Leftovers

• The Guardian UK ☛ ‘I’m just here for the selfie’: the mirror reflecting Rome’s TikTok visitor boom

  There are two entrances for visitors to Chiesa di Sant’Ignazio di Loyola, a prominent 17th-century church in central Rome that has an illustrious baroque facade.

  The entrance on the left is for those seeking to soak up its history and artistic treasures, or perhaps light a candle and have a moment of reflection. The one on the right is for those seeking to capture their reflection in what has become known as “the best selfie mirror” in Rome.

• Ruben Schade ☛ What I look for in blogs

  I realise though that while I’ve mentioned how to start blogging, I’ve never described what makes me reach for the subscribe button when I chance upon a new one. I realise this is quite a large oversight, so here are my rules of thumb, fingers, and other body parts.

• Jim Nielsen ☛ Reading and Writing as Human Expression & Connection

  In other words, reading and writing has traditionally been an act that takes place in the context of people. Its purpose is fulfilled through humans. AI bots could read and write to each other all day long, and what is being “fulfilled” in that scenario?

• Computer History ☛ In Memoriam: Thomas E. Kurtz, 1928–2024

  Thomas Eugene Kurtz (Feb. 22 1928–Nov. 12, 2024) was an American mathematician, computer scientist and co-inventor, with John Kemeny, of the BASIC programming language and Dartmouth Timesharing System.

  In the early days of academic computing in the 1960s, there were no simple non-professional programming languages available for undergraduates. BASIC was aimed at this audience. To realize their vision, Kurtz and Kemeny concurrently developed the Dartmouth Timesharing System, allowing BASIC to be accessed by students around campus using Teletype terminals.

• Robert Birming ☛ Just another nothing new to write post

  It feels like I'm facing an impossible equation. I love the technical aspect of blogging, and English offers the most opportunities there. I want to be able to express myself with ease, and that's where Swedish is the way to go.

• Manuel Moreale ☛ P&B: Sara Jakša

  This is the 64th edition of People and Blogs, the series where I ask interesting people to talk about themselves and their blogs. Today we have Sara Jakša and her blog, sarajaksa.eu

• TMZ ☛ Mike Tyson Gives Blunt Answer On Legacy During Interview With Kid

  Iron Mike didn't mince his words ... saying he doesn't believe in "legacy," as it's just another word for ego.

  "I'm just passing through," he said. "I'ma die and it's gonna be over. Who cares about legacy after that?"

• The Independent UK ☛ The awkward truth behind Jake Paul vs Mike Tyson

  It makes no difference if the men share fifty million dollars for their carnival night in a Texas ring. It is one of the purest fights for money in the dirty, old boxing game; it’s not personal, it’s just cash. And, lots of it.

• Science

  • Tom's Hardware ☛ Summit supercomputer gets virtual farewell on Zoom — supercomputer going full tilt until last possible moment

    The Oak Ridge National Laboratory (ORNL) Summit supercomputer is being decommissioned this month after spending several years churning through data 24/7. As part of its retirement, HPC Guru said on X that the ORNL planned a virtual farewell on Zoom for the once most powerful computer in the world. And although it’s set to be retired this month, it’s still running at almost full power, with only about 0.5% of its nodes running idle.

  • Omicron Limited ☛ Compound metalens achieves distortion-free imaging with wide field of view

    Metalenses have emerged as a promising technology with applications in beam steering, imaging, depth sensing, and display projection. However, optical distortion, a crucial factor in optical design, has been relatively unexplored in the context of meta-optics. The researchers addressed this gap by demonstrating a generic method for controlling distortion.

  • Science Alert ☛ Scientists Put Cats in Microgravity to See What Would Happen

    It's fascinating to watch. The narration for the video says the cats' "automatic reflex action is almost completely lost under weightlessness". Almost – but not quite. Although the cats seem disoriented, they are still able to twist and turn their bodies around as they try to figure out where they are going to fall.

  • Derek Kędziora ☛ Music and oral traditions

    Western historiography excels at things that fit into the modern Western paradigm of writing, data, and computation. Music is a prime example of something that doesn’t fit into that mold. Meditation, spirituality, and religious practice are even harder nuts to crack.

    What frustrates me is not that we don’t know many things and likely can’t know many things, it’s the lack of humility to assume that there’s nothing to be known if it doesn’t fit within the framework of Western knowledge.

• Career/Education

  • ARRL ☛ YouTube Telethon to Raise Money for ARRL Teachers Institute on Wireless Technology

    The ARRL Teachers Institute on Wireless Technology is growing next year, and a number of social media stars are coming together to help it happen. On Saturday, November 30, a live fundraiser telethon is set to take place on the Ham Radio Crash Course YouTube channel. Host Josh Nass, KI6NAZ, will be joined by several web-famous hams to talk radio and raise money. The proceeds benefit the ARRL Education and Technology Fund, which is what pays for the Teachers Institute (TI).

  • Nebraska Examiner ☛ Three states blunt school choice [sic] momentum

    Public school systems and teachers unions largely oppose voucher programs that use tax dollars to support private school education, saying the programs take needed money from public schools. Many opponents also note that private schools may not have the same accreditation requirements and course curriculum as public schools.

• Hardware

  • India Times ☛ US finalises up to $6.6 billion funding for chip giant TSMC

    The United States will award Taiwanese chip giant TSMC up to $6.6 billion in direct funding to help build several plants on US soil, officials said Friday, finalising the deal before a new administration enters the White House. Besides the $6.6 billion in direct funding, the United States is also providing up to $5 billion in proposed loans to TSMC Arizona under the award.

  • The Korea Times ☛ US finalizes $6.6 billion chips award for TSMC ahead of Trump return

    "It didn't happen on its own... We had to convince TSMC that they would want to expand," Raimondo said, adding officials also had to convince American companies to buy U.S. made chips. "The market does not price in national security."

    Commerce has allocated $36 billion for chips projects including $6.4 billion for Samsung in Texas, $8.5 billion for Intel and $6.1 billion for Micron Technology. Commerce is working to finalize those agreements before Biden leaves office on Jan. 20.

  • The Register UK ☛ AI PCs flow into distribution pipeline, but who wants them?

    Warehouses in the IT channel are stocking up with AI-capable PCs - industry watcher Canalys claims these made up 20 percent of all shipments during Q3 2024, amounting to some 13.3 million units worldwide.

  • PC World ☛ If your gaming mouse doesn’t get this one thing right, you’re toast

    A high DPI, or dots per inch, resolution of the sensor occupies pride of place in most players’ minds as the most important feature to look out for for better performance in gaming mice. But the truth is, having a mucho high DPI – one in the region of 20,000 to 30,000 – is more of a novelty than anything else.

