Leftovers

• Computational Complexity ☛ Tony Hoare (1934-2026)

  A story that I was determined to hear from the source was the legendary quicksort 'wager'. The story goes that Tony told his boss at Elliott Brothers Ltd that he knew a faster sorting algorithm than the one that he had just implemented for the company. He was told 'I bet you sixpence you don't!'. Lo and behold, quicksort WAS faster. I asked Tony to tell this story pretty much every time we met, because I enjoyed it so much and it always put a smile on both of our faces. To his credit, Tony never tired of telling me this story 'right from the top'. I had hoped to visit again in the past year and record him telling it so that there was a record, but unfortunately this did not happen. However, I discover that it is indeed recorded elsewhere. One detail I might be able to add is that I asked Tony if indeed the wager was paid out or if it had merely been a figure of speech. He confirmed that indeed he WAS paid the wager (!). A detail of this story that I find particularly reflective of Tony's humble personality is that he went ahead and implemented the slower algorithm he was asked to, while he believed quicksort to be faster, and before chiming in with this belief. It speaks to a professionalism that Tony always carried.

• Science

  • Bartosz Milewski ☛ The Axiom of Univalence

    On first viewing, the identity type seems odd. Does it make sense to replace the traditional yes/no equality predicate with an elaborate type of equality proofs? In fact the father or modern type theory Martin Löf had his doubts, and initially tried to reflect all identity proofs into more basic judgmental or definitional equalities. This turned out to be too restrictive for many applications.

    Still, some modern theorem provers like Lean impose the uniqueness of identity proofs (UIP) condition as an axiom. This so called axiom K states that reflexivity: [...]

• Career/Education

  • Bridge Michigan ☛ Michigan may require intensive reading training for elementary teachers

    As elected officials try to address low reading scores, one idea has bipartisan support: require teachers to take a specific ‘science of reading’ training. But lawmakers on both sides of the aisle are concerned about the time commitment it would take from teachers.

• Proprietary

  • Krebs On Security ☛ Iran-Backed Hackers Claim Wiper Attack on Medtech Firm Stryker

    A hacktivist group with links to Iran's intelligence agencies is claiming responsibility for a data-wiping attack against Stryker, a global medical technology company based in Michigan. News reports out of Ireland, Stryker's largest hub outside of the United States, said the company sent home more than 5,000 workers there today. Meanwhile, a voicemail message at Stryker's main U.S. headquarters says the company is currently experiencing a building emergency.

  • Artificial Intelligence (AI) / LLM Slop / Plagiarism

    • The New Stack ☛ Amazon calls engineers for a “deep dive” internal meeting to discuss "GenAI"-related outages

      Recent AI-assisted coding errors have caused multiple Amazon website and app outages, prompting new safeguards and review processes.

    • Brad Frost ☛ A Designer’s Thoughts About This Moment in AI

      We are people. We are people who use tools and technologies to make things, to advance things, to move things forward, to make the world a better place and help people become healthier, happier, and safe.

      At least that’s the aspiration. We all fall short of it. But I fundamentally believe that most people working to create things and put them out into the world are doing it because they want to make the world a better place.

      That is why this moment in time—this new technology, this AI landscape, and how it’s emerging and how it is being wielded and how it is being managed—is so incredibly diametrically opposed to this mission.

• Pseudo-Open Source

  • Openwashing

    • Open Source Initiative ☛ Open Education and the Shared Roots of Openness

• Security

  • Trail of Bits ☛ Six mistakes in ERC-4337 smart accounts

    Account abstraction transforms fixed “private key can do anything” models into programmable systems that enable batching, recovery and spending limits, and flexible gas payment. But that programmability introduces risks: a single bug can be as catastrophic as leaking a private key.

    After auditing dozens of ERC‑4337 smart accounts, we’ve identified six vulnerability patterns that frequently appear. By the end of this post, you’ll be able to spot these issues and understand how to prevent them.

  • Privacy/Surveillance

    • Don Marti ☛ Triple taxation on surveillance marketing

      This is a general version of an answer to a question about a marketing compliance project. A niche company has the option of either doing all the conventional compliance stuff around a conventional adtech/martech surveillance stack, or switching to post-creepy marketing, to the point of being able to accurately say "we do not sell or share your personal information" even by the CCPA definition of “sell.”

