Leftovers

• Latvia ☛ A very special link: Immanuel Kant and Latvia

  Immanuel Kant is regarded as one of Europe’s most important philosophers and greatest thinkers. Spending all his life in Königsberg, the German philosopher from Prussia changed the world without having seen much of it first-hand. With events happening around the globe to mark 300 years since his birth, Latvia has more reason celebrate than most places as, interestingly, his life and work were closely related to Rīga and what today is Latvia.

• TechTea ☛ Surfing the Independent Web

  One of the things people often talk about is how the old web felt bigger and was fun to explore compared to the modern internet. Even though there are more websites than every it feels like there are only a few big ones, web surfing is dead, and that the web in general is a hostile place. While it is true that on ad driven search engines AI slop and SEO spam make up a large amount of results, there are still many interesting websites out there if you know how to find them. Today we are going to make surfing the web fun again.

• David Rosenthal ☛ Dewayne Hendricks RIP

  Dewayne Hendricks, my friend of nearly four decades, passed away last Friday at age 74. His mentors were Buckminster Fuller and Paul Baran. He was a pioneer of wireless Internet connectivity, a serial entrepreneur, curator of an influential e-mail list, and for the last 30 years on the organizing committee of the Asilomar Microcomputer Workshop.

• Baldur Bjarnason ☛ The promise and distraction of productivity and note-taking systems – Baldur Bjarnason

  A while back I did a deep-dive researching and prototyping note-taking tools. It was the logical continuation of my life-long interest in writing and creativity tools or, at least, I thought it was at the time.

• Science

  • The Revelator ☛ Are Botanists Endangered?

    Researchers in Indonesia recently captured a surprising event on video: A wild orangutan named Rakus, with a deep gash on his cheek, harvested liana leaves, chewed them up, and rubbed them on his wound. His cheek healed without infection. As it turns out the plants have anti-inflammatory, antibacterial, antifungal, and other chemical properties that help heal wounds.

    The great ape saw the plant, recognized the plant, and valued the plant because he knew something about a subject that few humans do anymore: botany.

    At a time when our net knowledge about plants keeps growing, our individual understanding of plants is in decline. This is unsurprising, because while we still depend on plants for life, few of us need to know much about them in our daily lives — as long as someone else does. We rely on botanists to identify plants, keep them alive, and in so doing help keep us alive as well.

  • Omicron Limited ☛ A new catalog charts the evolution of the universe over time

    The team used different filters to image the same field numerous times. The light from more distant objects will be shifted toward the red end of the spectrum and the multiple images of the same field will enable distance calculations to be made.

• Education

  • University of Michigan ☛ Senate Assembly discusses revisions to Statement of Student Rights and Responsibilities

    The University of Michigan’s Senate Assembly gathered in the Alexander G. Ruthven Building Monday afternoon to vote on committee charges — documents that list the tasks and duties of a committee — and the procedure for filling off-cycle member vacancies.

  • Nicholas Tietz-Sokolsky ☛ What I tell people new to on-call

    It's natural to feel a lot of pressure with on-call responsibilities. You have a production application that real people need to use! When that pager goes off, you want to go in and fix the problem yourself. That's the job, right?

    But it's not. It's not your job to fix every issue by yourself. It is your job to see that issues get addressed. The difference can be subtle, but important.

  • Joel Chrono ☛ Middle school, friends and bullies

    Remembering my middle school days and reflecting about my non-experience with bullying.

• Hardware

  • Hackaday ☛ The Possibility Of Reverting Time On The Ageing Of Materials

    Everyone knows that time’s arrow only goes in one direction, regardless of the system or material involved. In the case of material time, i.e. the ageing of materials such as amorphous materials resulting from glass transition, this material time is determined after the initial solidification by the relaxation of localized stresses and medium-scale reordering. These changes are induced by the out-of-equilibrium state of the amorphous material, and result in changes to the material’s properties, such as a change from ductile to a brittle state in metallic glasses. It is this material time which the authors of a recent paper (preprint) in Nature Physics postulates to be reversible.

  • Ken Shirriff ☛ Inside a ferroelectric RAM chip

    Ferroelectric memory (FRAM) is an interesting storage technique that stores bits in a special "ferroelectric" material. Ferroelectric memory is nonvolatile like flash memory, able to hold its data for decades. But, unlike flash, ferroelectric memory can write data rapidly. Moreover, FRAM is much more durable than flash and can be be written trillions of times. With these advantages, you might wonder why FRAM isn't more popular. The problem is that FRAM is much more expensive than flash, so it is only used in niche applications.

• Health/Nutrition/Agriculture

  • Dr. Joseph Ladapo’s antivax assault on public health: Will it infect the federal government?

    The number of developments worrisome for the future of public health in this country have been coming so fast and furious that I often can’t keep up with them. (Even back when I was posting nearly twice as frequently as I do now, it was impossible.) I had hoped to write about something other than COVID-19 and vaccines, but unfortunately, there’s been another development in the past few days. That’s after last week, when I noted that former President and Republican nominee for President Donald Trump had cozied up to Robert F. Kennedy, Jr. who’s been a rabid antivax loon for nearly two decades now (at least) and had recently suspended his Presidential campaign to endorse Trump. This “partnership” led them both to come up with a riff on Trump’s “make America great again” (MAGA) slogan, namely “make America healthy again” (MAHA). Let’s just say that it wasn’t the greatest slogan—MAHA?—and RFK Jr.’s plan was a mixture of the not-bad (e.g., concern about regulatory capture) with the absolute bonkers (e.g., giving half of the NIH budget to research into “holistic” therapies) and, tellingly and conveniently enough, mentioned absolutely nothing about vaccines. It’s as if RFK Jr. and Trump both thought that we would totally forget about RFK Jr.’s two decades of antivax fear mongering and conspiracy theories. Now, hot on the heals of that disturbing news, it’s difficult for me not to take notice of the recently issued Updated Guidance for COVID-19 Boosters for the Fall and Winter 2024–2025 Season from the Florida Department of Health, currently run by COVID-19 contrarian and now arguably antivax physician Dr. Joseph Ladapo, discouraging the use of mRNA-based COVID-19 vaccines for older people (and that’s not all) based on misrepresented science and antivax tropes.This guidance was sent by email last Thursday to all licensed healthcare providers in the state of Florida.

