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● 02.07.23

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● Links 07/02/2023: Endless OS 5.0 and Voice.AI GPL Violations

Posted in News Roundup at 9:12 pm by Dr. Roy Schestowitz

GNU/Linux

Desktop/Laptop

=> ↺ Top 10 Mistakes New Linux Users Make

• Linux is an interesting choice for your operating system instead of Windows or macOS.

• You might have heard many good things, so you decided to try them. However, new Linux users make some mistakes that end up giving you an unpleasant user experience or making them think that using Linux is tough.

• And I do not blame you. When I started, I made some of those mistakes too, and it is simply inevitable for most users.

• But, if you get to know what you are doing wrong, problem solved, right?

Applications

=> ↺ 9 Best Free and Open Source Linux Disk Encryption Tools

• Many organizations and individuals need to encrypt sensitive files but do not have the funds to buy disk encryption software. Fortunately, there is a good selection of open source software available to download at no charge that offers good functionality. There are many different tools that allow for disk encryption.

• To provide an insight into the open source software that is available, we have compiled a list of 9 notable disk encryption tools. Hopefully, there will be something of interest here for anyone who wants easy-to-use data encryption and security.

Instructionals/Technical

=> ↺ Mysql Loading sample data

• Introduction MySQL is one of the most popular open-source relational database management systems used for managing and organizing data. To test and practice the features and functionality of the database, sample data can be loaded into the MySQL database. In this article, we will discuss how to load sample data into a MySQL database.

=> ↺ Mysql Inserting, Updating, and Deleting Rows

• MySQL is one of the most widely used relational database management systems in the world. It is an open-source database management system, which means that it is free to use and modify. It is widely used by website developers, data analysts, and other professionals who need to manage and analyze large amounts of data.

=> ↺ Day 96: the margin-trim property

• The margin-trim property allows a container element to trim the margins of its children where they adjoin the container’s edges.

=> ↺ 4 Useful Commands to Clear Linux Terminal Screen

• Just like any other operating system, Linux also supports a rich Graphical User interface (GUI). In fact, it supports multiple graphical desktop environments such as – GNOME, KDE, Cinnamon, and the list goes on.

• However, most Linux administrators and power users prefer to use the command line interface, because it allows us to automate repetitive tasks using the scripts.

=> ↺ 🔒 SSL is Everywhere

• This has all changed with the availability of free SSL certificates from Let’s Encrypt. There is now a much wider adoption of SSL encryption across the Internet. It is becoming less and less common to find web sites which don’t offer https. Wider adoption of SSL is a very good thing, but with this added layer of security there comes an added layer of complexity. Just like domain name registrations, SSL certificates need to be renewed regularly, otherwise they expire. This means you now have one more thing to monitor. 1

• In this post we’ll look at a three different ways to automate getting SSL certificate expiration dates. 2 Before we get to that, is an easier way?

=> ↺ Regular Expressions make me feel like a powerful wizard – and that’s not a good thing

• As a result, once the RegEx becomes more than trivially complex they’re hard for most humans to understand. That makes them difficult to debug. It also makes it difficult to add or remove functionality.

=> ↺ How to Setup Local YUM/DNF Repository on RHEL 9

• In this post, we will show you how to setup local yum/dnf repository using ISO file on RHEL 9.

=> ↺ Peter Czanik: Syslog-ng 101, part 6: Destinations and log path

• This is the sixth part of my syslog-ng tutorial. Last time, we learned about syslog-ng source definitions and how to check the syslog-ng version. Today, we learn about syslog-ng destinations and the log path. At the end of the session, we will also perform a quick syntax check.

Games

=> ↺ Dwarf Fortress: How Freeware Turned Into Millions

• If you’re not familiar with Dwarf Fortress, you’ve missed out on a legendary story about a labor of love. The game, a minimalist experience in which you are managing a colony of dwarves as they live their lives and conduct their dwarf-y business, was created by two brothers sixteen years ago. It’s an incredibly deep and detailed simulation and narrative builder… and it was released for free. This was during a time when lots of content producers were running around screaming about how “free” as a content concept could never work for anything.

=> ↺ Star Wars Dark Forces source port The Force Engine adds Linux support

• The Force Engine is a free and open source game engine reimplementation for Star Wars Dark Forces, with upcoming support of Outlaws. The latest release version 1.08 adds Linux support!

=> ↺ Space looter-shooter EVERSPACE 2 set to launch on April 6

• EVERSPACE 2 from ROCKFISH Games is ready to properly blast off on April 6th and it’s looking mighty fine. I’ve been quite excited about seeing this one completed and I’ll be taking a good look around the release or shortly after.

=> ↺ Steam Next Fest – February 2023 edition brings lots of demos

• Running until February 13th, you’ve again got a while to cram in trying out as many demos as possible in Steam Next Fest – February 2023 edition. Not only is there plenty to play but this also kicks off a full week of developer livestreams and chat, which you can see on the event page.

=> ↺ Steam and Steam Deck Beta fixes pages not rendering, plus GE-Proton 7-49 out now

• Valve put out another small Beta update for Steam Desktop and Steam Deck that fixes some more annoying bugs. Changelog again the same across both, since it’s mainly about New Big Picture Mode that Desktop and Steam Deck now share.

=> ↺ Building a Retro Linux Gaming Computer – Part 24: Mother Knows Best

=> ↺ Get some laid-back life sims and builders in this latest game bundle

• The Sim-ple Life Bundle from Humble Bundle is another that has a few good looking indie gems you might want to relax with. As usual, I’ll go over what to expect on Linux desktop and Steam Deck for compatibility. Noting if something is Native Linux or ProtonDB ratings (which goes: Platinum – Gold – Silver – Bronze – Broken) to save you some clicking around.

=> ↺ OG DOOM Shows Off The Origins Of Multi-Monitor

• We have a thing for DOOM, and we admit it. The source was released, and clever hackers have ported the engine to every system imaginable. It’s a right of passage, when hacking a machine, to run DOOM on it — be it a VoIP phone, or tractor. But the original 1993 release does have a few notable tricks, and there’s something to be said for recreating that experience on period hardware. And that’s what we’re covering today: [Tech Tangents] discovered DOOM’s multi-monitor support, and built a 4-computer cluster to show it off.

=> ↺ Superhero strategy game Capes now being published by Daedalic Entertainment

• Daedalic Entertainment have now teamed up with Spitfire Interactive to help their work on the superhero strategy game Capes. It’s a turn-based strategy game where you assemble a team of unique heroes who are fighting to take back their city, which is now controlled by evildoers.

=> ↺ NVIDIA Vulkan Beta 525.47.07 supports extension to help VKD3D-Proton DXR

• Seems like a future update of VKD3D-Proton that translates Direct3D 12 to Vulkan for Proton, for Windows games on Linux desktop and Steam Deck, will make use of a newer extension available in the new NVIDIA Vulkan Beta 525.47.07 release.

=> ↺ Gorgeous puzzler Bonfire Peaks getting a 3-part DLC starting March 2nd

• Easily one of the best puzzle games to release back in 2021 and frankly it’s criminally overlooked (only 140 use reviews on Steam?!), is set to get a whole lot bigger with the Lost Memories 3-part DLC. The gorgeous blocky-voxel world with great lighting and bite-sized puzzles won me over easily.

=> ↺ Zero Wing, Twin Cobra and other Toaplan classics get upgraded for PC

• All your base are belong to us. Toaplan are having some absolute classics revived including Zero Wing, Out Zone, Twin Cobra and Truxton with a PC release and enhancements. Oh, and Native Linux support to ensure they’re great on Steam Deck too.

=> ↺ Superfluous Returnz is an unnecessary video game of a useless superhero

• French comedy point and click adventure Superfluous Returnz is all about a useless superhero and it’s releasing on May 15th. Coming with Native Linux support, I must admit one particular scene in the trailer made me laugh a bit, probably more than it should have.

=> ↺ touchHLE is a new emulator for iPhone OS apps

• Want a way to emulate old Apple iOS apps and games? Well, touchHLE just had its first release to prevent some more things being lost to time.

Distributions and Operating Systems

New Releases

=> ↺ Endless OS 5.0 Is Out with Refreshed Desktop Experience, Wayland Support

• Based on Debian GNU/Linux 11 “Bullseye”, Endless OS 5.0 is finally here with its refreshed desktop interface built on top of the GNOME 41 desktop environment and running on top of the next-generation Wayland display protocol for improved privacy, security, and a performance boost over X11.

• Since Endless OS is an app-centric operating system, the new release comes with an all-new App Center that no longer features hard-coded lists of apps and promises to make it easier than ever to find, download, and install all the apps you need for your daily computing needs.

BSD

=> ↺ 5 Key Reasons Why You Need an OpenZFS Performance Audit

• To expand your OpenZFS storage infrastructure to meet constantly evolving infrastructure demands, you must understand where the limits of your current system lie. Only then can you plan to expand to provide the capacity, durability, and performance that modern applications demand.

=> ↺ Print on FreeBSD

• I kinda omitted this topic (printing) for quite a lot of time – when I was using FreeBSD in the corporate environment I still printed from Windows VM on a network printers. Then they forced me to use Windows anyway. At home my wife always had a printer configured (as she uses it more) and the other printer also had USB port – so you could just copy the PDF or JPG file to a USB pendrive – attach it the printer and hit print button for the selected files. No configuration needed.

Fedora Family / IBM

=> ↺ An Early Look at the Official Fedora Budgie and Sway Spins

• As I reported earlier this year, the upcoming Fedora Linux 38 release will get two new official spins featuring the modern and lightweight Budgie desktop environment, as well as the Sway tiling window manager and Wayland compositor.

• Of course, these will be available to the general public later this Spring and as a beta preview version later in March 2023. As usual, I wanted you to be the first to take an early look at these two new Fedora Linux 38 spins, just in case you have plans to switch to Budgie or Sway with the Fedora Linux 38 release because they look hot.

=> ↺ Fedora 38 Will Offer Unfiltered Flathub Access Out of the Box

• Fedora users can rejoice – the proposal to include unfiltered access to Flathub as a third-party repository in Fedora 38 has been approved.

Debian Family

=> ↺ SparkyLinux 6.6 Minor Release is out, brings a new Persistence USB tool and a few updates

• SparkyLinux is a unique Debian-based distribution which features both Debian stable and Testing flavours. In addition, it has several use-case specific flavours, such as the SparkyLinux gaming edition and system rescue edition.

• A new release of SparkyLinux 6.6 is here, bringing the latest package and Kernel updates.

• Here’s what’s new.

Devices/Embedded

=> ↺ VAR-SOM-AM62 System-on-Module features TI AM625x Cortex-A53/M4 SoC

• Variscite provides support for Linux (Yocto, Debian, Boot2Qt), Android, and FreeRTOS for the module, as well as evaluation kits with the Symphony carrier board and an optional LVDS display with a touch panel. The wiki is up with currently under construction with limited information. The VAR-SOM-AM62 AM625x system-on-module is compatible with the VAR-SOM Pin2Pin family that already includes modules powered by NXP i.MX6UL/6ULL, NXP i.MX 8M NANO/MINI/PLUS and i.MX 93, up to the higher-end i.MX 8X and 8QuadMax SoCs.

=> ↺ Low Power FPGA dev board can be pre-ordered for $69.95

• The IcyBlue Feather by Oak Dev Tech is a tiny development board based on the Lattice ICE5LP4K low-power FPGA. This development board provides flexible peripherals such as up to 22x GPIOs, LiPo battery support and it can be programmed using the open-source Project IceStorm.

=> ↺ Arduino Does SDI Video With FPGA Help

• If you are running video around your home theater, you probably use HDMI. If you are running it in a professional studio, however, you are probably using SDI, Serial Digital Interface. [Chris Brown] looks at SDI and shows a cheap SDI signal generator for an Arduino.