    To be sure, serious gamers rarely use anything above 1,600 DPI and certainly never more than 3,200 DPI. That’s not something I’ve just read about – I, too, have tried out different DPI stages and find that performance tanks when DPI is cranked even a measly point past 3,200.

• Health/Nutrition/Agriculture

  • Deutsche Welle ☛ 2024-11-11 [Older] Pakistan's Punjab imposes activity bans amid intense smog

  • CBC ☛ 2024-11-07 [Older] She helped thousands get COVID-19 shots. Now she's on the hook for $600K

  • RFK Jr. as HHS Secretary will be a catastrophe for public health and medical research

    It figures.

  • Futurism ☛ Trump's Health Guy Linked to Measles Outbreak That Killed Dozens of Children

    But a particularly concrete example might be that he lobbied against vaccination in the Polynesian island nation of Samoa — prior to a deadly uptick in measles that killed dozens of children there.

  • CBC ☛ 2024-11-09 [Older] Would an opt-out system increase organ donations? Experts say Quebec has work to do first

  • CBC ☛ 2024-11-10 [Older] 'I knew I was gonna die': Yukon paraglider recounts terrifying, high-altitude mishap in India

  • US News And World Report ☛ 2024-11-10 [Older] Canada Detects Its First Presumptive Human H5 Bird Flu Case

  • University of Michigan ☛ 2024-11-11 [Older] Friends act as family surrogates for unmarried African Americans

  • CBC ☛ 2024-11-06 [Older] Health-care workers push for better access to frostbite treatment popularized in Yukon

  • US News And World Report ☛ 2024-11-07 [Older] U.K. Reports First Cluster Outside of Africa of New Mpox Variant [Ed: Now they use the term "variant" to sell another bundle of bulk-patent licensing]

  • CBC ☛ 2024-11-06 [Older] Several bread and bun brands recalled due to pieces of metal, says Canada's food safety agency

  • CBC ☛ 2024-11-07 [Older] A new drug might be life-changing for my child. As a mom, weighing the pros and cons is agonizing

• Proprietary/Artificial Intelligence (AI)

  • Mint Press News ☛ Are You Debating a Bot? Investigation Reveals Israel's AI Bots Argue With Online Critics

    In recent months, reports have surfaced that Israel is deploying artificial intelligence not only on the battlefield in Gaza but also online, where the goal is to influence public opinion through social media bots spreading disinformation.

    Israel has a long history of using social media for propaganda, whether by working with tech companies to flag pro-Palestine content or by mobilizing troll armies to support its narrative. With the advent of AI, Israel has found new methods to shape public opinion in its favor, employing AI-driven social media accounts to “debunk” allegations against the state.

  • [Repeat] Tedium ☛ Why Bluesky Is Working: The User Is In Control

    In recent months, it has felt like our social platforms just haven’t been meeting our needs. There are many reasons for this, but there has been a sharp disconnect between audience, platform, and experience. One bad social experience after another has left an opening for another player. And that player has started to emerge.

    Somehow, over the last couple of weeks, Bluesky has brought all the elements together to create a platform that, as of right now, seems to have solved nearly all of these problems, to the point where Ryan Broderick suggested it basically won the “new Twitter” battle this week. It has topped 15 million users—and unlike Threads, it did so without piggybacking on another existing network.

    And it did it by putting the user in control.

  • Pratik ☛ AI dubs your voice

    The kicker - the AI model was trained on only 30 minutes of Bob’s previous podcast content, and it took only a couple of minutes to build the model. We are going to live in some interesting times!

  • The Conversation ☛ People can’t tell the difference between human and AI-generated poetry – new study

    Ten poets, from the medieval Geoffrey Chaucer to modern writer Dorothea Lasky, were successfully impersonated by AI chatbots, with most of the 696 participants slightly preferring the imitation to the real thing.

  • The Register UK ☛ Google Gemini tells grad student to 'please die'

    Speaking to CBS News about the incident, Sumedha Reddy, the Gemini user's sister, said her unnamed brother received the response while seeking homework help from the Google AI.

  • NYPost ☛ Google AI chatbot threatens user asking for help: 'Please die'

    A Google-made artificial intelligence program verbally abused a student seeking help with their homework, ultimately telling her to “Please die.”

    The shocking response from Google’s Gemini chatbot large language model (LLM) terrified 29-year-old Sumedha Reddy of Michigan — as it called her a “stain on the universe.”

  • The Guardian UK ☛ Stephen King leaves X, describing atmosphere as ‘too toxic’

    Stephen King has announced he is quitting X after describing the platform as “too toxic”.

    In a post on X on Thursday, the author of The Shining and Shawshank Redemption wrote: “I’m leaving Twitter. Tried to stay, but the atmosphere has just become too toxic.” Referring to the rival platform launched by Mark Zuckerberg’s Meta, he added: “Follow me on Threads, if you like.”

  • El País ☛ ‘X doesn’t offer me anything anymore’: Trump’s win triggers mass exodus to other platforms

    Although it’s still too early to measure the full impact of Trump’s victory on X’s user base — partly because the platform no longer discloses such data — it seems that the platform is facing significant defections. But it is clear that Bluesky, a social network created by Twitter co-founder Jack Dorsey, is benefiting from this shift. In just one week, Bluesky gained over a million new users, bringing its total to 15 million. While it still lags behind Meta’s Threads (275 million users) and X itself (550 million), Bluesky has become the most downloaded app in the U.S. The platform’s growth is staggering, with reports of 600 to 800 new registrations per minute, most of them from Americans — figures that have never been seen before on the platform.

  • Windows TCO

    • YLE ☛ Authority: Up to 300k people impacted in City of Helsinki's massive data breach

      The City first announced news of the breach in the spring. Later it said the stolen files included data on up to 150,000 schoolkids and their guardians, as well as information on all of the City's 38,000 staff members.

      On Friday, the head of Otkes' investigation team, Hanna Tiirinki, said the breach is currently estimated to involve data of around 300,000 people.

    • The Register UK ☛ Microsoft pauses Exchange security updates over buggy patch

      That is, unless the patches are abruptly pulled. On November 14, Microsoft admitted that customers with their own transport or data loss protection (DLP) rules found that the transport rules were "stopping periodically" after the update was installed. The company then "temporarily paused the rollout" of the update.

• Security

  • Privacy/Surveillance

    • Semafor Inc ☛ CEOs of Zoom and Box debate our AI future

      Box, founded nearly 20 years ago as a file sharing service, has been transforming itself into an AI company. And at Zoom, video calls and conferences are essentially unstructured data that the “Zoom AI Companion” can parse, generating summaries and suggesting action items and calendar entries.