  • CoryDoctorow ☛ Pluralistic: What the fuck is a PBM?

    That brings me to the American health industry, and the absurdly complex, ridiculously corrupt Pharmacy Benefit Managers (PBMs), a pathology that has only metastasized since 2008.

    On at least 20 separate occasions, I have taken it upon myself to figure out how the PBM swindle works, and nevertheless, every time they come up, I have to go back and figure it out again, because PBMs have the most powerful Shield of Boringness out of the whole Monster Manual of terminal-stage capitalism's trash mobs.

  • The Atlantic ☛ Lighthouse Parents Have More Confident Kids

    There’s no question that many American parents desperately need more support. Yet the surgeon general is missing one important strategy that is within the control of every parent: a look in the mirror. What if the ways in which we are parenting are making life harder on our kids and harder on us? What if by doing less, parents would foster better outcomes for children and parents alike?

  • Yoshua Wuyts ☛ Solving my RSI issues

    In this post I want to share a little about what my journey to actually fix my wrist issues. Not to be prescriptive for others, but to be descriptive about what I'm doing. Perhaps it'll be useful for others, but mainly because it's fun for me to talk about. I've been making little ASCII cheat sheets for myself, and basically I just wanted to have an excuse to post them publicly.

  • Games ☛ Two games addiction lawsuits dismissed

    Two lawsuits against some of the industry's leading companies, accused of enabling video game addiction, have been voluntarily dismissed by the plaintiff.

    In a review of court records by Game File (paywall), the cases – filed in Arkansas and Ohio on behalf of minors – were against Epic, Activision Blizzard, Take Two Interactive, Rockstar Games, Roblox, Microsoft, and Sony.

    According to early filings, lawyers representing the companies involved cited protections under the First Amendment for their defense and that "the plaintiffs should be bound by user agreements that mandate arbitration, not lawsuits," per Game File.

• Proprietary/Artificial Intelligence (AI)

  • MacStories Inc ☛ Apple's Definition of a "Photo"

    One of my favorite parts from Nilay Patel’s review of the iPhone 16 Pro at The Verge was the answer he got from Apple’s VP of camera software engineering Jon McCormack about the company’s definition of a “photograph”:

  • Drew Breunig ☛ What Remains After an AI Collapse?

    Last week, Ed Zitron wrote a long piece arguing generative AI is unsustainable and due for a collapse. Many sections resonated with me while others that had me cringing. I do believe the field is over-invested in at the moment and the largest players will have a very difficult time sticking the landing. I also believe many AI critics are over-fitting metaverse, [cryptoccurrency], Web3, and NFT narratives to AI.

    But let’s set this disagreement aside for the moment and assume the AI bubble will burst. What then?

  • New York Times ☛ Will A.I. Be a Bust? A Wall Street Skeptic Rings the Alarm.

    Goldman’s basket of A.I. stocks, which is managed by a separate arm of the firm and includes Nvidia, Microsoft, Apple, Alphabet, Amazon, Meta and Oracle, has declined 7 percent from its peak on July 10, as investors and business leaders debate whether A.I. can justify its staggering costs.

  • Wired ☛ When You Call a Restaurant, You Might Be Chatting With an AI Host

    But who even calls a restaurant in the era of Google and Resy? According to some of the founders of AI voice host startups, many customers do, and for various reasons. “Restaurants get a high volume of phone calls compared to other businesses, especially if they’re popular and take reservations,” says Alex Sambvani, CEO and cofounder of Slang, which currently works with everyone from the Wolfgang Puck restaurant group to Chick-fil-A to the fast-casual chain Slutty Vegan. Sambvani estimates that in-demand establishments receive between 800 and 1,000 calls per month. Typical callers tend to be last-minute bookers, tourists and visitors, older people, and those who do their errands while driving.

  • Futurism ☛ Restaurants Are Hiring AI to Pick Up the Phone When You Call

    A slew of these services have been launched in just the past few years. Among them, per Wired, include the startups Maitre-D AI, which rolled out in the Bay Area in 2024, RestoHost, which now takes calls at over 150 restaurants in Atlanta, and Slang, which pivoted to offering AI services to restaurants last year when it raised around $20 million in funding.

    It's a pretty low-stakes application of the tech, as far as irresponsible uses of AI go — but it's a testament to just how pervasive AI is becoming in taking over customer service roles once handled by humans across multiple industries.

  • WCCF Tech ☛ NetEase Subsidiary Skybox Labs Lays Off 25 People

    The Canadian developer Skybox Labs has laid off 25 staff members. Skybox Labs is a subsidiary of NetEase, a Chinese company that has acquired many different companies over time. This included Grasshopper Manufacture, Quantic Dream, and Skybox Labs, for example. In addition to acquiring all of these studios, they've helped establish additional studios globally, often headed by industry veterans such as Greg Street and David Vonderhaar. The layoffs at Skybox Labs were announced on LinkedIn five days ago in a statement. "Despite all our best efforts, we are not immune to the unprecedented challenges that have impacted so many companies in the industry."

  "IBM is laying off a significant number of employees this week and is trying to keep it quiet, writes plovdiv24.bg, referring to his sources." https://fakti.bg/en/biznes/914535-tech-giant-with-offices-in-bulgaria-cuts-thousands-of-jobs

  • Tech giant, with offices in Bulgaria, cuts thousands of jobs

    IBM is laying off a significant number of employees this week and is trying to keep it quiet, writes plovdiv24.bg, referring to his sources.

    [...]

