Old Fucking Punk @lwriemen@librem.one

The final rant of the year, followed by an end-of-year list of 15 LPs we couldn’t let slip by unacknowledged. ✨

https://diyconspiracy.net/last-hardcore-punk-roundup-2025/

And much love to Ghas Attack for stepping in with some awesome graphics for our site recently.

Amazing t-shirt!

I clicked on the link — https://punx.social — and saw my Fedi intro video prominently featured on the page. Day = made. It’s 8:05am here and I wish I could go straight back to bed because the day can’t possibly get any better 😆
https://mamot.fr/@pluralistic/115812058723304135

😬

WSJ: Tech Startups Are Handing Out Free Nicotine Pouches to Boost Productivity (Dec 30, 2025)

"...Earlier this year, two nicotine startups—*** and ***—made branded vending machines filled with flavored products for analytics company Palantir Technologies. Both machines are in the company’s Washington, D.C., offices. The pouches are free for employees and guests over the age of 21, a spokeswoman for Palantir said. Palantir pays to stock the nicotine products...."

https://www.wsj.com/tech/tech-startups-are-handing-out-free-nicotine-pouches-to-boost-productivity-e42d3cbe?st=ZoF6oB&reflink=article_copyURL_share

#addiction #startups #palantir

One of the finest investigative journalists of our times, a veteran of CBS news foibles himself, has posted a definitive explainer -- with deep context -- of the "60 Minutes" takedown by "oligarch functionary" Bari Weiss.

https://www.forever-wars.com/watching-bari-weiss-murder-investigative-journalism-at-cbs/?ref=forever-wars-newsletter

RE: https://dair-community.social/@Meron/115790600643812539

Below is an excerpt from what I wrote before. Just think about where these monsters are sending these poor young people to.

"Eritrea boasts the longest detained journalist in the world, and with over 360 detention facilities (many underground) in a country of 45 kmi², the regime has disappeared all dissidents (even imprisoning them in shipping containers in temperatures that induce one’s skin to be stuck to the walls), with no due process or trial.

Kidnapped by Deutsch Bahn.

https://www.theocharis.dev/blog/kidnapped-by-deutsche-bahn/

'Twenty minutes later. We are approaching Troisdorf. I stand up. I gather my things. My father texts me: he is at the station, waiting.

The driver comes back on: “Hello everyone. Apparently we were not registered at Troisdorf station, so we are on the wrong tracks. We cannot stop.”

He says this the way someone might say “the coffee machine is broken.” ...

I was trying to travel 35 kilometers. I was now 63 kilometers from my grandmother’s house. Further away than when I started.'

Exactly one year ago, on 30th December 2024, I laid the foundation of FediMeteo.

I took a VM, installed FreeBSD, and set up the first jail to support Italy. The goal was to create a tool for my own use, support a few countries, and announce it.

Unexpectedly, the enthusiasm was incredible. That pushed me to keep going, support more countries and cities, and turn it into what it is today.

FediMeteo now supports 38 countries and 2,937 cities, with more than 7,700 followers in the Fediverse alone, not counting the many people who follow via RSS feeds or visit the web pages.

If you are curious to read the story and some technical details, you can find it here:
https://it-notes.dragas.net/2025/02/26/fedimeteo-how-a-tiny-freebsd-vps-became-a-global-weather-service-for-thousands/

Today is also Tuesday, a #ThankYouTuesday, so I want to say thanks to:

* OpenMeteo - @openmeteo - for providing accurate, high quality data, without which FediMeteo would be far less useful

* @grunfink - creator of snac, who made all of this possible using very few resources, on a 4 euro per month VM

* FreeBSD, which thanks to the efficiency of the OS and its jail implementation made it possible to run this service in a stable and efficient way with minimal effort

* FediFollows - @FediFollows - that periodically spreads the word about cities, countries, and the enthusiasm around the project

*All of you*, who suggested, encouraged, corrected, and celebrated this project

And forward toward supporting more countries and other interesting features already in the works.