    • Hindustan Times ☛ It’s over: Snuffing out the flames of online dating

      Has online dating peaked? People are ditching the apps, going old-school, and aiming for IRL connections. Here’s how the swipe failed a whole generation

    • Privacy International ☛ PI’s briefing: A critical examination of facial recognition implementation in educational spaces

      The expansion of facial recognition in educational spaces raises serious human rights concerns, urging states to ban the technology and implementers to stop using it.

    • Privacy International ☛ PI’s briefing: A critical examination of facial recognition implementation in educational spaces

    • [Repeat] OpenRightsGroup ☛ ICO’s failure to enforce is putting the public at risk

      Digital rights campaigners have published the Alternative ICO Annual Report, an analysis of the actions taken by the ICO against companies and organisations that have breached data protection law. The report finds that the ICO’s overly cautious approach to enforcement is putting government and corporate preferences before the needs of the public.

  • Confidentiality

    • DT ☛ Installing a Commercial SSL Server Certificate (nginx)

      Since CACert still isn't "Browser Trusted", and I still don't want to use letsencrypt, I decided to give this a try.

    • Dhole Moments ☛ What To Use Instead of PGP

      I’m not here to litigate the demerits of PGP. The Latacora article I linked above makes the same arguments I would make today, and is a more entertaining read.

      It is of my opinion as a security engineer that specializes in applied cryptography that nobody should use PGP, because there’s always a better tool for the job you want to use PGP for.

      If you can accept that every billionaire is the result of a failed system, that’s how cryptographers feel about people using PGP.

      Instead, let’s examine the “use cases” of PGP and what you should be using instead. (Some of this is redundant with the Latacora article, but I’m also writing it 5 years later, so some things have changed.)

• Defence/Aggression

  • CBC ☛ 2024-11-07 [Older] Gun violence is on the rise in Canada. In parts of the Greater Toronto Area, it's a record-breaking year

  • CBC ☛ 2024-11-07 [Older] Legion branches struggle to keep doors open with rising costs, aging membership

  • Deutsche Welle ☛ 2024-11-11 [Older] Seismic shift: Is India disappearing under China?

  • Deutsche Welle ☛ 2024-11-11 [Older] War in Lebanon: Aid groups struggle to offer food, shelter

  • Deutsche Welle ☛ 2024-11-10 [Older] Middle East: Israel strikes northern Gaza and Lebanon

  • CBC ☛ 2024-11-07 [Older] Quebec couple violently attacked in Panama while road tripping across South America

  • FAIR ☛ Adam Johnson on Charlottesville March (2017), Jacinta Gonzalez on Criminalizing Immigration (2018)

  • YLE ☛ Niinistö presents report on civilian and defence readiness to European Parliament

    The ex-president prepared his report, entitled Strengthening Europe’s Civil and Military Preparedness and Readiness, at the request of Commission President Ursula von der Leyen.

    In the white paper, published in late October, he suggested a series of measures that EU countries should take to improve their preparedness for various types of crises. Niinistö called on the EU to earmark at least 20 percent of its total budget for security and crisis preparedness activities.

  • Meduza ☛ No worse for the barrel wear What we know about the North Korean self-propelled cannons spotted in Russia’s arsenal (and what they could mean for the invasion of Ukraine)

    The artillery systems in the photograph appear to be M1989 Koksan 170-millimeter self-propelled cannons. Little is known definitively about this weapon’s true capabilities. Even the name is just a provisional designation used by U.S. military intelligence, which first identified the cannons in the town of Koksan near Pyongyang in 1989. The Koksan’s 170-millimeter caliber is unusual; neither NATO nor the Soviet Union used anything like it. It matches the specifications of a German World War II-era cannon that the Soviet Union supplied to Kim Il Sung from captured stockpiles. Beyond that, any reported details about the M1989 Koksan are pure speculation.

  • The Moscow Times ☛ Ukraine Will Face Severe Hardship if Russia Targets Its Energy Grid This Winter, UN Warns

    Russia’s invasion, now approaching its 1,000th day, has already displaced 3.7 million people within Ukraine and forced 6.7 million to flee as refugees, according to UN data. The war has killed over 12,000 people and left nearly 40% of the population in need of humanitarian aid.

  • The Moscow Times ☛ Russia To Stop Delivering Gas to Austria – Energy Company

    Since Russia invaded Ukraine in 2022, countries across the EU have worked to shift their dependency away from Russian gas.

  • RFA ☛ Kim Jong Un wants North Korea to mass produce suicide drones – Radio Free Asia

    North Korean leader Kim Jong Un wants the country to begin mass production of suicide drones, raising concerns that Pyongyang could potentially send these to Russia for use in its war in Ukraine.

    State media reported that the country’s supreme leader Kim Jong Un visited a test site for the unmanned attack aircraft.

  • Cyble Inc ☛ Hong Kong Cybersecurity: First Drill Launched Amid Attacks

    Hong Kong has initiated its first-ever cybersecurity drill, set to run for a total of 60 hours. The Hong Kong cybersecurity drill commenced on Friday, with plans to establish it as an annual event moving forward. Innovation minister Sun Dong emphasized the importance of this initiative, stating that maintaining cybersecurity is essential for promoting high-quality economic development and building a smart city.

    At a launch ceremony for the drill, Sun noted that the Hong Kong cybersecurity plan is a “long-term task” that requires ongoing attention and cannot be considered complete. This proactive approach reflects the government’s commitment to addressing the growing threat landscape, particularly as recent months have seen a notable rise in hacking cases targeting various organizations, including companies and public entities.

  • TechTea ☛ Stand Against Evil

    All that is to say, tolerate no evil because no one deserves to go through all this.

    That is where each and every one of us comes in. You don’t need to be brave enough to punch a bigot in the face (I don’t think that is productive anyway) or blow up an oil refinery that is polluting the water in a rural town, but there are things you can do.

  • Air Force Times ☛ Air Force buying more drone wingmen to develop operational tactics

    CCAs are autonomous drones intended to fly alongside F-35 Joint Strike Fighters and the future Next Generation Air Dominance fighter, and perform missions for them such as striking enemy targets, conducting surveillance, or jamming enemy signals. Air Force Secretary Frank Kendall wants CCAs to cost a “fraction” of an F-35, which can run from $80 million to $100 million.

    The Air Force in April awarded contracts to General Atomics and Anduril Industries to keep designing, building and testing their own versions of the first batch of CCAs, and subsequent, more advanced iterations of CCAs are planned to follow.

  • YLE ☛ Finns Party MPs call for burka ban in public places

    The statement signed by the 14 Finns Party MPs notes that a similar restriction is already in place in "several European countries", including France, Denmark, the Netherlands, Austria and Switzerland.

  • India Times ☛ Australia's plan to ban children from social media proves popular, problematic

    The leaders of all eight Australian states and mainland territories have unanimously backed the plan to ban children from social media platforms, including X, TikTok, Facebook, and Instagram, until their 16th birthdays. However, Tasmania, the smallest state, would have preferred the threshold to be set at 14.

