiquote:

  A country is deemed great that truly cares about its children aka pikins, and the most vulnerable.

• Ruben Schade ☛ We’ll just replace the system!

  I’ve been talking a lot with a friend recently who’s been helping us out with something, and the story he’s been telling us about his work is both ridiculous and believable. Some of you may have… let’s just say, intimate experience with such a process! Maybe go grab a coffee, tea, or something stronger, then sit down as I tell you a story.

• New York Times ☛ Twitter Changed Soccer. There’s a Risk X Will Do It Again.

  The world’s most popular pastime has been irrevocably shaped by its exposure to social control media. That evolution can still go awry.

• Hackaday ☛ An Electric Skateboard For The Dogs

  What’s a dog to do if they want to do some accessible skateboarding? [Simone Giertz]’s three-legged pup, [Scraps], got the chance to try a LEGO Technic board for her thrills.

• NYPost ☛ Italian officials want to charge admission to this iconic site as overcrowding leads to chaos: ‘Too many tourists’

  A visit to Rome could soon cost a'more.

• Press Gazette ☛ The Guardian names new correspondents to cover underreported communities

  The appointments include The Guardian's first Caribbean correspondent.

• Hackaday ☛ An Automatic Cat Feeder Built With A 4060 Binary Counter

  We’ve seen a great many cat feeders over the years. Some rely on the Internet of Things, and some rely on fancy microcontrollers. [Larry Cook], on the other hand, built his using a simple 4060 binary counter chip.

• Science

  • Hackaday ☛ How Much Resolution Does Film Really Have?

    Have you ever scanned old negatives or print photographs? Then you’ve probably wondered about the resolution of your scanner, versus the resolution of what you’re actually scanning. Or maybe, you’ve looked at digital cameras, and wondered how many megapixels make up that 35mm film shot. Well [ShyStudios] has been pondering these very questions, and they’ve shared some answers.

  • Science Alert ☛ New Ultrafast Chip Paves Way For 4K Movie Downloads in Seconds

    "This vision is rapidly approaching reality."

  • Science Alert ☛ Scientists Reveal The Absolute Worst Thickness For a Paper Cut

    Ouch!

  • Science Alert ☛ HPV Linked to Disturbing Changes in Human Sperm, Scientists Find

    An insidious impact on male fertility.

  • Science Alert ☛ A Common Sleeping Pill May Reduce Buildup of Alzheimer's Proteins, Study Finds

    Intriguing...

  • Science Alert ☛ Alien Planets May Be Trapped in Endless Day or Eternal Night

    A moment that lasts forever.

  • Science Alert ☛ Lonely Space Probe Measures The True Darkness of The Universe

    "We now have a good idea of just how dark space really is."

  • Science Alert ☛ We May Already Be Touching The Andromeda Galaxy, Scientists Find

    The collision is underway.

  • Science Alert ☛ NASA Deploys Sail of Experimental Spacecraft Propelled Purely by Light

    A brilliant idea takes flight.

  • Science Alert ☛ Hints of a Hidden Structure Detected at The Edge of The Solar System

    Something nobody was expecting to find.

• Education

  • JURIST ☛ Ghana dispatch: legal battle over university’s revocation of visually impaired Ph.D. applicant’s admission could set landmark precedent

    A visually impaired Ph.D. applicant in Ghana, Isaac Anin Baah, has filed a lawsuit against the Kwame Nkrumah University of Science and Technology (KNUST), one of the nation’s premier higher educational institutions based in Kumasi, after his admission was unexpectedly revoked.

  • Pro Publica ☛ Illinois’ Garrison School to Reform How It Disciplines Disabled Students

• Hardware

  • Silicon Angle ☛ Intel reportedly weighing options for Mobileye stake, networking unit

    Intel Corp. is reportedly considering offloading a part of its stake in Mobileye, a major chip supplier to the auto sector. Bloomberg today cited sources as saying that the company could sell shares of Mobileye, formally Mobile Global Inc., via public markets or directly to a third party.

