Old Fucking Punk @lwriemen@librem.one

In the case of 404 Media, I guess I could stay on the free plan and use their Tip Jar? That's significantly more work for me to track and manage.

On groups.io, I instead have to upgrade to a paid plan for a month out of each year in order to pay them the amount of money I would like to pay them. It's very silly.

It kinda drives me nuts how companies choose their subscription tiers.

Just to pick on 404 Media for a moment, the lowest tier is $100/year. That's more than I want to pay, but I'd be fine with $50/year and a much reduced feature set, maybe even *no* features that a free user wouldn't get. (Basically, just a patronage tier.)

In these situations, I end up as a free user, even though I'd happily *donate*. They just make it surprisingly hard to do so.

The federal judge let Google off the hook in the antitrust case that the company supposedly lost. He said no to any serious remedy. And he indirectly killed Mozilla (Firefox and Thunderbird).

A good day for Google, and a terrible day for what's left of the open web.

https://arstechnica.com/gadgets/2025/09/google-wont-have-to-sell-chrome-judge-rules/

"Amazon argued, that the class was too large to be manageable"

This is my favorite defense to a class action suit.

"We cheated so many people, we can't possibly be expected to make it up to everyone"

From: https://www.reuters.com/legal/government/amazon-must-face-us-nationwide-class-action-over-third-party-sales-2025-09-02/

"If police are going to be using drones, we need much stronger limits on how they do that, including treating the flying of the drone as a search that requires a warrant,” EFF’s @Adam_D_Schwartz told the Columbus Dispatch. https://www.dispatch.com/story/news/local/2025/09/02/central-ohio-police-adding-drones-sparking-civil-liberties-concerns/85634475007/

Risk terrain modeling “is a mathematical way of justifying a type of policing in certain people and neighborhoods that police have already wanted to surveil,” EFF’s Matthew Guariglia told @Kansasdotcom. https://www.kansas.com/news/local/crime/article311854329.html

The saga continues! Today's episode: "Today's version of farm slavery isn't even cheap, farmers are getting TURBO screwed."

https://youtube.com/shorts/e5R539XZj28

1: "Well ChatGPT says otherwise. It contradicts what you said about security."
0: "ChatGPT is consuming popular material from 10 years ago. The threat landscape has changed."

1: "Well the language is clear it's saying the exact opposite of you."
0: "It has made a statement. But what is it's reasoning. What is the logical argument behind its suggestion?"

1: "I just feel more comfortable going with what it say."
0: "After we've worked together for five years? After you've seen the results of my work? You realize this isnt your field of expertise? You arent able to explain its reasoning. Why it said it. The history and context behind it."

Well this is going to be fun.

Being a leader in your field and releasing new research that is different from the current consensus now has to fight AI and LLMs.

AI / LLMs is bias at scale. Now it's entrenched status quo.

AI cannot innovate. AI can only average out. And when that average is bad. Or dangerous. And speaks with authority. Folks will double down and be hurt.

Academia.edu, WTAF is this? Get rid of it! NOW!

Today's the anniversary for Dead Kennedys’ Fresh Fruit for Rotting Vegetables — where “California Über Alles,” “Holiday in Cambodia,” and “Kill the Poor” redefined punk with humor & outrage. Want the untold story behind the chaos?
Get a copy of Dead Kennedys: Fresh Fruit for Rotting Vegetables, The Early Years here: https://pmpress.org/index.php?l=product_detail&p=624

Question for those of you who are #selfhosting your #fediverse/ #activitypub instance with a very small number of users (max 5, let’s say): how many other instances are you federated with?

No reason, I’m just curious.

FYI my little #gotosocial instance that hosts @logistics
(with ~150 followers at present) is federated to ~6,500 other instances.

Please boost for visibility.

Automatically save every document to Microsoft’s cloud. (Yes, this is the same Microsoft that’s helping Israel carry out the genocide of the Palestinian people.)

There is ZERO reason to use a Microsoft product today unless you are forced to by work.

#BDS #Microsoft #surverillance #BigTech #technofascism https://mastodon.social/@dangillmor/115132426182084126

What #OpenSource and #SelfHost can do. Had an idea, discussed it here. Seemed to rhyme with people. Booked two domains. Created a landing page with #Jekyll and CI/CD from a #git repo on my #Forgejo instance. Created logo with Inkscape. Added letsencrypt certificate. Put it on my VPS (Virtual Private Server) running Red Hat Enterprise Linux, (#RHEL) where it is now served with #Nginx. Git repo mirrored to #Codeberg so all can join. In under 8h.

https://devbnb.eu

https://codeberg.org/jwildeboer/devbnb

Any lead/principle-ish level engineers looking for work in Melbourne? I know someone that's looking for someone with experience in data warehousing.

(You'd be working with me too until February-ish 2026.)

Coming soon: Microsoft calls it auto-save to the cloud, which might sound convenient for Word users. Just be aware of what's in it for them -- feeding their "AI" database, among other things -- and think about potential consequences. https://techcommunity.microsoft.com/blog/microsoft365insiderblog/save-new-files-automatically-to-the-cloud-in-word-for-windows/4445216

If you weren't already aware that Politico serves frequently as a booster of right-wing beliefs, take a look at this piece, which bemoans worthy efforts to use tech to identify Trump's masked street thugs.

https://www.politico.com/news/2025/08/29/ai-unmasking-ice-officers-00519478

In today's post, I urge readers and writers to stop supporting #Substack, a platform that knowingly promotes white nationalist content with literal #Nazi symbols.

https://funcrunch.org/blog/2025/09/01/support-for-substack-is-normalizing-the-nazi-bar/

#WhiteSupremacy #racism

The scary headlines about "Chorus, a sEcReT dArK mOnEy gRoUp" have been absolutely wild to watch.

Because I'm in Chorus, & it's been a godsend.

Without it, I wouldn't be able to cover the US's massive modern-day farm slavery problem- at all.

https://youtu.be/f5UwwtrGdak

A Clean Hell: Anarchy and Abolition in America’s Most Notorious Dungeon by Eric King is a searing firsthand account from inside the most repressive prison in the United States—a place built not for rehabilitation, but for disappearance.

Learn about the book, contributors, praise, and more: https://www.kickstarter.com/projects/ww3/acleanhell

Dear fediverse,

I just had a video call over Signal with @joynewacc – – from Gaza.

Farah, or Joy, as she prefers to be called, is a 22-year-old Palestinian author and poet studying English Literature at the Islamic University of Gaza, which has been bombed by Israel.

She lives with her mother and four siblings in a shelter, trying to survive the genocide being committed by Israel.

Please help her and her family afford food during the famine that Gaza is experiencing. Please donate if you can and/or share this so that it might reach others who might be able to:

https://www.chuffed.org/project/evacuate-joy

Joy used to have an account on BlueSky but they closed it. Please give her a warm welcome to the fediverse and let her know she is welcome here.

If you’d like to read her writings, you can find them at:
https://drive.google.com/drive/folders/1XMS1kW6EYGnb_DF2P4BbRDDMClX9Sahx

#fediverse #Gaza #Palestine #solidarity #FreePalestine