George Mari @GeorgeMari@qoto.org

I didn't plan on this, but it turns out that releasing my new book on running your own email server was SUPER TIMELY. #sysadmin

https://mwl.io/nonfiction/tools#ryoms

Sabot in the Age of AI

Here is a curated list of strategies, offensive methods, and tactics for (algorithmic) sabotage, disruption, and deliberate poisoning.

🔻 iocaine
The deadliest AI poison—iocaine generates garbage rather than slowing crawlers.
🔗 https://git.madhouse-project.org/algernon/iocaine

🔻 Nepenthes
A tarpit designed to catch web crawlers, especially those scraping for LLMs. It devours anything that gets too close. @aaron
🔗 https://zadzmo.org/code/nepenthes/

🔻 Quixotic
Feeds fake content to bots and robots.txt-ignoring #LLM scrapers. @marcusb
🔗 https://marcusb.org/hacks/quixotic.html

🔻 Poison the WeLLMs
A reverse-proxy that serves diassociated-press style reimaginings of your upstream pages, poisoning any LLMs that scrape your content. @mike
🔗 https://codeberg.org/MikeCoats/poison-the-wellms

🔻 Django-llm-poison
A django app that poisons content when served to #AI bots. @Fingel
🔗 https://github.com/Fingel/django-llm-poison

🔻 KonterfAI
A model poisoner that generates nonsense content to degenerate LLMs.
🔗 https://codeberg.org/konterfai/konterfai

Are you interested in getting a PhD in Programming Languages, particularly in both practical and theoretical aspects of gradual typing? Consider working with me at the Australian National University.

PhDs in Australia take 3-4 years and come with a tax-free stipend. See https://users.cecs.anu.edu.au/~fabian.muehlboeck/phd.html for more details.

I am at POPL this week, so if you are there, feel free to find me or coordinate to meet with me via e-mail.

Hi everyone. I’m Joni Maree from Threads and Bluesky. I’d like to leave Threads, & Bluesky doesn’t fit my vibe. Love to connect here 💙

#Introduction

Particle physicist, I work in the @CMSexperiment at #cern. I am interested in the Higgs boson and silicon trackers.

I’ve just done my #eXit! Don't lose any of your followers. Thanks to #HelloQuitX I've registered 295 new passengers for a journey to #Mastodon. Join us on https://app.helloquitx.com and automatically find your communities on #January20!

I also took the opportunity to move from qoto.org to fediscience.org. Find my old profile at ChristopheDelaere@qoto.org

The MAGA faithful’s exclusion from the inauguration isn't a misfortune. It's certainly not an act of God – he seems reluctant to get involved either way. It's a preview of coming attractions.

https://www.theindex.media/this-is-trumps-america-theres-only-one-winner-here/

This Tuesday the Trump fascist WH is starting mass immigrant deportations in Chicago. I'm an immigrant and human rights lawyer based out of Chicago.

In this piece I cover:
•7 calls to action we can engage in to protect our immigrant neighbors as these raids begin
•Debunking 7 of the most common claims of anti-immigrant propaganda
•Answering 4 of the most common FAQs on dealing with ICE

Please read, share, & subscribe
https://www.qasimrashid.com/p/trumps-mass-anti-immigrant-raids

Noting that "much of the political and business world is prostrating itself at the feet of the least-qualified man, morally and intellectually, ever to occupy the White House," Paul Krugman asks why.

As he points out, great wealth gives people extraordinary power, so the billionaires now willingly in thrall to Trump can't be buying power or self-respect from him.

#Trump #billionaires #EconomicElites #oligarchy #ElonMusk #MarkZuckerman #JeffBezos
/1

https://paulkrugman.substack.com/p/the-pathetic-billionaires-club

I think we can break people who do bad things into two categories: those who could be fixed by three ghosts visiting them in the night with a lesson to impart and those who can't

"can't even be fixed by three ghosts" is the strongest assessment of moral failure yet identified

How do you fit a dictionary in 64kb RAM? Unix engineers solved it with clever data structures and compression tricks. Here's the fascinating story behind it. https://blog.codingconfessions.com/p/how-unix-spell-ran-in-64kb-ram

some people use fidget devices to relax, I just watch sorting algorithms at work https://www.toptal.com/developers/sorting-algorithms

I do not like this new A.I.
Its nonsense answers make me sigh
I do not want to hear its tale
I do not want it in my mail
I do not want it a-la-mode
I do not want it in my code
I do not want it with a scone
I do not want it in my phone
I do not want it as my chef
Not even in a PDF
I do not like this new A.I.
This is the truth I won't deny

Open Letter to Mark Zuckerberg

I've received 5 VC offers "to chat" regarding Pixelfed in the past few days.

Not for sale.

Pixelfed belongs to the people.

I'd rather be broke and true to my beliefs, than sell out.

That's why I'm organizing a Kickstarter to fund the ethical development of Pixelfed, Loops and more.

It's time that someone stood up to them, instead of joining them.

Are you with me?

https://www.kickstarter.com/projects/pixelfed/pixelfed-foundation-2024-real-ethical-social-networks

🔁 Mastodon users can follow Pixelfed accounts.
🔃 Pixelfed users can follow Mastodon accounts.

🖧 It's the Fediverse. Not everybody knows this. Spread the word!

#Mastodon #Pixelfed #Fediverse

Fed up with Meta? Avoiding Instagram or Facebook isn’t enough to stop Meta from harvesting and profiting from your private information. Here’s how to limit Meta’s ability to monetize your personal data. https://www.eff.org/deeplinks/2025/01/mad-meta-dont-let-them-collect-and-monetize-your-personal-data

RedNote may wall off “TikTok refugees” to prevent US influence on Chinese users
Rumors swirl that RedNote may segregate Chinese users as soon as next week.
https://arstechnica.com/tech-policy/2025/01/rednote-may-wall-off-tiktok-refugees-to-prevent-us-influence-on-chinese-users/?utm_brand=arstechnica&utm_social-type=owned&utm_source=mastodon&utm_medium=social

ChargePoint develops uncuttable charging cables to stop thieves
ChargePoint's CEO got so sick of the problem he started making prototypes.
https://arstechnica.com/cars/2025/01/chargepoint-develops-uncuttable-charging-cables-to-stop-thieves/?utm_brand=arstechnica&utm_social-type=owned&utm_source=mastodon&utm_medium=social

Hi, scientists from the Fediverse! It seems that Nature is asking people about Twitter migration and if they are happier on #bluesky .

On Nature writers' minds, Bluesky is the only place to migrate to. There's not a single mention of the Fediverse in there! However, there is a small free text box where you can write your thoughts, in the step before "send" button. So I did fill the poll anyway, writing why I decided not to go to Bluesky but to Mastodon instead.

I thought that maybe if we get enough people to actually fill the survey and mention that they migrated to Mastodon, we can make a stronger case for open, free networks. It's an extremely short survey, so let's try! https://www.nature.com/articles/d41586-025-00037-y

#academicchatter #OpenScience

Cool project: "Nepenthes" is a tarpit to catch (AI) web crawlers.

"It works by generating an endless sequences of pages, each of which with dozens of links, that simply go back into a the tarpit. Pages are randomly generated, but in a deterministic way, causing them to appear to be flat files that never change. Intentional delay is added to prevent crawlers from bogging down your server, in addition to wasting their time. Lastly, optional Markov-babble can be added to the pages, to give the crawlers something to scrape up and train their LLMs on, hopefully accelerating model collapse."

https://zadzmo.org/code/nepenthes/