=> ↺ Custom Enclosure For 3D Printer

• Having an enclosure around an FDM 3D printer is generally a good idea, even when printing only with PLA, as it keeps the noise in, and the heat (and smell, with ABS) inside. With all the available options for enclosures out there, however, [David McDaid] figured that it should be possible to make an enclosure that does not look like a grow tent and is not overly expensive. He also shared the design files on GitHub.

=> ↺ MicroPython ESP32 IDE Makes Life Simpler

• In theory, using MicroPython on the ESP32 is easy —  just flash an image and connect using a serial port. But that leaves a lot of things you still have to do. You need to move files between the two platforms. You’ll want to manage network configurations. You might want better editing and assistance, too. So there are a number of IDEs made to help you and one we recently noticed was MPY-Jama.

Open Hardware/Modding

=> ↺ Plotting AI-generated art onto paper

• AI-generated art is all the rage right now, thanks to widespread sharing on social media. The appeal is obvious: anyone can utilize an online service to create a unique (and often hilarious) piece of art based on a simple prompt. To display that art, one can utilize a high-quality printer or a digital photo frame.

Mobile Systems/Mobile Applications

=> ↺ Android using Context Hub RE (CHRE) to speed up Fast Pair

=> ↺ How to Record and Delete Call Recordings on Android – Guiding Tech

=> ↺ Xiaomi’s 200MP camera phone is getting Android 13-based MIUI 14 in some regions | Android Central

=> ↺ 8 Ways to Fix Bluetooth Turning on Automatically on Android – TechPP

=> ↺ 4 Ways to Print Text Messages From Android

• Printing text messages from Android is completely possible, even though Google doesn’t provide an obvious way to do it. As helpful as a big print button in the Messages app would be, that’s not how this works. You can print one, a few, or all your texts directly from your phone or through your computer.

=> ↺ OnePlus 11 is a Great Value for No-Frills Android Lovers

=> ↺ The OnePlus Pad wants you to take Android tablets seriously | Digital Trends

=> ↺ Android TV 13 is actually available now

=> ↺ The Rise of Oppo and Vivo and the Fall of Samsung and Huawei: Android Market Share Review – Gizchina.com

=> ↺ Can’t buy Kindle books on Android? This tutorial will help – Good e-Reader

=> ↺ Leaked Nothing Phone (2) specs suggest a fantastic Android phone is coming | T3

=> ↺ How to find your number on Android | Tom’s Guide

=> ↺ Android phones from Chinese vendors share private data • The Register

=> ↺ GTA Trilogy Definitive Edition for Android reportedly in development with no release date

=> ↺ Poco X4 GT starts receiving Android 13-based MIUI 14 update – Times of India

=> ↺ Realme X7 Max 5G gets Android 13-based Realme UI 4.0 stable update – GSMArena.com news

=> ↺ Android 14 might turn your smartphone into a webcam | BGR

=> ↺ OnePlus 11 everything we know so far: 4 years of Android updates to Hasselblad camera | Technology News,The Indian Express

=> ↺ The Wi-R protocol relies on body for data communication, consumes up to 100x less than Bluetooth – CNX Software

Free, Libre, and Open Source Software

=> ↺ How the Gherkin language bridges the gap between customers and developers

• Cucumber is an open source framework that enables the creation of automated software tests using an easy-to-write and common language. It’s based on the concept of behavior-driven development (BDD), which dictates that creating software should define how a user wants an application to behave when specific conditions are true.

• The Cucumber framework isn’t “technology” in the modern sense. It’s not a collection of bits and bytes. Instead, it’s a way of writing in natural language (English, in the case of this article, but so far Gherkin has been translated to over 70 languages). When using the Cucumber framework, you aren’t expected to know how to read or write code. You only need to be able to write down ideas you have about how you work. You should also document how you want technology to work for you, using a set of specific terms and guidelines.

Web Browsers/Web Servers

Mozilla

=> ↺ Fix for Firefox getting deleted when SFS layers change

• Forum member Caramel installed the ‘firefox-skel-ask’ PET, which has a menu entry “Internet -> Download latest Firefox”.

• I have already posted how this has been properly internationalized:

• https://bkhome.org/news/202302/ff-download-improved.html

• However, Caramel then added an SFS onto the layers on the main desktop, and after rebooting, Firefox was deleted.

• There are different ways that Firefox can be installed; via easy.sfs, via the ‘firefox-skel-ask’ PET, via a FF package in PKGget (PPM), or via a FF SFS. This may cause a conflict if two FFs are installed via these different ways. To fix this, there is a script in the initrd, /sbin/fixlayers, that tries to detect conflicts.

• I found the problem in /sbin/fixlayers script and applied a fix:

• https://github.com/bkauler/woofq/commit/e6b1eb44a499fa6cdc8fc552b2c22d3d22e33536

• I probably should put in similar code for Chromium. The Kirkstone-series has Chromium in easy.sfs, but there are also Chromium SFSs

Productivity Software/LibreOffice/Calligra

=> ↺ A brief history of LibreOffice

• In early 2009, OpenOffice.org was the main competitor to Microsoft Office in the individual office productivity suites market. The popular open source office suite’s community looked forward to a November conference in Orvieto, Italy. Things were going well, and the future looked bright.

• And then, in April of that year, Oracle announced its plans to acquire Sun Microsystems.

• Personally, I knew it was bad news for OpenOffice.Org. Oracle had no interest in the open source suite, and I felt confident it would abandon the project. Of course, I hoped to be proved wrong at the upcoming conference. Instead, a single representative from Oracle, with no budget to speak of, arrived in Orvieto and talked vaguely about monetization and re-branding. I felt that my worst fears were confirmed, and my fellow community members agreed.

FSF

=> ↺ FSF Events: Talk by RMS on March 17

• The Free Software Foundation (FSF) is hosting a talk by Richard

• M. Stallman on March 17, 2023 at 15:00 EDT (19:00 UTC).

Licensing / Legal

=> ↺ Voice.AI: GPL Violations with a Side of DRM

• This is concerning, since Praat is licensed under the GPLv3 and libgcrypt is licensed under the LGPLv2.1. These licenses are not included with the software at all; in fact, Voice.ai’s Terms of Service1 has sections which explicitly violate these licenses: [...]

=> ↺ If you’re into the FOSS/tech ecosystem. You’ve probably heard of ‘GitHub’

• Many people don’t know about the difference between open-source and proprietary shareware. I’ve seen many cases where people use GitHub releases to distribute proprietary binaries of their programs. Some don’t even bother to license their software, they just dump it on GitHub, so even though you can see the source code you’re not legally allowed to modify / re-use it for your own project.

• Your projects don’t have to be explicitly licensed under a FOSS license. There are plenty of web-based git forges. GitLab, Codeberg, Sourcehut to name a few. Isn’t it ironic that GitHub itself isn’t “oPen sOuRce”? Git is meant to be used over email, decentralized

Programming/Development

=> ↺ How did the very first software get programmed?

• I mean. Think about it.

=> ↺ Bare-bones Diffusion Models

• So… how do diffusion models generate images? Why are these images as good as they are, and not better (or worse)? And… if we’re talking about conjuring new images from nothingness, what does “better” even mean?

=> ↺ Andy Wingo: whippet: towards a new local maximum

=> ↺ Can sanitizers find the two bugs I wrote in C++?

• A few days ago I published a short post about two bugs I wrote while developing the C++ external scanner for my TLA⁺ tree-sitter grammar. Reactions were mixed! Many people were supportive, but there were of course the usual drive-by claims by developers that the bugs were trivial, they would’ve found & fixed them inside of 20 minutes, and I was laughably incompetent for having written them in the first place.

=> ↺ The Validity of Custom Element Tag Names

• There I was, minding my own business, when I readan opinion from David Bissetthat ended with</$0.02>.

=> ↺ Creatively Misusing TLA+

• I spent the past few weeks thinking about complexity and poking dead birds and stuff, but now that theMarch TLA+ workshop is available(useC0MPUT3RTHINGSfor 15% off!), I’m back in teacher mode and making workshop improvements.1TLA+ is intended for finding flaws in software designs. But what else can we do with it?

• Creative Misuseis the use of a tool in an unintended way. For example, if you use a screwdriver to pry something open, or a book as a monitor stand. Creative misuse in software includes making games in Excel spreadsheets and usingyestotest for broken hardware. Creative misuse is 1) very fun, and 2) expands the space of how useful the tool is. I love finding creative misuses for tools. Here’s a few of them for TLA+.

=> ↺ Subsetting Named Lists in R

• IntroductionIn R, lists are a fundamental data structure that allows us to store multiple objects of different data types under a single name.

Leftovers

=> ↺ 2023-02-07 secret government telephone numbers

• To be clear, the “secret” here was a joke and these buttons are in fact well documented. The buttons I was talking about were the AUTOVON call precedence buttons, used for a five-level prioritization scheme within the AUTOVON military telephone network. The labels on these buttons, FO, F, I, P, for Flash Override, Flash, Immediate, and Priority, directly reflected the nuclear C2 scheme at the time. The AUTOVON telephone network is long retired, but military telephone systems continue to provide a call precedence scheme today, admittedly usually without dedicated buttons.

• Well, the idea of call precedence without the priority buttons leads naturally to a followup that I promised: government and defense call prioritization schemes on the general, civilian telephone network. It has long been recognized that in the event of a national emergency, many people involved in the response would not have access to a dedicated government telephone network. This is particularly true when you view civil defense as a wider remit, beyond just military reprisal. Recovery from a disaster of any type will involve federal, state, and local government leaders, as well as staff of response organizations like critical utilities, hospitals, and disaster relief organizations. Not all of these people can realistically be furnished with a phone on a dedicated network. The only way to practically ensure prioritized communications in a disaster is to provide that capability as a feature of the public switched telephone network.

=> ↺ Bruce Springsteen and These Lost Years

• “At 15 it’s all tomorrows. At 73 it’s a lot of goodbyes. That’s why you have to make the most of right now. ”—Bruce Springsteen, opening night of the 2023 E Street Band tour, Tampa, Fla.1

=> ↺ Conor McGregor responds to Liam Neeson calling him a ‘little leprechaun’

• Neeson last week called McGregor a “little leprechaun” who “gives Ireland a bad name.”

=> ↺ Finland re-takes world ice carousel record

• Finland re-took the world ice carousel record from the United States on Monday, when Janne Käpylehto’s latest creation in southwestern Finland’s Lappajärvi was recognised as the biggest ever rotating ice circle.

=> ↺ War Fever

• With the exception of the Second World War, every military conflict in which the United States has taken part has generated an anti-war movement. During the American Revolution, numerous Loyalists preferred British rule to a war for independence. New Englanders opposed the War of 1812; most Whigs denounced the Mexican-American War launched by the Democratic president James K. Polk; and both the Union and the Confederacy were internally divided during the Civil War. More recently, the wars in Vietnam, Iraq, and Afghanistan split the country. At the same time, wars often create an atmosphere of hyper-patriotism, leading to the equation of dissent with treason and to the severe treatment of critics. During the struggle for independence, many Loyalists were driven into exile. Both sides in the Civil War arrested critics and suppressed anti-war newspapers. But by far the most extreme wartime violations of civil liberties (with the major exception of Japanese American internment during the Second World War) took place during World War I. This is the subject of Adam Hochschild’s latest book, American Midnight.

=> ↺ After Earthquake Devastates Syria, US Shows No Interest in Lifting Sanctions

• US sanctions are specifically designed to prevent Syria’s reconstruction.