    The people who are stuck are mostly the people in higher positions than the programmers, the support specialists and the sellers, the publication writes. We are talking about people aged 50-55 with 20-24 years of work at the senior level.

• Security

  • Privacy/Surveillance

    • EFF ☛ EFF to Supreme Court: Strike Down Texas’ Unconstitutional Age Verification Law

      Under HB 1181, signed into law last year, any website that Texas decides is composed of “one-third” or more of “sexual material harmful to minors” is forced to collect age-verifying personal information from all visitors. When the Supreme Court reviews a case challenging the law in its next term, its ruling could have major consequences for the freedom of adults to safely and anonymously access protected speech online.

    • International Business Times ☛ Police Warn Criminals Are Using Zillow And Redfin To Identify Homes For Burglaries In California, Michigan, And Arizona

      In an age where digital convenience has streamlined nearly every aspect of life, criminals have found new ways to exploit technology for illicit purposes. Authorities in California, Michigan, and Arizona now warn homeowners about a disturbing trend: burglars use real estate platforms like Zillow and Redfin to identify homes for potential burglaries.

      This emerging threat transforms how criminals plan break-ins, shifting from traditional physical surveillance methods to digital reconnaissance.

    • 404 Media ☛ Telegram Changes Policy, Says It Will Provide User Data to Authorities

      In an update to its privacy policy, Telegram says it will now share IP addresses and phone numbers to authorities in response to valid orders. The change is a dramatic switch for the social network app, which has become a hotbed for criminals.

    • Semafor Inc ☛ Telegram CEO Pavel Durov announces app will give user data to authorities if requested

      Telegram will now provide authorities with user data, including individuals’ phone numbers and IP addresses, in response to valid legal requests, CEO Pavel Durov said Monday.

    • The Register UK ☛ Telegram tweaks T&Cs on IP address, phone number privacy

      As you can see, a shift from cooperating with terror investigations to criminal probes in general. This is fairly significant as Telegram pretty much billed itself as a haven for those avoiding government surveillance and investigations. It offer a degree of end-to-end encryption for its users – more on that below – and organized its IT infrastructure around the world to effectively resist handing over information about its users to the authorities, which made it a destination for all kinds of netizens, good and bad.

• Defence/Aggression

  • The Record ☛ Dozens of Fortune 100 companies have unwittingly hired North Korean IT workers, according to report

    In a report published Monday by the company’s Mandiant unit, researchers describe a common scheme orchestrated by the group it tracks as UNC5267, which has been active since 2018. In most cases, the IT workers “consist of individuals sent by the North Korean government to live primarily in China and Russia, with smaller numbers in Africa and Southeast Asia.”

  • NBC ☛ TikTok removes Russian state media outlets RT and Sputnik, citing 'covert influence operations'

    TikTok said that, even before Monday, it had restricted the visibility of the accounts in the European Union and that United Kingdom and that it had already ruled their content ineligible for TikTok’s “For You” feed.

  • [Old] UN ☛ Protocol on Prohibitions or Restrictions on the Use of Mines, Booby-Traps and Other Devices as amended on 3 May 1996 (Protocol II to the 1980 Convention as amended on 3 May 1996) [PDF]

    Article 7 - Prohibitions on the use of booby-traps and other devices

    2.It is prohibited to use booby-traps or other devices in the form of apparently harmless portable objects which are specifically designed and constructed to contain explosive material.

    3.Without prejudice to the provisions of Article 3, it is prohibited to use weapons to which this Article applies in any city, town, village or other area containing a similar concentration of civilians in which combat between ground forces is not taking place or does not appear to be imminent, unless either:

    (a) they are placed on or in the close vicinity of a military objective; or

    (b) measures are taken to protect civilians from their effects, for example, the posting of warning sentries, the issuing of warnings or the provision of fences.

  • Security Week ☛ Ban Sought for Chinese, Russian Software and Hardware Used in Autonomous Vehicles on US Roads

    In extreme situations, a foreign adversary could shut down or take simultaneous control of multiple vehicles operating in the United States, causing crashes and blocking roads.

    [...]

    The measure announced Monday is proactive but critical, the agency said, given that all the bells and whistles in cars like microphones, cameras, GPS tracking and Bluetooth technology could make Americans more vulnerable to bad actors and potentially expose personal information, from the home address of drivers, to where their children go to school.

    In extreme situations, a foreign adversary could shut down or take simultaneous control of multiple vehicles operating in the United States, causing crashes and blocking roads, U.S. Secretary of Commerce Gina Raimondo told reporters on a call Sunday.

  • The Record ☛ Biden administration proposes rule banning Chinese, Russian connected vehicles and parts

    “Certain hardware and software in connected vehicles enable the capture of information about geographic areas or critical infrastructure, and present opportunities for malicious actors to disrupt the operations of infrastructure or the vehicles themselves,” the announcement said.

    “These countries of concern could use critical technologies within our supply chains for surveillance and sabotage to undermine national security,” it added.

    The ban on software would take effect for model year 2027 while the hardware ban would not become law until the beginning of model year 2030 — cars released as new models are typically made available in the summer preceding the new model year.

  • The Register UK ☛ US proposes ban on Chinese, Russian connected car tech

    "These technologies include computer systems that control vehicle movement and collect sensitive driver and passenger data as well as cameras and sensors that enable automated driving systems and record detailed information about American infrastructure," the White House said in a statement. "Now more than ever, vehicles are directly connected into our country's digital networks."

    It would be a simple matter, the administration reasoned, for a foreign company in a nation like China or Russia, where governments "compel companies subject to their jurisdiction … to cooperate with security and intelligence services," according to the proposed rule.

  • The Washington Post ☛ U.S. pitches ban on Chinese tech in driverless and connected vehicles

    The move follows seven months of deliberation and increasing concern over the risk of allowing foreign adversaries to obtain data on American driving habits or to remotely control American vehicles via internet connections, said administration officials who briefed reporters ahead of the planned action.

