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● Links 10/05/2023: Arduino, Raspberry Pi, and More

Posted in News Roundup at 10:53 am by Dr. Roy Schestowitz

GNU/Linux

Applications

=> ↺ OMG! Linux ☛ Resonance is a Stunning New Music Player for Linux

• As an observant quip, it’s rather amusing. But honestly? I’ve never found choice, be it in music players or Linux distros, a problem. Some see duplication, I see diversity.

=> ↺ Thunderbird ☛ Thunderbird Is Thriving: Our 2022 Financial Report

• A few years ago, Thunderbird was in survival mode. Our dedicated core team, passionate community of users, and generous donors kept Thunderbird alive during some difficult times. Then, just last May, we happily reported that Thunderbird’s financial outlook was steadily improving: our 2021 income had increased by 21% over 2020, and by more than 100% over 2018.

• But we are not content merely surviving. Our mission is to build the best email client and personal information manager available. To build professional software that puts your privacy first. To craft an experience that boosts your productivity, compliments your daily workflow, and meets your customization needs. And to expand the Thunderbird experience to Android and iOS. And to do all of this transparently, guided by the values of free and open source software.

=> ↺ Linux Links ☛ Machine Learning in Linux: Bavarder – chat with an AI

• Our Machine Learning in Linux series focuses on apps that make it easy to experiment with machine learning.

• Bavarder is a GTK4/libadwaita based app that offers an easy way to experiment with ChatGPT. Given that a flatpak is available for Bavarder, it’s an obvious candidate for us to investigate.

• Bavarder is free and open source software.

Instructionals/Technical

=> ↺ Ubuntubuzz ☛ Ubuntu 22.04 Runs Very Slow and The Solutions

• Do you experience performance issue with Ubuntu 22.04? We do, too, by using Kubuntu instead. We can confirm that many people are affected with this, both Ubuntu (GNOME) and Kubuntu (KDE) users including us and our students. We collected some solutions from several sources here to make it easier for you to do. We did it ourselves and it makes our system performance considerably better. Now let’s take care of it.

=> ↺ TecMint ☛ 16 Best Tools to Access Remote Linux Desktop

• Accessing a remote Linux desktop computer is made possible by the remote desktop protocol (RDP), a proprietary protocol developed by Microsoft. It gives a user a graphical interface to connect to another/remote computer over a network connection. FreeRDP is a free implementation of the RDP.

• RDP works in a client/server model, where the remote computer must have RDP server software installed and running, and a user employs RDP client software to connect to it, to manage the remote desktop computer.

=> ↺ OSTechNix ☛ Yum Extender NG – A Graphical Front-end Tool For YUM/DNF

• Yum or DNF is a command-line package management utility for RPM-based Linux systems, such as Fedora, Red Hat Enterprise Linux (RHEL), CentOS, AlmaLinux and Rocky Linux. However, for those who prefer a graphical user interface, there are a few GUI front-ends available for Yum/dnf. These front-ends provide a user-friendly interface for package management tasks, including installation, removal, and updates of software packages. Yum Extender NG or Yumex-ng is one such front-end for Yum/dnf, which provides an intuitive interface for managing packages in a user-friendly way. In this guide, I will explain what is Yum Extender NG and walk you through the steps to install and use Yumex-ng in Linux.

=> ↺ Linux Capable ☛ How to Install Yandex Browser on Ubuntu 22.04 | 20.04

• Yandex Browser is a freeware, cross-platform web browser developed by the Russian web search corporation, Yandex. It is built on top of the Chromium open-source project and was first launched in 2012.

=> ↺ How To Install and Play League of Legends Linux (2023)

• LoL is a 3D multiplayer online battle arena that runs in 3 different modes: Twisted Treeline. Summoner’s Rift. Howling Abyss. In each game, the teas bypass defensive line structures in order to destroy core building in the enemy team base and achieve victory. The match lasts an average of 26-60 minutes.

=> ↺ FOSS Post ☛ How to View and Remove File Metadata on Linux

• Whenever you create a new file, whether using your office application, digital camera or video editor, a set of metadata fields are — most of the time — created as well on your new file.

=> ↺ ID Root ☛ How To Install KubeSphere on Rocky Linux 9

• In this tutorial, we will show you how to install KubeSphere on Rocky Linux 9. KubeSphere is a powerful open-source platform for managing containerized applications in a Kubernetes environment. With its intuitive web console and advanced features, KubeSphere is quickly becoming the go-to choice for developers and IT teams looking to simplify their Kubernetes operations.

=> ↺ Linux Hint ☛ How Can I Protect My Data Using Server-Side Encryption?

• Visit the S3 dashboard to upload the object/data to the S3 bucket and during the process configure the server-side encryption to protect the uploading data.

=> ↺ OSTechNix ☛ [Repeat] How To Fix ‘Failed To Update Metadata For Lvfs’ Error In Linux

• I am using Debian 11 at work….

=> ↺ Linux Hint ☛ How to Add or Remove CHECK Constraint in MySQL?

• The CHECK constraint in MySQL is utilized to specify the condition on a particular column that must be fulfilled while inserting or updating any data.

=> ↺ Linux Hint ☛ How to Configure API Keys Using the Amazon API Gateway Console?

• To configure API keys using Amazon API Gateway, simply create an API key from the dashboard and attach a usage plan to it to complete the configuration.

=> ↺ TecAdmin ☛ How to Install Zabbix Agent on Ubuntu 22.04

• Zabbix is a powerful open-source monitoring solution that allows you to monitor the performance of your servers, networks, and applications. In this article, we will guide you through the process of installing the Zabbix client (also known as Zabbix Agent) on Ubuntu 22.04.

=> ↺ Linux Capable ☛ How to Install Timeshift on Ubuntu 22.04 | 20.04

• TimeShift is an incredibly powerful tool that ensures the safety and stability of your computer system by taking incremental snapshots of your file system at regular intervals. These snapshots can be restored at a later date to undo all changes to the system.

=> ↺ Linux Capable ☛ How to Install AngularJS on Ubuntu 22.04 | 20.04

• AngularJS is a robust, open-source JavaScript framework developed by Google. It is widely used for creating dynamic, single-page applications (SPAs) – a type of web application or website that interacts with the user by dynamically rewriting the current web page, rather than loading entire new pages from a server.

=> ↺ LinuxTechi ☛ How to Install Docker on Fedora 38/37 Step-by-Step

• Docker is a popular open-source containerization platform that allows developers to package their applications into containers. Fedora Linux is a popular distribution of Linux that is known for its cutting-edge technologies and open-source software.

Games

=> ↺ Johan Halse ☛ A face arguing with a thick skull forever

• There will always be assholes. The algorithms currently reward them, and make them seem powerful and plentiful. See them for what they are instead: pitiful, wrong, and far, far fewer than the rest of us. Let their existence strengthen your own resolve, and strive to make a difference. Your determination and your voice is needed now more than ever.

=> ↺ GamingOnLinux ☛ Steam Deck news round-up for early May 2023

• Since there’s so much happening and it can be hard to keep track, here’s a little round-up of some happenings with the Steam Deck (and Steam as a whole) plus a little gaming news.

=> ↺ GamingOnLinux ☛ GE-Proton 8-2 is out now fixing Shatterline, various Daedalic games and more

• GE-Proton 8-2 is the latest release of the community-made version of Proton, the translation layer from Valve for Steam Deck and Linux desktop. As a reminder: this is the version of Proton made and supported by the community, for the times where it may work better than the official Valve Proton, but it comes with less testing and may have its own issues. See more in my Steam Play and Proton guide.

=> ↺ GamingOnLinux ☛ The 2D massive space epic Starsector gets a big upgrade

• Starsector is something quite special, originally called Starfarer it’s been in development for quite a few years now and a big new release is now available.

=> ↺ GamingOnLinux ☛ itch.io is hosting another Türkiye & Syria Earthquake Relief Mega Bundle

• Support charity and get access a whole bunch of cool stuff in the Türkiye & Syria Earthquake Relief Mega Bundle hosted by itch.io.

=> ↺ GamingOnLinux ☛ Need a new controller? The 8BitDo Ultimate C 2.4G looks great

• If you’re in need of a new controller, the 8BitDo Ultimate C might just be what you need as 8BitDo revealed their slimmed-down version of their pricier Ultimate.

Distributions and Operating Systems

New Releases

=> ↺ Alpine 3.18.0 released

• We are pleased to announce the release of Alpine Linux 3.18.0, the first in the v3.18 stable series.

• Kernel modules are now signed. Verified modules are not enforced by default, so 3rd party modules with akms still works.

• All packages for ppc64le, x86, and x86_64 was linked with DT_RELR. This should have reduced size of compiled binares.

• Python pre-compiled files (pyc) are now shipped in separate packages. It is now possible to avoid install those and save space by doing apk add !pyc.

Canonical/Ubuntu Family

=> ↺ 9to5Linux ☛ Ubuntu 23.04 Now Works on StarFive’s VisionFive 2 RISC-V Single-Board Computer

• This is the second time Canonical has partnered with StarFive Technology, a high-tech company developing world-leading RISC-V-based products, to bring its Ubuntu Linux operating system to the latest models of the company’s single-board RISC-V computers.

• Last year in August, Canonical announced that Ubuntu 22.04.1 LTS has been optimized for the VisionFive RISC-V SBC, and now, the latest release, Ubuntu 23.04, will be available for the VisionFive 2 SBC, a high-performance and low-cost development platform designed for a wide range of edge computing use cases.