=> ↺ Over 1,600 Dead as Twin Earthquakes Devastate Syria and Turkey

• Thousands of collapsed buildings, widespread destruction, and deep anguish were reported alongside over 2,300 dead and thousands more injured after a pair of earthquakes—an initial 7.8 tremor on the Richter scale in the early morning and another that measured 7.5—devastated Syria and Turkey on Monday.

=> ↺ The earthquake in Turkey is one of the deadliest this century. Here’s why

=> ↺ Quake death toll surpasses 7,700 as rescuers search for survivors in Turkey and Syria

=> ↺ CNN reports from scene of rescue operation in Turkey

• CNN’s Becky Anderson reports from Gaziantep, Turkey after a powerful 7.8 magnitude earthquake rocked the region killing thousands and injuring thousands more.

=> ↺ Huu Can Tran’s American Dream

• In August of 1989, Huu Can Tran obtained full ownership of the house he previously shared with another roommate. It was a modest two-bedroom on a narrow street in sunny San Gabriel, Calif., about 10 miles east of Los Angeles. An immigrant from China, Tran, then in his late 30s, had grasped a little piece of the American dream: homeownership.

=> ↺ Denmark rushes to assist in wake of devastating earthquake

• Thousands killed in Turkey and Syria, while many more left without homes following a powerful 7.8 magnitude quake

=> ↺ Letter from London: Stay Firmly in Your Path and Dare

• An important sideline to the artist’s daily journey to what is presently a large black and pearlised soft pink and silver ink painting on the wall of her studio is mentoring. Some of her previous mentees are so pleased to have had her as mentor, they not only keep in touch, they continue to seek advice as well. This she gives freely, because she is that type of person. However, it does bring home the fact that there are many creative people out here in the UK perilously close to some kind of artistic dystrophy. Some are being brave about it, some are in pieces, while others just give up. Being an artist is like living on the edge anyway and artists often unfairly have to defend themselves from accusations of having it all too easy. This must be so infuriating for them. For many creative people, creative work is an utter necessity. Some cannot perceive of their life without it. It is existential, therefore, to use a word these days released again from what was the long grip of Jean-Paul Sartre and Simone de Beauvoir. For a true artist, it is a condition of existence.

• Traditionally, the arts in this country have been well supported. This has always been one of the reasons for the rich vibrancy and bounce to our habits and mores. Now that much of this support is dwindling, or disappearing altogether, some of it now even replaced in advance by a greater demand in schools for more science and less art, I fear that genuinely gifted people are falling by the wayside — people already gnawed to the bone by their lack of self-esteem and general sense of self-worth. I noted one teacher last week say that he was joining the latest teacher strikes after what he called ‘the last straw’ of his primary school losing their art teacher. It is not just in schools, either. The government now wants universities to decrease arts and humanities funding in order to teach what they deem commercially more advantageous courses. What is most frustrating is that this is a provenly counter-productive act and one which goes well against the grain of what people know. The arts are widely known to develop emotional intelligence. They stretch people. Steve Jobs would always hire an artist or musician who was into technology rather than a computer freak. The arts develop the whole being — mind, body and soul. Some folk who struggle with more mainstream subjects, as well as true high achievers interestingly enough, have said they don’t know what they would have done without an arts education. The present government also now want mathematics to be taught until 18. The artist of this piece has no qualifications in this subject whatsoever. She never understood it and couldn’t get to grips with it on any level, no matter how hard she tried. What kind of hell would her years to the age of 18 have been? Even the financial sector admits creative people make good financiers. Entrepreneurship, after all, is a creative mindset. At the end of the day, art is not a soft option.

Education

=> ↺ The Approaching Disintegration of Academia

• That moment haunts me as I begin my final semester before retirement—not only because faculty on the state payroll have deliberately crossed the critical line from pursuing the truth to professing The Way, but also because the Enlightenment sensibility that finds such mission creep objectionable seems to be passing from the scene. The “deconstructive turn”—as the critic Christopher Norris once called it—is nothing more than a verbal sleight-of-hand. It invites us to tease out secondary and tertiary senses of words to show how a text contradicts what it seems to be saying, free-associate our way to philosophical banalities or outright non-sequiturs, and finally glaze the mishmash with a layer of impenetrable jargon. If a reader is foolish enough to attempt to make sense of what is being said, he’ll get bogged down before he can figure out nothing is being said at all.

Hardware

=> ↺ Spy Drone Propeller Makes For A Quiet PC

• MIT recently announced its research on toroidal propellers to create quieter drones. That got [Major Hardware] thinking about noisy PC fans. The obvious solution was to adapt the toroidal shape for a PC fan. He was familiar with the idea from similar screws on boats that are commercially available. You can see his tests in the video below.

=> ↺ SDR Scanner Listens To Everything

• In the old days, scanners would listen to a bunch of channels in a round-robin fashion. If a signal breaks the squelch, the scanner stops and scanning continues scanning after a few seconds of inactivity. But with modern SDRs, you don’t have to listen to one channel at a time. You can listen to all of them. [Tech Minds] shows RTL SDR Scanner on Linux to record up to 20 MHz of the band simultaneously. It records all the channels in the band of interest. The actual project is on GitHub.

Health/Nutrition/Agriculture

=> ↺ Health Care Workers Stage Largest NHS Strike in UK’s History

=> ↺ UK Nurses, Health Workers Stage Largest NHS Strike in Nation’s History

• Condemning the United Kingdom’s Conservative-controlled government for putting “patients at risk” by refusing to pay nurses fairly and forcing healthcare providers out of the profession, tens of thousands of nurses and ambulance workers joined forces on Monday to stage the largest work stoppage in the history of the venerated National Health Service.

=> ↺ With Abortion Rights Under Attack, Menstrual Equity Gains Support

• Sandwiched between the high-profile leak of the Dobbs v. Jackson draft and the official overturning of Roe v. Wade, the Austin City Council passed a resolution to provide free menstrual products in public-facing city buildings. Pritika Paramasivam, a student at University of Texas at Austin and organizer with Texas Menstrual Equity Coalition, spoke at a press conference about the policy. Paramasivam urged council members to take proactive action to decrease reproductive health inequities by providing free products to the public. “In light of the recent news we have heard about the leaked draft and the threat placed upon the fundamental reproductive rights, such as abortion, Plan B, and sex-ed, I think it’s very important to understand that people across the United States have fear not only about their lack of access to reproductive health but also…menstrual equity,” said Paramasivam.

=> ↺ Climate change is contributing to the rise of superbugs, new UN report says

• Climate change and antimicrobial resistance are two of the greatest threats to global health, according to a new report from the United Nations Environment Programme.

=> ↺ MovieScoop Kent Plaza Cinemas adjusts business strategy to endure COVID-19 pandemic

• When the COVID-19 pandemic closed businesses down in 2020, over 70 films pushed their release dates. This caused MovieScoop Kent Plaza Cinemas, a movie theater in University Plaza in Kent, to adapt how the business operated.

=> ↺ Japanese vineyard makes excellent wine with Raspberry Pi

• Vineyard Kikushima grows Merlot, Pinot Noir, and Cabernet Sauvignon grapes on steep slopes in Katsunuma, the heart of of Yamanashi’s wine region. It’s scenic and full of wine — double tick — but humid conditions attract lots of insects prone to attacking grapevines. And while these insects can be managed using pesticides, that approach risks tarnishing the flavour of the wine as well as being undesirable from an ecological perspective, so Raspberry Pi has been harnessed to keep chemical use to a minimum.

=> ↺ Six foods that climate change is going to ruin

• Besides supply chain breakdowns, heat waves and rising sea levels, scientists cannot fully anticipate how the Earth’s ever-rising temperature will impact every aspect of the environment. Agriculture is a science of balances — just the right kinds of minerals in the soil, the ideal amount of sunshine and precipitation — and global warming throws so many new variables into the mix that the most predictable thing about it is its unpredictability.

Proprietary

=> ↺ Microsoft Outlook and Teams suffer another global outage

• Microsoft on Tuesday said it was investigating issues with collaboration suite Teams and email service Outlook as users across the globe struggled to access their emails. This marks the second such disruption in less than two weeks for Microsoft online services.

Security

=> ↺ Your child’s name makes a horrible password

• What’s in a name? A lot. It’s the first piece of information that identifies a person — from their first name given at birth to their last name which connects them to their family lineage. Even a fictional name like Clark Kent says a lot. Not surprisingly a lot of people use the name of their favorite superhero as passwords, which made us wonder: Do people still use their names or the names of their nearest and dearest as passwords? The unfortunate answer: Yes, they do. This year, in recognition of Safer Internet Day, we explore how common this is and why it is not a good idea.

=> ↺ Google engineers plot to mitigate prototype pollution

• Plan to create boundary between JavaScript objects and their blueprints gathers momentum

=> ↺ Trying to make sense of TikTok’s cybersecurity concerns

• It’s not just regulators and lawmakers struggling to make sense of cybersecurity concerns about TikTok — even your Codebook author can’t figure out which are overhyped and which are valid.

=> ↺ Latvian energy and transport companies come under cyber-attack

• On February 7, Latvian energy and transport companies have been attacked by cybercriminals, national cyber defense agency CERT.lv confirmed Tuesday.

=> ↺ Germany Appoints Central Bank IT Chief to Head Cybersecurity

• Germany appointed Claudia Plattner to lead its cybersecurity agency, months after her predecessor was removed following reports of possible problematic ties to Russia.

=> ↺ OpenSSL Ships Patch for High-Severity Flaws

• The most serious of the vulnerabilities may allow an attacker to read memory contents or launch denial-of-service exploits.

=> ↺ Vulnerability Provided Access to Toyota Supplier Management Network

• Security researcher finds severe vulnerability providing system admin access to Toyota’s global supplier management network.

=> ↺ Patch Released for Actively Exploited GoAnywhere MFT Zero-Day

• A patch has been released for the GoAnywhere MFT zero-day vulnerability that has been exploited in attacks.

=> ↺ Linux Variant of Cl0p Ransomware Emerges

• A Cl0p ransomware variant targeting Linux systems emerged recently, but a flaw in the encryption algorithm has already allowed for the creation of a free decryptor.

=> ↺ VMware Says No Evidence of Zero-Day Exploitation in ESXiArgs Ransomware Attacks

• ESXiArgs ransomware attacks continue, with thousands of unpatched ESXi servers compromised within a few days via CVE-2021-21974.

=> ↺ KrebsOnSecurity in Upcoming Hulu Series on Ashley Madison Breach

• KrebsOnSecurity will likely have a decent amount of screen time in an upcoming Hulu documentary series about the 2015 megabreach at marital infidelity site Ashley Madison. While I can’t predict what the producers will do with the video interviews we shot, it’s fair to say the series will explore tantalizing new clues as to who may have been responsible for the attack.

Privacy/Surveillance

=> ↺ e-Evidence compromise blows a hole in fundamental rights safeguards

• In December 2022, the Council and the European Parliament agreed on a final compromise text on the so-called ‘e-Evidence’ proposals. With major concessions given to the Member States’ position, the results of these trilogues negotiations are of bad omen for people’s rights and freedoms.

=> ↺ Strike against Radio Dreyeckland: German police now know sources

• With the search of the free radio station, authorities obtained large amounts of unencrypted data. The public prosecutor’s office also demanded that the web host hand over the IP addresses of all visitors.

=> ↺ CBP proposes to require even more information from international air travelers

• US Customs and Border and Border Protection (CBP) has proposed new rules to expand its Advance Passenger Information System (APIS) to require all international airlines serving the US to provide additional information about all passengers, prior to flight departures.

