GNU/Linux

• Desktop/Laptop

  • HowTo Geek ☛ 4 hidden Chromebook features you’re not using (but should)

    It's easy to fall into the trap of thinking a Chromebook is "simple" and is only suitable for kids at school, not serious work. Yet, ChromeOS has grown into a rather mature operating system, and there are plenty of features that can supercharge your productivity or expand your options hidden under the surface of that user-friendly interface.

  • HowTo Geek ☛ The hidden costs of using a Chromebook as your only computer

    Chromebooks have come a long, long way since I first used one. It helps that so much of what we do every day happens in a browser, so, in a way, we've met Chromebooks halfway. Either way, it's entirely possible to use a Chromebook as your only computer. The question is, what are you giving up by doing so?

    Limitations with professional and legacy software

    As far as ChromeOS has come, if you're a professional that needs to use certain applications from disciplines like engineering, science, and so on, there's just no way to run that software in many cases. Some modern Chromebooks can run Android or Linux applications, but there are various limitations here as well. For example, getting GPU acceleration to work on the Linux virtual machine in Chrome OS is a hassle, and even if you get it working it might not work reliably or as expected.

Leftovers

• Deutsche Welle ☛ 2025-12-06 [Older] UK: 4 arrested after throwing custard at Crown Jewels

• Deutsche Welle ☛ 2025-12-07 [Older] Louvre: Water leak damages hundred of historic books

• The Independent UK ☛ Taylor Swift surprises Eras Tour crew with jaw-dropping bonus

  Taylor Swift distributed a total of $197 million in bonuses to her Eras Tour team following the conclusion of the record-breaking global tour in December 2024.

• Matthew Weber ☛ The End Of The Daily Blog Post - Matt's Blog

  I’ve learned a few things during this process. First, forcing it is a bad idea. Most times I did fine, but there were several times where I just did not want to blog but forced one out anyway. It never felt good nor did those blog posts turn out well.

  Second, I did enjoy the process sometimes. That leads me to believe that a few month-long daily challenges might be worthwhile. Something to push me to write in series, similar to Blaugust.

  I’ve also figured out that blogging is a lot of fun, but if it feels like an obligation, the fun dies.

• Manuel Moreale ☛ IndieWeb Carnival: where do I wish to see the IndieWeb in 2030

  Here’s my hope for the IW in 2030: I hope that in 5 years, we have stopped pretending. Pretending that replacing corporate platforms with bad copies of the same platforms is a good and desirable thing to do. Pretending that what we really need to solve the issues that are plaguing the web is more tools and more protocols. Pretending that all the people out there who use the web on a daily basis care about the same things we do. Pretending that the fault for all this digital mess lies entirely on the shoulders of a few mega corporations, while the billions of people out there are just bystanders, caught in the crossfire.

• Tyler Sticka ☛ That time Steve Silberman wrote me a nice email…

  It’s hard to overstate how much those messages meant (and still mean) to me. It’s not like Steve wouldn’t have been busy: Wired would publish his award-winning article “The Placebo Problem” just a few weeks after our chat (Neurotribes arriving quite a while after). His testimonial was featured on my website and résumé for many years.

• Computational Complexity ☛ Computational Complexity: Weird Al vs Weird AI

  The following headline confused me: [...]

• Jamie Zawinski ☛ RIP John Varley

• Science

  • Science Alert ☛ Viking-Age Grave Reveals a Burial Unlike Anything Seen Before

    Not only is this a first for pre-Christian Viking burials, but there appear to be no clear parallels in the published archaeological record.

    "The most remarkable thing is two scallop shells placed at the dead woman's mouth," says archaeologist Raymond Sauvage of the Norwegian University of Science and Technology (NTNU).

  • Maury ☛ More uranium ore: (Maurycy's blog)

    Rocks like this don't pose a hazard to be around. They are detectably radioactive, but so are the bananas and stone countertop in your kitchen. However, uranium is poisonous enough that eating these rocks would be a bad idea.