Happy birthday, FediMeteo! 🎉

#FediMeteo #HappyBirthday #Meteo #Weather #FreeBSD #snac #snac2 #OpenMeteo #Fediverse

Scammers are generating images of broken merchandise in order to apply for refunds.

From the comments:

"There’s an Airbnb scam doing it too.
Fake damage photos after a booking, so the guest gets charged for damages.
Yet another reason to avoid Airbnb."

https://www.schneier.com/blog/archives/2025/12/using-ai-generated-images-to-get-refunds.html

@rhelune @Gurre @mejs I made a board game 😀 https://crossborderrail.eu/boardgame/

User: Hi! I'd like a wake up call.

Hotel front desk: The entire modern web infrastructure you rely on is held together by a handful of volunteer run opensource projects, and if one lead maintainer decides to delete their repository today, the global economy would stall by noon.

It was depressing enough as a 45 year old to have to do an on-camera online exam with an AI proctor to prove I have basic arithmetic skills for a job. Made worse when the 'detected mobile phone use' alert triggered because I lifted my hands near my face to count on my fingers.

So this formally brings the 2025 TransAtlantic tour to an end. All in all, we did 21 events in 16 cities, across 6 countries. It's been an exhausting but very rewarding experience, and hopefully we are grateful to have met comrades both old and new.

We managed to get some interviews filmed for future InterRebelliums and see some amazing anarchist spaces along the way.

European comrades, please consider kicking into our FireStarter Fund generously set up for us by comrades in Amsterdam. https://www.firestarterfund.nl/campaigns/40/submedia%E2%80%99s-2025-trans(a)tlantic-tour

We can't wait to get back to the normal routine and dive into work on InterRebellium 02. Shut Down Canada

AI slop has taken over YT's "worker co-op" search results 🤮

https://www.youtube.com/results?search_query=worker+cooperatives+&sp=EgIIAw%253D%253D

Catch up on some news you might've missed before the year ends. https://www.gocomics.com/brian-mcfadden/2025/12/29

'South Park' writers create parody website for Trump Kennedy Center after snagging the domain names. Logo has redacted Epstein file snippets

"Welcome to TrumpKennedyCenter.org

A national cultural center dedicated to legacy, loyalty, and the careful presentation of history.

​Here, tradition is preserved, narratives are curated, and performances are elevated beyond mere art. What is remembered matters. What is omitted matters more.

We invite you to experience culture as authority, pageantry as truth, and excellence as defined by those in power." #USPol

https://www.trumpkennedycenter.org/

I was recently reminded of this.

A couple decades ago, I wrote a short paper that described how the basic approaches of cryptography and computer security lead to an efficient and practical privilege escalation attack against master-keyed mechanical lock, which I published in IEEE Security and Privacy (a nerdy computing technical journal).

https://www.mattblaze.org/papers/mk.pdf

TL;dr: Master-keyed locks have fundamental, exploitable weaknesses.

But I wasn't ready for what happened next.

1/

#ICE is so busy HELPING (to destroy and terrorize) communities and families this holiday season they asked this one request:

ICE is asking for people to quit calling its hotline to report an undocumented girl named "Anne Frank" hiding in the attics of Republican lawmakers.

Please don't call
1-866-DHS-2-ICE
(1-866-347-2423) for this reason, or to report pregnant foreigners seeking shelter in your local manger this holiday season.

- https://www.instagram.com/iamdaymadison/

Violations of antitrust laws don't get any more blatant than this. But when the criminal-in-chief only enforces antitrust laws against people he doesn't like, lawbreaking is legalized for the ones he does like.

https://www.cnbc.com/2025/12/24/nvidia-buying-ai-chip-startup-groq-for-about-20-billion-biggest-deal.html

I think companies are overestimating how much AI can improve productivity of entire teams but underestimating at the individual level.

Separate studies from both Forrester and Orgvue found 55% of employers who laid off workers because of AI now regret that decision. A talent doom loop is a perfect way to describe the risk here.

https://www.cnbc.com/2025/11/16/why-replacing-junior-staff-with-ai-will-backfire-.html