• CBP’s Notice of Proposed Rulemaking (NPRM), published last Thursday in the Federal Register, falsely claims that the proposed rules would not affect individuals, only airlines. But the mandate for airlines to provide additional information about each would-be passenger makes it a de facto requirement, as a condition of air travel, for travelers to provide this information to airlines and the government.

• This would constitute a significant expansion of an ongoing unconstitutional surveillance and profiling program in which all international air travelers are required to respond to suspicionless, warrantless, interrogatories administered through airlines as intermediaries and outsourced government surveillance agents and interrogators.

=> ↺ Court Gives Its Blessing To FBI’s J6 Geofence Warrant, Denies Motion To Suppress

• Geofence warrants are just part of day-to-day cop business these days. Rather than moving forward with a list of suspects, law enforcement agencies just ask for data on everyone in a certain area at a certain time and move backwards to probable cause to investigate and arrest.

Defence/Aggression

=> ↺ U.S. military failed to detect prior balloon threats, top defense official says

• Air Force Gen. Glen VanHerck, the commander of North American Aerospace Defense Command, better known as NORAD, and U.S. Northern Command, was asked at a briefing whether his command had been involved in tracking previous balloons and whether he could identify differences between the most recent case and other balloons dating to the Trump administration.

=> ↺ Eek, a balloon! How China easily got Republicans to beclown themselves

• Presumably, we’re meant to believe his elaborate combover and spray tan would have created a manliness force field that repelled all floating objects. But, of course, it’s a lie, as Jonathan Karl of ABC News reminded Sen. Marco “Once Pretended To Like Rap” Rubio, R-Fla., when he echoed Trump’s lie on-air. In reality, U.S. officials claim the Chinese sent three balloons into U.S. airspace during Trump’s presidency, none of which were shot down.

=> ↺ Unauthorized Disclosure: High Stakes Of Perpetuating War In Ukraine

• Subscribe to the Unauthorized Disclosure podcast with this free trial offer.Medea Benjamin, CODEPINK co-founder and co-author of War In Ukraine: Making Sense of a Senseless Conflict, and Ann Wright, a CODEPINK member, retired Army colonel, and former State Department diplomat, join “Unauthorized Disclosure” hosts Rania Khalek and Kevin Gosztola to discuss the high stakes of a protracted conflict in Ukraine.Initially, President Joe Biden said the United States would not ship tank to Ukraine. That line was crossed, and now Ukraine would like fighter jets. Both Medea and Ann address the issue of escalating with more and more weapons and military equipment and crossing red lines that are drawn by officials.

• Medea draws from her experience in antiwar organizing to share how difficult it has been to advocate for a diplomatic settlement and mobilize Americans to oppose fueling this war. Later in the conversation, Ann, who lives in Hawaii, responds to the prevalent idea that the conflict in Ukraine against Russia has been a test run for a war over Taiwan against China. Hawaii is a US military launchpad for Asia-Pacific exercises and actions intended to curtail China’s influence in the region.The Chinese “spy balloon” incident shows just how rapidly a scenario could develop that resulted in a devastating conflict.

=> ↺ War as Crime of Aggression: Reed Brody on Prosecuting Putin & Probing Western Leaders for Other Wars

• As the war in Ukraine nears the one-year mark, we speak with veteran war crimes prosecutor Reed Brody about a growing movement to hold Russian President Vladimir Putin and his closest allies criminally responsible for the invasion. The Ukrainian government has called for a special tribunal to prosecute Russian leaders, modeled on the Nuremberg trials of Nazi officials after World War II. On Thursday, European Commission President Ursula von der Leyen announced the formation of an international center in The Hague for the prosecution of the crime of aggression in Ukraine. “Aggression is the worst international crime,” says Brody, who notes that there is currently no venue to prosecute crimes of aggression largely due to opposition from the United States and other victorious powers after World War II. “Let’s change the rules forever, so that aggression — not only by Russia against Ukraine but any cases of aggression — could be prosecuted.” Brody has been involved in several major war crimes cases, including against Chile’s former dictator Augusto Pinochet, Haiti’s Jean-Claude “Baby Doc” Duvalier and former Chadian dictator Hissène Habré.

=> ↺ U.S. Downs Chinese Balloon as Blinken Cancels Summit & U.S. Expands Military Presence in Philippines

• China has accused the United States of overreacting after President Joe Biden ordered a suspected spy balloon shot down off the coast of South Carolina on Sunday. China maintains the balloon, first spotted over U.S. airspace last week, was a civilian aircraft blown off course. The U.S. and China have been conducting surveillance on each other for years using spy satellites, hacking and other means. The Pentagon has revealed Chinese balloons also entered the continental United States at least three times during the Trump administration, as well as once before under Biden. The balloon saga led to the abrupt cancellation of a planned trip by Secretary of State Tony Blinken to Beijing and threatens to further derail the relationship between the two countries. “The two countries need to speak to each other,” says Nicholas Bequelin, a visiting fellow at Yale’s Paul Tsai China Center and formerly the Asia-Pacific director for Amnesty International, in a wide-ranging interview about evolving U.S-China relations and potential for tensions to escalate further.

=> ↺ Blinken Cancels Trip to Beijing After US Shoots Down Suspected Spy Balloon

=> ↺ US man convicted of aiding Islamic State as sniper, trainer

• A former New York stockbroker-turned-Islamic State group militant has been convicted of becoming a sniper and trainer for the extremist group during its brutal reign in Syria and Iraq. A Brooklyn federal court jury reached a verdict Tuesday in the trial of Ruslan Maratovich Asainov, a Kazakh-born U.S. citizen. Prosecutors say he fought in numerous battles and built a notable profile in the Islamic State group by becoming a sniper and later an instructor of nearly 100 other long-range shooters. Defense lawyers argued that his accounts of his role were boasts that had no firsthand corroboration and didn’t prove anyone died because of his conduct.

=> ↺ The US Is Legitimizing Jewish Terrorism Against Palestinians

• US Secretary of State Antony Blinken’s recent visit to Palestine offered a paltry aid package to Palestinians and a gift to Israel’s far-right in the form of the removal of the Jewish Defense League from the State Department’s list of terrorist organizations.

=> ↺ Who wants his seat forever? Military intelligence chief Kyrylo Budanov is rumored to be Ukraine’s next defense minister — Meduza

• Earlier this month, Ukrainian media started foreshadowing the likely resignation of Ukraine’s Defense Minister Oleksiy Reznikov. Amid rumors and speculation about Reznikov’s next appointment and who might take his seat as defense minister, military intelligence chief Kyrylo Budanov emerged as Reznikov’s most likely (though perhaps less than enthusiastic) successor. Here’s what we currently know about upcoming staffing changes in the Ukrainian Defense Ministry.

=> ↺ Russian Defense Ministry prepares legislation allowing draftees to volunteer for peacekeeping missions — Meduza

• The Russian Defense Ministry has drafted a bill that would make more Russian soldiers eligible to voluntarily participate in peacekeeping missions, including by allowing draftees to serve as peacekeepers, according to RBC.

=> ↺ ‘They said we wouldn’t make it alive’: Indigenous draftees from southern Siberia publish video documenting abuses by ‘Donetsk People’s Republic’ militia — Meduza

• A group of soldiers mobilized in Tuva, a region in Russia’s southern Siberia, have published a video documenting abuses by the militia of the self-proclaimed “Donetsk People’s Republic,” where the draftees were deployed after mobilization.

=> ↺ Prosecutor General seeks to outlaw Freedom of Russia Legion as terrorist organization — Meduza

• Russia’s Prosecutor General is seeking to designate the Freedom of Russia Legion as a terrorist organization to be outlawed in Russia.

=> ↺ Neo-Nazi Couple Arrested Over Alleged Plot to Take Down Baltimore Power Grid

=> ↺ Police-Perpetrated Killings Are Public Executions — We Must Abolish Them

=> ↺ The Brutality of Identity Politics Devoid of Class Consciousness

• The brutal murder of Tyre Nichols by five Black Memphis police officers should be enough to implode the fantasy that identity politics and diversity will solve the social, economic and political decay that besets the United States. Not only are the former officers Black, but the city’s police department is headed by Cerelyn Davis, a Black woman. None of this helped Nichols, another victim of a modern-day police lynching.

=> ↺ Memphis city attorney says seven more police officers facing discipline for Tyre Nichols beating

• CNN — Seven additional Memphis police officers are facing discipline in the wake of Tyre Nichols’ death, City Attorney Jessica Sink told CNN’s Nick Valencia on Tuesday.

=> ↺ Nobody Has A Gun Except You: The Village Comes Through

• In the wake of Tyre Nichols and too many others, heart-stopping video shows a neighborhood confront “thugs with a badge and gun” after Seattle cops respond to a false call about gunfire and quickly target the first black man they see – holding a cell phone. Police depart the volatile encounter – “We’re here with rifles to protect and serve and make sure someone gets shot” – after bystanders shield, film, vouch for the distraught guy and beseech cops, “Calm the fuck down.”

=> ↺ Memphis Officer Texted Photo of Tyre Nichols After Beating

• The revelation came in Memphis police documents related to the firing of five officers who have been charged with murder in Mr. Nichols’s death.

=> ↺ Cori Bush Invites Father of Ferguson’s Michael Brown to State of the Union

=> ↺ The Ukraine War in the Light of the UN Charter

• The war in Ukraine did not start on 24 February 2022, but already in February 2014.  The civilian population of the Donbas has endured continued shelling from Ukrainian forces since 2014, notwithstanding the Minsk Agreements.  These attacks on Lugansk and Donetsk significantly increased in January-February 2022, as reported by […]

=> ↺ US-Laid Trap for Russia Has Trapped West Instead

• A month before the Feb. 24, 2022 Russian invasion, CN wrote that the U.S. was laying a trap to lure Russia into an economic, information and proxy war. All three have failed for the U.S.

=> ↺ Is Withdrawing From Treaties the Nuclear Weapons Industry’s Business Plan?

=> ↺ In a First, South Korea Is Ordered to Compensate a Vietnam War Victim

• A court ruling held that South Korean troops were responsible for a civilian massacre that killed more than 70 villagers in Vietnam during the war.

=> ↺ Raving Balloonatics Take Over Washington

• It only took one balloon to drive the Washington political elite into a frothing rage. On Thursday, the Pentagon announced that a Chinese surveillance balloon had been detected hovering over Montana. The Chinese government acknowledged ownership of the slow-moving aircraft and claimed it was a weather balloon that had been forced off course by accident or “force majeure.” This claim was rejected by the United States government, which claimed that the balloon was an instrument of espionage. President Joe Biden had ordered the balloon to be shot down as soon as it was safe to do so, which turned out to be on Saturday when the flying object was no longer over land but rather off the coast of South Carolina.

=> ↺ A Memo and Balloon Help Media Inflate China War Hype

• The shooting down of a Chinese balloon near Charleston (New York Times, 2/5/23) and an Air Force general’s prediction of a war with China (NBC, 1/27/23) have ignited media talk of the possibility of confrontation between the two nuclear powers. It’s scary stuff, indeed, but the media hype is dangerously overblown.

• For Fox News, the balloon incident meant that the US has stepped closer to war with China, because China “is preparing its citizens for war” (2/4/23) and collecting information for a future confrontation (2/4/23), while the Biden administration’s failure to down the balloon while it hovered over Montana demonstrated to China that the US was weak (2/4/23). NBC (2/4/23) also called it a propaganda win for China, who along with the Wall Street Journal (2/4/23) said the event elevated tension between the US and China (NBC, 2/5/23). The Washington Examiner (2/4/23) called it a wake up call “to the communist country’s larger threat of war.” The New York Times (2/5/23) said that while spying between powers is common, “for pure gall, there was something different this time.”