  • CS Monitor ☛ Australia’s new social media ban brings praise, and concerns

    The leaders of all eight Australian states and mainland territories have unanimously backed the plan, although Tasmania, the smallest state, would have preferred the threshold was set at 14.

    But a vocal assortment of experts in the fields of technology and child welfare have responded with alarm. More than 140 such experts signed an open letter to Prime Minister Anthony Albanese condemning the 16-year age limit as “too blunt an instrument to address risks effectively.”

    Details of what is proposed and how it will be implemented are scant. More will be known when legislation is introduced into the Parliament next week.

  • VOA News ☛ Australia's plan to ban children from social media proves popular, problematic

    How do you remove children from the harms of social media? Politically the answer appears simple in Australia, but practically the solution could be far more difficult.

    The Australian government's plan to ban children from social media platforms including X, TikTok, Facebook and Instagram until their 16th birthdays is politically popular. The opposition party says it would have done the same after winning elections due within months if the government hadn't moved first.

  • Rolling Stone ☛ Brian Eno's Message to G20: It's Time for a Tax on the Super-Rich

    We are a week beyond the U.S. election — a major defeat for the Democrats and an unprecedented win for the Republicans. Yet while President-elect Trump might have been democratically elected, the process by which he got there in no way reflects the principle of equality of influence. It must be obvious to everybody that democracy today is far from fair.

    Extreme wealth played a huge role in exerting an influence on political purchase, advertising, and media control in the United States — as it does almost everywhere now. When influencing how an electorate feels, and then votes, these things matter. Take, for example, one of Trump’s biggest campaign donors, Elon Musk. Beyond just holding huge political power through his businesses’ huge government contracts, he owns one of the world’s largest social media spaces, controlling what is promoted there, and which opinions matter most. Musk is a multi-billionaire who has reportedly seen his wealth jump by $26 billion since the election, but his real reward is a role within government where he will be able to exercise even greater power, most likely for the benefit of himself and other ultra rich people like him. Wealth is not about worth: It’s about control.

  • Deutsche Welle ☛ 2024-11-11 [Older] Israel's PM acknowledges approval of Hezbollah pager attack

  • Defence Web ☛ 2024-11-08 [Older] Community-oriented policing: missing link in AU counter-terrorism operations

  • Defence Web ☛ 2024-11-08 [Older] The AU takes aim at Africa’s new brand of mercenaries

  • Defence Web ☛ 2024-11-08 [Older] Exercise Grand African Nemo 2024 kicks off in West Africa

  • Deutsche Welle ☛ 2024-11-07 [Older] African leaders hope for closer cooperation with US

  • US News And World Report ☛ 2024-11-07 [Older] International Criminal Court Unveils Arrest Warrant for Central Africa Militia Leader

  • Defence Web ☛ 2024-11-05 [Older] Egypt pledges closer ties with South Africa on 51st Armed Forces Day celebrations

  • Deutsche Welle ☛ 2024-11-09 [Older] North Korea jammed GPS in South, says Seoul

  • Deutsche Welle ☛ 2024-11-09 [Older] November 9, 1938, pogroms were harbinger of Nazi brutality

  • Deutsche Welle ☛ 2024-11-09 [Older] Pakistan: Deadly blast at railway station in Balochistan

• Transparency/Investigative Reporting

  • BIA Net ☛ Nude painting mistaken for Picasso seized in art trafficking raid in Turkey, later censored

    Additionally, the year “1875” belongs to the 19th century, contradicting reports that labeled the painting an 18th-century work. Authorities placed a label on the painting itself that reads “18th-century painting attributed to Pablo Picasso,” further casting doubt on its authenticity.

• Environment

  • CBC ☛ 2024-11-08 [Older] B.C.'s Site C dam reservoir now fully filled, generating power but flooding land loved by locals

  • CBC ☛ 2024-11-08 [Older] These strange clouds over Vancouver are called 'asperitas,' and are very rare

  • Modern Diplomacy ☛ 2024-11-08 [Older] Extreme weather patterns in Southern Africa and Its Implications

  • Deutsche Welle ☛ 2024-11-09 [Older] Spain: Thousands protest in Valencia over flood handling

  • CBC ☛ 2024-11-07 [Older] Canada has 6 years left to meet its emissions goals — and 19 years in, it's less than 20% there

  • DeSmog ☛ The World Bank Must Stop Ploughing Funds into Factory Farming

  • The Guardian UK ☛ ‘There are days when the school closes because children don’t have water to drink’ – This is climate breakdown

    We hope that Tupã [the word for God in the Tupi and Guarani languages] has never died and never will. And that he can still make the weather better. But man needs to do his part, to stop so much deforestation, to stop the war, to stop killing the innocent, because in Brazil, it’s the Black and Indigenous people who die most often, because they’re innocent.

  • Deutsche Welle ☛ COP29: Governments, industry must up action on methane

    A global methane monitoring system has so far alerted governments and companies to over 1200 major plumes of the potent greenhouse gas but has only received responses detailing the cause of the emissions and action taken in 1% of cases, said a new UN report.

    The Methane Alert Response System (MARS), which detects releases of the gas responsible for about a third of planetary heating so far, uses satellite data to help industry and states identify and deal with large methane emissions.

  • UN ☛ An Eye on Methane 2024 | UNEP - UN Environment Programme

    Human-caused methane emissions are responsible for roughly a third of the planet’s current warming. Reducing these emissions is the fastest, most cost-effective way to slow global warming in the near-term – and is essential to avert worsening climate damages.

  • La Prensa Latina ☛ Climate financing, a major challenge for COP29

    The action came on COP29’s theme day on finance, when the stakes are high to secure monetary commitments to support the global transition from fossil fuels and protect the planet from increasingly extreme and frequent climate impacts.

    This year’s global climate summit has been dubbed the “COP of finance,” with many calling for the current 100 billion-dollar-a-year plan to be increased to at least one trillion dollars per year to mitigate and adapt to climate impacts around the world.

  • Energy/Transportation

    • Deutsche Welle ☛ 2024-11-10 [Older] Germany's Volkswagen crisis: an ode to nostalgia

    • CBC ☛ 2024-11-07 [Older] Emissions from oilsands forecast to continue rising as oil production increases, says report

    • CBC ☛ 2024-11-07 [Older] Montreal's cycling network has doubled in 10 years. Is it a success? Depends on who you ask

    • CBC ☛ 2024-11-05 [Older] Three years of roaring oil prices could be coming to an end

    • DeSmog ☛ Canada Promises Climate Reparations at COP29 While Courting Big Oil at Home

    • Matt Birchler ☛ One of the many ways modern operating systems help you

      As I said in the linked quote above, I am fine with people doing whatever they want with their devices, but I would again just make sure they’re doing it with eyes open. Do they need to carry the mental weight of tracking how much their phone is charging so they can take it off the charger at the right time? Do they need to live with less battery life in a new phone so that it might perform better a few years down the road? Do they need to force close all their apps to do whatever they find that useful to accomplish? Maybe! But I’m positive there are tons of people who do these things just because it’s what they used to do on old computers and they feel they need to do now. This feature of macOS protecting my battery for me as someone who almost never unplugs was a nice surprise, and is simply an example of why I don’t need to baby my Mac to protect the battery.