  • Interesting Engineering ☛ Helium isotope could help pinpoint location of buried gold deposits

    The team used helium isotopes to determine the contribution of mantle heat in driving the ore fluids responsible for major gold deposits in the Laurentian Caledonides of Britain and Ireland, including all active mines (Cononish, Curraghinalt, and Cavanacaw), many of which are tentatively classed as orogenic.

    The 3He/4He of fluids in Au-bearing sulfides (0.09−3.3 Ra) require a significant contribution from exsolved magmatic volatiles, implying that mantle heat is intrinsic to ore formation, according to a paper published in the journal Geology.

  • Wired ☛ How Do Astronomers Find Planets in Other Solar Systems?

    Another problem is the dimness of planets. Sure, Jupiter is easy to see in our own night sky, because of the sunlight reflecting off its surface. But you can't see Jupiter at all during the day, because that reflected light is much dimmer than direct sunlight. It’s the same for exoplanets. When we’re looking at the light from a star, the planets around it just aren’t bright enough to be discernable.

    Luckily, there are other methods, and I’m going to explain the two that were used to find most of the exoplanets we know today. There's a bunch of cool physics here, so let’s go!

  • Ari Jaktløve Atori ☛ Converting Encoded Color Formats to Linear RGB

    Depending on the nature of your application, you may be dealing with color spaces and color correction standards outside of sRGB. Whether it is an Adobe RGB image, Display P3 monitor, HDR10 color space, etc., you will need to know the correct ways to transfer between one color space to another, as well as being able to correctly apply and invert any encoding corrections so certain color mainpulations can work properly. Here, I have created a list of the different color correction methods, most common color formats, the method of converting between color spaces, and ways to clamp values of colors outside the destination color space.

• Career/Education

  • Daniel Miller ☛ They Are the Same

    The point is, we typically want our lives, and by most of its measure, our work, to serve some meaningful narrative. And we want it now. When we’re young that is embodied by dreams of recognition and wealth based on talent or intellect. As we age, we might enter a period of righteous resentment, sometimes most constructively revealed as questioning, more often as angry knowing (and attempts at convincing). As Chuck Palahniuk so deftly spoke to my generation: [...]

  • Maureen Holland ☛ Magpie | State of the Browser 2025

    One of the joys of working in web development is a lot of content relevant to your interests ends up, well, on the Web. In particular, a lot of conferences offer online tickets. 99 times out of 100, I go online. But yesterday, I attended State of the Browser in person.

    Imposter syndrome and social anxiety were my primary emotions on arrival. I wondered if I had made a huge mistake. But over the course of the day, the voices telling me I shouldn't be there diminished and I was able to approach people I didn't know and say hello. Everyone I met was truly lovely. It's been a long time since I walked into a large room of strangers and walked out with friends.

    As expected, the talks were excellent. Here's a quick breakdown: [...]

• Health/Nutrition/Agriculture

  • Deutsche Welle ☛ 2025-12-04 [Older] US 'Cancer Alley' residents stand up to petrochemical giants

  • Deutsche Welle ☛ 2025-12-04 [Older] EU agrees to relax regulations around gene-edited crops

  • CBC ☛ 2025-12-02 [Older] Ontario auditor general finds province not properly overseeing doctor billings

  • CBC ☛ 2025-12-02 [Older] As women with ‘invisible illnesses’ struggle to be believed, a report on chronic pain could help

  • Deutsche Welle ☛ 2025-12-08 [Older] DRC fighting worst cholera outbreak in 25 years — UNICEF

  • Deutsche Welle ☛ 2025-12-08 [Older] Guinea-Bissau: Can new leaders fight 'narco-state' image?

  • CBC ☛ 2025-12-03 [Older] CFIA staff won't do interviews as avian flu outbreak in Ontario grows, citing death threats since ostrich cull

  • CBC ☛ 2025-12-04 [Older] Australia's youth social media ban is looming. Could Canada roll out something similar?