  • Tom's Hardware ☛ Qualcomm reportedly explores buying portions of Intel's PC client business

    Qualcomm explores ways to diversify its business into the PC space, eyes Intel's client PC unit.

  • Tom's Hardware ☛ Khadas announce updated Mind 2 range with defective chip maker Intel Meteor Lake CPUs

    Khadas updates the Mind Standard and Mind Premium with defective chip maker Intel Core Ultra 5 and Core Ultra 7 Meteor Lake processors.

  • Hackaday ☛ Ask Hackaday, What’s Next?

    Writing for Hackaday involves drinking from the firehose of tech news, and seeing the latest and greatest of new projects and happenings in the world of hardware. But sometimes you sit back in a reflective mood, and ask yourself: didn’t this all used to be more exciting? If you too have done that, perhaps it’s worth considering how our world of hardware hacking is fueled, and what makes stuff new and interesting.

  • Hackaday ☛ Bluetooth Version 6.0 Core Specification Released

    The Bluetooth SIG recently released the core specification for version 6.0 of Bluetooth. Compared to 5.x, it contains a number of changes and some new features, the most interesting probably being Channel Sounding. This builds upon existing features found in Bluetooth 5.x to determine the angle to, and direction of another device using Angle of Arrival (AoA) and Angle of Departure (AoD), but uses a new approach to much more precisely determine these parameters. as defined in the Technical Overview document for this feature.

• Health/Nutrition/Agriculture

  • New York Times ☛ Nurses Win a Bigger Role as Doctors Strike in South Korea

    As hospitals struggle from a monthslong walkout, nurses have picked up some of the slack. A new law gives them more responsibilities and, they say, greater recognition.

  • New York Times ☛ Time to Say Goodbye to the B.M.I.?

    The body mass index has long been criticized as a flawed indicator of health. A replacement has been gaining support: the body roundness index.

  • New York Times ☛ Missouri Reports Bird Flu in a Patient Without a Known Risk

    Previous human infections occurred in workers on farms. But community transmission of the virus remains unlikely for now, experts said.

  • The Kent Stater ☛ Drug Enforcement Administration share campaign with Ohio universities

    Brian McNeal is representing the Drug Enforcement Administration at Kent State and other Ohio universities for the start of September. He shares the role of drug prevention and the importance of promoting health and safety for college students.

  • New York Times ☛ X Gets a Brazilian Ax + Founder Mode + Listeners Respond on School Phone Bans

    “This is not a normal legal dispute.”

  • Science Alert ☛ Expert Warns Why You Should Never Become Your Own Dentist

    Health starts at home... but not dentistry.

• Proprietary/Artificial Intelligence (AI)

  • Xe's Blog ☛ LinkedIn collaborative articles confuse me

    Toss an insight to your algorithmic overlords

  • France24 ☛ Telegram chief Durov denounces French charges as ‘surprising’ and ‘misguided’

    Telegram CEO Pavel Durov criticised France for his recent arrest over extremist content on the messaging platform. In his first public comment on Telegram, Durov called it "surprising" he was arrested for third-party actions, condemning the use of outdated laws to charge platform executives for user-generated content.

  • Tom's Hardware ☛ Musician charged with wire fraud after using thousands of bots to stream Hey Hi (AI) music to earn millions in royalties

    A 52-year-old man allegedly bought AI-generated tracks and then used thousands of bots to rack up streams and earn more than $10 million over several years.

  • New York Times ☛ What Is ‘Agentic’ AI? It Doesn’t Require a Human to Tell It What to Do

    So-called agentic artificial intelligence doesn’t require a human to tell it what to do. At least, that’s the idea.

• Pseudo-Open Source

  • Openwashing

    • Rlang ☛ BlueSky Statistics Version 10 is Not Open Source

      I have verified with the founders that they no longer plan to release version 10 with an open-source license. I’m disappointed by this change as I have advocated for and written about open source for many years.