Devices/Embedded

=> ↺ Linux Gizmos ☛ Elkhart Lake SoC powers Pico-ITX board with 2.5 GbE LAN port

• ICP Germany just launched a high-performance Single Board Computer based on Intel Celeron processors. The HYPER-EHL board offers numerous serial ports and it can support up to two simultaneous displays via HDMI and iDPM.

Open Hardware/Modding

=> ↺ Raspberry Pi ☛ UK Bebras participants in the Oxford University Computing Challenge

• UK Bebras Challenge participants solve computational thinking puzzles to have a chance to take on the Oxford University Computing Challenge.

=> ↺ Raspberry Pi ☛ Compute Blade for the Raspberry Pi Compute Module

• Compute Blade (£54/$65) is a fascinating product developed by Ivan Kuleshov at Uptime Lab that puts a Compute Module in a rack-mountable carrier board to create a high-density server for industrial or home use.

=> ↺ Arduino ☛ Convert an old hour meter to track your job time

• On the hardware side, an Arduino Nano board will accept commands from the connected PC via the Serial connection and will control the hour meter. If you buy the same hour meter as Gautchh, you can follow their instructions and use their code. If you buy another model, you may need to perform some reverse-engineering to figure out the control signals and tweak the code. A simple 3D-printed enclosure houses the meter and the Arduino, putting them in a compact package that can sit unobtrusively on a desk.

=> ↺ Arduino ☛ Build your own high-quality ARCTOS robot arm

• If you want a robot arm, either for some practical job or just fun, you have a lot of options. There are many consumer and industrial robot arms on the market, but the models that aren’t glorified toys tend to be pricey.

=> ↺ Arduino ☛ Presenting our first 3 Project Hub competition selections!

• Our recently launched “Arduino Project of the Month” initiative adds a pinch of competition to our community’s passion for sharing. Out of the dozens of new entries added in February, we are now happy to announce our first top three selections, highlighting interesting projects for everyone to learn, test, and improve upon!

=> ↺ Tom’s Hardware ☛ Raspberry Pi Pico Reaction Game Tests Your Speed

• Stewart Watkiss is using a Raspberry Pi Pico to power his reaction game project which also doubles as a quiz button system.

Mobile Systems/Mobile Applications

=> ↺ The 5 Best Linux Smartphones of 2023 – Linux on the Go

• Today our data is becoming vulnerable each day. This is attributed to how some operating systems are not giving enough attention to privacy or malware, phishing, and viruses which with time are becoming powerful.

=> ↺ Purism ☛ Librem 5 USA Smartphone Provides Many Exclusive Security Features

• In today’s connected world it is nearly impossible to purchase a secure smartphone that is made in America.

• As a matter of fact the most popular smartphones on the market are made overseas such as the Apple iPhone and Samsung Galaxy smartphones.

• However, Purism is manufacturing a secure smartphone, Librem 5 USA, that is manufactured in the United States for supply chain security purposes.

• There are numerous security benefits provided by the Librem 5 USA that include…

Free, Libre, and Open Source Software

=> ↺ OSI Blog ☛ What Is Open Governance? Drafting a charter for an Open Source project [Ed: OSI’s Web site is now composed by Microsoft staff; under the guise of “Drafting a charter for an Open Source project” there is promotion of GitHub, which is proprietary and attacks Free/Open Source software. Microsoft has truly hijacked OSI.]

=> ↺ OSI Blog ☛ What Is Open Governance? Drafting a charter for an Open Source project [Ed: OSI’s Web site is now composed by Microsoft staff; under the guise of “Drafting a charter for an Open Source project” there is promotion of GitHub, which is proprietary and attacks Free/Open Source software. Microsoft has truly hijacked OSI.]

• Building a healthy Open Source community is much more than just choosing an Open Source license for the project. It involves creating a contributing guide, adopting a code of conduct, and establishing an open governance structure that allows all members to actively participate in and contribute to the project. This article provides a hands on guide on how to establish an open governance structure for an Open Source project.

Web Browsers/Web Servers

Mozilla

=> ↺ Mozilla ☛ Firefox 113 significantly boosts accessibility performance

• About five years ago Mozilla shipped Firefox Quantum, an upgrade that included significant performance improvements for most Firefox users. Unfortunately, Firefox Quantum didn’t improve performance for people who use screen readers and other assistive technology. In some ways, our screen reader performance actually regressed with the architecture changes that Quantum delivered.

• [...]

• Browsers are more complicated today than when Firefox’s accessibility engine was first designed, and the most significant overall change has been the move to security-isolated, multi-process architectures. With multiple isolated processes, screen readers had to do a lot of expensive work to retrieve and relay content to users. We were inspired by Chrome’s approach and extended it to improve Firefox’s accessibility performance; Firefox now provides a cache of all tab and browser UI content to screen readers in the browser’s parent process, where it can be used quickly and very easily.

• This blog post by accessibility tech lead Jamie Teh provides more context and technical details on the project, but the largest impact you’ll notice immediately is speed. For some of the worst use cases — like pages with very large tables — Firefox now performs up to 20 times faster, and we’re clocking other very large pages at 10 times faster! However, even for the most everyday actions, like opening and closing a Gmail message or switching channels in a Slack window, the performance is 2 to 3 times better.

=> ↺ Techdirt ☛ Mozilla Wonders What Social Media Could Look Like If It Started With A Clear ‘No Assholes’ Policy

• Content moderation at scale is impossible to do well. And, contrary to what most people believe, a huge part of content moderation is not “we have to suppress this content that scares us,” but just an attempt to “stop people from being jerks to others.” Unfortunately, too many people get confused, and think that “free speech” means they get to commandeer private property to be assholes to others, which results in confusing fights over people claiming their “free speech” is under attack when the reality is that a private property owner has decided you need to stop being an asshole.

=> ↺ CISA ☛ Mozilla Releases Security Advisories for Multiple Products | CISA

• Mozilla has released security advisories to address vulnerabilities in Firefox and Firefox ESR. A cyber threat actor could exploit some of these vulnerabilities to take control of an affected system.

Education

=> ↺ CCC ☛ Camp 2023 – Call for Participation

• There will be five channel stages in different areas of Ziegeleipark Mildenberg. The talks will take place on five days. The stages are managed by multiple groups, each setting their own agenda. Together we are looking forward to your submission around our preferred topics: Technology, Hacking, InfoSec, Decentralized Networks, Free Software, Sustainability, Digital & Human Rights.

=> ↺ Software Freedom Conservancy ☛ Call for Proposals

• We had over 15 tracks proposed by our incredible community, so now we want to hear from you about how you fit into the mix! While our tracks set the stage for the tone and overall character of the conference, there are plenty of talks we’ve seen in the community that don’t fit neatly into any specific one of them. In that case, we’d love to see the ways you and your community collaborate, use, build free software, and even ideas outside free software that you think a broader audience could benefit from!

Programming/Development

=> ↺ Peter Eisentraut ☛ How to submit a patch by email, 2023 edition

• The short answer is: Use git format-patch. That takes care of almost all of the conventions and details. Looking at the upcoming commit fests, it appears that the vast majority of patch submissions already use that. But I suspect that in some cases people produce the patches in some other way and then rename them to look like what other people are doing, without knowing about git format-patch?

=> ↺ MaskRay ☛ Assemblers

• GCC generates assembly code and invokes GNU Assembler (also known as “gas”), which is part of GNU Binutils, to convert the assembly code into machine code. The GCC driver is also capable of accepting assembly input files. Due to GCC’s widespread use, GNU Assembler is arguably the most popular assembler.

• Within the LLVM project, the LLVM integrated assembler is a library that is linked by Clang, llvm-mc, and lld (for LTO purposes) to generate machine code. It supports a wide range of GNU Assembler syntax and can be used as a drop-in replacement for GNU Assembler.

=> ↺ Buttondown ☛ The seven specification ur-languages

• I’ve been dreading this one. You see, TLA+ and Alloy don’t fit into any of the programming ur-languages, because they aren’t programming languages. They are specification languages (SLs) and are designed for modeling systems, not implementing them. While there’s a lot of intermixing, SLs come from a different lineage than PLs and we need to treat them separately.

=> ↺ Matt Rickard ☛ Why Declarative Build Systems Aren’t Popular

• Not helpful or detrimental for small projects. It’s the equivalent of Kubernetes — valuable ideas for large deployments but significant maintenance for even the most experienced development teams. While you get many speed benefits from adding a build system like this, it comes at the cost of developer velocity and maintenance. Developers must learn and maintain the system and port third-party software to it.

Python

=> ↺ Ivan Sagalaev ☛ Trie in Python

• A post about Haskell vs. Python readability came onto my radar the other day. It compares two implementations of a trie structure, and after looking upon the Python version I wanted to make my own attempt. I didn’t make it to necessarily compare or “battle” against the other solutions, it’s more of an exercise in the vein of “how would I do it”.

Rust

=> ↺ Rust Blog ☛ The Rust Programming Language Blog: Updating Rust’s Linux musl targets

• Beginning with Rust 1.71 (slated for stable release on 2023-07-13), the various *-linux-musl targets will ship with musl 1.2.3. These targets currently use musl 1.1.24. While musl 1.2.3 introduces some new features, most notably 64-bit time on all platforms, it is ABI compatible with earlier musl versions.