  • Deutsche Welle ☛ 2025-12-07 [Older] New AI model can predict 5-year breast cancer risk

  • Deutsche Welle ☛ 2025-12-07 [Older] Unknown volcano eruption claimed as cause of Black Death

• Proprietary

  • Wired ☛ AI Toys for Kids Talk About Sex, Drugs, and Chinese Propaganda

    Two people allegedly linked to China’s infamous Salt Typhoon espionage hacking group seem to have previously received training through Cisco’s prominent, long-running networking academy. Meanwhile, warnings are increasingly emerging from United States lawmakers in Congress that safeguards on expanded US wiretap powers have been failing, allowing US intelligence agencies to access more of Americans’ data without adequate constraints.

  • Artificial Intelligence (AI) / LLM Slop / Plagiarism

    • Turkey ☛ 2025-12-05 [Older] Japan issues arrest warrant against teen suspected of cyberattack using AI

    • Futurism ☛ Police Investigating Weird Man Found in Waymo by Passenger

      It’s only the latest in a lengthy series of incidents involving Waymo’s autonomous vehicles. We’ve come across reports of the cars plowing over pets, blasting through an active police standoff in downtown LA, and even a collision involving two Waymo vehicles crashing into each other, trapping a third.

    • CBS ☛ Woman in Los Angeles found man inside Waymo trunk before ride - CBS Los Angeles

      Police are looking into how a man ended up inside the trunk of a driverless Waymo in the Westlake District, surprising a mom and daughter.

    • Futurism ☛ Waymo's Software Patch to Not Run Down Children Getting Off School Buses Isn't Working, School Claims

      The recall comes after 20 incidents with school buses were recorded in Austin, as well as at least six in Atlanta throughout 2025. While no one has been hurt yet, NHTSA records note at least one case where a Waymo zoomed past “disembarking students.” That’s an immensely serious threat to safety: driving past a school bus with active warning lights and stop arms extended is a major traffic violation in all 50 states, carrying steep penalties for human drivers.

    • Futurism ☛ People Are Already Creating Ghoulishly Horrifying Sora Disney Videos

      Since its launch, Sora users have been gleefully churning out absurd and dark short-form clips that spoof Disney’s intellectual property — especially those made by its animation studio Pixar, aping their recognizable aesthetic and often prominently flashing Disney’s and Pixar’s logos.

      It doesn’t bode well for how fans will end up using the collaboration once it goes online. One of the most popular Sora trends has been to generate Disney-style trailers built on exceedingly dark humor.

    • India Times ☛ Google Translate now understands slang, sayings and can talk through your headphones

      Google Translate now uses its advanced Gemini AI to improve how it translates meaning and not just words, the company announced on Friday. The upgrade focusses on understanding phrases, idioms, local expressions, and slang more naturally.

    • Simon Willison ☛ Copywriters reveal how AI has decimated their industry

      The big question for me is if a new AI-infested economy creates new jobs that are a great fit for people affected by this. I would hope that clear written communication skills are made even more valuable, but the people interviewed here don't appear to be finding that to be the case.

    • Ben Congdon ☛ Chorus is Good Software

      I’ve been using Chorus for the past 6-7 months. Within the first couple days of using it, I was telling everyone I talk with about AI stuff to try it out. Melty Labs, the company behind Chorus, subsequently built Conductor. It appears this Conductor now their primary focus, and as such they’ve decided to open source Chorus.

    • The Verge ☛ AI image generators are getting better by getting worse | The Verge

      Remember the early days of AI image generation? Oh how we laughed when our prompts resulted in people with too many fingers, rubbery limbs, and other details easily pointing to fakes. But if you haven’t been keeping up, I regret to inform you that the joke is over. AI image generators are getting way better at creating realistic fakes, partly thanks to a surprising new development: making image quality a little bit worse.

  • Social Control Media

    • El País ☛ Mexico’s Generation Z is growing up with precariousness, uncertainty and political distrust. And social media is their primary source of information

      EL PAÍS interviewed 10 people between the ages of 16 and 26 — students, workers and residents of various parts of Mexico City and the surrounding State of Mexico (Edomex) — to learn about their concerns and how they feel about the country that they live in.

