Old Fucking Punk @lwriemen@librem.one

‘Unprecedented risk’ to #life on Earth: #Scientists call for halt on #MirrorLife #microbe #research | #Science | The Guardian

https://www.theguardian.com/science/2024/dec/12/unprecedented-risk-to-life-on-earth-scientists-call-for-halt-on-mirror-life-microbe-research

#Biology #Microbiology #SyntheticBiology

And I know, I know, this sounds like some kind of hoax. Surely, it's a hoax.

No. No, my friends, this is an actual thing UCLA is doing. I can't even...

https://newsroom.ucla.edu/stories/comparative-literature-zrinka-stahuljak-artificial-intelligence

This is an actual cover for an actual text book at an actual university (and one that you have likely heard of is you're a USian). WTAF is going on, people? I don't think the "AIs" are the only ones hallucinating, because someone must have been on some extremely hard substances to think THIS 👇 was a good idea. And it would be bad enough if the AIification stopped at a book cover, but no, they AIed the whole course. If this stuff isn't stopped, higher ed is cooked, imho.

https://lithub.com/uclas-new-ai-designed-literature-course-has-the-worst-looking-textbook-cover-ive-ever-seen/

Glad someone went through the trouble of debunking the insurance industry apologists.

https://www.thebignewsletter.com/p/its-time-to-break-up-big-medicine

I've got a feeling this might be a FAFO moment for the China hawks in Washington.

https://www.crisisinvesting.com/p/the-red-dragon-strikes-back

“One place suits one person, another place suits another person. For my part I prefer to live in the country, like Timmie Willie.” ~Beatrix Potter

https://www.neh.gov/article/beatrix-potters-quiet-rebellion

New In These Times comic from Ben Passmore on being sent to a reform school

https://inthesetimes.com/article/comic-burn-the-system-comics-reform-ben-passmore

@interfluidity @keubiko As the economic statistics are calculated, when a crash makes you spend a lot of money on health care & auto repairs, you have a higher standard of living.

Remember kids, "maximizing shareholder value is a made up economists’ creed, first promulgated by Milton Friedman in a New York Times op-ed. It is not a legal duty, as management touts regularly and falsely assert. Legally, equity is a residual claim. All other obligations, like payments to employees, suppliers, creditors, landlords, tax authorities, successful litigants, regulatory fines, come first." ~Y. Smith

"While it is welcome to see Elizabeth Warren using a quixotic bill to call attention to the fact that Corporate America is increasingly in the business of looting companies...one has to wonder at the timing. During the Biden almost lame duck phase? Note she first introduced this legislation in 2018, as in under Trump, so this is a rerun. That makes the timing even odder..."
https://www.nakedcapitalism.com/2024/12/warren-bill-would-stop-companies-from-placing-shareholder-paydays-over-worker-rights.html

Trump Floats Plan to Let Billionaire Polluters 'Bribe Their Way' Past Regulations - https://www.commondreams.org/news/trump-billion-investment #trump: the gangster-president... #bribery

Friendica vs. Hubzilla

Description of the Friendica experience after 2 months primarily using Hubzilla (166 words) https://friendica.myportal.social/display/e65e1095-1067-5ba7-a513-6c2513847562

@alcinnz @lightweight
> its predominantly the old farts who have the time & spoons to work towards change

Them (us?), and people like me, who are able and willing to live on the smell of an oily rag. Sacrificing any ability to live a "normal" life, so we can do fulltime, unpaid voluntary work on stuff we think matters.

Shameless self-promotion;

If you want to support my unpaid work on ethical tech, you can sign up for a paid subscription to the Disintermedia blog;

https://disintermedia.substack.com/

The challenge of our democracy is that... participating in it actively takes time. Not many people can do that, thanks to system that our democracy has slowly manifested. Now, aside from a few fortunate people whose obligations allow them enough time to stay abreast of things, the only ones with sufficient spoons to participate... is those with a vested interest, i.e. lobbyists who're getting paid. Their work is seldom in the public interest. But their influence is wildly disproportionate.

Whoa, have just had a flood of inspiration (and, at the same time, discovered forgotten inspiration from the past in my notes)... leading to a flurry of new blog posts. https://davelane.nz

Microsoft's new version of Recall appears to still capture sensitive data like credit card numbers, even with the "sensitive information" filter enabled (Avram Piltch/Tom's Hardware)

https://www.tomshardware.com/software/windows/microsoft-recall-screenshots-credit-cards-and-social-security-numbers-even-with-the-sensitive-information-filter-enabled
http://www.techmeme.com/241212/p41#a241212p41

The effect of AI is to reduce the cost of •generating code• by a factor of X at the cost of increasing the cost of •thinking about the problem• by a factor of Y.

And yes, Y>1. A thing non-developers do not understand about code is that coding a solution is a deep way of understanding a problem — and conversely, using code that’s dropped in your lap greatly increases the amount of problem that must be understood.

3/

I feel another blog post coming on: we're good (as humans) at feeling appalled by individual acts of violence & death, but we're really bad at judging & feeling similarly appalled at lower levels of misery & suffering among the masses - sometimes short of death - caused by 'official' forces, i.e. 'The System' (e.g. late-stage capitalism & corporatocracy).

https://yewtu.be/watch?v=QxIZoAdewsk or https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=QxIZoAdewsk