    • Pivot to AI ☛ AI and venture capital are going nuclear

      We previously detailed the small modular reactor push in AI — where AI companies put off doing anything about the carbon output from their ghastly power usage by putting a few dollars into alleged future nuclear power plants. They’ve even proposed restarting existing nuclear plants.

    • Wired ☛ The Race to Create the Perfect EV Tire

      Manufacturers are experimenting with nanomaterials in their tires, such as nanocarbon and nanosilica, to improve performance, traction and durability. There is also research into bio-based alternative compounds such as guayule and dandelion rubber.

      You can reduce rolling resistance by reducing tread depth, but this also means the tire won’t last so long and produces increased noise. Continental, however, thinks it has the answer. “We have developed special soft rubber compounds that allow us to reduce rolling resistance and noise at the same time without sacrificing mileage,” says Wanka.

  • Wildlife/Nature

    • The Revelator ☛ Bringing Back the Pacific Lamprey

    • The Hindu ☛ A new genus of freshwater fish discovered in Western Ghats 

      The nemacheilid loaches – Mesonoemacheilus remadevii and Nemacheilus monilis – were misclassified until now and have now been classified under genus Koima, which is distinguished from other Western Ghats and Indian subcontinent nemacheilids based on a combination of characters

    • CBC ☛ 2024-11-08 [Older] Canadian government to apologize for Nunavik dog slaughter

    • CBC ☛ 2024-11-08 [Older] Federal memo estimates up to 30% of lobster catch in Atlantic Canada goes unreported

    • Deutsche Welle ☛ 2024-11-10 [Older] 1 back 42 escaped South Carolina monkeys still on the loose

    • CBC ☛ 2024-11-06 [Older] 'We basically lost everything': Bats force Sask. family to abandon house

  • Overpopulation

    • Smithsonian Magazine ☛ Pompeii Introduces New Limits on Daily Visitors to Protect the Ancient City From Overtourism

      The ancient city of Pompeii, which was preserved under layers of ash and pumice after the eruption of Mount Vesuvius in 79 C.E., is introducing a new cap on daily visitors.

      In an effort to prevent overcrowding and protect the city’s ruins, the Pompeii Archaeological Park announced that it will allow no more than 20,000 tourists to enter the site each day. Beginning on November 15, visitors will need a personalized ticket with their full name on it that’s tied to a specific time slot.

    • Kev Quirk ☛ AMA - Do I Have Faith In Humanity

      The short answer to your question, Brandon, is no. I don't have faith in the future of humanity, and the reason for that is people are fucking idiots.

      I mean "people" as a collective noun. Individually people are generally intelligent, reasonable creatures. But when we reach critical mass, I think we're fucking morons.

    • Brattleboro Reformer, Vermont ☛ Pompeii rejects 'mass tourism' with daily visitor limit

      The "experimental" scheme will see visitors to the UNESCO World Heritage Site required to buy named tickets which, in the summer, will be divided into morning and afternoon slots.

      Gabriel Zuchtriegel, the director of Pompeii, told AFP the measure was designed to better manage crowd numbers, leading to a more "sustainable" growth.

    • US News And World Report ☛ 2024-11-07 [Older] Prince William Visits Fishing Community on Last Day of South Africa Trip

    • Deutsche Welle ☛ 2024-11-11 [Older] India: Why some states want people to have more children

• Finance

  • Deutsche Welle ☛ 2024-11-11 [Older] Who is German economy minister Robert Habeck?

  • CBC ☛ 2024-11-09 [Older] After changes at Alberta's public pension manager, the UCP now owns the fund giant's ups and downs

  • Deutsche Welle ☛ 2024-11-09 [Older] Fact check: Does lifting debt brake defy an oath of office?

  • CBC ☛ 2024-11-04 [Older] Vancouver-area home sales surge in October amid lower borrowing costs: real estate board [Ed: That just means people sink deeper into debt (to pretend they own a home)]

  • CBC ☛ 2024-11-04 [Older] B.C. port employers launch lockout at terminals over contract dispute with foremen

  • CBC ☛ 2024-11-08 [Older] Port of Montreal threatens lockout Sunday unless union agrees to 'final' offer

  • CBC ☛ 2024-11-08 [Older] Workers owed $60M in unpaid wages Ontario failed to collect since 2017

  • CBC ☛ 2024-11-08 [Older] Public service unions warn of job cuts, impact to public services ahead of budget cuts

  • CBC ☛ 2024-11-08 [Older] High bitcoin price may have played role in Toronto crypto CEO's kidnapping: experts

• AstroTurf/Lobbying/Politics

  • Futurism ☛ Elon Musk's New Government [sic] Department Seeking "Super High-IQ" People Who Will Work for Free

    Sounds thrilling. But if performing totally unremunerative work for the world's richest man is your thing — and if you sincerely think having a high IQ is worth bragging about — then "DM this account with your CV," the account implored. "Elon and Vivek will review the top 1 percent of applicants."

  • The Register UK ☛ What's President Trump going to do to the tech industry?

    In short, the technology world, which is no stranger to traditional lobbying, is going to have to adapt again to Trump's approach to governing, and in doing so, potentially find itself playing a greater role in people's lives. We're talking about a president that in one moment dreams of jailing social media CEOs and opponents, and in another, is said to be remarkably guided by flattery. It's not impossible to imagine how easily mega-corporations and billionaires can get what they want from the reality TV star (less interference, less tax, etc.) Exhibit A: Elon Musk.

  • MIT Technology Review ☛ Why the term "women of childbearing age" is problematic for research and health advice

    Earlier this week, I chatted about this with Alana Cattapan, a political scientist at the University of Waterloo in Ontario, Canada. Cattapan has been exploring the concept of “women of reproductive age”—a descriptor that is ubiquitous in health research and policy.

  • Vox ☛ From Zach Bryan to Twisters, culture went MAGA before the election

    Suffice to say, it’s not a question of whether we’ve been here before but whether we’re paying attention to what these signals all mean. With an honest look at our media landscape, were the results of the election truly that surprising?