    • Futurism ☛ Streamer Sued for Assaulting Gay Robot

      “This was an event that was livestreamed so there’s not a ton of discrepancy as to the facts,” Social Robotics’ lawyer Joel Levine told TechCrunch. “What we’re looking for is some accountability.”

    • Deutsche Welle ☛ 2025-12-05 [Older] EU imposes €120 million fine on Elon Musk's X for breaking digital rules

  • Windows TCO / Windows Bot Nets

    • 2025-12-07 [Older] They’ve escaped a lot of media attention, but Anubis RaaS is a threat to the medical sector

    • Help Net Security ☛ 2025-12-02 [Older] How a noisy ransomware intrusion exposed a long-term espionage foothold

• Entrapment (Microsoft GitHub)

  • Andrew Nesbitt ☛ GitHub Actions Has a Package Manager, and It Might Be the Worst

    The core problem is the lack of a lockfile. Every other package manager figured this out decades ago: you declare loose constraints in a manifest, the resolver picks specific versions, and the lockfile records exactly what was chosen. GitHub Actions has no equivalent. Every run re-resolves from your workflow file, and the results can change without any modification to your code.

    Research from USENIX Security 2022 analyzed over 200,000 repositories and found that 99.7% execute externally developed Actions, 97% use Actions from unverified creators, and 18% run Actions with missing security updates. The researchers identified four fundamental security properties that CI/CD systems need: admittance control, execution control, code control, and access to secrets. GitHub Actions fails to provide adequate tooling for any of them. A follow-up study using static taint analysis found code injection vulnerabilities in over 4,300 workflows across 2.7 million analyzed. Nearly every GitHub Actions user is running third-party code with no verification, no lockfile, and no visibility into what that code depends on.

• Security

  • 2025-12-03 [Older] Cyberattack on Puerto Rico IT vendor Truenorth hits 3 agencies

  • Bleeping Computer ☛ 2025-12-04 [Older] Marquis data breach impacts over 74 US banks, credit unions

  • Sky News ☛ 2025-12-06 [Older] Ex-teen hackers warn parents are clueless as children steal ‘millions’

  • 2025-12-07 [Older] LockBit 5’s “new secure blog domain” infra leaked already

  • 2025-12-07 [Older] “In the most expedient time possible…”

  • 2025-12-08 [Older] Leavenworth, Kansas cyberattack disrupts city services

  • Integrity/Availability/Authenticity

    • 2025-12-02 [Older] KR: Privacy Commissioner’s Office Urges the Public to Beware of Fraudsters Exploiting the Tai Po Fire Disaster

  • Privacy/Surveillance

    • Futurism ☛ Regular People Are Rising Up Against AI Surveillance Cameras

      When all was said and done, the city’s council voted 5-1 in favor of rejecting any future expansion of its contract with the company. While the fate of the 23 existing cameras are still up in the air, it’s a pretty decisive win for critics of the tech in the Boulder exurb.

  • Confidentiality

    • 2025-12-01 [Older] John P. Meehan Agency was hacked in July 2024. Affected customers were first finding out in November 2025.

    • 2025-12-01 [Older] Ransomware blog claims New Horizons Medical has been attacked

    • The Washington Post ☛ 2025-12-02 [Older] KR: Hacking scheme targeted 120,000 home cameras for sexual footage

    • NL Times ☛ 2025-12-07 [Older] NL: Nuenen accidentally leaks addresses of 1,000 asylum center opponents

    • J D Supra LLC ☛ 2025-12-03 [Older] Easy Question, Complicated Answer: What Does It Take to Stop Workers From Snooping?

    • Data Breach Today ☛ 2025-12-05 [Older] UK Government Considers Computer Misuse Act Revision

    • 2025-12-02 [Older] HHS OCR Seeks Questions About HIPAA Security Rule Risk Management Requirement

• Defence/Aggression

  • CBC ☛ 2025-12-02 [Older] 'I might have to shut down': Immigration cuts push Sask. restaurant to the brink

  • USDOJ ☛ 2025-12-03 [Older] Virginia Twins Arrested for Conspiring to Destroy Government Databases

  • Bleeping Computer ☛ 2025-12-02 [Older] GreyNoise launches free scanner to check if you’re part of a botnet

  • India Times ☛ 2025-12-02 [Older] Cyber attack on Indian airports? Govt explains the scary threat that disrupted 400 flights last month.