=> ↺ Verkhovna Rada appoints new Security Service head and new interior minister — Meduza

• Ukraine’s parliament has appointed Vasyl Malyuk as the head of the country’s Security Service, according to UNIAN. Malyuk had been serving as the agency’s acting head since July.

=> ↺ The Pope Delivers a Clear Message in the Democratic Republic of Congo

• Kinshasa, Democratic Republic of the Congo—In the sweltering heat of the garden of the Palais de la Nation, President Félix Antoine Tshisekedi welcomed Pope Francis to Central Africa.

=> ↺ Denmark to donate tanks to Ukraine

• Close to 100 Leopard 1A5 tanks formerly part of the Danish Defence will be dusted off and sent back into commission with the Ukrainians

=> ↺ Denmark wants Russian athletes banned from Olympics

• With the IOC wavering in making a decision, the Danes are adament that Paris 2024 should be without athletes from Russia and Belarus

=> ↺ China has more ICBM launchers than US, senior general tells lawmakers

• A senior American military officer notified lawmakers in January that China has more land-based fixed and mobile intercontinental ballistic missile launchers than the US, according to a letter sent to Congress.

=> ↺ Why is democratic India helping Russia avoid Western sanctions?

• Russia’s ability to endure sanctions relies on the reluctance of countries like India to join the West’s economic embargo. The trade channels being formed could have lasting geopolitical effects.

=> ↺ Is Nazi Loot Amid His 6,000 Oils, Some Grenades and Napoleon’s Toothbrush?

• The daughter of an eccentric Swiss collector has asked an independent panel to review whether items in his massive collection were stolen from Jews during World War II.

=> ↺ Burkina Faso’s Volunteer Defense Groups Pose Danger in Volatile Area

• ADF STAFF Three years after Burkina Faso recruited civilian volunteers to join the fight against terrorists in its northern regions, those groups are being blamed for crimes.

=> ↺ Drone factory fire near Rīga causes plume of hazardous smoke

• Residents of Mārupe and the vicinity are asked to close windows and doors and shut off ventilation due to a fire that has broken out at a drone production plant, said the State Fire and Rescue Service (VUGD) Tuesday, February 7, afternoon.

Environment

=> ↺ Legal sizes for lobsters could change to protect population

• The rules about the minimum and maximum sizes of lobsters that can be trapped off New England could soon become stricter, potentially bringing big changes to one of the most valuable seafood industries in the country.

• Fishers are required to measure lobsters from eyes to tail and must throw back the crustaceans if they’re too large or too small. The rules, which can vary slightly based on fishing grounds, are intended to maintain a breeding population of the lobsters in key areas such as the Gulf of Maine and Georges Bank.

=> ↺ The Hottest Winter I Ever Spent in San Francisco Was Cold and Wet

• It was January 1983 and raining in San Francisco.

=> ↺ Undaunted by Jail Threat, Greenpeace Activists Continue Protest on Shell North Sea Platform

• Undeterred by a court order threatening heavy fines or even two years behind bars, a pair of Greenpeace activists on Monday joined four other protesters aboard a shipcarrying a Shell oil platform into the North Sea in order to demand the company stop expanding fossil fuel production around the world.

=> ↺ Indigenous-Led Marine Protection Sets a Course Along Canada’s Pacific

• Klemtu, Canada—On British Columbia’s Central Coast, a rare robust stock of Pacific herring can still be found in Kitasu Bay. Every March, herring inject their milky white roe into quiet bays, and wolves, bears, seals, and humpback whales descend to feast.

• “Everything comes here to eat, including us,” said Ernest Vincent Mason, a hereditary chief of the Kitasoo Xai’xais First Nations and former fisherman.

=> ↺ Family of Forest Defender Killed by Police Demands Answers

• Family members of climate activist Manuel Esteban Paez Terán are demanding answers regarding the January 18 police killing of their 26-year-old relative, commonly known as “Tortuguita.”

=> ↺ Millions Are at Risk of Flooding Due to Climate Change – But Not Where You’d Think

• There’s no time to lose.

Energy/Transportation

=> ↺ Ice storm, wild weather reveals vulnerability of Austin’s power grid

• Power grid outages following an ice storm in Austin, Texas, have left thousands of people without electricity for nearly a week and counting. Infrastructure repairs have been sluggish, prompting criticism of local government and an unreliable grid.

=> ↺ Researchers Find “Inert” Components In Batteries Lead To Cell Self-Discharge

• When it comes to portable power, lithium-ion batteries are where it’s at. Unsurprisingly, there’s a lot of work being done to better understand how to maximize battery life and usable capacity.

=> ↺ Former Australian PM Tony Abbott Joins UK Climate Denial Group

• Ex Australian Prime Minister Tony Abbott has joined the UK’s main climate denial group saying: “we need more science”.

• Abbott announced he was “pleased” to join the board of the Global Warming Policy Foundation (GWPF), which had “consistently injected a note of realism into the climate debate”.

=> ↺ ‘This Is Criminal’: BP Cuts Climate Pledges While Reporting Record $28 Billion in Profit

• BP, a London-based oil giant that has attempted to style itself as a leader of the renewable energy transition, announced Tuesday that it is slashing its emission-reduction goals and planning more fossil fuel output than previously expected after reporting a record $28 billion in profits for 2022—more than double what it made the year before.

=> ↺ ‘Only the Beginning’: Democrats’ IRA Set to Create 100,000+ US Green Jobs

• A leading climate action group on Monday published a report revealing that the 94 clean energy projects announced since U.S. President Joe Biden signed the Inflation Reduction Act into law last August are set to create more than 100,000 green jobs.

=> ↺ Controlled Release of Toxic Chemicals Planned to Avoid Explosion of Derailed Train

• Authorities ordered Ohio and Pennsylvania residents in the vicinity of a derailed train to evacuate immediately or risk death prior to a planned release of toxic chemicals on Monday afternoon.

=> ↺ UN Chief Unleashes on Fossil Fuel Giants: ‘Your Core Product Is Our Core Problem’

• United Nations Secretary-General António Guterres made clear Monday that securing a livable planet depends on stopping the “bottomless greed of the fossil fuel industry and its enablers.”

=> ↺ How Russia Is Surviving the Tightening Grip on Its Oil Revenue

• Restrictions on Russia’s oil trade are raising the stakes in a protracted economic standoff that is reshaping the global energy market.

Wildlife/Nature

=> ↺ Fish can recognize themselves in photos, further evidence they may be self-aware

• Kohda’s previous research showed that bluestreak cleaner wrasses can pass the mirror test, a controversial cognitive assessment that purportedly reveals self-awareness, or the ability to be the object of one’s own thoughts. The test involves exposing an animal to a mirror and then surreptitiously putting a mark on the animal’s face or body to see if they will notice it on their reflection and try to touch it on their body. Previously only a handful of large-brained species, including chimpanzees and other great apes, dolphins, elephants and magpies, have passed the test.

=> ↺ ‘Grim’ Report Warns 40% of US Animals at Risk of Extinction

• Underscoring the need for humanity to overhaul its relationship with nature, 34% of plants species and 40% of animal species across the United States are at risk of extinction while 41% of U.S. ecosystems could collapse, according to an analysis published Monday by the nonprofit NatureServe.

=> ↺ Whale tangled in fishing gear and lobster pots freed by rescuers

• A North Atlantic right whale was left in a dire situation after it became entangled in commercial fishing rope and lobster pots.

=> ↺ Wunderkind British explorer’s life demonstrates ice-hard resolve

• The young British explorer Henry Watkins pursued impossible expeditions, leading men “Into the Great Emptiness” of Greenland’s ice cap. His leadership got them all home – eventually.

Finance

=> ↺ Boeing plans to cut about 2,000 finance and HR jobs in 2023

• Boeing says the total workforce was 156,000 employees as of Dec. 31, 2022.

=> ↺ France’s Pension Plan Strikes, Explained

• President Emmanuel Macron is forging ahead with plans to raise the legal age of retirement to 64, from 62, despite a third day of strikes, wide public opposition and a fierce parliamentary battle.

=> ↺ Head of Russia’s second-largest bank says customers withdrew $26 billion in war’s first two weeks, causing net loss for 2022 — Meduza

• Customers withdrew a total of $26 billion from Russia’s majority state-owned VTB Bank between February 24 and March 10 last year, resulting in a net loss for the bank in 2022, its chairman, Andrey Kostin, said in an interview on Tuesday.

=> ↺ Russian organization that provided popular science books to students closing due to political pressure and funding troubles — Meduza

• Vsenauka, an organization that provides free popular science books to Russian students, is closing as a result of political and financial challenges that have arisen in the last year, its creators announced on Tuesday.

=> ↺ Kimberlé Crenshaw on Critical Race Theory, Intersectionality & the Right-Wing War on Public Education

• We speak with renowned legal scholar Kimberlé Crenshaw about right-wing efforts to curtail the teaching of African American history, queer studies and other subjects that focus on marginalized communities. The College Board, the nonprofit group that designs AP courses for high school seniors, recently revised a curriculum for a course in African American studies after criticism from Florida Governor Ron DeSantis and others who maligned it as “woke indoctrination.” The new curriculum removes Black Lives Matter, slavery reparations and queer theory as required topics, and drops many major writers, including Crenshaw, from the reading list. “Anybody who’s concerned about our democracy, anyone who’s concerned about authoritarianism has to wake up and pay attention to this, because this is how it happens,” she says. Crenshaw coined the term “intersectionality” to study the overlapping or intersecting social identities and systems of oppression, domination or discrimination people experience.

=> ↺ Kamchatka court overturns convictions of Kronotsky Nature Reserve employees jailed for embezzlement — Meduza

• A Kamchatka court has overturned the convictions of four Kronotsky Nature Reserve employees who were previously convicted of embezzling federal funds, according to Russian state media.

=> ↺ A Debt Ceiling Holds Our Economy Hostage

• If Congress doesn’t raise the ceiling, one of the political parties threatens to bring our economy to a halt. That is not a sensible way to run a government. That’s why only the US and Denmark have a debt ceiling set at an absolute amount rather than as a percentage of GDP like other developed countries.

• Once the federal budget is not balanced and runs a deficit, the government must borrow more money, go deeper into debt to pay its bills, and not default on paying its loans. Although the U.S. has run a deficit in 77 out of the past 90 years, it has never defaulted on its debt payments because Congress raised the debt limit. However, that threshold may be crossed this year under pressure from the House Freedom Caucus, which demands a cut to the 2023 budget that Congress already approved.

=> ↺ Parents and Sons

• When his debut novel caused a sensation in France, Édouard Louis was just 21. The End of Eddy (originally published in 2014 as En finir avec Eddy Bellegueule) was an unflinching account of Louis’s difficult childhood as a gay boy in Hallencourt, a postindustrial village in northern France. In this world, the men were monstrous alcoholics, the women were trapped in miserable marriages, and the children were too many. Louis chronicled a community ravaged by addiction and violence and abandoned by the state. He described the working class at its worst: These men and women weren’t just tired and hungry; they were resentful, callous, and racist. To make life even tougher for luckless little Eddy Bellegueule (Louis’s birth name), they also proved to be viciously homophobic.

=> ↺ Job Growth: Is the Household or Establishment Survey Right?

=> ↺ Republicans Are Coming With Knives to Gut FDR’s New Deal

• Sometimes a little socialism is a very good thing. But don’t tell Mike Pence or the billionaires who bankroll him and his GOP colleagues.

=> ↺ As Defaults Mount, No Clear Exit Plan for African Countries, Chinese Lenders

• ADF STAFF Despite much speculation that Chinese lenders were constructing a so-called “debt trap” as a way to claim key national assets from their African borrowers, an analysis by the think tank Chatham House suggests that China might have actually trapped itself.