Leftovers

=> ↺ Hackaday ☛ Moisture Duck Gives You A Green Thumb

• Around the Hackaday bunker, any plant other than a cactus has a real chance of expiring due to thirst. Perhaps we should build some of [MakersFunDuck]’s Moisture Duck boards. As you can see in the video below, the simple PCB with an ATtiny13A tells you when it is time to water the plants. The video also covers several exotic methods of determining the watering status, some of which are pretty complex.

=> ↺ Latvia ☛ 1,700 Russian citizens apply for Latvian language exam in Daugavpils

• In Daugavpils, more than 1,700 Russian citizens have applied to take the national language exam, reported Latvian Radio May 9.

=> ↺ The Nation ☛ Newton Minow Sought to Lead Us Out of the Vast Wasteland

• More than six decades ago, Newton Minow, a 35-year-old lawyer who had been tapped by newly elected President John Fitzgerald Kennedy to chair the Federal Communications Commission, electrified the debate about television’s influence on society and convinced a generation of Americans that they had a right to demand better media.1

=> ↺ 37signals LLC ☛ The misallocation of tech talent

• Like undoing the absurd hiring spree committed by the largest tech companies during the pandemic. This spree swallowed up a preposterous amount of talent, then put much of it to work on bullshit projects with little to no value for the company or the economy as a whole.

• Such hoarding of tech talent represented a tragic misallocation of productive capacity. The likes of Amazon, Meta, Google, and many others added tens of thousands of positions to already bloated bureaucracies, which often just made them slower and less capable.

=> ↺ The Register UK ☛ Google Cloud’s watery Parisian outage enters third week, with no end in sight

• Google Cloud’s europe-west9 region took a shower on April 25. As datacenters and water don’t mix, outages resulted.

Science

=> ↺ uni Michigan ☛ [Computers] could run a million microbial experiments per year

• An artificial intelligence system that enables robots to conduct autonomous scientific experiments could a drastic leap forward in areas from medicine to agriculture to environmental science.

=> ↺ Science Alert ☛ A New Way to Activate Dormant Cells in The Retina Could Restore Vision

• A promising new direction.

=> ↺ Science Alert ☛ Radical Idea Could Make Future Space Mission 100 Times More Powerful

• We need a giant spacecraft constellation.

=> ↺ uni Michigan ☛ A message to the aspiring quitter

• “I never should have dropped. I can’t believe you let me do that,” I said. This was minute 10 of me walking around the patio in distress, whisper-yelling to my parents on the phone. In hindsight, me dropping out of my computer science class was not their doing.

=> ↺ Science Alert ☛ New Butterfly Genus Name Inspired by Lord of The Rings Villain’s Blazing Eye

• Introducing Saurona.

=> ↺ Science Alert ☛ New Ice Discovery Means Glaciers Could Melt Way Faster Than Predicted

• We might have missed something.

=> ↺ Science Alert ☛ ‘Dark Earth’ Buried in The Amazon’s Past Could Help Save Its Future

• A time capsule left by ancient hands.

=> ↺ Science Alert ☛ Your Big Nose Might Be The Result of an Ancient Affair With a Neanderthal

• We all have skeletons in our family closet.

=> ↺ Science Alert ☛ Nearby Civilizations Could Intercept Our Transmissions to Space Probes This Century

• We’re standing by for your call.

=> ↺ DroidGazzette ☛ Northern lights could be visible in parts of the U.S. Wednesday due to geomagnetic storm

• The National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration Space Weather Prediction Center raised geomagnetic storm watches for Wednesday and Thursday. The solar flare was associated with a partial coronal mass ejection, which is a large expulsion of plasma and magnetic field lines from the Sun’s corona — the outermost part of its atmosphere. If the CME arrives as anticipated, G2, or moderate, storm conditions are expected Wednesday with G1, or minor, conditions Thursday.

• Solar flares can cause radio blackouts, according to the NOAA.

Education

=> ↺ The Kent Stater ☛ How the Parisian protests are affecting study abroad students

• When preparing to study abroad, some find it easy to look at what is happening in the world to discourage themselves from going abroad for weeks to months on end. With Russia’s war on Ukraine and now the Parisian protests, there are many reasons why students and parents could be worried.

Hardware

=> ↺ Hackaday ☛ Scorched Moon: Secret Project A119

• In today’s world, it is hard to realize how frightened Americans were at the news of Sputnik orbiting the Earth. Part of it was a fear of what a rival nation could do if they could fly over your country with impunity. Part of it was simply fear generated by propaganda. While America won the race to the moon, that wasn’t clear in the 1950s. The Soviet Union was ahead in the ability to deliver bombs using planes and missiles. They launched Sputnik on a modified ICBM, while American attempts to do the same failed spectacularly. The Air Force wanted ideas about how to respond to Sputnik, and one of the most disturbing ones was project A119, a project we were reminded of recently by a BBC post.

=> ↺ Hackaday ☛ Making Music By Probing Magnetite Crystals

• Well, noises anyway. [Dmitry Morozov] and [Alexandra Gavrilova] present an interesting electronics-based art installation, which probes a large chunk of crystalline magnetite, using a pair of servo-mounted probes, ‘measuring’ the surface conductivity and generating some sound and visuals.

=> ↺ Hackaday ☛ Retro Gadgets: I Swear Officer, I Was Listening To 45

• Audio in cars has a long history. Car radios in the 1920s were bulky and expensive. In the 1930s, there was the Motorola radio. They were still expensive — a $540 car with a $130 radio — but much more compact and usable.  There were also 8-tracks, cassettes, CDs, and lately digital audio on storage media or streamed over the phone network. There were also record players. For a brief period between 1955 and 1961, you could get a car with a record player. As you might expect, though, they weren’t just any record players. After all, the first thing to break on a car from that era was the mechanical clock. Record players would need to be rugged to work and continue to work in a moving vehicle. As you might also expect, it didn’t work out very well.

=> ↺ Hackaday ☛ Hackaday Prize 2023: Bolt Bot Micro Servo Droids

• This Hackaday prize entry from [saul] is the beginning of a reconfigurable kit of 3D printed parts and servo motors for robotics learning. With just access to a printer, a few cheap-as-chips servo motors, an Arduino, and some nuts and bolts, you could be hacking together robot walkers within a few hours of starting!

=> ↺ Hackaday ☛ Tiny Orrery Keeps The Planets In Their Places

• [Frans] claims to have made the world’s smallest orrery. We won’t take a position on that — such things are best left up to the good folks at Guinness. But given that the whole thing is seriously in danger of being dwarfed by a USB-C connector, we’d say he’s got a pretty good shot at that record.

=> ↺ Tom’s Hardware ☛ Taiwan Will Defend TSMC From US Bombing in the Event of a China War

• A Taiwanese minister says that the armed forces will defend all of Taiwan’s people, materials, and resources from any threat. This includes protecting TSMC should a war with China occur.

Health/Nutrition/Agriculture

=> ↺ NBC ☛ More Americans are so worried about money, it’s hurting their mental health

• The survey found 52% of respondents listed money as the thing that takes the biggest toll on their mental health, compared with 42% who blamed worries about their own health and 41% who listed current events as their top concern.

• The latest finding compares with 42% of U.S. adults who said money was their top concern last year.

=> ↺ Bankrate LLC ☛ Americans report increased levels of financial anxiety

• “They’re at this double whammy disadvantage of not just caring for themselves, but also often caring for children and their aging parents, and getting toward the later half of their earning years,” she said. “So of course, they’re experiencing higher rates of financial anxiety.”

• Additionally, low earners experience more emotional distress than high earners. Nearly 60 percent of people earning $50,000 or less say money negatively impacts their mental health, compared to 45 percent of those with household incomes of more than $80,000 annually.

=> ↺ Latvia ☛ No more mandatory face masks in Latvian medical establishments

• Due to the decreasing risk of contracting Covid-19, it has been decided to remove the requirement for mandatory use of facial masks in medical establishments and in long-term social care facilities, the Ministry of Health said on May 9.

=> ↺ Mexico News Daily ☛ Mexico declares end of COVID-19 pandemic health emergency

• Deputy Health Minister Hugo López-Gatell says COVID-19 can now be managed as an endemic disease as numbers continue to decline.

=> ↺ US News And World Report ☛ Migrants Amass Along US-Mexico Border as COVID-Era Restrictions Near End

=> ↺ Science Alert ☛ A New Urine Test Could Be a Simple Way to Check For Cancer

• As easy as a pregnancy test.

=> ↺ US News And World Report ☛ Mothers Deserve Childbirth Price Transparency

• Giving birth can be an overwhelming task. Figuring out what you’ll pay financially for it shouldn’t be.

=> ↺ uni Michigan ☛ “Clean” eating is classist at its core

• Grocery stores nowadays are inundated with products touting profound health benefits. The shelves are increasingly lined with the latest “superfood,” sugar-free, organic breads and berries of a health nut’s dreams. When you leave the supermarket and jump onto social media, it just gets worse.

=> ↺ Latvia ☛ Fine for influencer’s miracle cure claims

• The Consumer Rights Protection Center (PTAC) said May 8 it was issuing a fine of 15,000 euros against social media ‘influencer’ Vineta Meduņecka, the product distributor of the internet marketing company ‘Coral Club’.

Proprietary

=> ↺ SFGate ☛ SF-based software startup Rapid lays off over three-fourths of staff

• Rapid, a San-Francisco-based software startup valued last year at $1 billion, laid off over 150 employees in a two-week stretch, former workers say.