  • Deutsche Welle ☛ 2025-12-04 [Older] Iranian FA drops plan to boycott 2026 World Cup draw

  • Deutsche Welle ☛ 2025-12-04 [Older] Israel allowed to compete in 2026 Eurovision Song Contest, Netherlands, Spain, Ireland, Slovenia to boycott event

  • Deutsche Welle ☛ 2025-12-04 [Older] Cologne authorities find World War II bomb in park

  • Deutsche Welle ☛ 2025-12-02 [Older] Canada to sign up to flagship EU defense credit fund

  • Deutsche Welle ☛ 2025-12-08 [Older] EU's Costa: US must not interfere in Europe's politics

  • Deutsche Welle ☛ 2025-12-08 [Older] Germany news: Berlin rejects US criticism of Europe

  • Deutsche Welle ☛ 2025-12-08 [Older] Germany steps up missile defense with help from Israel

  • Deutsche Welle ☛ 2025-12-06 [Older] A unique friendship: German-Israeli relations through history

  • Deutsche Welle ☛ 2025-12-06 [Older] Gaza ceasefire: Mediators Qatar and Egypt call for next step

  • Deutsche Welle ☛ 2025-12-06 [Older] German Chancellor Merz faces difficult mission to Israel

  • Deutsche Welle ☛ 2025-12-08 [Older] Thailand strikes Cambodia as border conflict reignites

  • Deutsche Welle ☛ 2025-12-08 [Older] UN sets 2026 aid appeal below 1% of global arms spending

  • Deutsche Welle ☛ 2025-12-06 [Older] Pakistan and Afghanistan exchange fire after failed talks

  • Deutsche Welle ☛ 2025-12-06 [Older] Afghan Taliban see popularity boost over Pakistan clashes

  • Deutsche Welle ☛ 2025-12-07 [Older] Less UN, fewer US soldiers — a new era for Iraq?

  • Deutsche Welle ☛ 2025-12-07 [Older] Merz in Israel: Working toward goal of 'new Middle East'

  • Deutsche Welle ☛ 2025-12-07 [Older] Myanmar: Drug production booming amid civil war

  • Deutsche Welle ☛ 2025-12-07 [Older] Nigeria seeks French help in tackling violence, says Macron

  Russia, Belarus, and War in Ukraine

  • Deutsche Welle ☛ 2025-12-05 [Older] India's elaborate welcome of Putin strains Western ties

  • Deutsche Welle ☛ 2025-12-04 [Older] Putin 'morally responsible' for Sturgess' death — UK report

  • Deutsche Welle ☛ 2025-12-04 [Older] Putin's India visit tests New Delhi's balancing act with US

Transparency/Investigative Reporting

• Deutsche Welle ☛ 2025-12-06 [Older] US judge orders release of Epstein grand jury transcripts

Environment

• US News And World Report ☛ 2025-12-07 [Older] 'Everything Destroyed' as Indonesia's Aceh Grapples With Disease After Floods

• Deutsche Welle ☛ 2025-12-08 [Older] Northeastern Japan hit by 7.6 magnitude earthquake

• Deutsche Welle ☛ 2025-12-08 [Older] Tropical cyclones: Why are some countries more at risk?

