Links 17/11/2023: Fifth Amendment Appeal to US Supreme Court, Finland Tightens Borders, TikTok a Platform for Osama bin Laden
Contents
-
Leftovers
-
New Yorker ☛ Siskel, Ebert, and the Secret of Criticism
Now the two men were in direct competition: doing the same job at Chicago’s two great rival papers. But, as much as they often clashed, there was another key thing they shared: neither was a movie person. Not only was neither a cinema-studies major (such a thing barely existed in their day) but also neither fit the profile of the cinephile, hanging out at repertory theatres and taking sides in the debates then raging over the so-called auteur theory. They were just regular moviegoers who managed to find a journalistic application for their pleasure. Their paths to television were separate but symmetrical, each maintaining print journalism as the solid basis of his activity. In 1973, Ebert hosted a series of Ingmar Bergman films on television, which scored an Emmy nomination. Then Siskel started delivering brief movie reviews on a local station. Then, in late 1975, the Chicago public station WTTW paired them up for a joint movie-review program.
-
Idiomdrottning ☛ The “Well, actually”–nerd and world politics
I was put on this God’s green Earth with the instinct to criticize my own team, my own side. That’s been a problem all my life. I eat plants? My brain immediately amplifies some of the issues with animal rights. I write FOSS code? I get hyperfocused on some of the problems in the community. Same goes for all kinds of political movements. I get called unloyal, not a team player, a trouble-maker. I see the bad in the side I’ve sided with because I want it to be better. I just want it to be better. It’s as if I’m thinking “Criticizing the other side? But everyone here already knows that those guys are bad! That should go without saying! But here are some ways that we are also kinda bad…”
-
Sumana Harihareswara ☛ In Retrospect, Surprised We Didn't Notice The Adjacent "Mostly Harmless" Joke Available
There's a genre of short scifi, particularly published on Tumblr, that imagines how aliens would view ordinary humans - what would they find remarkable about us? (Examples, example.) Leonard asked me the other day: don't you think this is what they'd think of us? Don't you think this is the reputation we'd get with them? Friendly con artists who drive unsafely and too fast.
-
Gergely Nagy ☛ Introducing: Chronicles
Just a short notice that this blog will not be updated in the future. I have moved my web presence - including my blog - to a new place. This site here will be kept in its current state indefinitely, but will not receive any more updates.
-
Science
-
Space ☛ Dark matter data salvaged from balloon-borne telescope that landed hard on Earth
"In our case, we were getting so much data per night that it would just be incredibly slow and expensive to retrieve this data mid-flight," Sirks said. "At the moment, the most efficient way for us to download data is to copy it onto an SD drive and just drop it to Earth, which is kind of crazy, but it works well."
So she and her colleagues from Australia, the U.K., the U.S., Canada, Europe and Taiwan developed "recovery packages" consisting of tiny computers with SD cards that store data, a homemade satellite link for communication with the telescope and parachutes sheathed in waterproof chicken roasting bags.
-
MDPI ☛ Data Downloaded via Parachute from a NASA Super-Pressure Balloon
Each drs capsule comprised a Raspberry Pi 3B attached to a custom 300 mm × 125 mm printed circuit board (pcb; see Figure 1). The capsules were powered by switchable 24 V DC from the main payload while they were attached, then by two internal 9 V lithium batteries after release. These batteries were the only components of the drs that could be considered potentially hazardous. However, they were compliant with safety test criteria T1–T8 defined in Section 38.3 of [5]. The drs used a geared pincer mechanism to hold on to a loop of nylon cable tie underneath the main payload. After coordination with local air traffic control, we issued a sequence of three commands (to prevent errors and fault propagation) that used a servo inside the drs to open the pincer, allowing the drs to drop away.
-
The Register UK ☛ NASA geeks code new tricks to model rocket plumes and avoid a lunar dust-up
The Artemis program is NASA's project to return humans to the surface of Earth's natural satellite, and the landers involved will be larger and equipped with more powerful engines than those used in the Apollo program half a century ago.
This means that the mission risks associated with their operation during landing and liftoff are significantly greater, according to the space agency. The rocket engines blast supersonic plumes of hot gas toward the surface and the intense forces kick up dust and may eject rocks or other debris at high speeds from the regolith – the loose, unconsolidated layer at the surface.
-
Science Alert ☛ Extreme Drop in Oxygen Will One Day Suffocate Most Life on Earth
For now, life is flourishing on our oxygen-rich planet, but Earth wasn't always that way – and scientists have predicted that, in the future, the atmosphere will revert back to one that's rich in methane and low in oxygen.
