Ed Casabar @edcasabar@qoto.org

Life Without The Algorithm

"There's more to photography than being popular. Being genuine counts for something too. In the new frontier of the Fediverse the focus is on enjoying your craft instead of being crafted by the algorithm."

https://ewenbell.com/blog/Life_Without_The_Algorithm

#SundayRead #OnTheBlog #Fediverse #Mastodon #Photography #MakeItMatter

Watching a documentary on the history of national parks and learning it took a century before management of the parks was routinely guided by science rather than popularity metrics.

We don’t have that long for our digital environments. But also, I am committed to the long game. https://m.media-amazon.com/images/I/71CS2ZM9-xL._RI_.jpg

Trump took hundreds of classified materials to Mar-a-Lago. He failed to comply with a federal subpoena. He returned some documents, but held on to others.

Based on everything we know, none of this applies to Biden.

https://www.msnbc.com/rachel-maddow-show/maddowblog/bidens-classified-docs-stubborn-bottom-line-hasnt-budged-rcna65517?cid=sm_npd_ms_tw_ma

EXTREMELY RARE footage of the elusive box jellyfish Chirodectes. Larger than a soccer ball, this jelly is a true ocean mystery, and this video is one of the only in existence, filmed off the coast of Papua New Guinea in 2021.
📽️Scuba Ventures Kavieng bit.ly/3FE29tL

Hey everyone. Just wanted to eliminate the confusion and let you know that this is actually me. 😂 Hope you are having an awesome Thursday!

Lake Ruataniwha in Mackenzie county New Zealand , amazing in autumn better still when calm and bathed in soft light.

A 3 shot pano hand held A7r and sigma 50mm art

#photography #nature #naturephotography #landscapephotography #NewZealand

Netflix has made the interview with Zelenskyy and Letterman free and public for everyone in case anyone is interested.

https://youtu.be/liooTXAF5Xo

#Ukraine #RemovePutin

Washington Post's MENSA chapter asked its members to choose one word from Webster’s; replace one letter, and then provide a new definition to it. These are the top winners.

#Writing #Books #puns

Newly-Elected Georgia Rep Steps Down After Drug Arrest - Republican Danny Rampey was arrested last month after investigators said he stole prescription narcotics at the retirement complex he manages. #Georgia #huffpost

https://www.huffpost.com/entry/danny-rampey-georgia-rep-drug-arrest_n_63b1e981e4b0fe267ca9df48

Short-Tempered.

Two short-eared owls have a brief aerial spat over the moors during the breeding season, here on Mull.

Both were hunting and took exception to the other as they flew a bit close to one another. They didn't actually come into contact, and flew off moments later.

Great to see and hear.

Hopefully 2023 will see more success with the nests of these wonderful owls.

#ShortEaredOwl #owl #BirdPhotography #BirdsOfPrey #owls #wildlife

🏙️ Guten Abend... Gute Nacht / #GoodEvening... #Goodnight 🌠
Artist: #KOBRAstreetart / #EduardoKobra in - City: #SãoPaulo Brasil 🇧🇷 2021
Title: "Seja Luz" (Let there be light/Es werde Licht) - #Streetart #Mastoart #Art #Mural #AugusteRodin #GuteNacht #traum #dream 🌟... see you 👋

#IDMastodon yearend 2022 Recap @NEJM N-95 😷, Closed spaces 👀Bivalent 💉must as we are moving forward to 2023 .XBB are still on the move . Persons who received the BA.5-containing bivalent booster had better neutralizing activity against all omicron subvariants (especially against BA.2.75.2, BQ.1.1, & XBB) than those who received either one or two monovalent boosters
📌https://www.nejm.org/doi/full/10.1056/NEJMc2214293
📌https://www.nejm.org/doi/full/10.1056/NEJMc2214302

Do you know how many times I've heard over the past few days how much the media is failing to follow the money in this story about the newly elected Rep. George Santos? This story makes it clear that's exactly what happened.

https://www.washingtonpost.com/media/2022/12/29/north-shore-leader-santos-scoop/

So let's follow the money, shall we? Starting with Mr. Santos' latest filing for The Devolder Organization, which is apparently responsible for his sudden unexplained wealth.

http://search.sunbiz.org/Inquiry/CorporationSearch/ConvertTiffToPDF?storagePath=COR%5C2021%5C0601%5C00184778.Tif&documentNumber=L21000206150

The organization lists its address as 336 N. Babcock St. Ste 104, and says another organization at the same address but Ste 101 is there called D&D International Investment Services Inc.

Both are affiliated with an individual named Devaughn Dames, who appears to be both a physician and a CFO somehow. He's also very passionate about spreading his knowledge about how to handle your money wisely. His linkedin page mentions both companies. He also seems to be an IT expert; previous domains include https://web.archive.org/web/20160518071721/http://www.manageditsolutions.net/about.html

One of Mr. Dames' email addresses (dev.dames at gmail) was used to register the vanity domain devaughndames[.]com. Firefox didn't like what that site tried to do when I visited it, but it loaded an empty page that had the heading "Financial Educational Services." But the pop-up takes you to a domain called myuwe.net, which is for an entity called United Wealth Education.

Now, UWE is full of stock photos and videos, and there isn't much there about who runs it. And after spending a few minutes on this site, you'll probably come away with the conclusion that the site is tied to some type of scam.

Well, if you look up the name of what Myuwe.com used to be called -- Financial Educational Services -- you'll see they were shut down JUST THIS YEAR by the US Federal Trade Commission for being a giant pyramid scheme that bilked people out of more than $213 million.

How's that for following the money? :) Wait, I'm not done yet.

雪の京都。Snowy Kyoto. #Fotomontag #photomonday #photography

A plea to journalists covering the Fediverse:

If you want to pitch a story and the only people you can think of to talk to are Gargron and the Journa Host admin, please don't.

Instead, use the time you saved to learn more about how this network functions, who the people behind ActivityPub are (and what that even is), who the people keeping instances running are, who the people moderating instances are; you can even get your hands dirty by digging through the Mastodon GitHub issue queue and learn why exactly some design decisions ended up the way they did, it's all right there!

Mastodon is not off-brand Twitter. You do this entire community a massive disservice by painting it as such, and you do our profession a disservice by expressing a complete lack of curiosity about this community before you report on it.

Thank you.

As you read this, remember that once sworn in as a Member of Congress you have a security clearance and the right to participate in classified briefings. Does the @HouseGOP@twitter.com trust George Santos with that responsibility? I certainly don't. https://nyti.ms/3Vt0YVd

Thinking about #Ireland this morning. A sense of scale is lost but this natural #RockFormation shaped like a bowl was absolutely huge. It formed a lip and I’m standing outside th bowl and had to scale the side to get the shot. Really amazing.
#LandscapePhotography #Photography #Nature #NaturePhotography #Ocean #Waves #Sunset #LongExposure #PhotoOfTheDay #TravelPhotography

The best #Aurora display I've ever experienced. #Iceland, October 2018.

#Photomonday
#Fotomontag
#AuroraBorealis
#Photography
#NightPhotos
#LongExposure