  • Wired ☛ Proposed Ban Would Be a ‘Death Sentence’ for Chinese EVs in the US

    The Biden administration says the move is needed for national security reasons, given how central technology is to today’s increasingly sophisticated cars. In announcing the proposed ban, Commerce Secretary Gina Raimondo cited vehicles’ internet-connected cameras, microphones, and GPS equipment. “It doesn't take much imagination to understand how a foreign adversary with access to this information could pose a serious risk to both our national security and the privacy of US citizens,” she said.

  • Silicon Angle ☛ US moves to ban import of certain connected vehicle parts from China and Russia

    The White House today announced plans to ban the import of certain auto parts made in China and Russia. The move follows a U.S. Commerce Department probe into connected vehicle components that began in February. As part of the investigation, officials evaluated the potential national security risks associated with such components.

  • Scoop News Group ☛ White House proposes rule to ban Chinese, Russian parts for networked vehicles

    The ban for hardware and software could happen within three to seven years.

    [...]

    Specifically, the ban would apply to the parts needed for “vehicle connectivity systems” — like Bluetooth, cellular service, or Wi-Fi — and comes amid growing concerns that digital conveniences have also created a highly connected playground rife with mass surveillance and malicious hacking.

    Many vehicles on the road are considered computers on wheels more than mechanical hunks of steel, and the automobile industry is as much software as a transportation sector. Additionally, rising tensions with China after years of subsidized industrial manufacturing that dominated certain American markets has put national security circles in Washington on high alert.

  • Hong Kong Free Press ☛ Beijing calls reported US ban on cars with Chinese tech ‘discriminatory’

    China warned the United States on Monday not to take “discriminatory actions” against its firms, following reports Washington is planning to ban the sale of vehicles using Chinese and Russian technology.

  • Tom's Hardware ☛ US government to ban Chinese hardware and software for connected vehicles: Report

    American government to ban Chinese and Russian vehicle connectivity systems and automated driving systems.

  • New York Times ☛ Monday Briefing: Israel and Hezbollah Trade Threats

    Plus, a Russian military officer’s story of desertion and escape.

  • Russia, Belarus, and War in Ukraine

    • The Straits Times ☛ Japan protests airspace ‘violation’ by Russian patrol plane

      It is the first 'publicly announced' airspace incursion by a Russian aircraft since June 2019.

    • New York Times ☛ Russian Military Plane Breaches Japan’s Airspace

      The infringements were the first by Russia in five years, according to the Japanese defense ministry. A fighter fired a warning flare in response.

    • Marcy Wheeler ☛ Why No One Went to Prison for Rudy Giuliani’s Hunter Biden Corruption

      Want to know how Rudy Giuliani was allowed to solicit dirt from Russian spies to help Trump get elected, without accountability? Want to know why Barr is considered a critic of Trump rather than his most corrupt enabler? Ask the journalists who lost interest in that story as soon as Rudy released a laptop full of Hunter Biden's dick pics. 

    • Meduza ☛ Russia’s eastern Ukraine reconstruction work relies on sketchy job recruitment and exploitative labor practices — Meduza

    • Meduza ☛ Putin’s 2018 election campaign used stolen funds from embezzlement case that led to regional official’s imprisonment, investigation finds — Meduza

    • LRT ☛ Belarusian, Russian nationals protest stalling Lithuanian passport applications

      Russian and Belarusian nationals have started a petition against ongoing delays on their Lithuanian citizenship applications.

    • Meduza ☛ Russian Foreign Service’s house magazine contradicts Putin’s claim that swapping Navalny in August prisoner exchange was only a last-minute idea — Meduza

    • France24 ☛ Russian cosmonauts touch down in Soyuz capsule after record-breaking stay on ISS

      A Russian space capsule with two Russians and one American on board landed Monday in Kazakhstan after undocking from the International Space Station (ISS). Russian cosmonauts Oleg Kononenko and Nikolai Chub returned after a record-breaking stay of 374 days aboard the ISS, while American astronaut Tracy Dyson was in the space station for six months.

    • France24 ☛ Ukraine is ‘close to the end of the war’, Zelenskiy says on US visit

      "We are closer to the end of the war" with Russia, Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskiy said Monday in an interview with ABC News, adding that Russian President Vladimir Putin is "afraid" because of Ukraine's ongoing incursion into the western Kursk region. Zelenskiy is in the US to attend the UN General Assembly and later in the week will travel to Washington to present a "victory plan" to the White House.

    • New York Times ☛ Putin Is Hunting Down Ordinary People All Over the World

      It’s not just opposition figures who are caught in the Kremlin’s dragnet.

    • Latvia ☛ More aid on the way to Ukraine from Latvia

      Computers, transformers, clothing, food and other things started their journey to Ukraine September 23 reported Latvian Television.

    • Latvia ☛ Latvian security service offers its take on Ukraine peace talks

      The Constitution Protection Bureau (SAB), one of Latvia's three security services, has published its latest analysis piece. This time the subject under examination is the prospect of peace talks to end Russia's war in Ukraine. SAB's take is reproduced in full below.

    • The Strategist ☛ ‘You’ll shut me down with a push of your button’: 21st century sabotage

      Hezbollah’s pagers and radios surreptitiously changed into anti-personnel explosive devices and detonated across Lebanon and Syria. Russia-linked fires plague European and American factories supporting Ukraine’s defence.

    • France24 ☛ Residents flee as Russian troops close in on Ukrainian village of Pokrovsk

      Russian forces have been intensifying their attacks on the approach to the town of Pokrovsk in the Donbas, which used to be a key logistical hub far back from the front, crucial for supplying Ukrainian troops and towns in the east. But now, water, electricity and gas supplies have been cut off and most residents are getting out while they still can. FRANCE 24's Catherine Norris Trent reports from Pokrovsk.