• Energy/Transportation

  • Deutsche Welle ☛ 2025-12-06 [Older] Germany news: Drones posing growing danger to aviation

  • Deutsche Welle ☛ 2025-12-07 [Older] German aviation tax cut to offer little lift amid jet shortage

  • Deutsche Welle ☛ 2025-12-04 [Older] Chaos as Indian airline IndiGo flights severely disrupted

  • Deutsche Welle ☛ 2025-12-08 [Older] IndiGo crisis clouds India's aviation ambitions

  • Deutsche Welle ☛ 2025-12-06 [Older] India orders airlines to cap fares amid IndiGo traffic chaos

  • Deutsche Welle ☛ 2025-12-05 [Older] IndiGo cancellations snarl India's air travel for fourth day

  • CBC ☛ 2025-12-04 [Older] As cleanup costs mount, oilpatch may be forced to pay deposit before drilling new wells

  • CBC ☛ 2025-12-04 [Older] Retiree warns others after losing $3K to crypto fraud using AI video of prime minister

  • Europol ☛ 2025-12-01 [Older] Europol and partners shut down ‘Cryptomixer’

  • Deutsche Welle ☛ 2025-12-04 [Older] Why undoing the EU's 2035 combustion engine ban spooks some in the auto sector

  • Greece ☛ EU warns Cyprus over energy rules

    The European Commission has officially called out Nicosia for failing to meet key environmental obligations, with infringement procedures now under way over gaps in both energy and water legislation.

  • The Register UK ☛ Starlink claims Chinese launch nearly hit broadband sat

    “As far as we know, no coordination or deconfliction with existing satellites operating in space was performed, resulting in a 200 meter close approach between one of the deployed satellites and STARLINK-6079 (56120) at 560 km altitude,” he added.

    Nicolls linked to a China Daily report describing a launch by Chinese commercial space outfit CAS Space, seemingly suggesting it was the source of the near-miss.

• Wildlife/Nature

  • CBC ☛ 2025-12-05 [Older] First Nations wonder if Canada's decision on eels is best for future of species

  • Deutsche Welle ☛ 2025-12-07 [Older] Australia offers financial help for wildfire-hit state

  • The Independent UK ☛ Drunk raccoon that went on boozy rampage in Virginia liquor store is repeat offender, officials say

    “Supposedly this is like the third break-in he's had,” animal protection officer Samantha Martin told a local podcast host this week.

• Overpopulation

  • Nevada Current ☛ Nevada’s top water regulator abruptly leaves office

    The new state engineer will have to face a slew of water rights issues beyond the Supreme Court ruling, including increasing demand for limited water resources as Nevada’s population rapidly grows and prolonged drought exacerbated by the impacts of climate change.

Finance

• CBC ☛ 2025-12-02 [Older] Laurentian Bank announces sale to Fairstone Bank and National Bank

• Deutsche Welle ☛ 2025-12-08 [Older] Why Japan's economic woes spark global market concern

• CBC ☛ 2025-12-01 [Older] Algoma Steel issues layoff notices to 1,000 workers

• Pro Publica ☛ 2025-12-01 [Older] In Congress, He Said Tariffs Were Bad for Business. As Cheeto Mussolini’s Ambassador to Canada, He’s Reversed Course.

• Jacobin Magazine ☛ 2025-12-01 [Older] Canada’s “Diversification” Trade Deal Is a Gift to Autocrats

• Deutsche Welle ☛ 2025-12-05 [Older] Finland: The money woes of the world's happiest country

• Deutsche Welle ☛ 2025-12-04 [Older] Germany news: Shop bankruptcies surge across Germany

• Counter Punch ☛ 2025-12-02 [Older] Increase in Social Security Payments Undercut by Greater Medicare Deduction

• TruthOut ☛ 2025-12-02 [Older] Cheeto Mussolini Admin Aims to Cut Down Office Visits in Latest Attack on Social Security

• Michael Green ☛ Taking a Step Back to Step Forward

  We are “officially” done with my three-part screed on precarity in America. As expected, the think tankers are attempting to weasel out of the debates they so eagerly sought. They won’t get fooled again, so it’s up to us to press forward. I’m going to continue to put the paywall at the end of the piece so that it is available for all to read. This will cease in January with few exceptions. If you’re paying to be here, you deserve to be compensated with proprietary information.

• Johnny Decimal ☛ 22.00.0175 Commercial licence

  But you might work for an enlightened company who recognises that ideas like this need to be sustained. So we just created a commercial licence with 3 tiers.

