Steve Hammett @bitflips@qoto.org

Good morning nerds

Happy International #RepairDay, wherever you are!

Over 1,300 events are taking place globally this weekend to mark the day, all over the UK and in every continent, from Argentina to Australia, from Benin to Taiwan

Find your nearest or celebrate online: https://repairday.org

Party like it's 1993! 🥳​

@SinclairSpeccy@bitbang.social Happy birthday, @volkerdi!

Thank you for dedicating more than half of your life to making us slackers less grumpy when using our computers.

Remembering Heather Rodgers

The value of an independent and fearless bar

https://emptycity.substack.com/p/remembering-heather-rogers

"Cochrane ignored this epidemiological evidence because it didn't meet its rigid standard. I have called this approach “methodological fetishism,” when scientists fixate on a preferred methodology and dismiss studies that don't follow it. Sadly, it's not unique to Cochrane. By dogmatically insisting on a particular definition of rigor, scientists in the past have landed on wrong answers more than once."

https://www.scientificamerican.com/article/what-went-wrong-with-a-highly-publicized-covid-mask-analysis/

Chromium 118 (also ungoogled) is a security update

I uploaded new 64bit packages for Chromium 118.0.5993.70 (also the un-googled variant) for which the sources were released a few days ago. This first release in the 118 series addresses a critical vulnerability (CVE-2023-5218) so it's wise to upgrade.
As mentioned in a previous blog post,

https://alien.slackbook.org/blog/chromium-118-also-ungoogled-is-a-security-update/

#Software #chrome #chromium #cve #google #privacy #ungoogled

BREAKING: Agreement has been reached on the full restoration of USS pensions. 69 days of strike action in the making. This will now be put before the Higher Education Committee and if agreed a full member vote will take place.

#UCU #USS #ucurising

https://www.ucu.org.uk/article/13215/Agreement-paves-way-for-full-restoration-of-university-pension-benefits-by-April?utm_source=Mastodon&utm_medium=Social&campaign=ucuRISING

Chromium package and release update

You have surely noticed an increase in the frequency with which I am releasing new chromium and chromium-ungoogled packages. This is caused by a new release policy from Google, with an update every week and a bump in the major version (currently 117) every month.
I have tried keeping up with that schedule, but I am giving up.

https://alien.slackbook.org/blog/chromium-package-and-release-update/

#Software #chrome #chromium #cve #google #ungoogled

Now that's outrageous, even for Google: the search giant disregards your search query and alters it such that you don't find what you are looking for, but what Google wants you to click on.

"How Google Alters Search Queries to Get at Your Wallet"
https://www.wired.com/story/google-antitrust-lawsuit-search-results/

This ought to be the downfall of the corporation - but it likely won't be.

The "New Outlook" demands that when adding your Gmail account, you also give Microsoft a copy of all your email, contacts, and calendar data.

The "Learn More" link confirms:

"Syncing your account to the Microsoft Cloud means that a copy of your email, calendar, and contacts will be synchronized between your email provider and Microsoft data centers."

WOW.

Good time to switch to @thunderbird, folks!

#Privacy #Outlook #Email

#OnThisDay, 4 Oct 1936, women join the Battle of Cable Street, in London's East End, protesting against a fascist march through the area. Of the 79 people arrested, eight are women, including Blanche Edwards (pictured).

Hat tip to the East End Women's Museum for this one! https://eastendwomensmuseum.org/blog/women-at-the-battle-of-cable-street

#WomenInHistory #Histodons #BritishHistory #Anti-Fascism

A local root vulnerability in glibc https://lwn.net/Articles/946381/ #LWN

Seeing as how we’re not tough on shoplifters soft on the causes of shoplifters, this is worth remembering

Liveslak 1.8.0 – more filesystems supported, lots of fixes

Liveslak updates! Quite soon after my August ISO refresh, I used some free moments to implement a request of sorts and fix some longstanding bugs.
Version 1.8.0 of the liveslak scripts is now available, containing these enhancements and fixes.
Links to the liveslak git repository and download locations

https://alien.slackbook.org/blog/liveslak-1-8-0-more-filesystems-supported-lots-of-fixes/

#Software #daw #git #liveslak

@dgar

@JeriLRyan Great video, let's share it on the #Fediverse!
✊ #strike ✊