• Security

  • Privacy/Surveillance

    • EFF ☛ You Really Do Have Some Expectation of Privacy in Public

      How is it possible to have an expectation of privacy in public? The answer lies in the rise of increasingly advanced surveillance technology. When you are out in the world, of course you are going to be seen, so your presence will be recorded in one way or another. There’s nothing stopping a person from observing you if they’re standing across the street. If law enforcement has decided to investigate you, they can physically follow you. If you go to the bank or visit a courthouse, it’s reasonable to assume you’ll end up on their individual video security system.

• Defence/Aggression

  • RFA ☛ Myanmar junta airstrike kills 11 civilians in northern town

    Eleven people were wounded in the bombing of the insurgent-controlled town.

  • New York Times ☛ U.N. Panel Calls for International Force in Sudan to Protect Civilians

    The country’s brutal civil war has led to the killing, rape and torture of civilians, including children, as it threatens to destabilize neighboring countries.

  • France24 ☛ US calls for renewal of UN security mission in Haiti as mandate set to expire

    US Secretary of State Antony Blinken on Thursday urged renewing the United Nations mandate for an international security mission in Haiti. The mission's mandate, set to expire in early October, was initially approved for 12 months but has struggled with limited troops and funding. Armed gangs have seized much of the capital Port-au-Prince and surrounding areas.

  • France24 ☛ Israeli army withdraws from West Bank city of Jenin and its refugee camp after 10-day operation

    Israeli troops left the occupied West Bank city of Jenin and its refugee camp on Friday after a more than weeklong operation that has claimed dozens of Palestinian lives. As Israeli tanks drove out of the city, civilians were seen returning to their homes. The refugee camp is seen by Israel as a bastion for Palestinian armed groups, and its latest military operation in the territory is considered to be the deadliest since the start of its war against Hamas.

  • New York Times ☛ Israeli Military Withdraws From Jenin After 10-Day Raid

    The operation killed 21 people, including children, and caused widespread destruction of streets, homes and businesses, according to Palestinian news media and residents.

  • Atlantic Council ☛ What to expect from Japan-South Korea relations after Kishida

    Japanese Prime Minister Fumio Kishida is meeting with South Korean President Yoon Suk Yeol in Seoul September 6-7—likely their final summit before Kishida steps down. Atlantic Council experts share their insights on what’s next for Tokyo and Seoul.

  • New York Times ☛ Blaming a Parent, Again, for Failed Gun Laws

    Is the problem the man who gave his son a gun, or the gun?

  • New York Times ☛ California Can Ban Guns in Parks and Bars, but Not Hospitals, Court Says

    California and Hawaii banned guns from various public venues. A federal appeals court dusted off the history books to help determine where to allow prohibitions.

  • New York Times ☛ Hamas’s Release of Hostage Videos Inflames Divisions in Israel

    The fourth recording in as many days of a hostage killed in Gaza has added to pressure on the Israeli government to reach a cease-fire deal with Hamas.

  • Russia, Belarus, and War in Ukraine

    • New York Times ☛ Ukraine’s Zelensky Presses Western Allies for More Weapons

      The Ukrainian leader argued that escalating military pressure on Russia, combined with diplomacy, was the best way to motivate Moscow to seek peace.

    • New York Times ☛ Distracted and Divided, Russian Security Service Misses Threats

      The Ukrainian offensive over the border caught Moscow’s intelligence agencies by surprise, experts say. It wasn’t the first time that has happened during the war.

    • RFERL ☛ EU Announces Aid Package For Ukrainian Energy Infrastructure, Refugees In Moldova

      The European Union on September 6 announced a new aid package to provide humanitarian aid to vulnerable Ukrainians ahead of the winter months.

    • RFERL ☛ Austin Says Using U.S. Weapons For Long-Range Strikes No Game Changer In Ukraine

      U.S. Defense Secretary Lloyd Austin said on September 6 that no single military weapon will be decisive for Ukraine to defeat Russia's full-scale invasion and that the use of donated U.S. weapons for long-range strikes into Russia would not turn the tide of the war in Ukraine's favor.