=> ↺ Information Security Buzz ☛ LinkedIn Displaces 716 Positions, Pulls Out Its China App

• LinkedIn is eliminating 716 jobs and will begin winding down its local jobs app in China as part of the company’s restructuring. In a letter that was sent out today, LinkedIn CEO Ryan Roslanky explained the decision to discontinue the separate China app known as InCareer by citing “fierce competition and a challenging macroeconomic climate.”

=> ↺ Quartz ☛ LinkedIn announced layoffs and the closure of its Chinese jobs app InCareer

• LinkedIn became the latest tech company to lay off employees to rein back costs.

=> ↺ Microsoft’s Share Prices Drop Ahead of Inflation Report and LinkedIn Layoffs

• On May 9, 2023, Microsoft Corp (NASDAQ: MSFT) experienced a decrease in share prices prior to the release of the April Consumer Price Index inflation report on Wednesday. Investors are concerned about the possibility of unexpectedly strong inflation data, as it can lead to higher expenses, lower pricing power, and lower consumer spending, particularly for tech-related equities.

• Earlier that day, LinkedIn, Microsoft’s business and employment-focused social media platform, had to let go of 716 employees as part of changes to its Global Business Organization (GBO) and China strategy. LinkedIn aims to sunset its Business Productivity team and reduce management roles while utilizing more vendors to “serve emerging and growth markets more effectively.”

=> ↺ Hackaday ☛ WordStar Reborn

• Wordstar was the word processor that helped sell the personal computer. At one time, it was ubiquitous, and many authors had a hard time giving it up. Some, like George R. R. Martin, apparently are still refusing to give it up. But most of us have moved on. Thanks to an open-source clone, WordTsar, you may not have to. This is a modern interpretation of our old friend.

=> ↺ Business Insider ☛ RIP Metaverse

• The Metaverse, the once-buzzy technology that promised to allow users to hang out awkwardly in a disorientating video-game-like world, has died after being abandoned by the business world. It was three years old.

=> ↺ Kian Ryan ☛ Online Psion Document Conversion With PsiConv

• In 2021, I wrote about my workflow for getting draft documents out of my Psion and in to my blog. It worked, but it required multiple steps and was a bit of a kludge.

=> ↺ The Register UK ☛ Show us the sauce code… Wendy’s and Google to test drive-thru order-taking bot

• The completed model was trained to recognize specific phrases or acronyms customers typically use when ordering, such as “JBC” describing Wendy’s junior bacon cheeseburger, “Frosties” milkshakes, or its combination meal “biggie bags.” Unsurprisingly, the chatbot, like human workers, will gladly offer to upsize meals or add more items to an order since it has been programmed to try and persuade hungry patrons to spend more cash.

=> ↺ US News And World Report ☛ Discord Forces Members to Change Usernames, Discord Erupts

• Discord is a social app favored by gamers

Windows TCO

=> ↺ [Repeat] Data Breaches ☛ City of Dallas update on ransomware attack recovery efforts

• Please see below for frequently asked questions regarding the incident: [...]

Security

=> ↺ CISA ☛ CISA Urges Organizations to Incorporate the FCC Covered List Into Risk Management Plans | CISA

• The Federal Communications Commission (FCC) maintains a Covered List of communications equipment and services that have been determined by the U.S. government to pose an unacceptable risk to the national security of the United States or the security and safety of United States persons to national security pursuant to the Secure and Trusted Communications Networks Act of 2019.

=> ↺ CISA ☛ CISA and Partners Disclose Snake Malware Threat From Russian Cyber Actors | CISA

• Today, CISA and partners released a joint advisory for a sophisticated cyber espionage tool used by Russian cyber actors. Hunting Russian Intelligence “Snake” Malware provides technical descriptions of the malware’s host architecture and network communications, and mitigations to help detect and defend against this threat.

• CISA urges organizations to review the advisory for more information and apply the recommended mitigations and detection guidance. For more information on FSB and Russian state-sponsored cyber activity, please see the joint advisory Russian State-Sponsored and Criminal Cyber Threats to Critical Infrastructure and CISA’s Russia Cyber Threat Overview and Advisories webpage.

=> ↺ CISA ☛ Microsoft Releases May 2023 Security Updates

• Microsoft has released updates to address multiple vulnerabilities in Microsoft software. An attacker can exploit some of these vulnerabilities to take control of an affected system.

=> ↺ Krebs On Security ☛ Microsoft Patch Tuesday, May 2023 Edition

• Microsoft today released software updates to fix at least four dozen security holes in its Windows operating systems and other software, including patches for two zero-day vulnerabilities that are already being exploited in active attacks.

=> ↺ Security Week ☛ Microsoft Patch Tuesday: 40 Vulnerabilities, 2 Zero-Days

• Microsoft’s May 2023 security updates address a total of 40 newly documented vulnerabilities, including two flaws already exploited in attacks.

=> ↺ Krebs On Security ☛ Feds Take Down 13 More DDoS-for-Hire Services

=> ↺ Bruce Schneier ☛ PIPEDREAM Malware against Industrial Control Systems

• Another nation-state malware, Russian in origin:

=> ↺ Security Week ☛ US Disrupts Russia’s Sophisticated ‘Snake’ Cyberespionage Malware

• The US government has announced the disruption of Snake, a sophisticated cyberespionage malware officially attributed to a unit of Russia’s FSB agency.

=> ↺ Privilege Escalation in Cloud-Native App Production Environments

• With today’s modern digital applications, managing access permissions during operational events is crucial to ensuring the safety and security of an organization’s production applications and infrastructure. A common and essential security principle, the principle of least privilege, states that developers and support engineers should have as little access as possible

Privacy/Surveillance

=> ↺ Teen Vogue ☛ TikTok Tracked Users Who Watched LGBTQ+ Videos, New Report Finds

• Former TikTok employees told the newspaper that the app’s videos were categorized under topics, including one labeled “LGBT,” and that TikTok kept an internally accessible dashboard of the usernames and ID numbers of people who had watched such videos. TikTok employees in the U.S., U.K., and Australia flagged the database to higher-level executives, expressing concerns that the data could be shared with outside parties or used as blackmail, according to the ex-workers. Executives restricted access to the dashboard in 2021, but by that point, some employees had been able to see the IDs of users who had watched queer content for over a year, per the WSJ.

=> ↺ The Wall Street Journal ☛ TikTok Tracked Users Who Watched Ga

• TikTok doesn’t ask users to disclose their sexual orientation, but it cataloged videos users watched under topics such as LGBT, short for lesbian, gay, bisexual and transgender, the former employees said. The collection of information, which could be viewed by some employees through a dashboard, included a set of affiliated users who watched those videos, and their ID numbers, they said.

=> ↺ Michael West Media ☛ PWC Royal Commission please

• Michael West discusses why we need a Royal Commission into PWC and their shady practices of leaking information to big multi nationals

Defence/Aggression

=> ↺ India Times ☛ Islamist module linked to global outfit busted, 11 arrested in Madhya Pradesh

• The MP Police has registered a case against the accused under sections 13, 17 and 18 of the Unlawful Activities (Prevention) Act, 1967, and other relevant sections. A special court has remanded them to ATS custody till May 19.

=> ↺ ANF News ☛ Two ISIS terrorists arrested in Deir ez-Zor

• The SDF (Syrian Democratic Forces) Anti-Terrorism Units (YAT), along with the Counter-Terrorism Group (CTG) of the Kurdistan Region of Iraq and the International Coalition forces, conducted a security operation targeting an active ISIS terrorist cell in the town of al-Suar, in the eastern countryside of Deir ez-Zor.

=> ↺ RTL ☛ 168 German shells discovered during excavation work in Longwy, France

• Le Républicain Lorrain reports that it took two days for the deminers to safely extract the shells. The discovery appears to be a depot used by German troops during the First World War. Each warhead was calibrated for cannons and consisted of an explosive and a detonator.

• A controlled underground explosion was conducted in a complex kept secret by the French state to safely destroy the shells. According to our colleagues in Lorraine, the explosives may have been abandoned during the evacuation of German troops from Longwy on November 10 and 11, 1918.

=> ↺ El País ☛ Migrants flow north to US border ahead of policy changes

• Some had vague information — from relatives, social media, smugglers — about coming border policy changes by the United States government and were hustling to make it to that distant border.

• On May 11, the United States government will end pandemic-related restrictions on people requesting asylum at the border — also known as Title 42, under which migrants have been expelled from the U.S. more than 2.8 million times since March 2020.

=> ↺ Democracy Now ☛ Sudan: Residents Trapped Between Warring Rival Factions as Humanitarian Crisis Escalates

• Conflict in Sudan between two rival military factions is entering its fourth week. Despite international calls for a humanitarian ceasefire, both combatant groups have repeatedly breached truce agreements. More than 700 people have died. As thousands of Sudanese civilians flee both the capital Khartoum and the country entirely, the fighting is expected to continue, with no end in sight. As Sudan braces for the renewed possibility of full-scale civil war, we speak to McGill University professor Khalid Mustafa Medani and Sudanese activist Marine Alneel about the country’s brewing humanitarian crisis. “The only path toward stability is the establishment of a civilian democracy,” says Medani.

=> ↺ Site36 ☛ Annual statistics: German police count more political crime

=> ↺ The Strategist ☛ China ‘the peacemaker’, or just a charm offensive?