This probably won't happen for another billion years or so. But when the change comes, it's going to happen fairly rapidly, according to research published in 2021.
-
Federal News Network ☛ This NASA team’s work means the whole world can sleep a little better
As if pandemic, threats of nuclear war, and a lack of Tesla charging stations aren't enough to worry about, there is always the possibility that an asteroid could hit the earth and wipe-out all of us. A team at NASA discovered a way to alter the path of an asteroid, should one come too close and they garnered the distinction of being finalists in this year's Service to America Medals program, also known as the Sammies. For the details, Federal Drive Host Tom Temin talked with two members of NASA's Planetary Missions Program Office: Program Manager Brian Key and Mission Manager Scott Bellamy.
-
YLE ☛ Friends meet less after pandemic
Communicating is still as common as ever, though face-to-face meetings have decreased, said researchers, who also found more feelings of loneliness.
-
Hackaday ☛ No TP? No Problem!
Among First World Problems, there can be few worse than running out of toilet paper. The horror! If you’re not able to do as we did yesterday and borrow a pack until more can be bought, then you’re not without options. A handy copy of the Daily Mail could be cut into squares and hung up in your Smallest Room, or you can even make your own with the help of this handy instructional video from [whoisandrewfahmy]. It appears from a casual search to be one of many such guides that appeared during the pandemic when the bog roll supply was seen as endangered, but it’s still interesting simply as a diversion into how something is made.
-
-
Education
-
The Drone Girl ☛ Vilde Wettergreen: how this entrepreneur disrupted FPV drones, unintentionally
Vilde Wettergreen got into drones the same way her company did: by pure happenstance.
But Vilde and her company, Immerse Optics, are making a strong impression on the drone industry. Vilde Wettergreen is the C.E.O. of Immerse Optics, a Norwegian company that started by making masks to create an immersive movie-watching experience from your phone. However, after receiving customer feedback and inspiration–including learning that drone pilots were using their product as an FPV tool– the company entered the drone sector.
-
-
Hardware
-
Jeff Geerling ☛ The Mighty 'MOX: 50kW AM Tower site tour
In this blog post, I'll write a bit about KMOX's tower system (AM towers are a lot different than FM, like the FM Supertower we toured last year), the transmitter, and the some of the history found at that tower site.
-
-
Health/Nutrition/Agriculture
-
FAIR ☛ Blaming Mass Shootings on Mental Illness Doesn’t Address Either Issue
It needs to be made clear: While Card’s mental illness might make him a “textbook example” of someone who should not have had access to a gun, it does not make him a “textbook example” of a shooter. A large majority of firearm deaths involving mental illness are suicides. These pieces did not make that distinction. (Gun suicides outnumber gun murders overall, but by a narrower margin.)
-
Federal News Network ☛ VA launches ‘full hiring initiative’ for mental health care amid uptick in veteran suicides
The Department of Veterans Affairs is planning to staff up on mental health professionals and launch new resources to address an uptick in veteran suicides.
-
Reason ☛ Rand Paul on the Lab Leak 'Deception'
Reason's Zach Weissmueller talked with the senator about his quest to uncover the origins of COVID-19 and hold Anthony Fauci accountable.
-
Reason ☛ Full Extent of COVID Fraud Will 'Never Be Known With Certainty'
A new GAO report details federal prosecutors' attempts to put the horse back in the barn.
-
-
Proprietary/Artificial Intelligence (AI)
-
Matt Rickard ☛ The Cost of Index Everything
Many AI products today are focused on indexing as much as possible. Every meeting, every document, every moment of your day. Every modality — images, audio, and text. Devices that are meant to capture your every moment.
Then, they run every data point through a complex pipeline of vector searches, heuristics, draft models, large models, and more to make sense of it. Models trained to take in ever-increasing context-lengths that fit in as many documents and pieces of information as possible.
But more information isn’t always better. The limits of the ‘index everything approach’.
-
India Times ☛ The AI of war: computers and autonomous killing
Robots, drones, torpedoes... all kinds of weapons can be transformed into autonomous systems, thanks to sophisticated sensors governed by AI algorithms that allow a computer to "see".
-
Trend Oceans ☛ ThisIsNotRat: Control Your System Using Telegram
Take control of your system with the TelegramBot.
-
-
Security
-
Integrity/Availability/Authenticity
-
Security Week ☛ Google Adds Passkey Support to New Titan Security Key
As for passkeys, which aim to eliminate the use of passwords, the new Titan security keys allow users to store more than 250 unique passkeys.
Google has been on a mission to replace passwords with passkeys, recently adding support to all Google accounts.
Passkeys leverage FIDO2 credentials and cryptography, enabling users to easily and securely log in to their accounts.