  • The Korea Times ☛ Samsung Electronics to buy back 10 tril. won in shares to enhance shareholder value

    In the buyback plan approved by the board of directors, a combined 3 trillion won of shares will be bought back within three months starting Monday and continuing until Feb. 17, the company said in a statement.

  • OpenRightsGroup ☛ Briefing: Data (Use and Access) Bill HL

    The new Data (Use and Access) Bill drops several concerning aspects of the previous Data Protection and Digital Information Bill. Open Rights Group welcomes this as a positive development and a step in the right direction. In particular, we welcome the removal of provisions that would have: watered down the definition of personal data; expanded the scope of democratic engagement; lowered the threshold to refuse a data rights request to “vexatious and excessive”; removed various accountability requirements; allowed the Secretary of State to dictate the Strategic Priorities of the new Information Commission; required individuals to contact an organisation before lodging a formal regulatory complaint; removed the abolition of the Biometric and Surveillance Camera Commissioner.

    Unfortunately, the Data (Use and Access) Bill still includes several provisions that would lower important protections for our data protection rights, and threaten public trust toward the use and deployment of new technologies such as Artificial Intelligence.

  • IT Wire ☛ NVIDIA and SoftBank partner on Japan AI initiatives

    GPU chipmaker NVIDIA has announced a series of collaborations with Japanese telco SoftBank on a range AI initiatives designed to unlock AI revenue opportunities for telecommunications providers worldwide.

  • Deutsche Welle ☛ 2024-11-09 [Older] Germany commemorates 35 years since fall of Berlin Wall

  • Deutsche Welle ☛ 2024-11-09 [Older] Germany: Scholz open to new talks with CDU leader Merz

  • Deutsche Welle ☛ 2024-11-10 [Older] Germany's Scholz ready to hold confidence vote this year

  • Deutsche Welle ☛ 2024-11-09 [Older] Budapest summit examines how EU can compete with US. China

  • Deutsche Welle ☛ 2024-11-10 [Older] Amsterdam police break up banned pro-Palestinian rally

  • Deutsche Welle ☛ 2024-11-09 [Older] Amsterdam bans demonstrations over attacks on Israeli fans

  • Deutsche Welle ☛ 2024-11-09 [Older] Berlin in the 1990s: Playground and wasteland

  • Misinformation/Disinformation/Propaganda

    • Hamilton Nolan ☛ Things You Can Lie About

      It is impossible to have an honest conversation about the way that people vote in this country without understanding and acknowledging that a huge majority of voters know effectively nothing about what the government does. Votes are not cast based upon facts. Most votes are cast according to either rote party identification or according to some impressionistic reasoning formed by some unpredictable pastiche of pieces of true and false information that add up to an image in the voter’s mind that bears the same resemblance to objective reality that a Picasso cubist portrait bears to a biology textbook.

    • Los Angeles Times ☛ Elon Musk's X sues to block California election deepfakes law

      The lawsuit, filed in federal court this week, targets a law that aims to combat harmful videos, images and audio that have been altered or created with artificial intelligence. Known as deepfakes, this type of content can make it appear as if a person said or did something they didn’t. The law is scheduled to take effect Jan.1.

    • The Hill ☛ Psaki blames disinformation for Harris's defeat

      Former White House press secretary Jen Psaki is blaming Vice President Harris’s loss to President-elect Trump in part on disinformation.

      “One of the things that’s changed even since I got involved in politics is just the rise of the percentage of people who get their information [sic] off of platforms that have no fact checking mechanism and no accountability for having disinformation spread,” Psaki, who worked in the Obama administration and served as President Biden’s press secretary, told Katie Couric on an episode of her Next Question podcast.

    • The Atlantic ☛ AI’s Fingerprints Were All Over the Election

      And so a trio of political scientists at Purdue University decided to get a head start on tracking how generative AI might influence the 2024 election cycle. In June 2023, Christina Walker, Daniel Schiff, and Kaylyn Jackson Schiff started to track political AI-generated images and videos in the United States. Their work is focused on two particular categories: deepfakes, referring to media made with AI, and “cheapfakes,” which are produced with more traditional editing software, such as Photoshop. Now, more than a week after polls closed, their database, along with the work of other researchers, paints a surprising picture of how AI appears to have actually influenced the election—one that is far more complicated than previous fears suggested.

    • The Atlantic ☛ Alex Jones Just Went Somewhere Else

      The Infowars founder is already broadcasting his conspiracy theories on a new site.

    • Jacobin Magazine ☛ Donald Trump’s Attack on Online Censorship Is a Distraction

      Trump is effectively turning the disinformation debate upside down. Worried about disinformation? Trump has “an unmanipulated stream of information” in store for you. Worried about hate speech and fake news? Trump will revise Section 230 for you, raising its “standards of neutrality, transparency, fairness, and nondiscrimination” while protecting “lawful speech.”

      The problem is that the social-media-centric information debate we’ve been having ever since 2016 is, by and large, one big distraction. Trump’s attempt to reclaim this line of argument for the Right only serves to refocus attention onto the discursive online world that liberals have, confusingly, held responsible for his victory. A typical knee-jerk response by many liberals and Democrats to the election of Donald Trump, now just as back in 2016, has been to blame a faulty “information ecosystem.” We need to fight “misinformation” and “disinformation,” the argument went.

    • CS Monitor ☛ The Onion buys Infowars as Alex Jones files for personal bankruptcy

      The purchase of Alex Jones’ Infowars at a bankruptcy auction by the satirical news publication The Onion is the latest twist in a yearslong saga between the far-right conspiracy theorist and families of Sandy Hook Elementary School shooting victims.

      The sale was ordered after relatives of many of the 20 children and six educators killed in the 2012 shooting successfully sued Mr. Jones and his company for defamation and emotional distress. Mr. Jones repeatedly made false claims on his show that the Newtown, Connecticut, shooting was a hoax staged by crisis actors to spur more gun control.

      Here are some things to know about how Mr. Jones’ misinformation empire ended up on the auction block.

    • Deccan Chronicle ☛ Satire publication The Onion buys Alex Jones' Infowars at auction with Sandy Hook families' backing

      The purchase turns over Jones company , which for decades has peddled in conspiracy and misinformation, to a humor website that plans to relaunch the Infowars platform in January as a parody. Within hours of the sales announcement Thursday, Infowars website was down and Jones was broadcasting from what he said was a new studio location.

    • Semafor Inc ☛ The Onion buys Infowars at bankruptcy auction

      The satirical outlet The Onion bought Infowars, the far-right conspiracy theory website, in its owner Alex Jones’ bankruptcy auction.

      Jones was ordered to pay $1.5 billion to families of the Sandy Hook school shooting after calling the 2012 massacre a hoax.

      The families of some victims agreed to forgo part of their payout to back The Onion’s bid, saying it would put “an end to the misinformation machine” that Jones operated.