    • RFERL ☛ Film Shown At Venice Festival Blasted As 'Russian Propaganda'

      The top aide to Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskiy and a group that represents Ukrainians living in Canadian have sharply criticized the showing of the film Russians At War at the Venice Film Festival, calling it Russian propaganda.

    • RFERL ☛ 'There Are Still A Lot Of F-16s,' Dutch Minister Says After Zelenskiy Outlines Plans To Get More

      Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskiy's plan to increase the number of aircraft in the Ukrainian Air Force is realistic, Dutch Defense Minister Ruben Brekelmans said on September 6 in an interview with RFE/RL.

    • RFERL ☛ U.S. Sees Potential Iran Transfer Of Missiles To Russia As Alarming

      Any Iranian transfer of ballistic missiles to Russia would mark a sharp escalation in the Ukraine war, the United States said on September 6 after reports that the two countries had deepened ties with such an arms transfer.

    • RFA ☛ Did China send troops to aid Russia in the Ukraine war?

      Verdict: False

    • JURIST ☛ New UK Labour government pushes for International Tribunal to prosecute Russian leaders for aggression

      The United Kingdom’s newly elected Labour government is aiming to accelerate global efforts to establish a tribunal capable of trying Russian officials for crimes of aggression in Ukraine, according to Lord Chancellor and Justice Secretary Shabana Mahmood.

    • France24 ☛ France to use frozen Russian assets to finance Ukraine military aid

      France’s defence ministry on Friday announced that it will use a share of €1.4 billion euros in revenue from frozen Russian assets to finance the purchase of military equipment for Ukraine. EU member states agreed in May to use the interest generated by seized assets belonging to the Russian central bank to support Kyiv, a decision Russia has denounced as "illegal". Read our blog to see how the day's events unfolded.

    • Latvia ☛ Latvia to host 'drone summit' in early 2025

      On Friday, September 6, while participating in the meeting of the Ukrainian Defense Contact Group in Ramstein, Germany, Latvian Minister of Defense Andris Sprūds said that at the beginning of 2025, Latvia will organize an international drone summit.

    • European Commission ☛ EU provides €40 million in humanitarian aid for winter preparedness in Ukraine

      European Commission Press release Brussels, 06 Sep 2024 With relentless attacks on Ukraine's energy infrastructure, the Commission is boosting its humanitarian funding to vulnerable Ukrainians with an additional €40 million ahead of the approaching winter.

    • Silicon Angle ☛ YouTube deletes Tenet Media’s channel following US indictment over Russian disinformation

      YouTube has deleted the channel of Tenet Media, a right-wing content production company that recent media reports have linked to a Russian influence operation.  A spokesperson for the Surveillance Giant Google LLC unit told The Washington Post today that the move is part of “ongoing efforts to combat coordinated influence operations.”

    • Scoop News Group ☛ Intel officials expect more foreign influence efforts leading up to Election Day

      U.S. officials said they expect Russia, Iran and China to increase the cadence of influence operations targeting voters over the final two months of this election cycle.

    • France24 ☛ Telegram CEO Durov announces new features to combat illicit content

      Russian-born Telegram boss Pavel Durov announced on Friday a range of new features for the social control media app that aim to tackle illicit content, bots and scammers. Durov was released on bail last week after being placed under formal investigation by French authorities following his arrest as part of a probe related to illegal content carried on the platform.

    • RFA ☛ South Korea, Japan ‘ready to stop North Korea hiding behind Russia’

      Japanese leader Fumio Kishida held his final summit with the South Korean President on Friday before stepping down.

    • RFERL ☛ Russia Adds Feminist Activist Marshenkulova To 'Foreign Agents' List

      The Russian Justice Ministry on September 6 added Zalina Marshenkulova, a feminist activist in exile, to its list of "foreign agents."