-
-
Privacy/Surveillance
-
Kansas Reflector ☛ Kansas legislators question education department’s plan for student data collection system
Details of the project were shared with Republicans and Democrats on the Kansas Legislature’s information technology committee, some of whom expressed concern about the department’s motivation for enhancing data collection and its ability to guarantee data privacy.
-
Gabriel Sieben ☛ “Parental controls? What parental controls?”
So let’s say you want to allow your 8-year-old to work on school, on a Windows PC. What’s the point of parental controls when you can’t disable Widgets, can’t disable the tabloid content in the Search box even if you block Bing, the Bing filter can still be bypassed using Office, and your student can use AI all they want? These are “parental controls”?
-
[Repeat] NYOB ☛ noyb files complaint against EU Commission over targeted chat control ad campaign
Today, noyb filed a complaint against the EU Commission’s Directorate General for Migration and Home Affairs. In September 2023, the Commission used unlawful micro-targeting on Twitter (X) to promote its heavily criticized chat control regulation. It seems that the Commission was desperate to garner public support, which could be used to pressure national governments into accepting the controversial legislative proposal. This move both undermined the established democratic procedures between EU institutions and violated the EU GDPR.
-
India Times ☛ Spotify to use Google's AI to tailor podcasts, audiobooks recommendations
Spotify has been an early adopter of AI, which it used for music recommendation algorithms a decade earlier. The Swedish company is now aiming to use LLMs to replicate that across its non-music content such as podcasts and audiobooks.
The music streaming giant has been looking to boost its earnings by increasing its slate of revenue-generating formats such as podcasts and audiobooks.
-
-
-
Defence/Aggression
-
YLE ☛ APN Podcast: How safe are Finland's streets?
The show asks if Finland is really becoming less safe, after a police index revealed that incidents of violent crime are becoming more common.
-
El País ☛ Only 4% of countries propose eliminating multibillion-dollar subsidies for fossil fuels in their climate plans
Eliminating this aid is a long-standing demand in the fight against climate change. In the final declaration of the U.N. Climate Change Conference in Glasgow, held at the end of 2021 in the Scottish city, the nearly 200 countries that participated in the event (practically the entire world) included an explicit call to gradually eliminate inefficient public aid to the fossil fuel sector. However, that call from two years ago hasn’t been transformed into concrete commitments in national climate action plans, as revealed this week by a report from the U.N., which also warns that efforts to ensure that global warming remains within the safest limits are still insufficient. The study warns that while greenhouse gas emissions will peak before the end of the decade, they will not be reduced quickly and intensely enough.
-
Jacobin Magazine ☛ Rick Santorum Just Came Out and Said What Conservatives Really Think of Democracy
What Santorum is objecting to is nothing more or less than the basic process of democracy. In this case, two issues were put to a vote, and groups of Ohio citizens that were both more motivated and more numerous than those on the other side made the majority preference clear.
-
India Times ☛ Osama bin Laden’s 'letter to America' controversy: All you need to know about it
The message includes bin Laden's assertion that the United States was attacked on September 11, 2001 due to its support of Israel. The letter also denounces what he described as Western "lies, immorality and debauchery" and argued that attacks against civilians and the United States were justified as a result.
-
New York Times ☛ Videos About Bin Laden’s Criticism of U.S. Surge in Popularity on TikTok
Videos on TikTok supporting a decades-old letter by Osama bin Laden criticizing the United States and its support of Israel surged in popularity this week, adding to accusations that the company is fueling the spread of antisemitic content. The White House condemned the resurfacing of the letter.
-
Axios ☛ TikTok shifts to aggressive communications strategy as criticism mounts
Elected officials have since accused TikTok of brainwashing young Americans by pushing "rampant pro-Hamas propaganda."
-
India Times ☛ TikTok to prohibit videos promoting bin Laden's 'Letter to America'
Discussions of the 20-year-old letter have spread on the platform this week in the context of debate over the Israel-Hamas war, with some users in the West praising its contents.
-
India Times ☛ TikTok joins Meta in appealing against EU gatekeeper status
The European Union in September picked 22 "gatekeeper" services, run by six tech companies - Microsoft, Apple, Alphabet's Google, Amazon, Meta and ByteDance's TikTok.
While Microsoft, Google and Amazon did not challenge their designations, Apple is yet to comment on its plan. Nov. 16 is the last date to appeal.
-
Defence Web ☛ Al-Shabaab hopes to recruit by celebrating Hamas attacks
It only took a matter of days for the Somali terror group al-Shabaab to congratulate Hamas for its deadly October 7 attack on Israel.
