From One Form of Fake 'Independence' ('Exile') to Another Phony and Shallow 'Autonomy' (Webchats)

Dr. Roy Schestowitz

2021-12-20 00:21:23 UTC
Modified: 2021-12-20 00:29:40 UTC

Meme reference: Napoleon Dynamite (no, not that Corsican who was sent to exile; the one who sent his judges ('opponents') to exile)

Working 'from' Munich Over compulsory 'ViCo'

Summary: Earlier today in Daily Links we included about 5 very shallow articles (except this one; see the 17 comments in there; no matter how much the EPO's management lies and bribes the media, the "court of public opinion" has made up its mind); Working 'from' Munich over compulsory 'ViCo' is hardly regaining one's independence, it's all about optics

If You Don't Want "Linux" to Become "Windows", Then Follow GNU: GAFAM isn't a friend of Linux; it's only a user in the same sense clients are "users" of a brothel
This is What the Slop Bubble Popping Can Look Like: Maybe not an overnight collapse, but getting there gradually
More Confirmatory Rumours Regarding "Massive" Red Hat Layoffs: Ecosystem and sales said to be targeted
Office Meetings Are Most Useful to the Least Productive Workers: In my "office life" days I really didn't like meetings
Claim That the Board of Directors at IBM Isn't Happy With How the Company is Run: IBM tries to project an image of strength to the whole world, especially to its clients
Readers Pleased With Layout Changes: Two days ago we began improving clarity and accessibility in the site
IBM Plans for Layoffs Becoming Clearer With "Employee Reviews": Of course this impacts Red Hat as well
IBM is Outsourcing Red Hat's Fedora to Slop to 'Save Money': If IBM cared about quality rather than alleged "cost savings" (cutting corners), it would assign more IBM staff to Fedora, but instead the exact opposite happened, with the likes of Cotton and Miller removed from the project
European Patent Office (EPO) Industrial Actions Formally Start in Two Hours: As per the latest (revised) action plan, today workers will slow down their work and limit patent grants
Microsoft Under Fresh Investigation by the Italian Competition Authority: In 2025 we kept a running tally of 30,000+ Microsoft layoffs, so 40k this year would not be unthinkable
The "Alicante Mafia" - Part VI - More Strikes Planned at the EPO, Starting This Month: Yesterday we said that friends of Berenguer or inside Berenguer's circle may have left
Gemini Links 20/01/2026: New Tea, Using a Roku at a Hotel, and "Voltage-Based Power Management for Any Raspberry Pi": Links for the day
Over at Tux Machines...: GNU/Linux news for the past day
IRC Proceedings: Monday, January 19, 2026: IRC logs for Monday, January 19, 2026
Links 19/01/2026: National Broadcasters on World or Local Affairs Up to a Week Ago: Links for the day
Gemini Links 19/01/2026: Game Boy and "The Lounge" (IRC) for the Elderly: Links for the day
Slopfarms in Google News (at Least Three Today) With Fake 'Articles' About "Linux": Google itself is trying to promote its own slop ("Overview") at the expense of original and credible sources
Links 19/01/2026: ChatGPT’s Defects and The Guardian on Why So-called "AI Companies Will Fail": Links for the day
IBM Quiet About Its Plan for Red Hat Amid Accelerated Bluewashing: Something is going on at Red Hat
The "Alicante Mafia" - Part V - It Seems Like Some People Are Already Leaving "The Mafia": they have a rough idea of what's coming
Microsoft Means War, Microsoft is on the Side of ICE: Microsoft, people-ready
Proprietary UNIX is What We'll Have If IBM Red Hat Gets Its Way: IBM Red Hat wants to control everything, even if that means killing everybody
Free Software in Times of Peace (and Times of War, Too): GAFAM and IBM are war companies
Founder of GNU/Linux (RMS) Speaks in US University (College) This Week: The auditorium has very high capacity and this is his "college comeback" talk in the United States
LinuxSecurity and Linuxiac Are Still Slopfarms, Even Anthony Pell Does It: We suppose waiting another month or another year won't change a thing