    • RFERL ☛ Russia Adds Self-Exiled Military Observer Yan Matveyev To Its Wanted List

      The Russian Interior Ministry on September 5 added self-exiled military observer Yan Matveyev to its wanted list on unspecified charges.

    • RFERL ☛ Russians Vote In Regional Elections With Many Opposition Candidates Barred

      Russians are voting for governors and regional legislators in 83 regions and cities, including Moscow and St. Petersburg, on September 6. But many opposition candidates have been barred from running.

    • LRT ☛ Three Belarusians named suspects in 2021 Ryanair plane grounding case

      Three Belarusian citizens have been named suspects in the 2021 Ryanair plane hijacking incident, the Prosecutor General’s Office said on Friday.

    • RFERL ☛ Poland Issues Warrants For 3 Belarusians Over Forced Landing Of Commercial Flight In 2021

      A court in the Polish capital has issued arrests warrants for three Belarusian men over their roles in the forced landing in Minsk of a commercial flight carrying then-dissident blogger Raman Pratasevich in 2021.

• Environment

  • RFA ☛ Torrential rains, deadly flooding hit Tibetan areas of Qinghai province

    Rights groups say the severe weather is the result of climate change.

  • New York Times ☛ Typhoon Yagi Expected to Strengthen Before Hitting Vietnam

    Yagi, one of 2024’s strongest storms, hit the southern Chinese island of Hainan on Friday. It is forecast to make landfall in Vietnam on Saturday.

  • Hong Kong Free Press ☛ Southern China braces for impact as Super Typhoon Yagi expected to make landfall on Friday

    Super typhoon Yagi on Friday moved towards China’s island province of Hainan, as authorities prepared for what could be the strongest storm to hit the country’s southern coast in a decade.

  • France24 ☛ Super Typhoon Yagi slams into southern China after deadly pass through Philippines

    Super Typhoon Yagi on Friday made landfall in southern China, barrelling into the Hainan and Guangdong provinces. The storm is the biggest to hit Asia in more than a decade and has led to hundreds of thousands of evacuations and schools and businesses to be shut. Yagi claimed more than a dozen lives when it swept through the northern Philippines earlier this week.

  • Hong Kong Free Press ☛ China records hottest August over 6 decades amid summer of extreme weather

    China logged its hottest August in more than six decades last month, its national weather service said, after the country endured a summer of extreme weather and heatwaves across much of its north and west.

  • Energy/Transportation

    • RFA ☛ Satellite imagery suggest floods damaged North Korea’s power grid

      North Korean cities appear darker at nighttime in late August photos.

    • New York Times ☛ Boeing Starliner Returns to Earth: How to Watch Live

      Two NASA astronauts remain aboard the International Space Station after the troubled vehicle they rode undocked ahead of a landing early Saturday in the New Mexico desert.

    • Latvia ☛ Rīga Airport passenger numbers exceeded pre-Covid levels in August

      Rīga Airport (RIX) continues to grow its passenger numbers according to preliminary data published September 6.

    • Hackaday ☛ Hot Water Heater Hacked To Run On Solar Juice

      It’s 2024, and there’s no getting around it. Grid energy is expensive. [Darrell] realized that a lot of his money was going on water heating, and he came up with a neat solution. What if he could hack in some solar power to slash his bills at a minimum of fuss? It worked so well for him, he’s whipped up a calculator to help others do the same.

• Finance

  • Hong Kong Free Press ☛ Hong Kong gym chain Physical Fitness ‘temporarily’ shuts down after HK$3 million unpaid pensions payments

    Hong Kong gym chain Physical Fitness has announced a “temporary closure” citing high rents, after pensions authorities warned of legal action against the fitness company over HK$3 million outstanding contributions involving 740 employees.

  • JURIST ☛ Pakistan top court restores amendments to anti-graft law

    The Supreme Court of Pakistan on Friday restored amendments to the anti-graft laws, which were previously struck down in its judgment delivered on September 15, 2023. The reversal came followed an appeal by the federal government of Pakistan against the earlier judgment.