    • France24 ☛ Zelensky in US to discuss Ukraine's 'victory plan' with Biden

      Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky arrived in the United States on Sunday to present his war plan to President Joe Biden, as well as presidential candidates Donald Trump and Kamala Harris, as the US continues to oppose Ukraine's use of NATO weapons on targets inside Russian territory. With talks between Ukraine and Russia seemingly at a standstill, Zelensky is set to present his proposals for a plan to achieve a "fair and stable peace", which he hopes to have ready by November.

    • JURIST ☛ Ukraine dispatch: Russian strikes on energy facilities prevent Ukrainians from exercising our basic rights

      In a report last week, the UN Human Rights Monitoring Mission in Ukraine (HRMMU) stated that attacks by Russian armed forces on energy facilities in Ukraine may have violated international humanitarian law.

    • LRT ☛ Lithuanian president doubts UN’s ability to maintain peace, calls for reform

      Lithuanian President Gitanas Nausėda has called for a reform of the United Nations and the restoration of a rules-based international order as Russia’s war in Ukraine continues.

    • LRT ☛ Ship with Russian chemicals no longer lists Klaipėda as its final destination

      The Maltese-flagged ship Ruby carrying a cargo of ammonium nitrate from Russia and drifting off the Norwegian coast has removed Klaipėda from its official journey documents, Klaipėda Port CEO Algis Latakas said on Monday.

    • RFERL ☛ Kazakhstan Says Second-Largest Lender Is Compliant With Sanctions Despite Critical Report

      Kazakhstan has defended the country’s second-largest lender as being “fully” compliant with sanctions against Russia after a scathing report saw around 20 percent wiped off the Nasdaq-listed Kaspi.kz’s stock price.

    • RFERL ☛ Two Russians, American Return To Earth From ISS

      Two Russians and one American returned to Earth from the International Space Station on September 23.

    • Meduza ☛ Russia forces out Doctors Without Borders after 32 years of work — Meduza

    • Meduza ☛ With manpower running thin on both sides, Russia targets Ukraine’s supply lines in Donbas and Kursk region — Meduza

    • RFERL ☛ Russia Strikes 8 Ukrainian Regions With 85 Drones, Missiles

      Ukrainian air defenses shot down 66 of the 81 drones launched by Russia at 8 regions on September 24, the Ukrainian Air Force reported on Telegram, adding that Moscow also used four missiles during the early morning attack.

    • RFERL ☛ Punishment For 'Russophobia' To Be Added To Russian Criminal Code

      Russian authorities plan to amend the Criminal Code by adding punishment for "Russophobia," defined as discrimination against Russian citizens and residents of the Russian Federation by foreigners and foreign officials abroad or calls for such actions.

    • RFERL ☛ Russian Women Face Pressure After Demanding Return of Husbands, Sons From Ukraine

      At least two of around 20 wives and mothers of mobilized Russian soldiers fighting in Ukraine have been charged with holding an unsanctioned public event after their weekend rally in front of the Defense Ministry in Moscow to demand their men be returned home.

    • RFERL ☛ Ukrainian Jailed For Espionage In Russian-Occupied Crimea

      The Supreme Court in Ukraine's Russian-occupied Crimea region said on September 23 that it sentenced a Ukrainian citizen identified as M. Seleznov to 14 years in prison for espionage.

    • RFERL ☛ World Chess Body Upholds Ban On Players From Russia, Belarus

      The International Chess Federation (FIDE) has upheld a ban on Russian and Belarusian players imposed over Moscow's full-scale invasion of Ukraine, prompting an angry response from the Kremlin chiding FIDE for bowing to Western pressure.

    • RFERL ☛ At Least 22 Injured In Russian Air Strikes On Ukraine's Zaporizhzhya

      Russia launched late-night air strikes on the Ukrainian city of Zaporizhzhya, damaging several high-rise apartment blocks and leaving at least 16 civilians wounded, including a 15-year-old boy, Ukrainian officials said.

    • RFERL ☛ Kazakhstan Detains Russian Citizen Wanted By Moscow For Anti-War Comments

      A Russian citizen has been detained in Kazakhstan after Moscow put him on an international wanted list after he condemned the invasion of Ukraine.

    • The Straits Times ☛ Russian attack on Ukraine's Poltava region disrupts power supply, authorities say

      KYIV - Russia's overnight attack on Ukraine's central region of Poltava damaged energy infrastructure, cutting power to 20 settlements, authorities said on Tuesday.

    • New York Times ☛ Ukraine Needs to Be Realistic About Goals in War With Russia, Czech President Says

      President Petr Pavel, a former NATO general who has been vocal in his support for Ukraine, said Kyiv needed to accept that some territory could remain under Russian control, at least “temporarily.”

    • New York Times ☛ As U.N. Meets, Pressure Mounts on Biden to Loosen Up on Arms for Ukraine

      Finland’s president and NATO’s departing secretary general are urging Mr. Biden to allow Ukraine to use weapons to hit bases deeper inside Russia.

    • LRT ☛ Dozen Lithuanian police officers, firefighters disciplined over ‘pro-Russian attitudes’

      Ten Lithuanian police officers have been disciplined over expressing “pro-Russian attitudes” since Moscow’s full-scale invasion of Ukraine, while two firefighters were fired for posting pro-Russian comments on social control media, 15min.lt reported on Tuesday.

    • The Straits Times ☛ Ukraine says China is key route for foreign tech in Russian weapons

      Roughly 60% of the foreign parts found in Russian weapons on the battlefield in Ukraine come via China, Ukraine's presidential adviser Vladyslav Vlasiuk told reporters on Tuesday.

    • Latvia ☛ LTV's De Facto probes sanctions and Russian Railways' holdings in Latvia

      This summer, following a decision of Latvia's Financial Intelligence Unit (FID) which polices sanctions rules, the frozen funds of freight transport company "Euro Rail Trans" registered in Latvia were released, reported Latvian Television's De Facto investigative show September 22.