• With a renewed five-year mandate as General Secretary of the Central Committee of the Chinese Communist Party, Xi Jinping has re-emerged on the international stage.

=> ↺ AntiWar ☛ NATO’s Great New Idea: ‘Let’s Start a War With China!’

• NATO’s post-Cold War history is that of an organization far past its “sell-by” date. Desperate for a mission after the end of the Warsaw Pact, NATO in the late 1990s decided that it would become the muscle behind the militarization of “human rights” under the Clinton Administration.

=> ↺ Scheerpost ☛ The Nord Stream Explosions: New Revelations About Motive, Means and Opportunity

• As new details emerge about the pipeline blasts, they also prompt questions: What did US intelligence know about the biggest whodunit of the century, when did they know it, and how did they know it?

=> ↺ Scheerpost ☛ Talk World Radio: James Bamford on Israelgate and Nordstream

• This week on Talk World Radio we’re discussing Israelgate and Nordstream. Our guest, journalist James Bamford, has a new book called Spyfail: Foreign Spies, Moles, Saboteurs, and the Collapse of America’s Counterintelligence…

=> ↺ Common Dreams ☛ ‘Heinous Crime’: Israeli Strikes on Gaza Kill at Least 13 Palestinians, Including Children

• Human rights defenders on Tuesday condemned an intense Israeli aerial bombardment of densely populated areas of Gaza that killed at least 13 Palestinians—including at least 10 civilians and three leaders of a militant resistance group—while wounding more than 20 others.

=> ↺ Common Dreams ☛ ‘Broken Country’: 2-Year-Old FBI Training Video of How to Survive US Mass Shooting Goes Viral

• As the U.S. remains on track for a record number of mass killings in 2023, an FBI training video instructing people on how to survive a shooting has gone viral this week.

=> ↺ Common Dreams ☛ ‘Serbia Against Violence’: Tens of Thousands Demonstrate After Pair of Mass Shootings

• Tens of thousands of people in Serbia hit the streets on Monday to demand the resignation of top government officials and a prohibition on violence promotion in the media following a pair of mass shootings in the country that left 17 dead and 21 injured, many of them children.

=> ↺ Common Dreams ☛ The Mercenaries Who Fight for American Empire

• The way mercenary leader Yevgeny Prigozhin and his private army have been waging a significant part of Vladimir Putin’s war in Ukraine has been well covered in the American media, not least of all because his firm, the Wagner Group, draws most of its men from Russia’s prison system. Wagner offers “freedom” from Putin’s labor camps only to send those released convicts to the front lines of the conflict, often on brutal suicide missions.

=> ↺ Meduza ☛ ‘Security concerns and moral issues’ What happened to the usually lavish Victory Day parade in Red Square this year? — Meduza

• Less than a week before the anticipated May 9 Victory Day parade in Moscow’s Red Square, two drones attacked the Kremlin. Even before the incident, the authorities spoke of canceling some May 9 festivities, including the Immortal Regiment procession in central Moscow, in which people carry pictures of relatives who served the Soviet Union during the Second World War. Victory Day parades, normally lavish spectacles, having been shrinking in size for several years. This year, “security considerations” were just one more reason the authorities gave when explaining the cancellations. Independent journalist cooperative Bereg analyzed the Kremlin’s and the Defense Ministry’s shifting plans and catalogued the differences in this year’s diminished celebration. With Bereg’s permission, Meduza shares an abridged version of their report in English.

=> ↺ Meduza ☛ Yandex goes Dutch In an effort to divest itself of its Russian segment, the multinational IT giant is looking to create a ‘consortium’ of oligarch shareholders, while distancing from the Kremlin — Meduza

• The IT giant Yandex describes itself as a “technology company that builds intelligent products and services powered by machine learning.” Now undergoing a reorganization, the multinational company is looking to divest itself of the troublesome Russian assets that have become a liability for the family trust established by Yandex founder Arkady Volozh. But restructuring Yandex is proving to be a complex task with many stakeholders to make happy, including some of Russia’s richest men who remain closely connected to Vladimir Putin. In this collaborative reportage, Svetlana Reiter, Irina Malkova, and Valeria Pozychanyuk report from behind the scenes of an incipient deal where Russia’s “old” oligarch money prepares to back new technologies like AI and big-data processing.

=> ↺ Meduza ☛ 14 people arrested at anti-war art exhibition in Russia’s Leningrad region — Meduza

• In Russia’s Leningrad region, police officers arrested 14 people at an anti-war art exhibition, reports the Telegram channel SOTAvision and the outlet RusNews. According to the Telegram channel, they were arrested for suspicion of theft. All those arrested were taken to the Gatchinsky District Internal Affairs Ministry.

=> ↺ Meduza ☛ ‘There’s nothing stronger than love for our Motherland’ Meduza’s brief retelling of Vladimir Putin’s Victory Day speech — Meduza

• I’d like to wish you all a happy Victory Day. Our fathers and grandfathers saved humanity from Nazism. Today, civilization is again at a crossroads; a true war is being waged against our Motherland once more. But we’ve fought back against international terrorism. We’ll defend the residents of the Donbas and ensure our own security. We want a future that is peaceful, free, and stable. Any ideology of superiority is criminal and deadly. The Western elites are pitting people against each other and dividing society while sowing Russophobia and aggressive nationalism and destroying the traditional values that make people human. They forgot what the Nazis’ ambitions of world domination led to and forgot who liberated the people of Europe. The goal of Russia’s enemies is the breakdown of our country. The Ukrainian people have become hostages of a coup d’etat and a bargaining chip for their Western masters. These battles, decisive for the fate of our Motherland, have become sacred. We’re proud of the participants of the special military operation, of those who are fighting on the front line. There’s no work more important right now than your combat work. There’s nothing stronger in the world than love for our Motherland. For Russia! For our valiant armed forces! For victory!

=> ↺ Atlantic Council ☛ Putin’s embarrassing one-tank parade hints at catastrophic losses in Ukraine

• Putin has transformed Victory Day into a celebration of Russia’s resurgence as a military superpower, but this year’s embarrassing one-tank parade underlined the catastrophic scale of Russian losses in Ukraine, writes Peter Dickinson.

=> ↺ Atlantic Council ☛ Russia’s invasion fails to prevent progress in Ukraine’s energy sector

• Russia’s seven-month airstrike campaign against Ukraine’s civilian energy infrastructure has failed to derail Ukrainian progress toward greater energy sector integration with the EU, writes Aura Sabadus.

=> ↺ Atlantic Council ☛ James Cleverly on the UK’s support for Ukraine and foreign policy ‘refresh’

• The UK foreign secretary joined the Atlantic Council to talk about the UK’s national-security strategy, support for Ukraine, and China policy.

=> ↺ Meduza ☛ Alexander Lukashenko conspicuously absent at Victory Day breakfast in Moscow, rushed back to Belarus with ambulance in tow — Meduza

• Alexander Lukashenko, the president of Belarus, flew back to Minsk shortly after attending the Victory Day parade in Moscow, skipping the formal breakfast for visiting foreign leaders.

=> ↺ Meduza ☛ ‘The future is gloomy, but’: Russian business leaders and government officials discuss recently leaked telephone calls where elites criticized Putin — Meduza

• Over the past several months, Ukrainian and Russian independent media outlets have published multiple audio recordings that are purportedly private phone conversations in which elite members of Russian politics, business, and society harshly criticize President Vladimir Putin, his policies, and the ongoing war in Ukraine. In March, the Ukrainian media released a recorded conversation that allegedly took place between Russian music producer Iosif Prigozhin (no relation to the Wagner Group founder and catering tycoon Evgeny Prigozhin) and billionaire and former politician Farkhad Akhmedov, in which the men call Putin and his cronies “criminals” and say, “They fucked us and our children and their future.” Iosif Prigozhin dismissed the recording as a fake soon after it appeared. In April, another recorded telephone conversation appeared on YouTube, this time allegedly between Russian billionaire Roman Trotsenko and the businessman Nikolai Matushevsky. The investigative news outlet iStories published a synopsis of the alleged Trotskenko–Matushevsky call and collected the reactions of several Russian business and thought leaders (who remained anonymous in the original piece). Meduza is sharing an abridged English-language version of the report.

=> ↺ Meduza ☛ ‘We shouldn’t celebrate until we’ve repented’ Meduza’s readers on how their views of Victory Day have changed since the war began — Meduza

• May 9 is Victory Day, the day Russia celebrates the anniversary of the Soviet victory in World War II. This is the second time the country has marked the holiday since the start of the full-scale war in Ukraine. Last year, many of Meduza’s readers said that as far as they’re concerned, the holiday no longer exists. We decided to find out how Russians’ perceptions of the holiday have changed in the year since and how they plan to spend it. We’re publishing some of the most notable responses below.

=> ↺ Meduza ☛ Ukraine says air defenses shot down 23 missiles launched by Russia overnight — Meduza

• Russian troops launched 25 cruise missiles overnight on May 9. According to Ukraine’s Air Force, 23 of the missiles were shot down by Ukrainian air defenses.

=> ↺ Meduza ☛ Nizhny Novgorod governor visits Zakhar Prilepin in hospital following assassination attempt — Meduza

• Gleb Nikitin, the governor of Russia’s Nizhny Novgorod region, posted on Telegram about visiting the nationalist writer-turned-politician Zakhar Prilepin in hospital.