Al-Shabaab, a branch of al-Qaida, gathered hundreds of supporters on October 15 for pro-Hamas protests in its southern Somalia strongholds, Jilib and Kunya Barrow.
-
Gizmodo ☛ TikTok Has Canceled Osama bin Laden
The virality of “Letter to America” on X comes just a day after Elon Musk shared his opinions on Jews, randomly agreeing with a tweet saying Jewish communities encourage “hatred against whites.”
-
Vice Media Group ☛ The Far Right Is Loving Elon Musk's Comments About Jewish Groups Corrupting 'the West'
Musk made the comments in reply to an X user who was replying to a Jewish person asking for those who think “Hitler was right” to “say it to our faces.” The user replied, “Okay,” and continued to say that “Jewish communties [sic] have been pushing the exact kind of dialectical hatred against whites that they claim to want people to stop using against them,” and that they support “hoards of minorities flooding their country.”
Musk replied, “You have said the actual truth.”
-
New Yorker ☛ How to Define Genocide
A historian of the Holocaust examines Israel’s rhetoric and actions in Gaza.
-
Russia, Belarus, and War in Ukraine
-
Atlantic Council ☛ Vladimir Putin’s anti-colonial posturing should not fool the Global South
The countries of the Global South may have many good reasons for pursuing closer ties with Putin’s Russia, but a shared opposition to imperialism is most certainly not one of them, writes Taras Kuzio.
-
Atlantic Council ☛ Ukraine vows to strike back if Russia resumes energy infrastructure attacks
Ukrainians are currently preparing for a repeat of Russia's winter bombing campaign targeting the country's civilian energy infrastructure, but this year Ukraine has the capacity to strike back, writes Marcel Plichta.
-
France24 ☛ Thousands of Ukrainian children forcibly taken to Belarus, says Yale research
More than 2,400 children from Ukraine aged between six and 17 years old have been taken to 13 facilities across Belarus since Russia's invasion of Ukraine, research published by Yale University said on Thursday.
-
France24 ☛ Germany hikes Ukraine military support, but is its defence-spending tilt tenable?
Germany, already Europe's biggest supporter of Ukraine, has unveiled plans to double its military aid to Kyiv for 2024, while continuing to invest in its armed forces in order to become "the backbone of European defence". It’s a strategy shift Berlin hopes to maintain over the long term, but counting on public support in a difficult economic context might make it hard to sustain.
-
RFERL ☛ U.S. Imposes Sanctions On U.A.E.-Based Maritime Companies, Vessels For Violating Price Cap On Russian Oil
The U.S. Treasury Department has imposed sanctions on three maritime companies based in the United Arab Emirates and vessels owned by the companies for shipping Russian oil sold above a price cap imposed to reduce the amount of oil revenue Moscow has to fund its war in Ukraine.
-
RFERL ☛ Russian Artist Gets Seven Years In Prison For Using Price Tags In Anti-War Protest
A court in Russia's second-largest city, St. Peterburg, has sentenced Aleksandra Skochilenko, a 33-year-old Russian artist, to seven years in prison for using price tags in a city store to distribute information about Moscow's full-scale invasion of Ukraine.
-
RFERL ☛ Moscow Court Sentences Leader Of Russian Volunteer Corps Fighting On Ukraine's Side To Life
A Moscow court on November 16 sentenced in absentia Denis Kapustin (aka Nikitin), a commander of the Russian Volunteer Corps (RDK) that fights along Ukrainian forces against Russian troops invading Ukraine, to life in a special-regime prison -- the toughest type of penitentiary in Russia.
-
CS Monitor ☛ As world patience thins, Israel, Ukraine race against time
Volodymyr Zelenskyy and Benjamin Netanyahu are fighting against not only their enemies but also the clock, on which international patience is ticking.
-
CS Monitor ☛ Amid slog of Ukraine war, NATO turns warier eye on Russia
Through war games and planned exercises, NATO security efforts are being heightened, both for readiness and to deter an unpredictable Russia.
-
New York Times ☛ Cameron Meets Zelensky on His First Visit to Ukraine as U.K. Secretary
With much global attention turned to the war in Gaza, President Volodymyr Zelensky has warned that his country cannot afford a “frozen conflict” with Russia.
-
New York Times ☛ Finland Will Close 4 Border Crossings With Russia to Stem Migrants
Officials accused Moscow of loosening migration controls. Relations between the countries deteriorated after Finland joined NATO following the Russian invasion of Ukraine.
-
RFERL ☛ Finland Announces Closure Of Four Border Crossings Citing Surge Of Asylum Seekers
Finland will close four crossings on its border with Russia, Finnish Prime Minister Petteri Orpo said on November 16, citing an increase in the number of asylum applicants arriving at the checkpoints.