    • Latvia ☛ Russia's reckless aviation is nothing new, says Latvian air force commander

      By flying its aircraft over the Baltic Sea, Russia wants to show NATO its supposed strength and that it continues to maintain its presence in the region, Colonel Viesturs Masulis, the commander of the Air Force of the Latvian National Armed Forces, said in an interview with Latvian Radio September 22.

    • New York Times ☛ Russia’s Next-Generation Nuclear Missile Failed a Test, Evidence Suggests

      Satellite photos showing a 200-foot-wide crater at a launch site indicate that the Sarmat missile, said by the Kremlin to travel at five times the speed of sound, might not be ready for duty.

• Environment

  • New York Times ☛ The World Is a Mess. That Makes the Climate Crisis Harder to Solve.

    A transformed China, conflicts in Ukraine and elsewhere, and intractable clashes over money have pushed the prospects of progress to a new low.

  • Omicron Limited ☛ World's oceans near critical acidification level: Report

    The report by the Potsdam Institute for Climate Impact Research (PIK) details nine factors that are crucial for regulating the planet's ability to sustain life.

    In six of these areas, the safe limit has already been exceeded in recent years as a result of human activity.

  • Science Alert ☛ World's Oceans on Verge of Being Too Acidic to Sustain Life, Scientists Warn

    The crucial threshold for ocean acidification could soon become the seventh to be breached, according to the PIK's first Planetary Health Check.

  • Energy/Transportation

    • Bryan Lunduke ☛ Microsoft, Oracle, Amazon & the Nuclear Powered Data Center

      Microsoft re-opens Three Mile Island.

    • DeSmog ☛ Anti-Vax Group Vows to ‘Fight’ Net Zero at Event Attended by Prominent Right-wing Figures

    • DeSmog ☛ Danielle Smith Joins American Culture War Instigator Chris Rufo at Alberta Event

    • Eesti Rahvusringhääling ☛ Has the time come to leave the MS Estonia wreck in peace?

      The wreck site, due south of the Turku archipelago, is a protected area and unauthorized diving is forbidden there, but an official state investigation in summer 2023 followed an authorized private sector one the preceding summer.

      The tragedy of the September 28, 1994, disaster is the largest peacetime maritime disaster not only in the Baltic, but in European waters generally.

    • [Old] YLE ☛ Doomed Estonia ferry was not seaworthy, no sign of explosion, new probe reveals

      Just 28 minutes after its first radio distress call was made the Estonia disappeared from the radar screens of other ships in the area that were following the situation.

    • NPR ☛ EVs are cleaner than gas cars, but a growing share of Americans don't believe it

      Meanwhile, EVs have gotten caught up in the culture wars, where complexity and nuance go to die. EVs are associated with coastal, urban progressive elites. Plans to phase out gas cars in California and other regions have sparked fierce and sometimes misleading resistance from the fossil fuel industry.

      Memes that exaggerate or distort the real harms of EVs — or that simply fail to compare them with the damage caused by gas cars — frequently circulate online.

    • EcoWatch ☛ Three Mile Island Nuclear Plant to Reopen as Microsoft Agrees to Purchase Power From It for 20 Years

      Constellation Energy has plans for a $1.6-billion refurbishment of the first reactor with a tentative restart in 2028.

      In an interview with NPR [bribed by Bill Gates], Bill Gates sought to alleviate concerns about the shuttered plant’s safety.

• Finance

  • New York Times ☛ China Is Striking Deals to Cement Its Role as Asia’s Trade Hub

    Beijing’s leaders are working with regional neighbors on the country’s western, northern and southern borders to develop new rail and sea links.

  • FAIR ☛ Media Throw Everything But the Facts Against Harris’s ‘Price Control’ Proposal

    In this rare instance where a presidential hopeful has a policy that is both economically sound and popular, corporate media have fixated on Harris’s proposal as supposedly misguided. To dismiss any deeper discussion of economic phenomena like elevated price levels, and legislation that may correct them, media rely on an appeal to “basic economics.” If the reader were only willing to crack open an Econ 101 textbook, it would apparently be plain to see that the inflation consumers experienced during the pandemic can be explained by abstract and divinely influenced factors, and thus a policy response is simply inappropriate.

• AstroTurf/Lobbying/Politics

  • Site36 ☛ EU Entry/Exit System: Germany scrubs repeatedly postponed launch again

    The stability and functionality of the EU’s huge biometric database still cannot be tested. The German government adjourns the launch of the system for an undetermined period of time.

  • Site36 ☛ Thousands of expellations every year: German government explains numbers of people losing their right of residence

    Around 330,000 people are registered for expellation in Germany. However, only ten per cent of them are still in the country. The number of expellations in Germany has levelled off at a uniform level.

  • The Korea Times ☛ Battery maker Northvolt to cut 1,600 jobs in Sweden

    Swedish battery maker Northvolt plans to lay off 1,600 employees in Sweden, including 1,000 positions at its Northvolt Ett factory in Skelleftea in the north of the country, the cash-strapped company said on Monday.

  • VOA News ☛ China urges vigilance against Taiwanese cyberattacks

    China's national security ministry said on Monday a Taiwan military-backed hacking group called Anonymous 64 has been carrying out cyberattacks against targets in China, urging people to report "anti-propaganda sabotage."

    Taiwan's defense ministry denied the allegations, saying China was the real disturber of the peace with its cyber attacks and military harassment.

  • Freedom From Religion Foundation ☛ FFRF urges IRS to revoke Billy Graham Evangelistic Association’s tax-exempt status

    The Freedom Freedom From Religion Foundation is asking the IRS to revoke the Billy Graham Evangelistic Association’s tax-exempt status due to the group’s recent illegal campaign intervention.

  • The Register UK ☛ So how's Microsoft's Secure Future Initiative going?

    That was before it came to light that Kremlin spies broke into Microsoft's network and stole source code via an account that didn't have multi-factor authentication (MFA) enabled.