=> ↺ Meduza ☛ Warsaw protesters keep Russian ambassador from laying wreath at Soviet Military Cemetery — Meduza

• Sergey Andreyev, Russia’s ambassador to Poland, could not lay a wreath at the Soviet Military Cemetery in Warsaw to commemorate Victory Day and the end of World War II in Europe. RIA Novosti has published video footage of the crowd surrounding the Russian diplomats and forcing them to leave the memorial site.

=> ↺ Meduza ☛ Evgeny Prigozhin says Russian army unit abandoned positions in Bakhmut — Meduza

• Wagner Group founder Evgeny Prigozhin said in a new video posted to Telegram that a Russian Armed Forces unit abandoned its positions in the Bakhmut area on Tuesday.

=> ↺ Democracy Now ☛ Israel Kills 13, Including Women & Children, in Airstrikes Targeting Militant Leaders in Gaza

• Israel launched surprise airstrikes in Gaza overnight, targeting three commanders of the Islamic Jihad militant group, who were assassinated in their homes. The attacks killed a total of 13 people, including the wives and children of the men. The Israeli attack broke a ceasefire that had been reached last week after a spike in violence following the death of Palestinian prisoner Khader Adnan in Israeli custody. “As the occupying power, Israel has the obligation to protect the civilian population,” says Phyllis Bennis, author and fellow at the Institute for Policy Studies. “Instead, we’re seeing the expansion of an apartheid regime, and one which is prepared to use violence at extraordinary levels without a moment’s hesitation.”

=> ↺ Democracy Now ☛ Phyllis Bennis on Ukraine War & Why a Ceasefire Is the First Step Toward Lasting Peace

• As Russia marks the Soviet Union’s defeat of the Nazis 78 years ago, Ukraine is preparing to launch a major counteroffensive, which has forced Moscow to issue an evacuation order for thousands of residents in areas occupied by Russian forces. Meanwhile, international actors are calling for negotiations, possibly brokered by China or Brazil, to end the war. For more on the prognosis for peace in Ukraine, we’re joined by Phyllis Bennis, author and a fellow at the Institute for Policy Studies.

=> ↺ European Commission ☛ Press statement by President von der Leyen with Ukrainian President Zelenskyy

• European Commission Statement Kyiv, 09 May 2023

• Dear President Zelenskyy, dear Volodymyr,

• It is an honour and it is a privilege to be here on the 9 May.

=> ↺ RFERL ☛ Zelenskiy, Von Der Leyen Discuss Ukraine’s EU Integration, More Russia Sanctions, Faster Ammo Deliveries

• Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky on May 9 highlighted the need for faster deliveries of artillery shells from the European Union during a meeting with visiting European Commission President Ursula von der Leyen.

=> ↺ Latvia ☛ Flower flag in support of Ukraine at Freedom Monument, Rīga

• Expressing support for Ukraine on its way to accession to the European Union (EU) and commemorating the victims of the war, a flower composition in the colors of the Ukrainian flag was created in Rīga on Monday at the Freedom Monument, Latvian Television reported.

=> ↺ Ukraine’s Future Lies in the Great Reset

• Elite plans for digital ID, Central Bank Digital Currencies (CBDCs) and a “Green” post-war economy proliferate in Ukraine as conflict rages, manifesting in Ukraine’s Diia app, the e-hryvnia, a corporate takeover of Ukraine’s war efforts and prospective reconstruction, and other efforts that signal a Fourth Industrial Revolution roll-out. Outlining these efforts and who’s behind them, Stavroula Pabst argues that Ukraine’s cannon-fodder status before and during NATO’s proxy war makes it an ideal testing ground for the Great Reset.

=> ↺ Defence Web ☛ Global Command and Control Technologies sees upsurge in demand amid global tension

• Global Command and Control Technologies (GC2T) has seen an uptick in business prospects following Russia’s invasion of Ukraine over a year ago as countries, particularly in Africa, are looking for products that neither Ukraine nor Russia can supply at present.

=> ↺ France24 ☛ French AFP journalist killed in rocket attack near Bakhmut

• A French journalist based in Ukraine for AFP was killed on Tuesday near the embattled city of Bakhmut, the news agency reported. Earlier in the day, Russian President Vladimir Putin gave a speech at the annual May 9 Victory Day parade accusing the West of unleashing a “real war” on Russia. Officials in Kyiv said Russian forces fired a dozen cruise missiles at the Ukrainian capital overnight. Follow our blog to see how the day’s events unfolded. All times are Paris time (GMT+2).

=> ↺ LRT ☛ Several dozen commemorate Victory Day in Vilnius amid Ukraine war tensions

• As Russia celebrates the Soviet Union’s victory over Nazi Germany on Tuesday, a small group of people gathered to commemorate the occasion at Antakalnis Cemetery in Vilnius, amid controversy flamed by Russia’s invasion of Ukraine.

=> ↺ RFERL ☛ Outbound Inspections Resume Under Black Sea Grain Deal, Says UN

• Inspections of outbound vessels have resumed under a deal allowing the safe Black Sea export of Ukrainian grain, which Moscow has threatened to quit over obstacles to its own grain and fertilizer exports.

=> ↺ RFERL ☛ Wagner Chief Again Slams Russian Defense Ministry; Accuses Soldiers Of Fleeing

• Wagner Group chief Yevgeny Prigozhin again accused the Russian Defense Ministry of failing to supply his mercenary fighters with enough ammunition and accused Russian troops of fleeing fighting around the Ukrainian city of Bakhmut.

=> ↺ RFERL ☛ UN Says Almost 9,000 Civilians Confirmed Killed In Ukraine, Though Figure Is Likely Much Higher

• The United Nations says that, as of May 7, 8,791 civilians have been killed in Ukraine since the start of Russia’s full-scale invasion in February 2022.

=> ↺ RFERL ☛ Russia Holds Victory Day Celebrations Amid Fresh Strikes On Ukraine

• Russian President Vladimir Putin has presided over a parade to commemorate the end of World War II in Europe even as he pushes ahead with the continent’s largest land war since since the conflict ended in 1945.

=> ↺ Helsinki Times ☛ Finnish public’s pro-EU sentiment remains at record highs – EU Skepticism linked to distrust of politics

• A recent survey conducted by the Finnish Business and Policy Forum (EVA) reveals that 64% of Finns hold a positive attitude towards their country’s membership in the European Union, while 17% remain critical of the Union. This record-high approval rating for EU membership was observed after Russia launched a large-scale attack on Ukraine in February 2022.

=> ↺ New York Times ☛ On Muted War Holiday, Putin Tries to Justify Invasion of Ukraine

• With Russia struggling on the battlefield, Vladimir V. Putin presided over a scaled-down celebration of the Soviet Union’s victory in World War II, while using it to repeat false claims about Ukraine.

=> ↺ New York Times ☛ China Does an Awkward Dance with Europe Over Russia-Ukraine War

• A three-stop tour by China’s foreign minister this week has everyone trying to balance economic and security interests when it comes to Russia and Ukraine.

=> ↺ New York Times ☛ AFP Journalist Killed by Rocket Fire in Intense Battle Near Bakhmut

• Arman Soldin, 32, was the 17th journalist to be killed in Ukraine since 2022, according to the Committee to Protect Journalists.

=> ↺ New York Times ☛ Vladimir Putin Is the World’s Most Dangerous Fool

• He will do anything to justify the terrible losses he has piled up in the name of a country where defeated leaders don’t retire peacefully.

=> ↺ New York Times ☛ U.S. Will Provide Ukraine With $1.2 Billion for Military Use, Including Air Defense

• A Pentagon spokesman also confirmed that Ukrainian troops using a U.S.-made Patriot air-defense system shot down a hypersonic Russian missile.

=> ↺ New York Times ☛ What Is Russia’s May 9 Victory Day?

• The holiday commemorating the Soviet defeat of Nazi Germany in 1945 is toned down this year as the war in Ukraine drags on.

=> ↺ New York Times ☛ William Burns, a C.I.A. Spymaster With Unusual Powers

• Mr. Burns, a key figure in bolstering the Biden administration’s support for Ukraine, has amassed influence beyond most previous spy chiefs.

=> ↺ Axios ☛ AFP journalist killed in rocket attack in Ukraine

• A journalist working for French news agency Agence France-Presse was killed in Ukraine during a rocket strike near the eastern city of Bakhmut on Tuesday, AFP said.

=> ↺ Axios ☛ American extremists linked to Russian sites

• American extremists are consistently turning up on loosely-governed Russian social media platforms.

• Why it matters: While there’s no evidence to suggest that the Russian government is explicitly trying to lure American extremists to its social sites, experts note that Moscow doesn’t seem interested in doing anything to discourage them, either.

=> ↺ Axios ☛ Putin slams “Russophobia” at scaled-back Victory Day parade

• Russian President Vladimir Putin declared on Tuesday that a “real war has again been unleashed against our homeland” as he marked Russia’s Victory Day, which commemorates the defeat of Nazi Germany.

• The big picture: More than a year on from Russia’s invasion of Ukraine, and with his forces bracing for a Ukrainian counter-attack, Putin again tried to paint the West as the true aggressors and equate Russia’s current fight with its war against the Nazis.

=> ↺ The Straits Times ☛ Japan working towards opening of Nato liaison office in Tokyo

• Nikkei Asia reported that Nato was planning to open its first office in Asia to facilitate consultations in the region.

