Old Fucking Punk @lwriemen@librem.one

Today I'm going to teach my government kids about non-free speech absolutism, and they will need to use SCOTUS cases to build a prosecution against Meta

So
I need some solid news links to Meta's terrible shit. Hit me with them y'all

I see people railing at the affront of #libre software that they find 'hard to use' and how that's elitist and shouldn't be the case. That it's the software designers' or developers' fault.

The #libre software world certainly needs more good designers, accessibility, & UX people, but they seem rare. Unlike those design-focused people, who require software devs to realise any sort of functioning app, devs can throw together an interface that *they* can use without too much trouble... 1/n

This piece in the Atlantic is a eyebrow-raiser; a defense of James Dobson, an earnest insistence that "despite its flaws" Evangelicalism has helped many people live better lives, etc…

I'll say this, at least: The public defense of Evangelical culture is no longer able to rest on the assumption of moral superiority. "But it helped them be nicer, doesn't that count for something?" is... a hilarious fallback for fundamentalism.

https://www.theatlantic.com/ideas/archive/2024/02/evangelicals-christianity-james-dobson/677362/

Note that all the technology exists - & is fully #libre - to allow each country to take control of their learners' Chromebooks (using #Chromium or #Gallium codebases) and have all the data held in-country on locally administered, gov't run systems rather than #BigTech ones. It would probably cost no more than paying Google their loss-leading fees & probably much less over time, without any privacy issues. Sadly, Microsoft's stuff has no such libre route - it needs to be culled from education.

Repeat after me: a university is *not* a corporation, and should not be run like one. The former exists for the pursuit of knowledge, while the latter for the pursuit of profits. These are mutually incompatible.

Happy #BlackHistoryMonth !

Not ready to talk about Black History. Still talking about white US history.

Q: Why are Black neighborhoods so often high crime neighborhoods? Must be a lawless people! Violent! Thieves! Predators!

A: There is no such thing as a "high crime neighborhood." The whole concept is entirely made up based on our notion of what we consider a crime.

You may be thinking:🤔 Wait... What?! Not true! A high crime neighborhood has more drug use and sales, theft, and even murder!

But what about theft? If you park your car in a high crime area, you're likely to get your windows smashed!

But, most theft in this country, is wage theft. Mostly rich white business owners, stealing wages from poor Black and brown service workers. Between $8B and $15B a year. Yes I said "billion!" Yes I said "a year!"

Republicans want to defund the (corporate) police

"The Antitrust Division has fewer people enforcing anti-monopoly laws in a $24 trillion economy than the Smithsonian Museum has security guards."

-Matt Stoller

https://www.thebignewsletter.com/p/congressional-republicans-to-defund

#antitrust #corruption

Fascinating to see people talking up Bluesky in the Fediverse. Why? They're here. They've already escaped the world of implicitly corruptable corporate-owned for-profit platforms... and yet they don't realise they've already succeeded at the hard part. Now they seem desperate to snatch defeat from the jaws of victory.

A UN Cybercrime Treaty that subjects security researchers to prosecution will make everyone less safe, 124 prominent security researchers told UN delegates today. Malicious actors will have an easier time launching attacks unless the treaty protects their work. https://www.eff.org/deeplinks/2024/02/protect-good-faith-security-research-globally-proposed-un-cybercrime-treaty

“Workers at video game outlet IGN announced they’re unionizing Tuesday, with a supermajority of support from editorial and creative workers. With around 80 members in the unit, the union would be one of the largest unionized games journalism outlets in existence.”

HELL YES https://aftermath.site/ign-creators-guild-union-games-journalism

One reason journalists flock to centralized platforms -- despite massive evidence that this is a strategic mistake -- is that the journalism craft is accustomed to needing a daddy.

#FOSDEM was great, but it's also great to finally sit at my own laptop at home.

Thanks to all the people who helped me connect and gave me pieces of valuable info! That was one intense conference!

@SkepticalScience Given LLM’s affinity for lying and generally making shit up, I’m not sure this is a good choice of technology to solve the problem. The concepts of truth vs. lies or real information vs. misinformation seem beyond the reach of AI models.

Can you help #translate #Codeberg's user interface into more languages? Consider joining the #localization team of #Forgejo and review or provide translations for your native language.

Learn more: https://forgejo.org/docs/latest/developer/localization/#joining-the-localization-team

Retired old people who aren't just ... busy being sick and dying give back to their communities in HUGE ways. We had someone's grandpa come to our robotics competition to cheer the team on. The old people in my building do all the serious political organizing and man the polls. I'm too busy working being in my 40s and all that.

Lowering retirement ages takes away more than just "retirement" ... it makes everything harder.

Far as I'm concerned it should be 59.

A complete stranger took my Kitchenaid mixer on, fixed it, and delivered it back to me, all for a $20 tube of degreaser and some thanks.

Repair Cafes are amazing, and they're all around the world -- look in your community for a Repair Cafe for things you can't fix.

I'm so thrilled. It was a gift from my stepmom and my brother did an idiotic job of packing it when he shipped it to me, which broke shit.

Dude not only repaired things, but fabricated a new knob for me.

Most humans are good.

There has not been a single example of a war on drugs that has worked. Not one.

And I come from a country that hangs drug traffickers.

For folks around Ōtautahi, the band I'm in, 3kg, is playing at A Rolling Stone (Colombo St. by end of Welles St) from 8pm this Sat night (10 Feb). Rock, funk, mod, swing. Covers & originals.

Niki Haley wants to raise the SS retirement age to 70.

Life expectancy for African American men in the US is 62.

For men in general? 73.

Enjoy your negative 8 and 3 years everyone.