      A lot of advice about how to do conventional compliance is coming out because many in the corporate privacy compliance scene have takes on the recent Ford and PlayOn cases.

    • Alcides Fonseca ☛ Age-verification in Operating Systems and the Internet

      Yes, we have a problem, but we are law-constraining the wrong things here. It’s like passing a law requiring all knives to have a fingerprint lock to only allow over 16 year olds to open it. Several internacional security and privacy researchers warn against these changes without proof that they have any impact.

      A simpler alternative would be for a non-profit or a government authority to create whitelists of websites that are suitable for different age ranges, and let parents configure those whitelists in their kids devices.

• Defence/Aggression

  • YLE ☛ Finnish security chief floats homeschool ban

    Supo's national security review this week suggested that home schooling could, over time, heighten security risks linked to social fragmentation. The report warns that isolated educational settings may enable the spread of extremist ideologies, including radical Islamist or far-right teachings.

    Helsinki University terrorism researcher Leena Malkki noted that Finland should not close its eyes to these concerns.

  • Green Party UK ☛ War on Iran shows dependence on fossil fuels makes economies vulnerable to oil shocks

    Responding to the Climate Change Committee’s (CCC) finding that the cost of Net Zero is less than the cost of the 2022 Ukraine oil price shock, the Green Party has today said we need to transition to clean energy as quickly as possible to protect people and the economy from future oil shocks. 

  • New York Times ☛ U.N. Security Council Condemns Iran’s Retaliatory Strikes in the Middle East

    In an overwhelming vote, the council backed a resolution condemning Iran. A Russian proposal calling for an end to the war that didn’t assign blame or even name the parties, was rejected.

  • Russia, Belarus, and War in Ukraine

    • Site36 ☛ Estonia’s secret service bars 1300 Russian former soldiers from Schengen area, the German Police 3500 Ukrainian nationals

      Estonia and Germany have entered around 5000 Russians and Ukrainians into a Schengen database for refusal of entry – apparently without individual examination. The lists reportedly came from the secret service in Kyiv, and more are expected to follow. EU states repeatedly refuse entry to undesirable persons across the entire Schengen area.

    • New York Times ☛ Russia Says Ukraine’s Strike on Factory City Was Deadly

      Ukraine said the attack struck a key electronics plant, highlighting how it remains capable of hitting high-value targets inside Russia.

    • Latvia ☛ Latvia leads plea not to welcome Russia back to Venice Biennale

      In a joint statement, the ministers of culture and foreign affairs of 22 European countries including Latvia call on the organizers of the 61st Venice Biennale international art exhibition to reconsider the participation of the Russian Federation in this year's event, the Latvian Ministry of Culture announced.

    • RFERL ☛ Moscow Raises Toll In Attack Ukraine Says Hit Russian Military Electronics Plant

      Russia said the death toll in a Ukrainian air strike that Kyiv claimed did substantial damage to a missile-components plant in the Russian city Bryansk increased to seven on March 11, and lashed out at Britain over the attack.

    • LRT ☛ Europe has become the world’s largest arms importer, led by Ukraine

      Europe has increased its arms imports by 210% between 2021 and 2025, making it the largest importing region in the world. This is mainly due to the conflict in Ukraine, which has made the Eastern European country the largest single arms importer.

• Transparency/Investigative Reporting

  • BoingBoing ☛ Palantir's Israel partnership began with Epstein introductions

    Palantir's strategic partnership with Israel's Ministry of Defense — the one supplying AI tools for the Gaza campaign and now the Iran war — traces back to introductions made by Jeffrey Epstein. DOJ-released documents show Epstein spent years connecting Peter Thiel with former Israeli prime minister and defense minister Ehud Barak, arranging at least six separate meetings because both men wanted to connect Silicon Valley with Israeli national security, Branko Marcetic reports for Jacobin.

• Environment

  • Wildlife/Nature

    • New York Times ☛ Why Falling Cats Always Seem to Land on Their Feet

      It takes backbone to solve an enigma like the “falling cat” problem.

    • YLE ☛ Finland's forest agency cuts spending on recreation areas despite record profits

      Metsähallitus has not drawn up a list of sites to be closed, he said. Jansson also pledged that the agency will not compromise on hikers' safety despite pressure to cut costs.