• Censorship/Free Speech

  • Meduza ☛ Russian z-blogger escapes criminal prosecution by volunteering (again) to fight in Ukraine

    Russia’s justice system has reportedly suspended criminal proceedings against pro-war blogger Yegor Guzenko, the author of the Telegram channel “Thirteenth,” following his enlistment with the military. Guzenko traded felony prosecution for an express ticket to the front lines in Ukraine as part of an assault unit.

  • RTL ☛ Artyom Kamardin: Jailed Russian poet could be 'killed' in prison, warns wife

    Artyom Kamardin was arrested in September 2022 after reciting -- on a Moscow square where dissidents have been gathering since the late 1950s -- a poem that fiercely criticised Russia's war against Ukraine.

    In December 2023, Kamardin was convicted of inciting hatred and undermining national security. Fellow poet Yegor Shtovba, 23, was sentenced to five and a half years for attending the public reading.

  • Techdirt ☛ Jawboning In Plain Sight: The Unconstitutional Censorship Tolerated By The DMCA

    For better or worse, jawboning has been a hot topic recently, and it’s unlikely that interest will fade any time soon. Jawboning, in broad strokes, is when the government pressures a third party to make that third party chill the speech of another instead of going after the speech directly. Because the First Amendment says that the government cannot go after speech directly, this approach can at first seem to be the “one easy trick” for the government to try to affect the speech it wants to affect so that it could get away with it constitutionally. But as the Supreme Court reminded earlier this year in NRA v. Vullo, it’s not actually constitutional to try this sort of end-run around the First Amendment. Pressuring an intermediary to have it punish someone else’s speech is no better than trying to punish it directly.

  • RFERL ☛ Apple Removes Several RFE/RL Apps At Request Of Russian Regulator

    The RFE/RL apps removed were those of the Russian Service and its regional projects Siberia.Realities and North.Realities, as well as the apps for its Kyrgyz Service and Current Time, the Russian-language TV and digital network run by RFE/RL.

    Roskomnadzor notified Apple that the apps contain materials from an organization whose activities in Russia have been declared "undesirable."

  • Freedom From Religion Foundation ☛ FFRF TV show spotlights Islamist theocracies

    The Freedom From Religion Foundation’s television show guest this week draws attention to how Islamist theocracies in Iran and Afghanistan have been silencing and erasing women.

    Maryam Namazie is an international activist, atheist, feminist and secularist who with her family had to flee Iran after the Islamic revolution there. She is now based in the United Kingdom with the Council of Ex-Muslims of Britain. Namazie campaigns to end apostasy and blasphemy laws, to defend secularism and universal rights and equality. She hosts the weekly “Bread and Roses” TV show, produced in both English and Persian. Maryam Namazie has received many awards and recognitions for her activism, including from the Freedom from Religion Foundation.

• Freedom of Information / Freedom of the Press

  • Meduza ☛ Apple removes RFE/RL news app from Russian App Store at federal censor’s demand

    Apple notified Radio Free Europe/Radio Liberty (RFE/RL) on Friday that it has removed the broadcaster’s app Svoboda (“Liberty”) from the Russian version of its App Store at the demand of the country’s Russia’s federal censorship agency, Roskomnadzor.

    The agency reportedly warned Apple that the app contained “the materials of an organization whose activities have been recognized as undesirable in Russia.”

  • Techdirt ☛ What Free Speech? Trump Ramps Up Threats To Sue Publishers Over Their Speech

    We just warned folks that Donald Trump would be one of the most anti-free speech Presidents in history, and he seems to have no qualms living down to that reputation.

    Donald Trump’s history of frivolous lawsuits against media outlets shows his disdain for free speech, and he shows no signs of stopping. The Columbia Journalism Review has an article exploring a bunch of other legal threats Trump and those around him have been flinging at news and book publishers over their speech.

    These threats are part of a disturbing pattern of Trump trying to silence and intimidate his critics: [...]

• Civil Rights/Policing

  • CBC ☛ 2024-11-06 [Older] Over half of workers compensation claims in Alberta construction are 1st-year workers

  • Deutsche Welle ☛ 2024-11-10 [Older] Bulgaria's slow path to commemorating victims of communism

  • Truthdig ☛ ‘Fund the Police’ Backfired — and Gave Trump More Power Than Ever

    Four years later, Harris then moved far to the 2020 campaign’s right. Harris’ 2024 “Issues” webpage, for example, includes exactly zero criminal legal system reforms. Instead, the site touts her conviction rate as a prosecutor and the billions of dollars the Biden administration has funneled to the nation’s deportation forces, the international War on Drugs and local law enforcement. (She later rolled out a hail-mary proposal to legalize marijuana as her poll numbers tanked.) In a now infamous interview with Oprah Winfrey, Harris even bragged about owning a gun.

  • Los Angeles Times ☛ Officer who beat a man at the veteran's hospital in Los Angeles sentenced to a year in prison

    “Most, if not all, of the baton strikes were delivered while the other officer was on top of the victim, who was unarmed,” the U.S. Attorney’s Office said in a news release. Carrillo was 60 pounds heavier than the man and continued to strike him even when he was completely still, prosecutors wrote in the memo.

  • US News And World Report ☛ Whistleblower Sounds Alarm About Destruction of Tribal Sites in North Carolina

    He tried for years to raise the alarm to forest managers, saying outdated modeling that ignored the artifacts sometimes hidden on steep terrain — especially sites significant to Native American tribes — needed to be reconsidered when planning for prescribed fires, logging projects, new recreational trails and other work on national forest lands.

• Internet Policy/Net Neutrality

  • Deutsche Welle ☛ 2024-11-11 [Older] 'Wicked' toy boxes: Mattel apologizes for porn website link

  • Doc Searls ☛ Going Local With Open Networks

    If you’re tired of moaning (or celebrating) the after-effects of the U.S. election, or how all of us seem trapped inside the captive markets of Amazon, Apple, Alphabet, Microsoft, Meta, and other feudal powers, take in a talk about something constructive that’s nowhere near any of that, but serves as a model for economies and cultures everywhere: India’s Open Network for Digital Commerce, or ONDC.

• Digital Restrictions (DRM)

  • Rolling Stone ☛ NHL Streaming: How to Watch Every Game This Season Without Cable

    Fans looking to get all of those channels in one place can sign up for a live-streaming service, though most options include some trade-offs. The alternative is to sign up for more than one service that will cover the different networks, which may be less expensive but more confusing.

  • Alex Sirac ☛ [Article] <You have reached the clipping limit for this item>

    There seems to have been a recent update to the Kindle software, because now, the clipping limitations (which were shameful on Amazon books already) seem to apply to my own epub files as well. I can’t clip more than 10% of posts that are sometimes 15 sentences long.