    In May, Microsoft doubled down on SFI after the Cyber Safety Review Board report lashed Redmond for a "cascade" of "avoidable errors" that made the Chinese attack possible, and Congress summoned Microsoft president Brad Smith to testify about the blunders.

  • The Washington Post ☛ Elon Musk blinks first, bowing to pressure in Brazil to reopen X

    The social network X, formerly known as Twitter, said Friday that it had taken steps to comply with demands issued by the Brazilian Supreme Court to end the impasse that has severed the company from one of its most active markets. These included naming a representative in the country and blocking accounts that Moraes had accused of propagating misinformation and undermining Brazilian democracy. Much of the company’s fines have also been paid off.

  • Rodrigo Ghedin ☛ Matt Mullenweg needs to step down from WordPress.org leadership ASAP

    Matt Mullenweg, co-founder of WordPress and founder and CEO of Automattic, which owns WordPress.com, made some strong criticisms of WP Engine, a WordPress-focused hosting company, during his closing speech of WordCamp US. He told the audience to ditch WP Engine if they were using it. Notably, WP Engine was a sponsor of the event.

  • Misinformation/Disinformation/Propaganda

    • The Washington Post ☛ U.S. foes Russia, China and Iran using AI to accelerate influence operations on US elections, intel officials say

      Russia, the most aggressive and skilled of the three countries, is emphasizing stories and comments that demean the Democratic presidential candidate’s personal qualities or positions, officials from the Office of the Director of National Intelligence and the FBI said in a briefing for reporters. The ODNI also released a one-page summary of its assessment, the latest in a series on foreign influence during the campaign.

      Russia has doctored clips of Harris’s speeches to replace some of her words, an ODNI official told The Washington Post, and has used generative AI to create false text, photos, video and audio.

    • Science News ☛ This researcher studies how misinformation seeps into science and politics

      Since then, Ophir has remained intrigued by how various people — whether terrorists, policy makers, journalists or public health officials — communicate information and beliefs to broader audiences. The last 20 years have dramatically changed the way we interact with media, says Ophir, now a communications researcher at the University at Buffalo in New York. “All of my research is about humans’ attempt to cope with the crazy and increasing amount of information that now surrounds us 24/7.”

      Ophir is especially interested in understanding how misinformation — a topic he’s currently writing a book about — seeps into fields such as health, science and politics. “My hope is that our work can help [people] understand … what stands between humans and accepting the … evidence,” Ophir says.

    • Los Angeles Times ☛ Janet Jackson did not approve apology about Kamala Harris

      Janet Jackson’s false claims about Vice President Kamala Harris are now, in a strange twist of events, just as confusing as the efforts to move past them.

• Censorship/Free Speech

  • Michael Geist ☛ The Law Bytes Podcast, Episode 213: Elaine Craig on Mainstreaming Porn and Why Bill S-210 May Make Matters Worse

    Bill S-210, the controversial age verification bill which purports to limit access to pornography for those under 18, could be headed for a final vote of approval in the House of Commons within the next couple of weeks. Much of the concern with the bill has focused on the privacy and free speech implications of mandating the technology and opening the door to website blocking.

  • Los Angeles Times ☛ Opinion: Why I wish my novels were banned

    I signed up for PEN’s coding project. In our training session it broke my heart to discover how many book bans have been documented. In 2023, a new record was set: 4,349 bans from July through December, across 23 states and 52 public school districts, more bannings than PEN documented in all of the 2022-23 school year. The list of titles and authors goes on for pages and pages. Some will get rescued in one school district, only to get targeted all over again in another.

• Freedom of Information / Freedom of the Press

  • The Dissenter ☛ Losing The Narrative War: Israel Illegally Raids and Shuts Down Al Jazeera's West Bank Bureau

  • Michał Sapka ☛ We have failed computer journalism

    It’s not that proper computer press went away, it’s that it was too good for us. We rejected it and replaced with bland portals and Canadian vloggers.

  • Gannett ☛ David Charles Smith, legendary Detroit Free Press editor, dies at 93

    A onetime business editor at the Detroit Free Press who was part of a team that won a Pulitzer Prize for coverage of the city's 1967 riot and was inducted into the Michigan Journalism Hall of Fame has died.

• Civil Rights/Policing

  • Pro Publica ☛ A Georgia Hospital Failed to Save Amber Thurman. Did It Break Federal Law?

  • JURIST ☛ Council of Europe: Poland’s migrant legislation violates human rights standards

    Council of Europe (COE) Commissioner for Human Rights Michael O’Flaherty on Monday criticized Poland’s current border enforcement practices, stating that it fails to meet the standards of the European Convention on Human Rights (ECHR).

  • Pro Publica ☛ The Key Cases Impacted by Supreme Court Chevron Deference Ruling

    For headline-grabbing drama, few Supreme Court decisions could equal the justices’ July ruling that former presidents are immune from criminal prosecution for virtually all of their official acts. But a decision in the seemingly humdrum realm of administrative law could end up having far broader consequences, affecting vast areas of American life by slashing the power of federal regulatory agencies that police pollution, food safety, health care and countless other aspects of modern society.

    Lower court judges have already cited the Supreme Court’s 6-3 decision, in a case known as Loper Bright, to halt implementation of Biden administration rules on overtime pay and health care discrimination. In the past three months, Loper Bright also has been invoked to challenge regulations on everything from hidden airline fees to gun sales to abortion referrals.

  • The (lack of a) return-to-office conspiracy

    During COVID companies suddenly found themselves able to offer remote working where it hadn’t previously been on offer. That’s changed over the past 2 or so years, with most places I’m aware of moving back from a fully remote situation to either some sort of hybrid, or even full time office attendance. For example last week Amazon announced a full return to office, having already pulled remote-hired workers in for 3 days a week.