-
YLE ☛ Eyewitnesses: Russia no longer allowing asylum seekers across border
According to the Finnish Border Guard, just five people crossed the border by 6am on Thursday, with no more crossings by noon.
-
New York Times ☛ Ukrainians Fleeing Russian Occupation Cross Through Russia Back to Their Own Country
About 100 Ukrainians a day travel back into Ukraine at an unofficial border crossing, bringing tales of repression and fear about life in Russian-controlled territories.
-
Meduza ☛ Zelensky says Ukraine has seized the initiative from Russia in the Black Sea — Meduza
-
Atlantic Council ☛ Russian War Report: Desperate for recruits, Russia offers one million rubles to join its military
The Russian army is struggling to fund equipment and recruit as they host fundraisers and drives offering pledges of one million rubles.
-
France24 ☛ Charles de Gaulle's pro-Kremlin grandson says he wants Russian citizenship
A grandson of French war hero and former president Charles de Gaulle said Thursday he wanted Russian citizenship, saying Russia offered “great possibilities”.
-
RFERL ☛ New U.S. Sanctions Take Aim At 'Russia's Malign Influence' In Balkans
The U.S. Treasury on November 16 imposed a broad set of sanctions on eight people and six entities across the Balkans accused of “perpetuating corruption and enabling Russian malign influence” in the region.
-
Meduza ☛ ‘She won’t survive in prison’: A firsthand account of the conviction of Russian anti-war protester Sasha Skochilenko — Meduza
-
Meduza ☛ Russian Ministry of Science and Higher Education collecting data on students and teachers who have contact with people from foreign countries — Meduza
-
Meduza ☛ Two Baltika beer executives arrested on suspicion of transferring Russian brands to Carlsberg — Meduza
-
European Commission ☛ Speech by President von der Leyen at the Kyiv Investment Forum, via video message
-
RFERL ☛ Former Russian Air Force Commander Found Dead At Home
The former commander of Russia's 6th Air and Air Defense Forces Army, Vladimir Sviridov, and his wife, Tatyana, were found dead in their home near the southwestern city of Mineralnyye Vody, Russian media reported on November 16.
-
RFERL ☛ Armenian Police Release Woman Who Fled Native Ingushetia Over Domestic Violence
The Marem women's rights organization told RFE/RL on November 16 that Armenian police released a 21-year-old woman who fled her native region of Ingushetia in Russia's North Caucasus to escape domestic violence.
-
RFERL ☛ Imprisoned Russian Opposition Activist Kara-Murza's Wife Concerned For His Life
The wife of imprisoned Russian opposition politician Vladimir Kara-Murza has expressed concern over his health, saying he is being kept in punitive solitary confinement in a Siberian prison despite having a serious medical condition resulting from when he was poisoned in 2015 and again in 2017.
-
teleSUR ☛ Russia Says Relations With US Could Be Severed at Any Moment
Bilateral relations have been hampered by U.S. political elites, who consider the American hegemony to be the "basic worldview."
-
Vice Media Group ☛ Russia Televises New Nuclear-Capable Hypersonic Missile Being Loaded Into Silo
Russia's much-hyped Avangard missile makes an appearance on state TV weeks after Russia de-ratified a nuclear test-ban treaty.
-
The Straits Times ☛ North Korea’s Premier meets Russian minister visiting Pyongyang
Moscow and Pyongyang have been stepping up cooperation following their leaders' summit in September.
-
RFERL ☛ RFE/RL Probe Finds Belarusian Tycoon With Links To Lukashenka Built Luxurious 'Family Nest'
An investigative report by RFE/RL's Belarus Service says oligarch Alyaksey Aleksin, who is closely linked to the country’s authoritarian ruler Alyaksandr Lukashenka, has built an opulent residence named the "Family Nest" on the shores of the Zaslauskaye water reservoir near Minsk.
Rust
-
-
-
Environment
-
Science Alert ☛ Doomsday Clock Warns We're Alarmingly Close to an Uninhabitable Earth
There is no one overall reason for this move. Of course, with climate change now a major factor in the threat to humanity, the clock has to reflect this, and does. But it is, however, other more immediate factors that have largely caused the hands to be pushed forward.
-
CoryDoctorow ☛ Big Train managers earn bonuses for greenlighting unsafe cars
Almost no one knows this, but last June, a 90-car train got away from its crew in Hernando, MO, rolling three miles through two public crossings, a ghost train that included 47 potentially explosive propane cars. The "bomb train" neither crashed nor derailed, which meant that Grenada Railroad/Gulf & Atantic didn't have to report it.
