Matt Panhans @mpanhans@librem.one

Real Internet of Shit stuff here. Ebike firm goes belly-up, but the encryption key to unlock your bike is stored on its very-soon-to-disappear servers.

https://mastodon.notsobig.co/@phill/110701490478043590

One of the world's very strangest volcanoes, and easily one of my favorites is Kawah Ijen in Indonesia. These photos of lava are not color enhanced or photoshoped, the lava from Kawah Ijen is just that beautiful electric blue color. The lava is an incredible blue due to an extremely high sulfur content--because sulfur burns blue.

In normal volcanoes, you can sometimes catch the blue tint of volcanic gasses betraying the presence of sulfur coming into contact with oxygen, but at this volcano there is so much sulfur in the lava and air that it appears blue, and spits blue flames.

The crater during non eruptive periods is a sulfur mine, and you can find massive nearly pure sulfur crystals there. The crater lake of Ijen is enormously toxic and the sulfuric gasses in the crater can kill.

“These sh*t e-scooters are everywhere!!”

remade my whole website in Quarto and it looks much like it once did but oh man was it way easier to do. highly recommended if you want more flexibility and automation than like a Google Site but still want it to be simple and easy https://nickchk.com/

The Dutch government has officially launched their own Mastodon server, State Secretary of Digitalisation @avhuffelen announced today! The server lives on the official domain of the Dutch government, at social.overheid.nl.

The Secretary mentions in her announcement a letter to the government explaining her support for 'value-driven alternative social networks', such as Mastodon. For more information on that, check out
https://fediversereport.com/dutch-government-officially-launches-mastodon-server/

The FTC has stayed taking Ls (losses) in recent years. A judge just dismissed the FTC’s attempt to block Microsoft’s acquisition of Activision.

This is what happens when instead of focusing on its mission of protecting consumers, the FTC succumbed to the anti big tech narrative being pushed my media like the NYT.

And now it keeps getting embarrassed by losses in court.

https://www.theverge.com/2023/7/11/23779039/microsoft-activision-blizzard-ftc-trial-win

Whoa. Sophos researchers just announced that they’ve uncovered 133 malicious drivers signed with legitimate digital certificates, and found 100 of of those 133 drivers were signed by Microsoft.

https://news.sophos.com/en-us/2023/07/11/microsoft-revokes-malicious-drivers-in-patch-tuesday-culling/

From the post:

"Today, Microsoft issued Security Advisory ADV230001 as part of their July Windows Update that addresses Sophos’ discovery of more than 100 malicious drivers that had been digitally signed by Microsoft and others, dating as far back as April 2021."

"They also released Knowledge Base article 5029033, which includes new, more detailed information on the technical measures Microsoft has taken to protect against these malicious signed drivers. Sophos has had protection measures in place since 2022 that could detect the presence of, and block the installation of, these drivers."

https://msrc.microsoft.com/update-guide/vulnerability/ADV230001

https://support.microsoft.com/help/5029033

I wrote recently about one of the bigger names in signing malware as a service:

https://krebsonsecurity.com/2023/06/ask-fitis-the-bear-real-crooks-sign-their-malware/

Here we go again.

Tons more malware signed by Microsoft again. Good on Sophos here for telling them.

Microsoft have got to sort this out. Aside from being super embarrassing for them, it’s pretty woeful that they keep trying to sell us on the idea they block malicious drivers when they keep directly signing them. At least flag packed files, MS.
https://news.sophos.com/en-us/2023/07/11/microsoft-revokes-malicious-drivers-in-patch-tuesday-culling/

Why Don’t We Build Skyscrapers Out Of Wood?. This is Ascent Milwaukee. A gorgeous combo luxury apartment and retail space. But if you look closely, you might notice something special about this building… Figured it out yet? It’s made out o... https://undecidedmf.com/why-dont-we-build-skyscrapers-out-of-wood/

I am not open to your ahistorical take on Google Chat and XMPP.

Google didn't do anything wrong by using an open standard.

They didn't do anything wrong by building a good interface that people liked to use.

And they didn't do anything wrong by disconnecting from the network when the spam and harassment outweighed the benefit to their users.

We, the XMPP community, failed to capitalize on success by diversifying the network. It's our own fault not enough nodes were there.

The wheel turns for blogs and social media https://crookedtimber.org/2023/07/08/the-wheel-turns/

Rabbits can swim..

It’s REALLY important that #Vancouver’s Downtown Business Association, who were originally AGAINST downtown bike-lanes, later became one of their most vigourous supporters, because of EVIDENCE that bike-lanes are better for downtown business than any street parking they replace.

#cities #bikes #downtowns #cars #BikeLanes