Kyle Rankin @kyle@librem.one

I used this calculator to tally up Scrabble scores this weekend and was pretty happy with how it performed. There is a special kind of satisfaction when winding the crank for each sum.

I (mostly) fixed my mechanical calculator! Here it is calculating 12 x 42. The 8th place from the right increments by 5 with each turn so I still need to take it apart and fix that but otherwise it is working well.

There's a new addition to my mechanical computer collection! This is a Monroe LN-160x mechanical calculator. I didn't notice at the time that it was missing the front lever for the carriage return, and it looks like I'll have to do some repair work to get it working again.

I wrote about the longer-term implications of Apple's client-side scanning, in particular that other vendors will follow Apple's lead and do it poorly.

The hard part is getting customers to accept client-side scanning to begin with. With that out of the way, expanding it later is easy. https://puri.sm/posts/internet-of-snitches/

You should always follow innovations in criminal and student surveillance, because they often serve as proving grounds for tech that ultimately finds its way to the rest of us.

My biggest worry about Apple crossing the Rubicon with client-side searches is all the other vendors that inevitably copy Apple innovations, but poorly. Even if Apple can keep their promises, others won't. Imagine a home (and car) full of devices searching for crimes. ⁨#privacy⁩

Criminals and students always face the bleeding edge of surveillance tech, because neither group has enough agency to resist it. ⁨#privacy⁩ ⁨https://www.reuters.com/article/us-usa-tech-prison-idUSKBN2FA0OO

This double IPA is an opportunity to use up leftover hops from past beers. Here's the hop portions for the boil. There's another 180g besides this for dry hopping.

Brewing a double IPA today and opted to save money by buying grain in bulk. Didn't think about the fact that meant I had to crush 16# of barley by hand with my grain mill. #armday

Yet an Entourage isn't just an assistant. They also *monitor* their human, warn them when their behavior falls outside of society norms, remind them of rules, and report them to the authorities.

So the Entourage is simultaneously a very helpful assistant *and* a tool of the state to keep a person in line. It's hard not to see parallels in Apple's client-side scanning of Photos, messages, and search queries for contraband.

While I don't watch much anime, I'm a sucker for anything in a cyberpunk universe. I'm rewatching Ergo Proxy and this week's Apple Child Safety news reminded me of a concept in the show.

There are androids called "autoreivs" in this dystopian future. One type is called an Entourage and it is assigned to a particular human. They are a personal assistant and follow the person around, chauffeur, and even act as a bodyguard.

“The poorest man may in his cottage bid defiance to all the forces of the crown. It may be frail – its roof may shake – the wind may blow through it – the storm may enter – the rain may enter – but the King of England cannot enter.” https://puri.sm/posts/your-phone-is-your-castle/

I wonder whether China will compel Apple to add hashes of "tank man" to their contraband database for iPhones sold within the country.

I was going to write something up about Apple's new child safety features, but the @EFF post on the subject covers what I would have wanted to say, better than I could say it. https://www.eff.org/deeplinks/2021/08/apples-plan-think-different-about-encryption-opens-backdoor-your-private-life

Apple protects residents' privacy by having robots strip search them first. Humans only do strip searches after the robot finds something suspicious.

iPhone users don't live in a walled garden, they live in a digital nursing home. They are well taken care of, but Apple controls the property, activities and visitors. Apple plans to search residents regularly for contraband. #privacy https://www.apple.com/child-safety/