Mike Capern @mikecsees@qoto.org

If you want to be good a citizen, consider joining your public library board. They are always looking for engaged volunteers. You can ensure anti #LGBTQ initiatives such as toxic speakers and book bans don’t happen. #libraries #PublicLibraries

the downfall of #Twitter is going to be hard on a lot of people who create/perform/post for a living.

we’re losing a lot of our audience who won’t migrate, which means we’re also way harder to find. it can be despairing, and feel like we’re invisible here.

every 🔁 you give someone’s post can brighten their day, because it means someone, somewhere, was interested in their work and wanted other people to see that work in their feed as well. #TwitterMigration #FediTips

Researchers from the French National Centre for Scientific Research have revived more than a dozen prehistoric viruses that were previously trapped deep within the Siberian permafrost.
From seven ancient permafrost samples, scientists were able to document 13 never-before-seen viruses that have been lying dormant, frozen in ice, over tens of thousands of years.
https://globalnews.ca/news/9305181/50000-year-old-zombie-virus-revived-siberia-permafrost/
#research #Science #biology

Seventy-seven per cent of demonstrators open carrying were right wing. This is Brownshirt behaviour. What this isn’t is open and democratic debate. It also isn’t something that ever happens in Europe. https://www.nytimes.com/2022/11/26/us/guns-protests-open-carry.html

No cats in my life for now (unless bobcats & cougars count), as coyote population makes it impossible. But in honor of #Caturday, here's a long-ago fav from South Carolina when I had scores--all resulting from TNR of a huge feral population. This pic was taken prob around 2001(?) after some of them discovered infrared heat in the kennel storage room. Glowing eyes were extremely appropriate for this tribe. For a long time all dogs on the place had remarkable respect for cats. 😂 🔪 😾

I should share that I was an advisor briefly to Post.news, asked to put together an advisory board. I withdrew for various reasons -- disagreement about another advisor and about federation -- and have no ties to it now. I received nothing. I like Noam, its founder, and respect his work (Waze!). I'll watch Post. But I'm much more engaged here and want to study and learn about the potential of federation -- ActivityPub, Bluesky, Scuttlebutt -- as a model for public discourse.

I get a sense that #Twitter is about to become like this town:

"The town that went feral...This is the so-called Free Town Project, a venture wherein a group of libertarian activists attempted to take over a tiny New Hampshire town, Grafton, and transform it into a haven for libertarian ideals—part social experiment, part beacon to the faithful, Galt’s Gulch meets the New Jerusalem.... And then the bears moved in."

https://newrepublic.com/article/159662/libertarian-walks-into-bear-book-review-free-town-project?utm_source=substack&utm_medium=email

I've seen plenty of discussions in recent days over the network structure of Mastodon and whether it can remain decentralized as large commercial players begin taking an interest in the fediverse. I am neither an engineer nor an economist, but I do research the way media and information get distributed and I have some thoughts on this. A thread…

Good morning!

This was a beautiful misty dawn photographed by my husband at Bembridge on the Isle of Wight.

It's always a bit of a gamble when you're not naturally an early riser, but you're hoping that the weather forecasts are accurate - fortunately they were on this particular day!

In response to criticism of the Fediverse I've read today, and to some very uninformed comments I've read on Twitter from Musk supporters about firing most of Twitter's employees, I want to talk about what I know about the technical side of running a social service.

The short answer is: it ain't easy and it ain't cheap.

Even Crimethinc (play on 1984 thought crime) was trolled out. See original post on this thread ⬇️

I am just dying right now! ☠️

HOW was this done last year- and I missed it? 😳 #StarTrek #AllIWantForChristmasIsQ #Christmas 🎄

If you wander down the coast from Glencoe to Oban, you’ll drive along the side of Loch Linnhe. You’ll also pass Cuil Bay which has a spectacular view South down the coast. This image was shot just after sunset which allowed me to capture a band of golden light on the horizon just as it started to fade allowing the Milky Way to then dominate the night sky.

#Photography #AstroPhotography #LandscapePhotography #ScottishPhotography

At the turn of the (20th) century newspapers were the social media platforms of the day.

At the turn of the 21st century newspapers ceded that role, and their futures, to big-tech and the portals and silo-social networks.

The move to the fediverse gives modern news orgs a once in a generation opportunity to take that back.

Follow the lead of @TexasObserver and other news orgs that are launching their own instances for their staff/reporters and their audiences.

New York is taking a first-in-the-nation step to tap the brakes on the spread of cryptocurrency mining, under legislation that Gov. Kathy Hochul signed Tuesday.

https://www.masslive.com/politics/2022/11/cryptocurrency-mining-limited-under-new-york-law-first-of-its-kind-in-us.html

Today I am working here. First opened in 1752,the Biblioteca Marucelliana, Florence, was created to house the library of Francesco Marucelli (1625-1703), as per his will. It's motto: "Maxime Pauperum Utilitati", roughly "Above all for the poor". It is still a free public library @histodons

When #Twitter kicked #QAnon off on 1/8/21, the #diaspora largely ended up on #Telegram which is full of #nazis and #Russians. #diasqora

The people #radicalized on Telegram for two years have gotten far worse because it’s basically a Kremlin #psyops marketplace targeting every interest, demographic and vulnerability with propaganda and almost zero #moderation.

Twitter just sent QAnon away for an upgrade.😬
#EvacuateTwitter
https://jimstewartson.substack.com/p/putins-massive-american-telegram

I cannot express how important this is for you to read. Please take the time, take notes, tell everyone, write your representatives. Thank you.

Clock is ticking for the pro-democracy “independent state legislature” takeover.

https://web.archive.org/web/20221125035119/https://newrepublic.com/article/169091/supreme-court-independent-state-legislature-theory

“We the People” select our representatives!!

6 unelected, life-tenured justices, who have proven their views on fundamental issues to be well south of mainstream America, have no business attempting to snatch that hallmark of democracy away.