• Finance

  • GeekWire ☛ Atlassian layoffs impact 63 workers in Washington as CTO steps down [Ed: Atlassian's debt is large; this is not about "hey hi"]

    Enterprise collaboration software giant Atlassian is laying off 63 workers in Washington, according to a WARN notice filed with state regulators.

    Atlassian announced Wednesday that it will lay off about 10% of its staff, or 1,600 employees, as the 24-year-old software firm transitions to an “AI-first company.” Atlassian CEO Mike Cannon-Brookes wrote that AI is changing the mix of skills and number of roles required in certain areas.

    “This is primarily about adaptation,” he said. “We are reshaping our skill mix and changing how we work to build for the future.”

  • India Times ☛ Atlassian layoffs: Sydney-based software company announces to cut 1,600 jobs, CEO says ‘We are doing this to …’

• Censorship/Free Speech

  • AccessNow ☛ Connect the population: Access Now demands end to Iran’s continued internet blackout amid war

    join the international community, including the UN’s Independent International Fact-Finding Mission, in calling on Iran to immediately restore internet and mobile communications and in demanding accountability and transparency for the grave human rights violations documented in the country

  • The Telegraph UK ☛ Briton arrested in Dubai for ‘filming footage of missiles’

    Influencers and tourists have shared images of missiles falling – and often being intercepted – in Dubai since Iran began to attack Gulf countries.

    However, United Arab Emirates (UAE) authorities have warned tourists and expats that they could face prison for posting material about the conflict.

  • The Sun ☛ Brit tourist, 60, held in Dubai after arrest for 'filming Iranian missiles' while on holiday

    Dubai authorities have repeatedly warned tourists, influencers and expats not to post footage or commentary about the conflict online.

  • The Asia Business Daily ☛ British Tourist in His 60s Arrested in Dubai for Filming 'Iranian Missiles' While on Vacation - The Asia Business Daily

    According to local cybercrime law, posting content deemed to harm public order or the national image can result in a fine of up to $77,000 (approximately 100 million won) or imprisonment. Nonetheless, cases of tourists uploading missile footage or photos to SNS reportedly continue to occur.

• Freedom of Information / Freedom of the Press

  • Marcy Wheeler ☛ Pam Bondi Dropped Cases against Four Alleged Drug Dealers So She Could Hunt Don Lemon

    So let me repeat, again. Between the first and the second indictment, DOJ seems to have exploited the texts of Nekima Levy Armstrong and Chauntyll Allen, whom they credibly treat as the organizers of this alleged conspiracy. And yet none of those new details include anything about faith. On the contrary, a good many people charged in this conspiracy speak openly of faith and God.

    The new indictment doesn’t add evidence. It adds defendants.

• Digital Restrictions (DRM)

  • Six Colors ☛ M5 MacBook Air Review: Not just more of the same—the same, but more

    Though it may not boast the sheer power of the MacBook Pro, the Air, like the rest of its M5 siblings, does feature those newly rechristened “super” cores, of which it features four, in addition to six efficiency cores (none of those newfangled “performance” cores like the M5 MacBook Pro). There’s also the 16-core Neural Engine, as well as either 8 or 10 of the improved GPU cores with their Neural Accelerators.

Monopolies/Monopsonies

• Copyrights

  • [Old] It's Nice That ☛ Elizabeth Goodspeed on what happens when we treat the past like a stock library

    While there hasn’t been another major term extension since the 1998 Sonny Bono Act, corporate influence over copyright enforcement has deepened in other ways, through aggressive litigation, digital restrictions, and the expansion of corporate control over creative work. Publishing houses, record labels, and film studios continue to lobby for longer copyright terms – meanwhile, independent creators rarely have the resources to defend their work. Take Alex Norris, creator of Webcomic Name, who has spent years in a legal battle after signing a contract to develop a board game based on their comic. The publisher later claimed ownership of Webcomic Name itself, leading Norris to sue. Despite multiple rulings in their favour, the fight has dragged on, draining time, energy, and money – and forcing Norris to crowdfund legal fees just to protect their own work. Or look to the Internet Archive, which was sued by Hachette Publishers for expanding its digital lending system during Covid, which let readers borrow digitised copies of books that libraries already owned. Despite the fact that a study later showed the lending programme had no measurable impact on book sales, Hachette pressed forward anyway; they were worried about loss of control, not loss of revenue. Instead of safeguarding creators, copyright now favours whoever has the resources to outlast their opponent in a legal battle.