=> ↺ Chinese Demand Decimates West African Donkey Population

• ADF STAFF Many rural West African communities rely on donkeys as a source of labor, transport and income. Traditional Chinese medicine values donkeys for their skins. In recent years, China has been unable to meet its high demand for ejiao, a gelatin created from boiling donkey skins.

=> ↺ Elon Musk still needs 10 million more Twitter Blue subscribers to pay the interest on his loans

=> ↺ Will the disappearing jobs in tech and media ever come back?

• When the economy gets worse, companies cut their advertising budgets. This truism has played out throughout the last year as economists have nagged about a potential US recession.

=> ↺ Associate of Russian oligarch accused of violating sanctions

• An associate of a Russian billionaire has been charged with violating U.S. sanctions and money laundering. An indictment unsealed Tuesday in Manhattan federal court charged Vladimir Voronchenko with joining a scheme to make over $4 million in payments to maintain four U.S. properties belonging to sanctioned oligarch Viktor Vekselberg. The indictment says Voronchenko is also charged with contempt of court for fleeing the U.S. after receiving a grand jury subpoena requiring his testimony. It isn’t clear if Voronchenko has a lawyer who can comment on his behalf.

=> ↺ IRS urges special refund recipients to delay filing taxes

• The Internal Revenue Service is recommending that taxpayers hold off on filing their tax returns for 2022 if they received a special tax refund or payment from their state last year.  Last year, 19 states offered diverse programs that offered inflation relief payments or refunds for taxpayers. The IRS issued the guidance Friday due to the agency’s uncertainty about the taxability of the payments. For residents from states such as California and Illinois, the agency is recommending that they hold off on filing their tax returns until they receive further instruction from the IRS.

AstroTurf/Lobbying/Politics

=> ↺ BBC News apologizes for ‘mistake’ using Viola Davis image instead of Beyoncé

• BBC News has issued a groveling apology after using a photo of Viola Davis in a story about Beyoncé.

=> ↺ Jacinda Ardern: Saint or Psychopath?

• Martin Hanson While still at the height of her popularity, “Jacinda Ardern: Leading with Empathy”, a biography of the New Zealand Prime Minister was published. It was described by the publisher as “a major biography of one of the most important and inspirational leaders of the twenty-first century”. 20 months later came her shock resignation. …

=> ↺ Ranked Choice Voting Won at the Polls in 2022

• On a ranked choice ballot, voters can rank every candidate in a given race. Over time, that could lead more voters to consider candidates outside the two parties.

=> ↺ CJR’s Error at Word 18

• In CJR’s 23,000 word narrative criticizing reporting on the Russian investigation, Jeff Gerth committed the first of many errors at word 18.

=> ↺ Biden’s Approval Ratings Among Worst for a President’s 2nd Year

• The economy has helped drag down the president’s numbers, with a low point coming amid record high gas prices.

=> ↺ Behold, the New GOP Culture Wars

• Republicans are resorting to their age-old tactic of manufactured moral outrage to distract from the fact that they have no economic agenda other than to enrich the already wealthy. It would be laughable if their culture wars didn’t have a deadly impact on people’s lives. From attacks on the right to an abortion, to the right to be transgender, to the right to study accurate history, conservative attacks on vulnerable populations have reached a fever pitch. And it’s destroying the nation.

• As if overturning Roe v. Wade at the Supreme Court in 2022 wasn’t enough, 20 GOP state attorneys general are now targeting pharmacy chains Walgreens and CVS for fulfilling mail orders of the abortion drug mifepristone. The U.S. Food and Drug Administration, a federal agency, in January expanded availability of the drug across the country. The abortion pill was relatively unknown some years ago but is now used in more than half of all abortions nationwide, likely in response to the rapidly disappearing access to surgical abortions. Now, as they go after mail-order abortion pills, Republicans are showing just how hell-bent they are on ensuring that the bodies of women (and transgender men) remain glorified baby incubators.

=> ↺ If You Want to Hear the Future of Democratic Politics, Listen to Delia Ramirez

• President Joe Biden will deliver his third State of the Union address tonight, and it will in all likelihood go according to plan. The presentation will be steady and competent. Not too much drama. After 36 years in the US Senate—eight years as vice president and more than two years as president—Biden knows how to SOTU. He’ll deliver a recitation of recent economic good news, outline policy goals, take a few subtle swipes at House Speaker Kevin McCarthy and a Republican majority that is functional only in its ability to stall the president’s agenda, and finish with a temperate call to action that reinforces the assumption that he’ll be bidding for a second term in 2024.

=> ↺ Ahead of SOTU, Youth Groups Say Lack of Bold Action Puts Biden Reelection at Risk

• Ahead of U.S. President Joe Biden’s State of the Union address scheduled for Tuesday evening, four national youth-led advocacy groups on Monday warned the president that a continued failure to deliver on his promises to young voters could jeopardize his chances of a second term in the White House.

=> ↺ It’s No Coincidence That the Midterms Turned the Blackest Parts of America Red

• The fundamental right to vote has been a core value of Black politics since the colonial era—and so has the effort to suppress that vote right up to the present moment. In fact, the history of the suppression of Black voters is a first-rate horror story that as yet shows no sign of ending.

=> ↺ Blueprint Offers Biden Path to Ending For-Profit Corporate Prisons

• Campaigners from two national justice advocacy groups on Monday released recommendations for the Biden administration to act on in order to fulfill the president’s longtime promise to “stop corporations from profiteering off of incarceration.”

=> ↺ Trappers are Trying to Steal Our Public Lands

=> ↺ Biden, Go Bold in the State of the Union

• President Biden’s State of the Union address on February 7 will frame the last two years of his administration—and perhaps his legacy. With House Republican Speaker Kevin McCarthy handing the keys to the asylum to his party’s lunatic fringe, it will take heavy lifting just to keep the government open and the country’s debts honored. But the cascading mega-crises the country faces—contagion, climate, conflict, corruption, corrosive inequality, and impending recession—demand aggressive action. Biden should call on Congress to act; he should also lay down the gauntlet, promising that if Congress fails to act, he will use his executive powers to address the challenges we face.

=> ↺ Do We Know Apartheid When We See It?

• In Arabic, the term sumud means roughly steadfastness or steadfast perseverance. It is a term that has become a cultural rallying point and a liberatory social practice for a people locked in a daily fight for survival on their own land. For this people, right now facing a deadly onslaught from an increasingly dangerous right-wing government, sumud is solidarity, mutual aid, and determined resistance to an apartheid system. The Western story about what we are witnessing in Palestine has omitted the accounts of Palestinians themselves. It has left out their story of sumud, which takes shape through a shared fight for freedom and equality. Sumud is a practice that “creates a continuous world” in which Palestinians can “live in resistance and refusal together,” and as a struggle in recognition of the material reality that is Palestine as a people, place, and culture.

• Last March, the UN Special Rapporteur charged with assessing the situation in Palestinian issued a disturbing report detailing “a deeply discriminatory dual legal and political system” and calling the international community to action. Less than two months before the UN report, Amnesty International had issued a report detailing the crimes of Israel’s apartheid regime and calling it a “cruel system of domination and crime against humanity,” founded upon key components of “territorial fragmentation; segregation and control; dispossession of land and property; and denial of economic and social rights.” Not long after the release of these reports, the Israeli government launched a campaign of terror called Operation Breakwater (or “Break the Wave”), a focused torrent of violence that made 2022 one of the deadliest years on record in the West Bank. According to a report from the nonprofit Euro-Mediterranean Human Rights Monitor, more than 200 Palestinians were killed in 2022, about 1 in 5 of whom were children. Most of these lost lives belonged to “civilians killed by Israel’s army in unjustified operations and contexts where they presented no imminent threat or danger to the lives of Israeli soldiers or settlers.”The new year is still young, but already it has seen levels of violence and death that, if sustained, will make 2023 even bloodier than 2022. January alone witnessed 35 Palestinian deaths, 8 of which belonged to children. The Palestinian people are in a desperate fight.

=> ↺ Amnesty Calls for End to ‘Politically Motivated’ Prosecution of Hong Kong Democracy Defenders

• As the 90-day trial of 16 pro-democracy figures began Monday in Hong Kong, the global human rights group Amnesty International blasted what it called the “politically motivated” charges against the defendants, while urging authorities to drop the case.

=> ↺ Guns, Guns, Guns

=> ↺ Senate Urged to ‘Stand Up to Homophobic Attacks’ on Biden FCC Nominee Gigi Sohn

• Digital and LGBTQ+ rights groups are condemning homophobic attacks against U.S. President Joe Biden’s Federal Communications Commission nominee Gigi Sohn, whose Senate confirmation has been stalled for over a year largely due to opposition from the powerful telecom industry.

=> ↺ Oaxaca governor promises to lead ‘new era’ of national conference

• As the new Conago president, Jara said that governors would “work together” amid a “new stage” in the country’s political life.

=> ↺ Congolese leader Patrice Lumumba Back to Russian University

• The Russian Foreign Ministry is preparing for the second Russia-Africa summit in St. Petersburg, July 2023.

=> ↺ Protest in Iran: A Middle Eastern déjà vu with a twist of irony

• A recent survey of Iranian public opinion suggests that the lack of confidence in a Middle Eastern regime is starkest in Iran, although crisis-wracked Lebanon, Egypt, or Syria may compete.

=> ↺ Why India needs a national security strategy

• One of the critical aspects for India is to identify the strategic landscape which might be comprising of terrestrial, marine, space, cyber, and psychological aspects. Furthermore, the developments in artificial intelligence, biotech, machine learning, and data mining needs comprehensive plan of action which can help India in meeting future challenges.

=> ↺ Israel gives Ukraine intelligence. “The best thing” that could have happened to Israel-NATO relations?

• NATO sources tell ‘Haaretz’ some of the intel is on the Iranian drones in Ukraine, writes Yossi Melman at Israeli newspaper. Israel has stepped up its intelligence assistance to Ukraine in recent weeks via NATO, sources in Brussels told ‘Haaretz’, with Jerusalem remaining keen to keep its aid to the embattled country indirect.

=> ↺ ‘His Empire Was Built on Lies’: Ex-Prosecutor Urges Manhattan DA to Charge Trump

• “We developed evidence convincing us that Donald Trump had committed serious crimes. As we put the facts together, many of us came to believe that we had enough evidence to convict him, and we could present a solid case in court that would lead to a guilty verdict.”

=> ↺ DOJ Offers to Let Members of Congress See Details of Classified Docs Trump Took

=> ↺ Dell to Cut About 6,650 Jobs, Battered by Plunging PC Sales

• After the reduction, the headcount for Round Rock, Texas-based Dell will be its lowest in at least six years — about 39,000 fewer employees than in January 2020. Dell in November 2021 spun out its stake in VMware, which had about 37,500 workers after the spinoff, according to a filing.

=> ↺ We asked the Justice Minister about the corruption case linked to her ministry

=> ↺ Laughing at Power with Mr Fish

• By Art27 Mr. Fish recently did a podcast with Art27, which can be listened to here. We start 2023 off with a long anticipated guest, the political cartoonist and artist Dwayne Booth, better known as Mr Fish. Fish’s incendiary political artwork and relentless truth-seeking has been a recurring topic around the art27 office, and we […]

=> ↺ Always That Guy: Bill Maher’s Pliable Right-Wing Brand

• Well-meaning left-wing people seem to recall, at some point somewhere in Bill Maher’s 30-year talk-show career, a golden age of Maher. A time when they believed absolutely that he was their guy. It’s why every time Maher has made headlines over the years—for calling Islam “the only religion that acts like the mafia that will fucking kill you if you say the wrong thing,” or arguing that #MeToo is the new McCarthyism, or devoting a lengthy segment of self-examination to why he casually used a racist slur while talking to a US senator—someone always says, “What happened to that guy?”