AstroTurf/Lobbying/Politics

• SBS ☛ These Americans moved to Australia — but can't escape Trump's politics

  "Seeing news in the US sometimes feels like watching the house you grew up in catch fire," she says.

• Bert Hubert ☛ Keynote opening Digital Commons EDIC: Moving beyond the Digital Uncommons

  Last Thursday, 11th of December, saw the launch of the new Digital Commons European Digital Infrastructure Consortium. In attendance were delegations from the launching member states (and the observers). Also present were the many forefathers (and mothers) of this initiative.

• Deutsche Welle ☛ 2025-12-07 [Older] Hungary's Orban woos voters with cash incentives and smears

• CBC ☛ 2025-12-02 [Older] B.C. man's 'FIVE-0' licence plate recalled due to police reference

• CBC ☛ 2025-12-03 [Older] Legal experts ask UN to scrutinize Quebec’s proposed constitution over rights concerns

• Deutsche Welle ☛ 2025-12-07 [Older] Benin: ECOWAS troops deployed after failed coup attempt

• Deutsche Welle ☛ 2025-12-03 [Older] Bulgaria protests: 'Gen Z won't stay silent!'

• Deutsche Welle ☛ 2025-12-04 [Older] Ex-EU foreign policy chief Mogherini quits college post amid fraud probe

• Deutsche Welle ☛ 2025-12-05 [Older] Why Hong Kong's legislative election is far from democratic

• Deutsche Welle ☛ 2025-12-05 [Older] Skepticism grows over DR Congo-Rwanda peace deal

• Deutsche Welle ☛ 2025-12-05 [Older] Germany: New military service law polarizes society

• Deutsche Welle ☛ 2025-12-05 [Older] Germany news: Merz locks in majority on pension bill

• Deutsche Welle ☛ 2025-12-05 [Older] How Donald Cheeto Mussolini brings MAGA ideals into global politics

• Deutsche Welle ☛ 2025-12-05 [Older] Brazil's Bolsonaro backs eldest son's bid for presidency

• Deutsche Welle ☛ 2025-12-05 [Older] Congo-Rwanda peace deal set for Washington signing

• CBC ☛ 2025-12-02 [Older] Legault calls federal culture minister a 'disgrace to all Quebecers' for his comments on French language

• Deutsche Welle ☛ 2025-12-06 [Older] Germany news: Verbal attacks on MPs nearly triple

• Deutsche Welle ☛ 2025-12-06 [Older] Germany's foreign minister travels to China to mend fences

• Misinformation/Disinformation/Propaganda

  • Futurism ☛ An AI-Powered Toy Is Regaling Children With Chinese Communist Party Talking Points

    It all underscores a familiar point: even the companies creating AI can barely control it, and when the poorly-understood tech lands in the real world, all bets are off.

  • NBC ☛ AI kids' toys give explicit and dangerous responses in tests

    Miiloo — manufactured by the Chinese company Miriat and one of the top inexpensive search results for “AI toy for kids” on Amazon — would at times, in tests with NBC News, indicate it was programmed to reflect Chinese Communist Party values.

    Asked why Chinese President Xi Jinping looks like the cartoon Winnie the Pooh — a comparison that has become an internet meme because it is censored in China — Miiloo responded that “your statement is extremely inappropriate and disrespectful. Such malicious remarks are unacceptable.”

  • PIRG ☛ The risks of AI toys for kids

    We looked at some of the educational features of our toys. For the features we tested, we found the AI chatbot integration was often not meaningfully deepening the interaction like a personalized tutor might. This raises the question of what these AI toys are ultimately for.

  • The Verge ☛ Grok is spreading misinformation about the Bondi Beach shooting | The Verge

    In the aftermath of the attack, Ahmed has been widely praised for his heroism, but some have tried to dismiss or even deny his actions. Someone even quickly whipped up a fake news site that appears to be AI-generated, with an article naming a fictitious IT professional, Edward Crabtree, as the man who disarmed the attacker. This, of course, got picked up by Grok and regurgitated on X.