Links 18/01/2026: Legal Trouble for xAI, Climate Concerns, Data Breaches and More: Links for the day
'Vibe Coding', Chatbots, and Other Bots (e.g. "Agents" Disguised as "Superintelligence") Aren't Saving You Time: False marketing, FOMO marketing tactics
Gemini Links 19/01/2026: Analog Cameras and Plucker in 2026, US Losing Acceptability in Europe: Links for the day
Over at Tux Machines...: GNU/Linux news for the past day
IRC Proceedings: Sunday, January 18, 2026: IRC logs for Sunday, January 18, 2026
Links 18/01/2026: The "Deepfake Porn Site Formerly Known as Twitter" and Turkey to Block Kids' Access to Social Control Media: Links for the day
Gemini Links 18/01/2026: Against English as Language of the Net, "Symposium of Destruction": Links for the day
You Would Expect This Kind of Misleading Narrative Shortly Before Microsoft (or GAFAM) Mass Layoffs: misleading PR
FOSDEM 2026: democracy panel, GNOME & Sonny Piers modern slavery experiment: Reprinted with permission from Daniel Pocock
Pump-and-Dump With IBM Shares, Courtesy of People Who Stand to Gain From the 'Pump': "3 Reasons to Buy IBM Stock Right Now"
IBM: Spying on Staff Like Never Before and Implementing Silent Layoffs This Month, Say Insiders: what we heard from whistleblowers seems to corroborate
'Cancel Culture' Doesn't Work (in the Long Run): Despite all the attacks, I'm enjoying life, I'm keeping productive, and our audience continues to grow
IBM is Not a Free Software Company (It Never Was): Red Hat's main product, RHEL, is full of secret sauce and has 'secret recipes' (it is basically proprietary)
IBM Turning Up the 'RTO' (Stress) and 'PIP' (Fear) Heat on Workers, Rebellion May be Brewing: Sometimes it feels like today's executives at IBM view IBM workers as a liability
Links 18/01/2026: Indonesia Against Comedy, Media-Hostile (Censors Comedians) Convicted Felon in White House Defecting to Opponents of NATO: Links for the day
GNU/Linux Still up (statCounter Says to 6%) in Bosnia And Herzegovina: Let's see where it is at year's end
Making Layout Changes: Feedback can be sent to us
Behind an Economy of Fake 'Worths' and Fictional 'Valuations' or 'Market Caps': They normalise white-collar crime and say "everyone is doing it!"
Links 18/01/2026: "South Africa is Running Out of Software Developers", Companies Spooked to Find Slop is a Major Liability: Links for the day
Eventually the Joke (and Financial Fraud) is on Microsoft, Stigmatised for Slop: Is Microsoft trying to commit suicide?
GNU/Linux Leaps to All-time Highs in Virgin Islands: it seems to have started around the "end of 10"
Place Your Bets: Who Will Die First? Microsoft or IBM?: Not even joking; make a guess
Making and Keeping the Sites Accessible: Sometimes less does mean "more" (or "MOAR")
The "Alicante Mafia" - Part IV - How Europe's Largest Patent Office Recruited Drug Addicts, Antisemites, and People Who Absolutely Cannot Do the Job (But Know the 'Right' People): To better overlap industrial actions we might delay/postpone/pause this series for a bit
Restoring Professional Pride in the Tech Sector: Rejecting slop isn't being a Luddite
Benefiting by Adding Presence in Geminispace: As the Web gets worse, not limited to bloat as a factor, people seek alternatives
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Slop Bubble "Is Worse Than The Dot Com Bubble": Edward Zitron Says It like it is
Software Patents and USMCA (or NAFTA): We recently pondered going back to issuing 2-3 articles per day about patents and common issues with them
IBM Sued Over PIPs: PIPs are "performance improvement plans"
Sites With "Linux" in Their Name That Are in Effect Slopfarms and Issue Fake Articles: We try to name some of the prolific culprits
Gemini Links 18/01/2026: Raising Notifications From Terminal and Environmental Sanity: Links for the day
IRC Proceedings: Saturday, January 17, 2026: IRC logs for Saturday, January 17, 2026
Over at Tux Machines...: GNU/Linux news for the past day

From One Form of Fake 'Independence' ('Exile') to Another Phony and Shallow 'Autonomy' (Webchats)

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