=> ↺ The Immense Irony of the GOP’s Anti-Socialism Vote

• The Republican resolution decrying “the horrors of socialism,” which the US House approved by an overwhelming bipartisan majority last week, formally asserted that “Congress denounces socialism in all its forms, and opposes the implementation of socialist policies in the United States of America.”

=> ↺ Epidemics of Race-Based Violence and Police Brutality

• Have you ever spoken with a parent of black boys about the struggle and fear of keeping them safe? There are several familiar concerns, but a number that are unique. “He is 12 now and I think I need to tell him he is not allowed to wear hoodies anymore,” is such an example.

• A great deal of research shows that white people and black people have different experiences with law enforcement. A friend explained: “when you get pulled over for speeding on your way to work you might call in and let them know you’ll be late. I call my wife and tell her that I love her.”

=> ↺ Elon Promises A Free API For ‘Good Bot Content,’ Again, Demonstrating He Has No Idea How Any Of This Works

• It’s been clear since the takeover, that Elon’s running Twitter entirely based on his fleeting and oft-changing whims. The weird decision last week to suddenly, with one week’s notice, remove the free tier for Twitter’s basic API, has create a bit of an uproar, as tons of tools, services, and useful bots made use of it. Many have been posting farewell messages on Twitter, leading Musk (as he seems to do all too often) to announce a policy change in a reply tweet. He did this when he rolled back his bizarrely stupid policy that you were no longer allowed to link to other social media (a policy so obviously stupid, that only Musk’s mother would defend it). Musk rolled that one back in a reply tweet — meaning a tweet that very few people would see, because they don’t show up nearly as much.

=> ↺ The American Crisis of Trust—Let’s Learn from Leading Democracies

• So, Donald Trump is back on social media. What a perfect moment to grapple with our nation’s crisis of trust.

Misinformation/Disinformation/Propaganda

=> ↺ How Deepfake Videos Are Used to Spread Disinformation

• For the first time, A.I.-generated personas, often used for corporate trainings, were detected in a state-aligned information campaign — opening a new chapter in online manipulation.

Censorship/Free Speech

=> ↺ Siberian court fines man for interviews about earlier fine for social media post describing dream about Zelensky — Meduza

• A court in the Siberian city of Chita has fined local resident Ivan Losev 35,000 rubles (almost $500) on two counts of “discrediting” the Russian army for two interviews he gave about an earlier fine he received, he told the independent outlet Mediazona. The earlier fine was punishment for a social media post in which he described a dream he had about Volodymyr Zelensky.

=> ↺ 6 months after stabbing, Salman Rushdie is back, and he doesn’t want your pity

• In 1989, Rushdie defied advice to lie low after Iran’s late supreme leader, Ayatollah Ruhollah Khomeini, put a virtual contract on his life in response to his novel “The Satanic Verses,” which many Muslims found blasphemous or at least outrageously irreverent.

• Rushdie has also expressed little desire to embrace a recluse’s life after the midsummer violence at a public, outdoor discussion in Chautauqua, New York.

=> ↺ Disney cuts Simpsons episode in Hong Kong over reference to forced labour camps in China

• The instructor says: “Behold the wonders of China. Bitcoin mines, forced labour camps where children make smartphones.”

• It is understood Disney removed the episode to comply with China’s sweeping national security laws, which were introduced to Hong Kong in 2020.

=> ↺ Disney removes Simpsons ‘forced labour’ episode in Hong Kong

• Disney has removed an episode of The Simpsons referring to Chinese labour camps from its streaming service in Hong Kong.

• The absence of the One Angry Lisa episode in its latest season was flagged in media reports this week. It is unclear when it was removed.

=> ↺ Disney Removes Episode of Animated Comedy From Streaming Service in Hong Kong

• U.S. entertainment giant Disney has removed an episode of the animated situation comedy The Simpsons from its streaming service in Hong Kong because of a reference to forced labor camps in China.

=> ↺ The Supreme Court Considers the Algorithm

• Gould was in the minority, and the case was decided in Google’s favor. But even the majority cautioned that the drafters of Section 230—people whose conception of the World Wide Web might have been limited to the likes of email and the Yahoo homepage—never imagined “the level of sophistication algorithms have achieved.” The majority wrote that Section 230’s “sweeping immunity” was “likely premised on an antiquated understanding” of platform moderation, and that Congress should reconsider it. The case then headed to the Supreme Court.

• This month, the country’s highest court will consider Section 230 for the first time as it weighs a pair of cases—Gonzalez v. Google, and another against Twitter—that invoke the Anti-terrorism Act. The justices will seek to determine whether online platforms should be held accountable when their recommendation systems, operating in ways that users can’t see or understand, aid terrorists by promoting their content and connecting them to a broader audience. They’ll consider the question of whether algorithms, as creations of a platform like YouTube, are something distinct from any other aspect of what makes a website a platform that can host and present third-party content. And, depending on how they answer that question, they could transform the internet as we currently know it, and as some people have known it for their entire lives.

=> ↺ Wikipedia back in Pakistan after ‘blasphemy’ ban

• An agency spokesman had said Saturday that Wikipedia would “remain blocked until they remove all the objectionable material”, without specifying what content was at issue.

=> ↺ Pakistan blocks Wikipedia, says it hurt Muslim sentiments

• Under Pakistan’s controversial blasphemy laws, anyone found guilty of insulting Islam or its figures can be sentenced to death, although the country has yet to carry out capital punishment for blasphemy.

• But even allegations of the offense are often enough to provoke mob violence and even deadly attacks. International and domestic rights groups say that accusations of blasphemy have often been used to intimidate religious minorities and settle personal scores.

=> ↺ Russia’s Justice Ministry censors Oxxxymiron’s 2009 hip-hop track portraying high school shooting as ‘extremist content’ — Meduza

• Russia’s Justice Ministry has added “The Last Bell,” a hip-hop track released in 2009 by the Russian artist Oxxxymiron, to its list of extremist content. The song portrays a high school shooting reminiscent of the 1999 Columbine high school massacre in Colorado.

=> ↺ Prigozhin wins libel case against journalist who described him as Wagner Group ‘owner’ — Meduza

• A Moscow court has dismissed the journalist Alexey Venediktov’s appeal in the libel lawsuit filed by Evgeny Prigozhin after Venediktov described him as the “owner” of a private military company.

=> ↺ 2 Florida School Districts Order Teachers to Cover or Remove Books in Classrooms

=> ↺ It’s Time To Codify The ‘NY Times v. Sullivan’ Standard Into Law

• For all the misleading claims about “free speech under attack” in place where it is definitively not under attack (i.e., on social media sites, or via “cancel culture”), there are many areas in which free speech absolutely is under attack, and there may be no bigger one than the (relatively new!) movement to overturn the extremely important NY Times v. Sullivan case from 1964 that basically set the standards for defamation of a public figure. Basically, in an effort to make defamation law compatible with the 1st Amendment, the Supreme Court realized that it had to have a very high bar to bringing a successful defamation case. Otherwise, the Court (accurately) surmised, the rich and powerful would bring such cases against critics for just minor inaccuracies.

=> ↺ NCAC and CAA denounce Arkansas Tech University’s handling of Controversial Exhibition

• The National Coalition Against Censorship (NCAC) and the College Art Association (CAA) expressed their deep concern with Arkansas Tech University’s handling of its on-campus exhibition, Artifacts, by artist Dominique Simmons.

=> ↺ Academic freedom lecturer addresses teaching of racial history

• New York Times columnist Jamelle Bouie delivered the 32nd annual Davis, Markert, and Nickerson Lecture on Academic and Intellectual Freedom with a talk titled “Revisiting Du Bois and ‘The Propaganda of History.’”

=> ↺ She criticized her country’s military. Pro-military accounts then shared a sex tape she’d made with a partner

=> ↺ Latvian blogger accused of pro-Kremlin activity

• On February 3, the State Security Service (VDD) completed an investigation against a pro-Kremlin blogger and brought a criminal case against him on the justification and glorification of crimes committed by the Russian armed forces in Ukraine, as well as efforts to create hatred and alienation between people of different nationalities, VDD said February 7.

=> ↺ Youth campaign for safer internet launched

• February 7 is World Safer Internet Day. In connection with this, the Child and Adolescent Hotline of the State Children’s Rights Protection Inspectorate (VBTAI) 116111 is organizing a campaign called “I choose to speak”, reports LSM’s parents’ and children’s service.

Civil Rights/Policing

=> ↺ Mutual Aid Inside: How Incarcerated Communities Survive Together

• This article was funded by the Marvel Cooke Fellowship. Read more about this reporting project and make a contribution to fund our fellowship budget.

• Joseph Wilson, who is incarcerated in a maximum security state prison, believes COVID-19 worsened the existing crisis of incarceration in the United States and amplified the urgency for mutual aid practices in prison.

=> ↺ China: Tibetan children forced to assimilate, independent rights experts fear

• Roughly one million Tibetan minority children in China have been separated from their families and placed into Government-run boarding schools, forcing their assimilation into the dominant culture, three independent UN human rights experts said on Monday.

=> ↺ China: UN experts alarmed by separation of 1 million Tibetan children from families and forced assimilation at residential schools

• Around a million children of the Tibetan minority were being affected by Chinese government policies aimed at assimilating Tibetan people culturally, religiously and linguistically through a residential school system, UN experts* warned today.

• “We are very disturbed that in recent years the residential school system for Tibetan children appears to act as a mandatory large-scale programme intended to assimilate Tibetans into majority Han culture, contrary to international human rights standards,” the experts said.

=> ↺ The Fate of Tibet After the Inevitable: A Tibetan Opinion

• This was perfectly summed up by Edward Lucas, who coined the term “Tibet test.” “If you think you live in a free country, ask if your politicians feel free to meet the Dalai Lama. If the answer is no, then you are part of the Chinese empire—you just haven’t realised it yet.”

=> ↺ Podcast Episode: When Tech Comes to Town

• Catherine Bracy, co-founder and CEO of the Oakland-based TechEquity Collaborative, has spent her career exploring ways to build a more equitable tech-driven economy. She believes that because the technology sector became a major economic driver at the same time deregulation became politically fashionable, tech companies often didn’t catch the “civic bug” – a sense of responsibility to the communities in which they’re based – in the way that industries of the past might have.

=> ↺ $340 Million Anti-Labor Consulting Industry Is Behind Contemporary Union-Busting

=> ↺ New Legislation Takes Aim at Hidden Foster Care

• Last month, Washington state Rep. Lillian Ortiz-Self, a Democrat, introduced a first-of-its-kind bill aimed at providing attorneys for parents who are facing hidden foster care, the subject of a ProPublica-New York Times Magazine investigation in December 2021. The story documented how, across the country, caseworkers who have not petitioned a court persuade parents to send their children to live in another home, often by threatening a foster placement if they refuse. The Washington bill unanimously passed out of the House Committee on Human Services, Youth and Early Learning on Friday.

• The ProPublica-New York Times Magazine story exposed a shadow foster care system in which parents and their children have little or no legal protections. Caseworkers investigating allegations of mistreatment sometimes coerce parents to place their children with a relative, friend or family. Child welfare departments then often skirt their responsibility to keep families together or to monitor the informal arrangements, saving money in the process; the hidden system strips parents of access to free lawyers, judicial oversight and court-mandated services to attempt to reunite families.

=> ↺ Georgian court refuses to release imprisoned ex-president Mikheil Saakashvili — Meduza

• A Tbilisi court has dismissed Mikheil Saakashvili’s petition to be released from prison in the Republic of Georgia. Georgia’s former third president has been in custody in his country since the fall of 2021. Saakashvili’s legal team had submitted the pleading in December 2022.