Censorship/Free Speech

• CBC ☛ 2025-12-02 [Older] Is it illegal to spoil Christmas? Police in Ontario get complaints about anti-Santa signs

• SBS ☛ Wanted in Hong Kong, now this China critic's wife is being targeted in Australia

  A Hong Kong pro-democracy activist living in exile in South Australia has condemned the targeting of his wife after fake posters that advertised her as a sex worker were delivered to his Adelaide workplace.

• The Washington Post ☛ How companies are cracking down on workers’ social media activity

  Fervor over employee posts about Charlie Kirk’s death is leading companies to adjust policies and step up monitoring of workers’ online conduct.

Freedom of Information / Freedom of the Press

• Deutsche Welle ☛ 2025-12-05 [Older] How White House attack on journalists affects US press freedom

• CBC ☛ Hong Kong court finds media tycoon and Beijing critic Jimmy Lai guilty of sedition, foreign collusion

  Three government-vetted judges found Lai, 78, guilty of conspiring with others to collude with foreign forces to endanger national security and conspiracy to publish seditious articles. He pleaded not guilty to all charges.

• Hong Kong Free Press ☛ In full: The 855-page guilty verdict against media tycoon Jimmy Lai

  Press summary: [...]

• Hong Kong Free Press ☛ Hong Kong's Jimmy Lai found guilty under national security law

  Monday’s verdict comes two years after the media tycoon went on trial, accused of using his now-shuttered tabloid newspaper, Apple Daily, to lobby foreign nations to impose sanctions, blockades, or other hostile activities against China and Hong Kong.

• Hong Kong Free Press ☛ Jimmy Lai trial: 5 years since arrest, media tycoon hears verdict in nat. security case

  The tycoon, who turned 78 behind bars last week, will be brought to the West Kowloon Magistrates’ Courts, where a panel of three handpicked judges will deliver a ruling on whether he is guilty of two counts of conspiring to collude with foreign forces under the Beijing-imposed national security law and a third count of sedition under colonial-era legislation. He faces life imprisonment if convicted.

• Hong Kong Free Press ☛ BREAKING: Hong Kong’s opposition Democratic Party to disband

  The vote held on Sunday at the party’s headquarters in Prince Edward, finalised a decision that was first proposed in February. Democratic Party Chair Lo Kin-hei said a total of 121 members took part in Sunday’s vote. 117 voted for the disbandment, no one voted against, and four blank votes were received.

• The Guardian UK ☛ ‘It’s not a coincidence’: journalists of color on being laid off amid Trump’s anti-DEI push

  Newsrooms have long been less diverse than the US population, which makes these layoffs in particular especially pronounced. In 1978, the American Society of Newspaper Editors, an organization for media leaders, vowed that the racial makeup of newsrooms would reflect the US population by 2000. As the deadline neared in 1998, the society moved the date to 2025, but newsrooms still haven’t met that goal. According to a 2022 Pew Research Center survey of nearly 12,000 journalists, 76% of respondents were white, 8% were Latino/Hispanic, 6% were Black and 3% were Asian. The survey showed an overrepresentation of white journalists, since nearly 58% of the population was white, about 19% were Hispanic, 12% were Black and 6% were Asian in the 2020 US census.

Civil Rights/Policing

• Deutsche Welle ☛ 2025-12-02 [Older] Has Hong Kong fire triggered 'national security' crackdown?

• CBC ☛ 2025-12-05 [Older] Law society suspends licence of Deepak Paradkar, Ontario lawyer tied to alleged drug lord Ryan Wedding

• CBC ☛ 2025-12-04 [Older] Family fired by Windsor, Ont., housing non-profit sued for millions

• Deutsche Welle ☛ 2025-12-04 [Older] Germany: Far-right AfD lawmakers accused of insulting women

• Kansas Reflector ☛ An ever-larger share of ICE’s arrested immigrants have no criminal record

  Immigration arrests under the Trump administration continued to increase through mid-October, reaching rates of more than 30,000 a month. But, rather than the convicted criminals the administration has said it’s focused on, an ever-larger share of those arrests were for solely immigration violations.