=> ↺ Common Dreams ☛ US Spending on Weapons and War Remains Higher Than 144 Other Nations Combined

• World military spending has reached a new record high of $2.24 trillion in 2022, according to new data published by the Stockholm International Peace Research Institute (SIPRI). That’s up 3.7% since the previous year, including the steepest increase among European nations since the end of the Cold War over 30 years ago.

=> ↺ The Nation ☛ The Military Industrial Complex Is More Powerful Than Ever

• The military-industrial complex (MIC) that President Dwight D. Eisenhower warned Americans about more than 60 years ago is still alive and well. In fact, it’s consuming many more tax dollars and feeding far larger weapons producers than when Ike raised the alarm about the “unwarranted influence” it wielded in his 1961 farewell address to the nation.1

=> ↺ Scheerpost ☛ War for Profit: A Very Short History

• As they did over a century ago ahead of World War I, the Merchants of Death thrive behind a veil of duplicity and slick media campaigns.

=> ↺ LRT ☛ ‘Western Europe wouldn’t have missed the Baltics’ – how Latvia and Estonia joined the EU

• Lithuania, together with Latvia and Estonia, joined the European Union on May 1, 2004. Although the membership negotiations were incredibly fast, officials involved in the process recall Western Europe perceiving the Baltics as potentially problematic because of Russia’s neighbourhood.

=> ↺ LRT ☛ Lithuania mulls national ban to prevent sanctioned goods from reaching Russia

• In a bid to prevent sanctioned goods from reaching Russia, Vilnius is seeking approval from Brussels for a national ban on shipping some goods out of Lithuania, Foreign Minister Gabrielius Landsbergis said on Tuesday.

=> ↺ LRT ☛ New EU sanctions on Russia won’t be big – Lithuanian FM

• The European Union’s planned 11th package of sanctions against Russia will not include any of the major restrictions on businesses proposed by Lithuania, Foreign Minister Gabrielius Landsbergis said on Tuesday.

=> ↺ LRT ☛ Police takes down flag praising Russia in Vilnius

• On Tuesday morning, police took down a red flag with a message praising Russia from a bridge in Vilnius.

=> ↺ RFERL ☛ U.S. Busts Russian Cyberoperation In Dozens Of Countries

• The U.S. Justice Department says it has disrupted a long-running Russian cyberespionage campaign that stole sensitive information from computer networks in dozens of countries.

=> ↺ teleSUR ☛ Putin Promises Victory in the War Unleashed Against Russia [Ed: Huh? Against Russia? TeleRUS at it again, inverting narratives (like calling invasion "liberation")?]

• The Russian president accused Western powers of “imposing their will, their rights, their rules” to forge “a system of looting, violence, and oppression.”

=> ↺ New Yorker ☛ Art Is Now a Crime in Russia

• The arrests of a director and a playwright in Moscow signal a new chapter in the Putin regime’s eradication of dissent.

=> ↺ US News And World Report ☛ Russia Stages Victory Day Concert for Estonian Russians Across the River

=> ↺ New York Times ☛ U.S. Says It Dismantled Russia’s ‘Most Sophisticated’ Malware Network

• The Justice Department said the F.B.I. had turned the structure of the Russian intelligence service’s “Snake” network for spying on computers against itself.

=> ↺ ADF ☛ With France Out, Analysts Expect Wagner Mercenaries to Move into Burkina Faso

• Now that Burkina Faso’s junta has forced French troops to leave the country, analysts say Russia’s Wagner Group mercenaries could fill the void. Mamadou Drabo, executive secretary for junta-aligned civic group Save Burkina, told The Associated Press (AP) that the country’s leaders have invited Russian instructors to train its soldiers.

=> ↺ CS Monitor ☛ Texas shooter wore a supremacist patch. What does that mean?

• Authorities have not identified the motive of the Dallas, Texas, shooter Mauricio Garcia, who was wearing an extremist patch. Posts by Mr. Garcia on a Russian social networking site expressed a fascination with white supremacy and mass shootings.

=> ↺ ADF ☛ Wagner Group Amplifies Sudan Conflict With Weapons Drop

• ADF STAFF On April 17, two days after fighting broke out between two rival Sudanese generals, a Russian Ilyushin 76 cargo plane based at Libya’s al-Jufra air base was bound for Sudan.

Transparency/Investigative Reporting

=> ↺ Pro Publica ☛ Texas Public Records Loophole Used to Deny Release of Suicide Reports

• When Patty Troyan’s son Logan Castello died by suicide in November 2019 in his Central Texas home, she immediately tried to understand what prompted him to take his own life not long after getting married and days before a planned family Thanksgiving gathering.

=> ↺ Jacobin Magazine ☛ Right-Wing Grifters Love to Say They’re “Canceled” — but Get All the Elite Support They Want

• Right-wing personalities claim that a new elite class is sidelining critics of progressive dogma. Yet such messages are broadcast by all major media: again showing how easy it is to make a grift out of pushing reactionary talking points.

=> ↺ The Telegraph UK ☛ Bud light exec says ‘one social media post’ crashed sales amid trans row

• An ensuing boycott by conservatives was blamed for wiping around $4 billion off Anheuser-Busch’s value within days and sales volumes of the beer dropping by a quarter.

• Two Bud Light executives were placed on leave in the wake of the marketing calamity.

• However, Mr Doukeris told the Financial Times that online “misinformation and confusion” had led to customers interpreting Mulvaney’s personalised can as one that was in production for general sale, rather than a one-off.

• [...]

• He added: “You have one fact and every person puts an opinion behind the fact. And then the opinions start to be replicated fast on each and every comment. By the time that 10 or 20 people put a comment out there, the reality is no longer what the fact is, but is more [about] what the comments were.”

Environment

=> ↺ DeSmog ☛ Italy’s Eni Faces Lawsuit Alleging Early Knowledge Of Climate Change

• Italian oil major Eni is facing the country’s first climate lawsuit, with environmental groups alleging the company used “greenwashing” to push for more fossil fuels despite knowing of the risks posed by burning its products since 1970.   

• Greenpeace Italy and Italian advocacy group ReCommon aim to build on a similar case targeting Anglo-Dutch oil major Royal Dutch Shell in the Netherlands to force Eni to slash its carbon emissions by 45 percent by 2030.

Energy/Transportation

=> ↺ RTL ☛ Greens frustrated with unsafe cycling lanes in capital

• As an example, LSAP councillor Tom Krieps highlights the flaws in the cycling lane on Rue des Aubépines: “The problem is that at the moment it’s a hybrid solution. If there are no cyclists, motorised traffic is allowed to drive on the cycling lane.”

• Drivers don’t keep their distance to cyclists, especially when a big bus or truck is pushing closely behind them, says Krieps. He suggests removing the parking spots on the right side of the road and creating a proper, separated cycling lane.

Wildlife/Nature

=> ↺ The North Lines IN ☛ Snow leopard documented for the first time through ‘camera trap’ in Kishtwar

• Regional Wildlife Warden Jammu, Dr M K Kumar told the Kashmir News Observer that despite being aware of the presence of snow leopards in the area, they have captured the sight of the animal for the first time on three occasions through a “camera trap”.

• “On three occasions, we have spotted the animal through a camera trap, and on the first occasion, two were spotted in a single frame, and on the second and third occasions, one was present,” he said, adding that this happened for the first time.

Overpopulation

=> ↺ Dawn Media ☛ The ‘water cops’ of Las Vegas make city a model in drought-hit US

• Some 2.3 million people live in the arid Las Vegas Valley, and 40 million tourists are drawn each year to its giant casinos and hotels.

• Yet because Nevada is allowed to use less than two per cent of the drought-hit Colorado River’s total water, it has taken drastic action, from banning lawns to capping the size of swimming pools.

• Even as the region’s population has exploded by more than half in the past two decades, use of the mighty but dwindling river — by far Las Vegas’s main water source — has declined by almost a third.

=> ↺ Overpopulation ☛ More population neglect from the United Nations

• The UN’s latest State of the World Population 2023 report deepens its denouncement of population concerns. While it commendably emphasizes women’s reproductive rights, it neglects the role an excessive and growing population plays in driving global ecological degradation and overlooks the many ways overpopulation can undermine poor people’s rights to safety and security.

=> ↺ teleSUR ☛ Expert Warns Drought Could Keep Food Prices High in Spain

• “If there’s a lack of homegrown products due to drought, then they will have to be brought in from abroad…”

• The ongoing and intense drought conditions may lead to a persistent increase in food prices in Spain, said Jaume Bernis, a member of the Coordinator of Farmers and Ranchers Organizations (COAG).

Finance

=> ↺ MWL ☛ Print Price Increases

• Unfortunately, back in 2011 I decided that I wanted my tech books to look like Real Books. You know, from Real Publishers, whatever that means. He put prices on covers. Younger Me had lived through several periods of inflation, and while he had learned the lessons of inflation on the demand side he failed to extrapolate for when he became a supplier. If he thought about prices on covers becoming invalid in five or ten years, he would have sneered Like I’ll still be making a living doing this in 2023. I assumed my writing career was unsustainable. I have to file updated, priceless covers with the printers.

=> ↺ Common Dreams ☛ Biden ‘Considering’ 14th Amendment But Downplays Using It to End Debt Limit Fight

• After meeting with congressional leaders at the White House Tuesday afternoon, U.S. President Joe Biden told reporters he has been “considering” invoking the 14th Amendment to the Constitution to avert a catastrophic default, but he also suggested that doing so won’t solve the current battle with House Republicans.

