sojournTime @sojournTime@qoto.org

Today, @ddosecrets published 212GB of chat logs and recordings from paramilitary/militia groups, including Three Percent and Oath Keepers, available for everyone to download https://ddosecrets.com/article/paramilitary-leaks

More about the leak from @ProPublica: https://www.propublica.org/article/ap3-oath-keepers-militia-mole

Lynn Conway, electricial engineer and computer scientist, co-architect of the VLSI design revolution, and transgender activist, was born #OTD in 1938.

She invented Dynamic Instruction Scheduling at IBM, but IBM fired her when they learned she was transitioning.

Photo: Lynn Conway

I'm fully aware that this is a total waste of my time, but given today's news about an Apple settlement relating to Siri audio recordings I wrote this blog post about why I still don't think that companies are spying on us through our phone's microphones: https://simonwillison.net/2025/Jan/2/they-spy-on-you-but-not-like-that/

#MardiPatisserie

Drops of Jupiter is still a banger

neat hand-drawn zoetrope disc

#zoetrope #animation

I assembled my new Framework laptop this morning! I was SUPER nervous about assembling a laptop, but they have great video and written instructions on their website, and it booted into bios with no issue! I'm really excited about having a laptop that is designed to be repairable, and I hope it lasts me for a LONG time

Turns out that the slowest part of this process is actually waiting for my rural internet to download the latest version of Ubuntu...

Thanks for the recommendations, fediverse.

#Netzfund

The open letter genre is not my favorite, but this is a pretty good one: it makes sense both as a letter and as an editorial (whereas I think most open letters only succeed at one of those at most). Makes me feel proud to be a ProPublica supporter. https://link.propublica.net/view/5f0a081e2adb6b4c4e117336mh8n0.fq0/77a20502

If you love Richard Feynman you've got to watch this video...

... where Angela Collier will ruthlessly dissect the mythology he built around himself. You probably won't agree with everything she says, and you may hate some of it, but it will still be thought-provoking.

I didn't know about what she calls "Feynman bros": lazy male students who read Surely You Must Be Joking, Mr. Feynman! and try to adopt the flashy womanizing persona he depicts there, instead of working hard on physics. I can easily believe they exist. So if you know a youngster who likes physics, don't give them that book. Instead do what my uncle did: give them The Feynman Lectures on Physics.

I didn't know these books and indeed every book 'by Feynman' was actually written by his Caltech colleague Robert Leighton or his son Ralph Leighton based on audiotapes of lectures or conversations. I still don't know how much of a role Feynman had in crafting these concoctions.

I *did* know that he once flew into a rage and tried to choke his second wife.

I did not know he was good with children, eagerly answering letters from them, etc. It's nice that Collier points out this good side.

I *did* notice, from his anecdotes, that he put a huge amount of work into trying to seem like a manly man rather than a nerd.

I didn't fully notice that almost none of his anecdotes feature the famous physicists he worked with at the Manhattan Project. Collier points out that this leaves him free to make things up.

I think she overlooks how he eagerly *points out* that he used tricks to seem smart. He explains the tricks to show they're not so hard.

I could go on....

(1/2)

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=TwKpj2ISQAc

Today, 100 million Americans are the target of a much larger misinformation campaign, executed by Fox News et al, showing them a distorted view of the world at the behest of the entire Republican Party, rather than a single candidate.

~Fin~

The blogs became daily reads for staff, whose coverage was inexorably influenced by the Thune campaign's slow drip of poison.

Come Election Day, Thune won by scarcely 4,500 votes. Senate Democrats lost their leader. Republicans got their scalp.

Lauck went on to be a senior advisor to Thune, and Van Beeck spent years as legislative counsel for Thune. All this had zero impact on public disclosure and campaign finance laws.

The blogs had a single, shared mission: distort the worldview of the political reporters at the Argus Leader, the state's major newspaper. Each blog covered the race in great detail, complaining about claimed bias from the paper and its reporters (never mind that none existed).

Argus Leader reporters were not accustomed to having a constant source of feedback, and they each blog became a funhouse mirror in which they perceived themselves.

Ultimately, Daschle would be the sole incumbent to lose, and the first majority leader to lose reelection since 1952. The Republican nominee was Thune, formerly South Dakota's House rep.

Thune hired two people—Jon Lauck and Jason Van Beek—and had them start South Dakota political blogs, "Daschle v. Thune" and "South Dakota Politics." There was no disclosure that those blogs were Thune campaign mouthpieces. They pretended to be independent.

Twenty years ago, John Thune was elected to the U.S. Senate using a terrible, novel misinformation campaign that presaged the media environment of 2024. With Thune the new majority leader of the Senate, post-election, I think it's time to retell this story that has somehow been forgotten.

In 2004, Sen. Tom Daschle was the Senate minority leader, and Republicans were desperate for his scalp.