=> ↺ Employers Are Charged With Breaking Federal Labor Law in 4 in 10 Union Elections

=> ↺ NYPD Narcotics Detective Facing 26 Criminal Charges Walks After Prosecutors Withhold Evidence

• NYPD detective Joseph Franco developed a late career habit of letting perps walk. Very late career. He was fired. But not before wreaking enough havoc, prosecutors were forced to toss nearly 100 convictions.

=> ↺ A Couple Of Fifth Circuit Appeals Court Judges Look Like They Believe Performing Journalism Is A Criminal Act

• In 2018, Laredo (TX) police officers arrested independent journalist Priscilla Villarreal after she published the name of a Border Patrol agent who had committed suicide. The alleged crime was “misuse of official information.” But all Villarreal had done was perform an act of journalism: she had asked Laredo police officer Barbara Goodman to verify information she’d obtained elsewhere.

=> ↺ Remembering Robert Hoyt

• My old friend Robert Hoyt — singer/songwriter, multi-instrumentalist, organizer, nurse, father, lover of the wild — died on the morning of February 1st, 2023, at the age of 68, only weeks after being diagnosed with an aggressive form of cancer.  He hadn’t wanted to make his illness public, and only a very few of his friends and relatives were aware of it.  I’ve been getting beautiful personal messages from many people I haven’t seen much or at all since the 1990’s with updates.

• Just to say from the outset, I will not be writing the definitive remembrance of Robert, and I’m not sure if anyone else could do that if they wanted to try to, either.  It may be a stretch to say that Robert led many lives, but he certainly embraced a number of different identities over his lifetime, certainly on a musical level at least.  I suspect any thorough effort to pay homage to the man would have to involve at least four or five different people, who knew him during different stages of his life.

=> ↺ Abortion and the 13th Amendment

• Judges cannot take the Supreme Court’s silence as a ground to subvert Supreme Court precedent.

Digital Restrictions (DRM)

=> ↺ As Dawn Ostroff Exits, Spotify Rethinks Rich Talent Deals

• The latest pivot at Spotify is partly a recession-era sign of the times and partly growing pains for a company that has made massive expansions in recent years but has yet to become profitable. Though Spotify remains cash-flow positive, the company has spent more than $1 billion on its podcast expansion alone since 2019, making expensive tech and studio acquisitions and striking flashy talent deals for sums previously unheard of in podcasting for such talent as Joe Rogan, Alex Cooper and Dax Shepard. Since 2019, when the company’s podcast expansion began in earnest, Spotify has seen these costs as a necessary evil to help the company grow beyond music, boost advertising, draw in new users and, ultimately, compete with rivals as it seeks the perch as the “world’s No. 1 audio platform,” as Ek once told THR in late 2019. \

=> ↺ My Printer Is Extorting Me

• The trouble started with a label for a package. My printer was unresponsive. Then I discovered an error message on my computer indicating that my HP OfficeJet Pro had been remotely disabled by the company. When I logged on to HP’s website, I learned why: The credit card I had used to sign up for HP’s Instant Ink cartridge-refill program had expired, and the company had effectively bricked my device in response.

• For those not trapped in this devil’s bargain, Instant Ink is a monthly subscription program that purports to monitor one’s printer usage and ink levels and automatically send new cartridges when they run low. The name is misleading, because the monthly fee is not for the ink itself but for the number of pages printed. (The recommended household plan is $5.99 a month for 100 pages). Like others, I signed up in haste during the printer-setup process, only slightly aware of what I was purchasing. Getting ink delivered when I need it sounded convenient enough to me, a man so thoroughly coddled by one-click e-commerce that the frontal lobes of my brain likely resemble cottage cheese. The monthly fee is incurred whether you print or not, and the ink cartridges occupy some liminal ownership space. You possess them, but you are, in essence, renting both them and your machine while you’re enrolled in the program.

=> ↺ Slanting History to Smear Hulu’s 1619 Series

• This month, Nicole Hannah-Jones, with the help of Oprah, took the Right’s favorite target of historical censorship, the New York Times’ “1619 Project” to Hulu as a six-part mini-series. Phillip W. Magness, an early historical critic of the 1619 Project, immediately jumped on the first episode proclaiming in Reason magazine that Hannah-Jones and her consulting expert, historian Woody Holton, “peddles false history.” But a closer look at Magness’ criticisms reveals that lacking actual historical evidence, the MAGA attempt to malign historians who document that slavery was an integral factor in the American Revolution is just a furious blur of misdirection, omission, and half-truths.

• Phillip W. Magness was one of the first to pen a book condemning the 1619 Project. His instant book, The1619 Project: A Critique, was published in 2020 by the rightwing think-tank that signs his paychecks, the American Institute for Economic Research, whose mission is to promote “the value of personal freedom, free enterprise, property rights, limited government, and sound money.” Ever since Magness has been flogging away at Hannah-Jones and any historians who defend the proposition that the American Revolution had anything to do with slavery.

=> ↺ Netflix’s Unnecessary Password Crackdown Is Already A Hot Mess

• Netflix’s password sharing crackdown hasn’t even launched yet in the States, but is already a public relations mess.

Monopolies

Patents

=> ↺ Roundup Ready 2 Patent Litigation

• Bayer and its subsidiary Monsanto have filed a new set of patent infringement lawsuits against farmers who saved seeds and replanted them in violation of Monsanto Roundup Ready patents and license agreements.  Monsanto’s original patents on genetically modified plants have all expired. But, the company now primarily sells Roundup Ready 2 – Xtend seeds for soybeans and cotton. And those new lines are covered by new patents. Here, the company has asserted United States Patent Nos 9,944,945  and 7,838,729.

=> ↺ A new European patent landscape (2): scope of the Unitary Patent system

• In June 2023 the European patent landscape will see one of the most dramatic changes in decades with the introduction of the Unitary Patent (UP) and the opening of Unified Patent Court (UPC).

Copyrights

=> ↺ Better Sharing for Generative AI

• AI is an area that Creative Commons has long focused on, including most recently in a webinar series we held last fall. We are going to expand on our views in future posts, including exploring why we think the legal arguments in the US court case against StabilityAI, Midjourney, and DeviantArt are ill-founded. (Getty Images also subsequently filed a similar suit against StabilityAI in the US, as well as apparently commencing litigation in the UK, but we have yet to see that complaint.)

=> ↺ Nintendo ‘Hacker’ Gary Bowser Seeks Early Prison Release

• Last year, a U.S. federal court handed a 40-month prison sentence to Gary Bowser for this role in the infamous Team-Xecuter group. The Canadian pleaded guilty to being part of the Nintendo hacking group and is now hoping for an early release. However, in a phone call with Nick Moses, Bowser reveals that his looming freedom will present its own challenges.

=> ↺ UK Govt: 3.9 Million People Illegally Streamed Live Sports in 2022

• The UK Intellectual Property Office has published the latest edition of its Online Copyright Infringement Tracker. Live sports piracy remains stubbornly high and with a 36% overall infringement rate, the situation is worse than it was in 2019. Relentless anti-piracy campaigns failed to stop 3.9 million people from accessing illegal sports streams in 2022.

Gemini* and Gopher

Personal

=> ↺ Briefly

• I have a longer post or two on the stove, but nothing quite ready yet. But as I try to get a tad better about actually posting (both here and to my main blog), I’m hoping to do more frequent smaller posts here. We’ll see how much difference this actually ends up making.

• Despite having been away for so long, I’m certainly glad to see that The Midnight is still jumping. Finding any sense of community seems to get harder and harder by the day, and even though I wouldn’t exactly consider myself a “regular” or whatever, it’s comforting simply to see activity continue. I was also gratified to see that my blog[1] is still on Writer’s Lane; than you for that, m15o!

=> ↺ 🔤SpellBinding: AGMNUTS Wordo: MISTY

=> ↺ Barbarians come to town

• I posted this on Mastodon and got into a short exchange with @Yora@dice.camp. The following is my elaboration on what I found to be interesting about it all.

• I think Patrick’s point is that a game of expeditions into the unknown is about going from civilisation into the wilderness. My contention is that the civilisation part of the adventure consists of buying stuff and gathering information in town before leaving; there is no implication that this generates engaging situations. The part that you are leaving (civilisation) is not emphasised.

=> ↺ February Blues

• It’s been entirely too long since I posted anything to this gemlog, and in fact my online presence has been almost non-existent for a while now across all platforms. When I think about the reasons it’s not just that my current projects aren’t really Gemini related, or that there’s a lot of unfinished work sitting around. Those are factors, yes. It’s got more to do with the feeling up until last week that it was something like January the fucking 75th, my job sucks, the hope of getting betterr employment is on hold while the tech sector reboots a bit, and my truck is suicidal. Even my dog seems to be less than chipper these days, although he might just be picking up on our moods.

=> ↺ comfort and things

• i’m an adventurous type. always looking for the new and the exciting. used to be i bought the new phones the day they came out, preordered the new games, got excited about all the new tech.

• these days things have changed, slowed down as it were. i still get excited, but in my experience the new new new is 90% just the old wrapped in new plastic at this point. either i’m getting old or the world is getting dull.

Politics

=> ↺ What Can I Say?

• As I’ve watched the climate change, almost imperceptibly at first, and recently like a roller-coaster car having just come over the highest peak on its track, I’ve wondered what I’ll say to my grandchildren and great-grandchildren when they ask about it.

=> ↺ Phonics vs Whole Language Instruction

• It’s sickening how the GOP has made climate a partisan issue. It’s weird and disorienting. Science and the eve of destruction isn’t really a matter of opinion.

• The democrats have a similar skeleton in their own closet. Nowhere near in terms of magnitude (the destruction of planet Earth is pretty hard to beat which is why you have senators like Manchin thinking “can’t beat ‘em, join ‘em”) but a pretty fundamental issue:

Technical

=> ↺ Hello Again.

• Last year (2022) might have been one of the most significant years of my life thus far. I had some success that year and some notable failures. Something that I suppose counts as a “success” is that I finally have some clue as to who I am, and who I could (or should) be.

Internet/Gemini

=> ↺ Pretty print gemtext

• It is just too easy to extend, simple to remember and very easy to read even unformatted.

• However, I was worried that long lines become a problem to some readers of my ATOM feed or when people read my mails since it depends on how the client handle them.

=> ↺ re: A Blogging Retrospective

• While certainly not the target audience of some of the questions posed in this gemlog, this struck a chord recently with me. As I have been really struggling to figure out what to write over the last month or so.

=> ↺ About BBSes

• I ran across an article on the tilde NNTP server in the tilde.text newsgroup and found myself amused by the inferences made by someone looking at the modern BBS landscape having clearly never used a BBS in its natural time.

Programming

=> ↺ Re: Wrapper Script Etiquette

• I stumbled upon some musing[1] about different form simple shell scripts can take and had some thoughts. Now my first rule of programming is to follow the style of the team you’re working with. If you think something should be different, you must convince the team instead of doing your own thing in the corner. It’s more important that the team be able to survive without you than it is to be “right”. If you are working alone then as a team of 1, you just need to convince yourself. Once you have satisfied the above, the next rule is to keep it as simple and straightforward as possible. To paraphrase something I heard many years ago, you have to be smarter than the author to debug a thing so try not to be your cleverest when you are writing something else you may not be qualified to maintain it. For some final context before I begin my more specific thoughts I’m used to working in mixed environments so my goal with shell scripts specifically is maximal portability. I prefer POSIX shell to the point that I’d rather inline Python or Perl than resort to bash-isms. My targets are typically MacOS/bash, Linux/bash, Linux/dash, and BSD/pdksh.

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=> Techrights

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