  • Federal News Network ☛ GSA moves forward with a new EPA, consistency is the next opportunity

    Major issues with GSA’s implementation of EPAs on MAS were first flagged in 2021 as U.S. inflation spiked to levels unseen in over a decade.

• AstroTurf/Lobbying/Politics

  • New York Times ☛ China Stops Foreign Adoptions, Ending a Complicated Chapter

    Beijing said the move was in line with international trends, as more countries have limited such adoptions. Many would-be adoptive families were left in limbo.

  • RFA ☛ Clues show Huang Ping was Chinese diplomat directing New York official

    Linda Sun is accused of acting as a Chinese agent while she was an aide to 2 governors.

• Censorship/Free Speech

  • AccessNow ☛ Joint Statement: Saudi Arabia must free detainees jailed for their online expression ahead of Internet Governance Forum

    Access Now, Amnesty International, and civil society partners demand Saudi Arabia free individuals detained for their online expression ahead the UN Internet Governance Forum in Riyadh.

  • BBC ☛ Scunthorpe fudge maker devastated by Instagram account suspension - BBC News [Rianne: This family business is more profitable than Meta, until Meta decided to suspend their account without explanation. Jealousy?]

    The family-run business claims it has lost almost 100,000 followers after Instagram's decision.

• Civil Rights/Policing

  • Citizen Lab ☛ Locked In, Locked Out: How Data Breaches Shatter Refugees’ Safety

    In an article published by the Tahrir Institute for Middle East Policy, Citizen Lab senior researcher Noura Aljizawi discusses the leak of personal data of Syrian refugees in Türkiye and the severe impact on their lives.

  • Pro Publica ☛ Nike Shareholders to Demand Actions on Climate, Worker Protections

    When Nike’s shareholders convene in a virtual meeting room on Tuesday, they will hear from dissatisfied investors who hope to shift the company’s approach to climate change, gender equity and labor rights using one of the only tools they have: transparency.

    They’re offering a record number of proposals to make the company investigate the problems they perceive and report the results publicly.

  • CS Monitor ☛ Human smuggling is on the rise. International collaboration is key to halting it.

    Despite efforts to crack down on immigration at the U.S.-Mexico border, human smugglers adapt quickly to new laws and regulations in how they market their “services” to desperate migrants. Human trafficking is on the rise. International collaboration is key to halting it.

Monopolies/Monopsonies

• Digital Music News ☛ Live Nation’s CFO Isn’t Afraid of the U.S. Government — “I Expect We’re Going to Prevail”

  Despite the U.S. Government’s interest in a potential Live Nation/Ticketmaster break-up, Live Nation CFO Joe Berchtold doesn’t seem too worried.

• Silicon Angle ☛ UK tentatively finds that Google’s display ad unit violates competition rules

  The UK’s antitrust watchdog has tentatively found that Surveillance Giant Google LLC’s business practices in the display advertising market are anticompetitive. The Competition and Markets Authority, or CMA, published its findings today. In conjunction, the watchdog sent Surveillance Giant Google a statement of objections over the business practices that were found to violate antitrust rules.

• Press Gazette ☛ News diary 9-15 September: Surveillance Giant Google ad monopoly trial, Harris-Trump debate, Lucy Letby inquiry

• Press Gazette ☛ Google ad tech practices harming ‘thousands of UK publishers and advertisers’, watchdog believes

  Google responded that the CMA's case relies on "flawed interpretations" of the sector.

• DOJ v. Surveillance Giant Google Ad Tech – Alleging Anticompetitive Harm Where None is Found

• Patents

  • JUVE ☛ Novartis’ imminent infringement suit against Celltrion fails

    At the end of July, Düsseldorf local division held a PI hearing concerning imminent infringement. Claimants Novartis and Genentech had challenged defendant Celltrion over the formulation patent monopoly EP 3 805 248. The patent monopoly is in force in all UPC contracting member states except for Malta.