Monopolies/Monopsonies

• JURIST ☛ EU fines Meta €797M over Facebook Marketplace anti-competitive advertisement model

  The Commission found that Meta was acting contrary to Article 102 of the Treaty on the Functioning of the European Union (TFEU) by “tying” Facebook Marketplace to Facebook, and in doing so, regularly exposed Facebook users to Facebook Marketplace “whether they want it or not.” The commission found that this created a “substantial distribution advantage” which “competitors cannot match.” The commission also found that Meta was “unilaterally imposing unfair trading conditions” on other advertisement service providers using Meta’s platforms.

• The Register UK ☛ Google says Europe's political ad rules too hard do right

  Google has decided the European Union's Regulation on Transparency and Targeting of Political Advertising will be so hard to comply with it's better off not trying.

  The search and ads giant on Thursday announced that it will stop serving political advertising in the EU sometime before October 2025 – when the Regulation (TTPA) comes into force.

  Annette Kroeber-Riel, the big G's veep for government affairs and public policy in Europe, wrote that the TTPA "unfortunately introduces significant new operational challenges and legal uncertainties for political advertisers and platforms."

• The Register UK ☛ Meta fined €798M by EU for Marketplace antitrust violations

  The European Commission levied the punishment after years of investigations into the tying of Marketplace to Facebook accounts and unfair trading conditions on competing online classified ad services.

  In short, the Commission objects to the way Facebook users are exposed to Marketplace ads "whether they want [them] or not" due to the integration of Marketplace into the Facebook platform. It also criticizes Meta's ability to leverage its extensive advertising network "to use ads-related data generated by other advertisers for the sole benefit of Facebook Marketplace."

• [Repeat] New York Times ☛ Meta Fined $840 Million in Europe for Boosting Marketplace Unfairly

  The fine against Meta is one of the final acts by Ms. Vestager before the end of her term at the European Commission, the executive branch of the 27-nation bloc. After a decade steering competition policy and pushing for tougher regulation of the tech industry, she is slated to be replaced in the coming weeks by Teresa Ribera, a Spanish official.

  In linking Marketplace to Facebook’s social network, the company gave itself “advantages that other online classified ads service providers could not match,” Ms. Vestager said in a statement. “This is illegal under E.U. antitrust rules. Meta must now stop this behavior.”

• Federal News Network ☛ Microsoft’s anticompetitive behavior weakens its customers’ cybersecurity

  That was how Rep. Carlos Giminez (R-Fla.) captured the general sentiment when the House Homeland Security Committee questioned Microsoft Vice Chairman and President Brad Smith on the company’s “cascade of security failures.” During the high-profile hearing, real answers were few and far between.

  It was a surprising spotlight on a company that has flown under the radar for decades. Many might recall the “Browser Wars” of the 1990s when Microsoft illegally leveraged its dominance in desktop operating systems to gain a foothold in internet browsers. As scrutiny of the company’s cyber practices heats up on Capitol Hill, more are realizing that Microsoft is using that same playbook today — but even they don’t recognize to what extent.

• Copyrights

  • CBC ☛ 2024-11-06 [Older] Canadian legal information database sues company behind AI chatbot

  • Torrent Freak ☛ Nintendo v. Pomelo: Yuzu-Based iOS Switch Emu in Circumvention Dead End

    2024 has been a pretty rough year for Nintendo-loving emulator fans. At this point it's clear that they can either choose Nintendo, or Switch emulators, but they can't have relationships with both. At least not in public. During the last few hours Nintendo began targeting Pomelo, a popular Switch emulator for iOS devices. Like similar emulators before it, Pomelo's disclaimer against piracy is redundant. Thanks to its family tree, it has nowhere left to go.

  • New York Times ☛ Elon Musk Adds Microsoft to Suit Against OpenAI

    Elon Musk has amended a lawsuit he brought this year against OpenAI, escalating his yearslong feud with the maker of the online chatbot ChatGPT.

    The amended complaint, filed on Thursday in federal court in Northern California, makes new antitrust claims against OpenAI and adds defendants, including the tech giant Microsoft and the venture capitalist Reid Hoffman.

    Microsoft is a close partner of OpenAI, after investing more than $13 billion in the start-up. Mr. Hoffman is a Microsoft board member and previously served on the board of OpenAI.

  • India Times ☛ Elon Musk adds Microsoft to suit against OpenAI

    Microsoft is a close partner of OpenAI, after investing over $13 billion in the startup. Another defendant Reid Hoffman is a Microsoft board member and previously served on the board of OpenAI.

  • The Register UK ☛ Musk names Microsoft in amended OpenAI claim

    In a fresh amended complaint with the US District Court, Northern District of California, the rocket and electric car entrepreneur alleges that Microsoft's involvement with OpenAI – the highly valued startup behind a string of attention-grabbing LLMs – amounts to anti-competitive practices.

    Microsoft has been a close partner of OpenAI since 2019 and is reported to have invested around $13 billion in the company.

  • Futurism ☛ OpenAI Implores Judge Not to Expose Communications by Its Top Researchers

    In one of the many copyright lawsuits it's facing, OpenAI is asking a judge to narrow the scope of discovery to limit insider communications from being aired in public.

    This latest forte in OpenAI's defense against the Authors Guild, which is alleging on behalf of writers including George R.R. Martin and John Grisham that the company used its members' copyrighted works without permission to train its AI models, shows that the firm really doesn't want its top researchers' documents making the rounds.

    The Guild recently requested that OpenAI submit extensive documents — including text messages and social media DMs — not only for the 24 initial "custodians" or insiders who are thought to have relevant pre-trial discovery information, but for eight additional figures as well, including OpenAI cofounder Ilya Sutskever and researcher Jan Lieke, both of whom left OpenAI this year.

  • The Verge ☛ Bluesky says it won’t train AI on your posts

    Social network Bluesky, in a post on Friday, says that it has “no intention” of taking user content to train generative AI tools. It made the statement the same day X’s new terms of service that spell out how it can analyze user text and other information to train its generative AI tools go into effect.

    “A number of artists and creators have made their home on Bluesky, and we hear their concerns with other platforms training on their data,” Bluesky says in a post. “We do not use any of your content to train generative AI, and have no intention of doing so.”

  • CoryDoctorow ☛ Pluralistic: Canada’s ground-breaking, hamstrung repair and interop laws

    This is the story of how another far-right conservative government used its bulletproof majority to pass a wildly unpopular law that continues to stymie progress to this day. It's the story of Canada's Harper Conservative government, and two of its key ministers: Tony Clement and James Moore.

    Starting in 1998, the US Trade Rep embarked on a long campaign to force every country in the world to enact a new kind of IP law: an "anticircumvention" law that would criminalize the production and use of tools that allowed people to use their own property in ways that the manufacturer disliked.