This is just one of many terrifying near-misses that are increasingly common in America's hyper-concentrated, private equity-dominated rail sector, where unsafe practices dominate and whistleblowers face brutal retaliation for coming forward to regulators.
-
Low Tech Mag ☛ Plastic Waste in the Fuel Tank?
Nowadays, there’s much less firewood available than in the 1940s, especially in industrialized regions. So, what would be the solution to the disruption of gasoline or electricity in the Third World War? Dutch artist Gijs Schalkx found another fuel supply, which is abundant: plastic waste. The production of plastics only started in the 1950s, after the Second World War. Since then, plastic has become an increasingly popular material, growing to a global annual production of 460 million metric tons in 2019 – twice as much as in 2000 and eight times as much as in 1976. 34
-
DeSmog ☛ EU Lawmakers ‘Do Not Speak For Us’ Say Farmers Ahead of Crunch Vote
Every summer, Herbert Dorfmann – one of Italy’s representatives in the European Parliament – joins politicians from across the alpine region to hike with farming groups. The one-day stroll offers a chance for powerful agricultural unions to give their thoughts on key EU farming legislation.
In recent years, one topic has been front and centre: the EU’s ambitious Farm to Fork plans to reform agriculture to better protect nature and climate. In Dorfmann, the unions have found a sympathetic ear. He, along with many of the lobby groups he meets up in the Alps, has opposed proposals to slash pesticide and fertiliser use, and restore damaged ecosystems.
-
Energy/Transportation
-
MIT Technology Review ☛ What’s coming next for fusion research
But making a fusion power plant a reality will require a huge amount of science and technology progress. Though some milestones have been reached, many are yet to come. At our EmTech MIT event this week, I sat down with Kimberly Budil, director of the Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory (LLNL).
She was at the center of the science news world last year, when researchers from the national lab achieved what’s called net energy gain, finally demonstrating that fusion reactions can generate more energy than is used to start them up.
-
The Register UK ☛ White House hopes to power up American battery factories with $3.5B fund
MESC defines battery supply chains as consisting of five steps - raw material production, material processing and refinement, battery material and cell fabrication, pack assembly and recycling - all of which can apply for funding.
-
DeSmog ☛ Everything You Need to Know About Saudi Aramco
There are a lot of major oil companies that tend to fill headlines when talking about climate change – BP, Shell, Chevron – any of the ‘big six’ public oil companies. It’s easy to forget sometimes, amid their multi-billion pound windfall profits, that some of these firms are modest players in comparison to the state-owned oil companies around the world.
Chief among all of them is one company – Aramco. Once known as the Arabian American Oil Company due to its original American owners, it is now owned by Saudi Arabia and is key to the authoritarian Gulf state’s seemingly never-ending prosperity.
-
DeSmog ☛ McCann to Make New Pitch for Aramco Oil and Gas Advertising Work
Global advertising firm McCann is putting itself forward to continue working for the Saudi fossil fuel giant Aramco, DeSmog understands.
The US-based McCann currently works for Aramco across a number of its global agencies, under contracts that are set to expire early next year. According to industry insiders, the American-owned company has taken the decision to repitch for the work, despite Aramco’s record of pollution and greenwashing.
-
-
-
AstroTurf/Lobbying/Politics
-
Security Week ☛ Biden Campaign Looking for CISO
A job listing from the Biden for President campaign said the incoming CISO will lead both IT and security teams and provide technical direction on and drive a secure architecture plan, consisting of many campaign IT & Technology systems.
-
EDRI ☛ EU AI Act Trilogues: Status of Fundamental Rights Recommendations
As the EU AI Act negotiations continue, a number of controversial issues remain open. At stake are vital issues including the extent to which general purpose/foundation models are regulated, but also crucially, how far does the AI Act effectively prevent harm from the use of AI for law enforcement, migration, and national security purposes.
-
Tech Central (South Africa) ☛ ICT ministers promote future-orientated, intelligent digital infrastructure for Africa
Taking place alongside AfricaCom, the continent’s premier ICT conference and exhibition, the forum provided a platform for dialogue and an exchange of views on the development of a future-orientated intelligent digital infrastructure in Africa, which is essential for achieving the socioeconomic development goals of the continent.
-
The Register UK ☛ Amazon bankrolling industry lobbying against Microsoft Azure should surprise no one
These collectives argue Microsoft unfairly locks customers into Azure, or makes it difficult or too expensive to run its software in rival clouds – such as Amazon Web Services, or AWS – and thus the Windows maker should be taken to task by watchdogs and possibly even blocked from competing for government deals and other IT contracts.