  • Software Patents

    • Unified Patents ☛ IP Investments entity, Distributed Media, media streaming patent monopoly found invalid

      On September 5, 2024, the Central Reexamination Unit (CRU) entered a notice of intent to issue a reexamination certificate canceling the challenged claims (1-19 and 21) of U.S. Patent 7,739,714, owned and asserted by Distributed Media Solutions, an NPE and entity of IP Investments Group.

    • Unified Patents ☛ IPVal entity, 5G IP Holdings, 5G patent monopoly found invalid

      On September 5, 2024, the Central Reexamination Unit (CRU) entered a final rejection of all challenged claims of U.S. Patent 10,813,163, owned and asserted by 5G IP Holdings LLC, an NPE and IP Valuation Partners, LLC entity.

• Trademarks

  • TTAB Blog ☛ TTABlog Test: Is "ACUITI" Confusable with "QIACUITY" for Medical Testing Services?

    The USPTO refused registration of the mark ACUITI for cancer screening and genetic testing software, finding confusion likely with the registered mark QIACUITY for identical and overlapping services. The second and third DuPont factors weighed heavily against the applicant, the fifth and sixth were neutral, and the fourth factor - consumer sophistication - favored the applicant. But what about the marks? How do you think this came out? In re GRAIL, LLC, Serial No. 90777742 (August 29, 2024) [not precedential] (Opinion by Judge George C. Pologeorgis).

• Copyrights

  • Digital Music News ☛ Look Out, Fentanylware (TikTok) — SoundCloud is Breaking New Artists Again Too — ‘Ascending’ Out of Beta

    SoundCloud pushes its Ascending program out of beta, after breaking such new artists as Shaboozey, Barry Can’t Swim, and Kenya Grace. SoundCloud has been working toward a formal structure for developing artists, such as its First On SoundCloud and Buzzing Playlists features.

  • JURIST ☛ US federal appeals court confirms Internet Archive infringes US publisher copyright monopoly protections

    A US federal appeals court on Wednesday held the Internet Archive’s Free Digital Library infringes upon publishers’ copyright monopoly protections.

  • CS Monitor ☛ Why China’s rock music is here to stay

    A new textbook warns that rock ‘n roll is a security threat. Yet China’s vibrant rock scene is mainly a source of creative freedom.

  • Digital Music News ☛ Breaking: Federal Judge Pauses Spotify’s Push for Kobalt Damages as Eminem Litigation Fallout Continues

    With Spotify having scored a victory in a marathon royalties battle against Eminem publisher Eight Mile Style, the presiding judge has temporarily denied the streaming giant’s motion for a massive damages payment from Kobalt.

• Gemini* and Gopher

  • Personal/Opinions

    • A Kind Person's Guide to Kidnapping

      One unexpected thing the Summer vacation brought me was plenty of opportunities to practice kidnapping. Mostly, but not limited to, children.

    • 🔤SpellBinding: CGIZNVL Wordo: MAMMY

  • Technology and Free Software

    • The Old Mine

      I watched the trailer for the Minecraft movie that released recently[1]. I'm not going to comment on how the movie looks, but I do have other thoughts surrounding it.

      What struck me was how much I am not the target audience. And that sparked reflection on who the target audience is. I started playing Minecraft early in it's beta release, which I suppose was in the early 2010s. I realized that a very significant part of this movie's target audience had not even been born then. So a lot of my discomfort with the movie boils down to "Oh fuck I'm getting older." Somewhat more eloquently, there's a dissonance for me, one that existed well before now and is being strongly excited by the movie. Minecraft for me is mentally filed as a new thing. Something that just came out. It was popular when I first heard of it, but it was nowhere near a big as it is now. So being made conscious that it is not so new anymore feels strange. Seeing it intrude into the real world feels strange. I see Minecraft toys on the shelves of department stores and it seems quaint. "Minecraft, that little indie game?"