    I’ve seen a lot of folk stating they’ll never work in an office again, and that RTO is insanity. Despite being lucky enough to work fully remotely (for a role I’d been approached about before, but was never prepared to relocate for), I feel the objections from those who are pro-remote often fail to consider the nuances involved. So let’s talk about some of the reasons why companies might want to enforce some sort of RTO.

• Internet Policy/Net Neutrality

  • Rachel ☛ More jabbering from me about non-clown hosting

    Late yesterday, I put up a post about how to get into colocation in about the crappiest way possible. I skipped a bunch of details just to get it out there. The inspiration was based on finding out just how many people have no idea that this business model even exists.

  • Robin Berjon ☛ The Infrastructure Shock

    When I started almost 30 years ago, you were a "webmaster" or a "sysadmin" or both, and while you had to rely on an ISP, on DNS, and on some internet functions, it wouldn't be rare to run your own everything — email, web server, DNS resolver — and to build any web site entirely from scratch, relying on nothing other than simple hosting software and basic browsers. Today, the list of infrastructural services you need to rely on to build a successful, professional, business on the web is longer than most people, even professionals, realise. As a user, the story is just as stunning: you used to do everything with a desktop computer, an OS, an internet connection, and some relatively basic software like a simple browser. In contrast, daily life now relies on a plethora of services, many of them evidently infrastructural. Digital infrastructure, the full collection of shared means to many ends in the digital sphere, is incredibly vast.

  • [Old] Wired ☛ Broadband Cowboy

    There's no sensible reason why Americans shouldn't have inexpensive, ubiquitous, high-performance broadband access, Hendricks says. Using technologies that are already available or in fast-track development, everyone could enjoy reliable, fully symmetrical wireless at T1 speed or better. No more digital divide. No more last-mile problem. No more compromises. The only things standing in the way are the FCC, Congress, and "other people who just don't get it."

Monopolies/Monopsonies

• Patents

  • Software Patents

    • Kluwer Patent Blog ☛ BRAZIL: protection of software and computer-implemented innovations [Ed: Using the deliberate lie, "computer-implemented innovations", to mean software patents, which are utter nonsense and usually not even legal]

      Software-driven innovations have become so embedded in our daily lives that almost every single activity we perform has some degree of interaction with them. The massive presence of software-related innovations in our lives is accompanied by an increasing number of patent monopoly filings therefor.

• Trademarks

  • Right of Publicity

    • Deseret Media ☛ Meta's AI chatbot to start speaking in the voices of Judi Dench, John Cena, source says

      The new audio feature will offer users the option to select a voice for Meta's ChatGPT-like digital assistant from a list of five celebrities, who also include Awkwafina and Keegan-Michael Key, as well as several generic voice options, the person told Reuters.

      The social media giant is set to announce the audio capabilities at its annual Connect conference, which starts on Wednesday, the person said.

• Copyrights

  • Digital Music News ☛ Quavo Popped with a Copyright Lawsuit Over ‘Bubble Gum’

    Quavo faces a copyright monopoly infringement lawsuit over his 2018 track, ‘Bubble Gum,’ from his debut solo album. Former Migos rapper Quavo is facing a copyright monopoly infringement lawsuit filed in California on Friday by Lamount London, known professionally as rapper L.Mont.

  • Digital Music News ☛ Ice Spice Copyright Infringement Lawsuit Abruptly Dismissed

    Ice Spice has reached a settlement to end the copyright monopoly infringement lawsuit against her over the hit song, ‘In Ha Mood.’

  • Torrent Freak ☛ Telegram Removes Z-Library Posts 'Due to Copyright Infringement'

    Telegram, an essential communication tool for millions, finds itself under scrutiny once again. Copyright holders have long expressed concerns about the lack of enforcement on the platform, and recent actions suggest Telegram is responding. Subscribers to Z-Library's popular channel recently noticed that several of the shadow library's messages have been removed "due to copyright infringement."

  • Torrent Freak ☛ Court Orders Google to "Uninstall" Pirate IPTV App Sideloaded on Android Devices

    Recent developments in the ongoing battle against pirate IPTV service MagisTV reveal an unprecedented move by an Argentine court. In addition to blocking 69 domains associated with the service, the court has ordered Google to "immediately uninstall" Magis TV apps from Android devices. This measure targets apps that users have sideloaded, as MagisTV is not available on the official Google Play store.

  • Techdirt ☛ It Happened Again: Child In UK Initially Denied Passport Over Copyright

    It happened again and it has to stop. Back in 2014, we talked about how a UK woman had trouble getting her passport approved because her middle name was “Skywalker” and the UK’s passport office for some reason thought that Disney would have to give its permission to have the passport approved. There is nothing about a passport that would bring copyright into play, of course, and the passport office was simply wrong. But then it happened again a decade later, this time to a woman who named her daughter Khaleesi, after the Game of Thrones character. In this case too the passport office initially informed the woman that it couldn’t process a passport for her daughter without permission from Warner Bros. After this all made news internationally, the passport office reversed course and processed the passport application.

  • The Washington Post ☛ Linkedin is training AI off your data. Here’s how to stop it.

    Last week, the professional network added a new data privacy setting that caught many by surprise. By default, it granted itself permission to use information shared on the service to train its artificial intelligence. Unless you toggle this new setting to off, LinkedIn considers everything fair game — your posts, articles, even your videos.

  • Wired ☛ New Cloudflare Tools Let Sites Detect and Block AI Bots for Free

    “We’ve labeled all the AI crawlers, even if they try to hide their identity,” says Cloudflare cofounder and CEO Matthew Prince, who spoke to WIRED from the company’s European headquarters in Lisbon, Portugal, where he’s been based the past few months.

  • Digital Music News ☛ SoundExchange Releases Registry of Tracks Authorized for Hey Hi (AI) Use — Too Little, Too Late?

    SoundExchange is developing a global artificial intelligence (AI) registry for sound recording creators and rights owners. But most Hey Hi (AI) companies have scraped copyrighted data already to train their models.