-
Misinformation/Disinformation/Propaganda
-
India Times ☛ More TikTok users turning to the app for news [sic], Pew study shows
News organizations are competing with TikTok and other social media platforms for consumers' attention and advertisers' budgets, with many seeking ways to engage TikTok's large and coveted Gen Z audience.
-
New York Times ☛ Jewish Celebrities and Influencers Confront Fentanylware (TikTok) Executives in Private Call
TikTok faces escalating accusations that it promotes pro-Palestinian, anti-Israel content. “Shame on you,” Sacha Baron Cohen said on the call.
-
-
-
Censorship/Free Speech
-
RFERL ☛ Iranian Nobel Laureate Mohammadi Again In Hospital
Renowned globally as a staunch advocate for the "Women, Life, Freedom" movement, Mohammadi was awarded the Nobel Peace Prize on October 6.
For years, Mohammadi has voiced dissent against the obligatory hijab rule imposed on Iranian women, as well as restrictions on women's freedoms and rights in the country by its Islamic regime.
-
RFA ☛ Chinese police put Tiananmen artist, film director under travel ban
Film director and dissident artist Guo Zhenming, known for his work commemorating the 1989 Tiananmen massacre, has been placed under a travel ban after being invited to a screening of his latest film in Singapore.
-
Deutsche Welle ☛ Russia jails artist over anti-war supermarket protest
A Russian artist who replaced supermarket price tags with messages calling for an end to Moscow's war in Ukraine was sentenced to seven years in prison on Thursday.
Critics say the case of 33-year-old Alexandra Skochilenko is part of a crackdown on anyone who speaks out against Russia's "special military operation" that has led to nearly 20,000 arrests and more than 800 criminal cases.
Her supporters in the courtroom shouted "shame" after the judge Oksana Demiasheva read out the verdict.
-
RFERL ☛ Tatar Journalist's Home, Office Searched In Connection With Case Against RFE/RL Journalist
Police in Russia’s Republic of Tatarstan have searched the home and office of noted independent journalist Iskander Siradzhi in connection with a probe launched against RFE/RL correspondent Alsu Kurmasheva, who has been in detention center in Tatarstan's capital, Kazan, since October 18.
-
RFERL ☛ Russia Adds Three Arrested Navalny Lawyers To Terrorist List
Russia's financial watchdog, Rosfinmonitoring, on November 16 added three of Kremlin critic Aleksei Navalny's lawyers to its list of extremists and terrorists, meaning that Russian banks must freeze their accounts and stop providing them with services.
-
-
Civil Rights/Policing
-
EFF ☛ EFF to Supreme Court: Fifth Amendment Protects People from Being Forced to Enter or Hand Over Cell Phone Passcodes to the Police
-
Vice Media Group ☛ 'No Contract, No Coffee': Starbucks Workers Hold Largest Strike in Company History
Workers from hundreds of stores around the country refused to come in to work, instead holding picket lines outside their stores to demand that Starbucks bargain with their union, Starbucks Workers United. Since the first store successfully unionized over a year ago, the National Labor Relations Board has tallied ballots in 454 elections around the country, of which 369 were successful.
-
Axios ☛ AI helps defense attorneys sift through police body cam videos
How it works: Defense attorneys load audio and video files into the JusticeText software and the app converts the audio into text.
-
Hong Kong Free Press ☛ Tibet activists and pro-China supporters stage opposing demos in San Francisco as Xi Jinping joins APEC summit
A protest organized by the city’s Tibetan diaspora was held outside the hotel where US business leaders attended a dinner with Xi, whom they accuse of human rights violations in Tibet.
-
RFA ☛ 4 Tibetans sentenced to prison for 2nd time for religious activities
It is not unusual for Chinese authorities in the Tibet Autonomous Region and Tibetan-populated areas of western provinces like Sichuan to arrest, detain and abuse Buddhist monks, nuns and others on account of their religious practices, without giving them trials.
There also have been reports of individuals dying in custody after being beaten, according to the U.S. State Department’s 2022 Report on International Religious Freedom, issued this May.
-
Deutsche Welle ☛ Lithium mining in Africa reveals dark side of green energy
An August fact-finding mission by the Mineworkers Union of Namibia into the Uis mine — which is operated by Chinese mining company Xinfeng Investments — found that the mine's local employees live in tiny, hot shacks made of corrugated zinc and without proper ventilation.
The union also faulted a lack of privacy in the sanitation blocks, where toilets and showers are lined up without partitions between them. By contrast, the mine's Chinese workers have comfortable air-conditioned rooms and decent bathrooms.
