Old Fucking Punk @lwriemen@librem.one

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

“The most important issues in AI right now are its use to inform decisions about people’s rights,” EFF’s @prilkit told @AlJazeera, such as predictive policing and deciding who gets health benefits, housing, and jobs. https://www.aljazeera.com/economy/2024/12/12/the-trump-administration-could-reverse-progress-on-ai-regulation

Say it with me now

ABSOLUTE F**KING BULLSHIT

https://www.abc.net.au/news/2024-12-13/coalition-says-nuclear-option-cheaper-than-renewables/104720926

We need more sensible conversations about how non-free firmware is treated while we promote and advance free software. We should also acknowledge that FSF’s current approach with RYF is less than ideal. This post by @mjg59 is an example of a sensible discussion of the issues:

https://mjg59.dreamwidth.org/70895.html

If you are interested in how these issues impacted a real company who tried to make freedom-respecting hardware, check out a talk I gave at SCALE20x:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9xbvMtFLOmE

#FOSS #firmware #RYF

When it comes to non-free firmware I think there's two reasonable positions - treat it like non-free code running on a remote system (suboptimal, outside the scope of current free software priorities) or treat it like software running on the primary CPU (all code on the local system should be free software, no matter where it's running). I think the FSF's position is unreasonable: https://mjg59.dreamwidth.org/70895.html

"In some small plants, fewer than half the workers are documented. More than half are hired through a contractor who brings in undocumented people. They don’t get the same benefits, like holidays and overtime pay, and they’re paid less while enduring the same risks."

https://www.labornotes.org/blogs/2024/12/poultry-bosses-benefit-trumps-threats

Call to Action against the #PRGT #Pipeline

https://north-shore.info/2024/11/13/call-to-action-against-the-prgt-pipeline/

One of the things I've been gradually realizing is that so many people have wrong, backwards ideas about how the world works because they had such "normie," privileged experiences growing up and into adulthood to where they actually believe the talking points our society uses to justify its constant bullshit. They live in a fairy-tale land because they've so rarely been required to think and defend themselves.