timorl @timorl@qoto.org

US wants to make Math not work when it's inconvenient for law enforcement:
https://www.theregister.com/2020/06/24/us_encryption_backdoor/

Fun bit:
> The terms "device manufacturer," "operating system provider," and "provider of remote computing service," apply only to firms with unit sales over one million annually or one million customers/subscribers.

So #Signal would have been able to avoid it if it was a federated network of independent service providers.

Unrelated: I seem to have misplaced my smallest open-source violin.

NYT threatens to dox blogger who often gets death threats. He deletes his blog
https://slatestarcodex.com/2020/06/22/nyt-is-threatening-my-safety-by-revealing-my-real-name-so-i-am-deleting-the-blog/

(submitted by perditus)

@djsumdog @LawrenceRoberts @prchrskd We already had an idea that outdoor transmission rates are low and it's true; two weeks laters and protesters who were all outside and 80% in masks aren't getting sick.

But in Arizona we reopened bars etc. without masks and two weeks later they're calling us the worst hotspot in the US and with our hospital capacity hitting 85% two days ago (blocking all elective surgeries until further notice) we are not looking hot.

Facebook makes a Slack competitor called "Facebook Workplace," with marquee customers like the government of Singapore, Walmart, Discovery Communications, Starbucks, and Campbell Soup Corporation.

On Wednesday, the company demonstrated a new suite of features for Workplace, including the ability to censor certain words or topics from the system. The example they chose? "Unionize."

https://theintercept.com/2020/06/11/facebook-workplace-unionize/

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Looks like somebody in the #UK government said: "you know what we need right now, in the middle of the COVID pandemic? a rushed, nation-wide roll-out of a critical piece of software that just got written and never got tested"

https://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2020/may/30/boris-johnsons-test-and-tracing-system-britain-lockdown

#coronavirus #covid19 #software

Here's my #FanArt of Phos from #LandOfTheLustrous based on part of the opening sequence of the #anime. It's from early 2018. I was still figuring out how shading worked (I'm STILL figuring out how shading works), but I'm very proud of the face and especially the "hair", which is made of a number of layers. It's got a very cool translucent look. I thought I'd shared it on this account already, but I guess not!
#HousekiNoKuni #宝石の国 #MastoArt

A Dutch court has sided with a woman who sued her mother to force her to remove pictures of her grandchildren from social media, finding that the images violated the GDPR.

https://www.bbc.com/news/technology-52758787

The mum said that she had repeatedly asked the grandmother to remove the pictures. The court found that the "purely personal" exception to the GDPR does not apply when large commercial platforms like Facebook and Pintrest are involved.

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you should never criticize a monarchist. it's wrong to kingshame

Meanwhile in #Poland, a historic victory of the incumbent Andrzej Duda in presidential elections.

Not a single vote went to any of the opposition candidates: https://www.theguardian.com/world/2020/may/11/poland-holds-ghost-election-with-0-turnout

Russia asked #decentralized messaging platform @delta for access to data on their servers #facepalm

Their response is in this blog post

https://delta.chat/en/2020-05-01-roskamnadzor

"If you don't specify that you require a secure ethical system, what you get is an insecure unethical system."

RT https://twitter.com/WTMMP/status/1251285960819687426 'STOP DOING MATH'

now, i know six billion, that's not the kind of number we WANT to hear. none of us WANTS to, i know, sandy, it's tragic, it's very tragic, i pray each night for the souls of these poor folks -- ahaha, not to God of course -- but you know what it's not the right time to do? it's not the right time to lose hope. six billion is a bad number. you know what's a great number? seven thousand, six hundred and twenty eight. that's the number of seals on the Gates of Heaven, okay. that's all they have left. we have them in every hospital now, the machines, i'm sure you've seem them, the big black tubes with the masonic sigils that go in all the squishy places -- when the spirit comes out, when the body passes away, it goes up the tubes, it goes inside, and bam, we've got it. you know what a human soul is, carla? power. that's what it is. the power to throw down God from his throne of corpses, once we have enough of them. we're going to unmake the Maker, friends. you call this a plague? i call it opportunity. i call it the time to seize the Kingdom of the Lord for our own and friends, come this time next year, i will be wearing His crown and gnawing His tender flesh for my supper. that's who you're going to need in 2024, okay - you need a president who can look God in the and laugh, a president who will spite the very cosmos and rend the cold stars themselves into the firmamant for an empire that will never die. we will invade hell by no later than 2025, i can promise you that, opening up a brave new frontier, my engineers are working on it already, it'll revitalize our flagging economy like nothing since the trans-atlantic slave trade. excuse me, i need to put on my ceremonial blackface for this part, the witching hour approaches fast, and we all know what that means, now don't we, cindy,
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Don't you ever think that open source software activism is not a "real world" issue

"Hospitals Need to Repair Ventilators. Manufacturers Are Making That Impossible"
https://www.vice.com/en_us/article/wxekgx/hospitals-need-to-repair-ventilators-manufacturers-are-making-that-impossible

I went for a job interview today.

The interviewer asked me, “What’s your biggest weakness?”

I said, “Answering the semantics of a question but ignoring the pragmatics.”

The interviewer asked, “Could you give me an example?”

I said, “Yes, I could.”

BOOM BOOM

aaaawkward
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