-
RFERL ☛ Iran Releases Rights Lawyer Sotoudeh From Prison
Sotoudeh has been a vocal advocate for numerous activists detained by the Islamic republic. Her career, marked by several arrests since 2010, has seen her endure periods of solitary confinement, highlighting the challenges faced by human rights defenders in Iran.
-
-
Monopolies
-
Trademarks
-
TTAB Blog ☛ CAFC Affirms TTAB: "EVERYBODY VS. RACISM" Fails to Function as a Source Indicator for Bags, Clothing, and Public Interest Services
In a non-precedential ruling, the CAFC upheld the Board's decision [TTABlogged here] affirming a refusal to register the proposed mark EVERBODY VS. RACISM for tote bags and various clothing items, and for the services of "promoting public interest and awareness of the need for racial reconciliation and encouraging people to know their neighbor and then affect change in their own sphere of influence," finding that the phrase fails to function as a source indicator. The appellate court concluded that the Board's determination was supported by substantial evidence. In re GO & Associates, LLC, Appeal No. 2022-1961 (Fed. Cir. Nov. 14, 2023) [not precedential].
-
Techdirt ☛ McDonald’s Loses Trademark Suit In Australia Against Hungry Jack’s Over ‘Big Jack’ Burger
Three years ago we discussed an interesting trademark battle between McDonald’s and Hungry Jack’s in Australia. It’s interesting for a number of reasons. For starters, Hungry Jack’s is a part of Burger King, McDonald’s chief rival globally, making this something of a proxy war. Second, this suit was filed on the heels of McDonald’s losing its “Big Mac” trademark in Europe after Supermacs got it canceled in expanding into the continent. And finally, to tie those two things together, this particularly dispute was over Hungry Jack’s “Big Jack” burger, which is designed similar to the Big Mac, save some differences that Hungry Jack touted specifically in its advertising of the sandwich.
-
-
Copyrights
-
Techdirt ☛ Sarah Silverman’s AI Case Isn’t Going Very Well Either
Just a few weeks ago Judge William Orrick massively trimmed back the first big lawsuit that was filed against generative AI companies for training their works on copyright-covered materials. Most of the case was dismissed, and what bits remained may not last much longer. And now, it appears that Judge Vince Chhabria (who has been very good on past copyright cases) seems poised to do the same.
-
-
-
-
Gemini* and Gopher
-
Personal/Opinions
-
🔤SpellBinding: ADYSTUI Wordo: BOLLS
-
quick calico cushion fix
when i made my first pillow-case style cushion cover i made the inner flap too long; hard to get the inner cushion in or out. it has a flimsy non-woven cover. of course i ripped the inner cushion cover when i took it out:-(
-
-
Technology and Free Software
-
Re: Defaults
* Cloud File Storage: an OpenBSD virt "in the cloud", so "Berkeley Fast File System", but that's not what they meant by "cloud". so, nope. git, rsync, and sftp pretty much suffice for my remote file needs.
-
Pagat Archive
Sent an email asking for permission to make a mirror/archive. This time it was for Pagat, a site with tons and tons of card games. And like last time, permission was given provided that I don't make any archives/mirrors public. Fair enough!
-
Nothing works here
How are you doing? I’m feeling pretty frustrated. This music program I’m in is not run very smoothly. I’ve had a hell of a time understanding my classes because they’re all in a different language (which I am learning; I won’t know enough in time.) One class is “how to cite papers using Chicago style,” and another is about old dusty-ass books that people don’t use anymore. There’s a third class that I’m in about music theory, which has been kinda cool; all of the aforementioned classes are in the other language. Δεν ξέρω, βρε. I'm not a quitter, but this is getting fucking stupid. It seems like nobody knows what the fuck is going on and I think the only other foreign student has dropped out. Oh, and getting a student ID (i.e. proof of enrollment with the uni) has taken over 2 months.
-
This, that, and Re: Defaults
I realized while reading some gemlogs that I now want to run from women I used to think were cool.
-
Is Geek Culture Dead
Hey, new here. I'm just curious to if you think geek culture is dead. My personal thoughts is that it is not dead. Just watered down for the mainstream, I'm tired of people watering down stories to fit the current audience. Modem MCU and the Henry Cavill Witcher situation are peak examples of this, Henry genuinely wanted a faithful Witcher. Netflix did not. They knew that it wouldn't squeeze the most juice out the rag. Anyway just posting to see what you all think. This seems like a really chill place away from the chaos of social media. Hope to be seeing you more.
-
-
* Gemini (Primer) links can be opened using Gemini software. It's like the World Wide Web but a lot lighter.