=> ↺ Michael West Media ☛ A not so super budget for superannuants and retirees

• Tuesday’s budget announcement was rather short on excitement. Much of it has already been announced or leaked over the last couple of months. Superannuants and retirees in general had low expectations of any major changes, and their expectations were met. Harry Chemay reports.

• The second Budget of the Albanese Government holds the line on fiscal discipline, while acknowledging the pain that many Australian households now face with mounting cost of living pressures. The Budget seeks to address the latter issue directly with a relief package of almost $15 billion, spearheaded by its Energy Price Relief Plan.

=> ↺ Common Dreams ☛ GOP Hostage-Taking on Debt Ceiling Must Be Stopped to Avoid Economic Calamity

• Recent reports indicate that the debt limit “X-date” could come as early as June 1. On this X-date, the U.S. Treasury will no longer have enough cash in its accounts at the Federal Reserve to meet all the legal spending obligations legislated by Congress. These obligations include paying holders of U.S. Treasury debt, Social Security checks, and reimbursements to doctors treating patients covered by Medicare and Medicaid. The normal way of dealing with such a cash shortfall—selling new debt issues and depositing the proceeds into the Treasury’s account—is exactly what the debt limit will make impossible on that date.

=> ↺ Common Dreams ☛ ‘End the Absurdity’​: Experts Say Biden Must Not Let GOP Force ‘Catastrophic’ Default

• Ahead of congressional leaders’ Tuesday meeting at the White House, economists and other experts have renewed warnings about what the GOP’s threatened first-ever U.S. default—or even coming precariously close to it—could mean for the country.

=> ↺ Michael West Media ☛ Finally a surplus, but Budget fine print reveals tough times to continue for households

• Treasurer Jim Chalmers has scraped together a budget surplus for one year thanks to raging commodity prices, but the prospect of an economic downturn makes the prognosis for households bleak. Callum Foote emerges from the budget lockup.

• Jim Chalmers, rising above the Coalition’s puffery of ‘Back in Black’, proudly announced a budget surplus of $4.2bn, or 0.2% of GDP, the first surplus in fifteen years. Chalmers, like all notable Australian treasurers, was helped by sky-high commodity prices. Who knows when they will drop.

=> ↺ Axios ☛ Biden provokes key Republicans with New York debt ceiling trip

• Vulnerable House Republicans from New York are warning that President Biden’s planned trip to their home turf on Wednesday could only serve to further strain tensions between them and the White House.

• Why it matters: These GOP lawmakers — who would be critical to a Democratic effort to pass a clean debt ceiling increase – see Biden’s speech as a provocative ploy to pressure them into supporting that push.

=> ↺ Quartz ☛ The Economist has named the countries plagued the most by crony capitalism

• The wealth of crony capitalists around the world has grown exponentially by 850% in the past 25 years to $3 trillion, a survey has shown.

=> ↺ Latvia ☛ Food prices fall slowly in Latvia

• One year after the Russian war, prices are falling for most food products. The decline in Latvia delayed compared to the world, but experts forecast a further fall in prices. Pre-war levels will probably not be reached, according to experts surveyed by Latvian Radio on May 10.

=> ↺ Common Dreams ☛ How to End Global Financial Apartheid

• The key to economic development and ending poverty is investment. Nations achieve prosperity by investing in four priorities. Most important is investing in people, through quality education and health care. The next is infrastructure, such as electricity, safe water, digital networks, and public transport. The third is natural capital, protecting nature. The fourth is business investment. The key is finance: mobilizing the funds to invest at the scale and speed required.

=> ↺ New York Times ☛ Hong Kong Wants More Tourists, but Mostly ‘Good Quality’ Ones, Please

• The return of budget tour groups from mainland China is sparking frustrations — and a dose of snobbery — in a city starved for business.

=> ↺ Quartz ☛ After cracking down on tech, China is targeting foreign consulting firms

• Chinese authorities have raided the offices of consulting firm Capvision as Beijing ramps up its anti-espionage campaign in the consulting sector.

=> ↺ Quartz ☛ Italy’s exports to China almost doubled in two months

• Italy’s exports to China reached a monthly record of €3 billion ($3.3 billion) in February, a 62% surge from the same period in 2022. That’s almost double their value of €1.7 billion last December, according to data that Banca d’Italia, the nation’s central bank, shared with Quartz.

=> ↺ Quartz ☛ The global price of olive oil hit a 26-year high

• Heat and drought in the Mediterranean are harming production of olive oil, causing its price to spike. The global price of the oil is now almost $6,000 per metric ton, according to data from the International Monetary Fund (IMF).

=> ↺ Quartz ☛ The unnecessary debt ceiling showdown is already costing US taxpayers money

• The US government is closing in on an arbitrary limit on issuing new debt, and financial markets are finally starting to notice. Forecasters expect that the debt limit will be reached sometime between mid-June and mid-August, but speaker of the House Kevin McCarthy says Republicans will refuse to raise it unless…

=> ↺ Quartz ☛ These are the TV shows and films affected by the Hollywood writers’ strike so far

• The impact of Hollywood’s ongoing writers’ strike, which started on May 1, is becoming increasingly clear.

=> ↺ US News And World Report ☛ Americans Likely Saw Little Relief From Inflation in April

• After steadily declining for nearly a year, consumer price data to be released Wednesday will likely show that U.S. inflation remained stubbornly high in April, a sign that it might be entering a newer, stickier phase

=> ↺ Michael West Media ☛ Chinese data, US debt ceiling worries push stocks down

• Share markets have dipped as traders are kept on edge by weak Chinese trade data and the impasse over the US debt ceiling, which has also caused a sharp sell-off in short-dated US Treasury bills.

=> ↺ Michael West Media ☛ Federal budget sparks fresh concerns of more rate hikes

• Treasurer Jim Chalmers has rejected concerns his cost of living budget will fuel inflation and trigger more interest rate rises. His second budget juggled several priorities, namely keeping a lid on inflation while offering some cost of living support to those most in need.

=> ↺ Michael West Media ☛ PM defends budget spending, denies inflation fears

• Prime Minister Anthony Albanese has defended the billions in budget spending on vulnerable and low-income Australians as the coalition warns it will feed higher interest rates.

=> ↺ LRT ☛ Lithuania’s monthly inflation close to zero in April

• Monthly inflation in Lithuania was close to zero in April, the State Data Agency said on Tuesday.

=> ↺ Michael West Media ☛ Budget a ‘missed opportunity’: falls short for farmers

• There are warnings from farmers that Tuesday’s budget won’t stop the price of food going up.  National Farmers’ Federation president Fiona Simson said the budget was a missed opportunity to address food price inflation. “The budget does nothing to get to the heart of rampant food price inflation,” she said.

=> ↺ Michael West Media ☛ Asia stocks stumble ahead of US inflation data

• Stocks were struggling to advance in Asia and the dollar was firm on Wednesday ahead of US consumer price data that could damage hopes for interest rate cuts later this year if inflation fails to show much of a decline.

AstroTurf/Lobbying/Politics

=> ↺ ADF ☛ Russian ‘Firehose of Falsehoods’ Boosts Authoritarians and Sows Distrust

• In mid-2020, the Central African Republic’s Constitutional Court denied President Faustin-Archange Touadéra’s request to delay the 2020 elections because of the COVID-19 pandemic. Almost immediately afterward, claims began circulating online that the court had been bribed to act against the president.

=> ↺ India Times ☛ EU draft rules propose tougher cybersecurity labelling rules for Amazon, Google, Microsoft

• Amazon, Alphabet’s Google, Microsoft and other non-European Union cloud service providers looking to secure an EU cybersecurity label to handle sensitive data can only do so via a joint venture with an EU-based company, according to an EU draft document seen by Reuters.

=> ↺ LRT ☛ Lithuanian MP’s post about Israel draws condemnation as anti-Semitic

• Lithuanian MP Remigijus Žemaitaitis has attracted controversy with a Facebook post criticising Israel. Several ambassadors have slammed his statements, while prosecutors have opened a probe into suspected anti-Semitism.

=> ↺ Scoop News Group ☛ FBI disrupts sophisticated Russian cyberespionage operation

• The FBI operation dubbed “Medusa” targeted nearly 2o-year-old malware operated by Turla, a unit within the Federal Security Service of the Russian Federation, which has been known for years as one of Russia’s premier cybersespionage outfits.

• The group was using and continuously updating a piece of malware known as “Snake” — which dates back to 2004 — to steal sensitive documents from hundreds of computer systems in at least 50 countries, the U.S. Department of Justice said in a statement. The stolen material was then exfiltrated through a covert network of Snake-compromised computers in the U.S. and other countries.

=> ↺ CISA ☛ Hunting Russian Intelligence “Snake” Malware

• We consider Snake to be the most sophisticated cyber espionage tool in the FSB’s arsenal. The sophistication of Snake stems from three principal areas. First, Snake employs means to achieve a rare level of stealth in its host components and network communications. Second, Snake’s internal technical architecture allows for easy incorporation of new or replacement components. This design also facilitates the development and interoperability of Snake instances running on different host operating systems. We have observed interoperable Snake implants for Windows, MacOS, and Linux operating systems. Lastly, Snake demonstrates careful software engineering design and implementation, with the implant containing surprisingly few bugs given its complexity.

=> ↺ The Register UK ☛ FBI-led Op Medusa slays NATO-bothering Russian military malware network

• Turla, the FSB-backed cyberspy group, has used versions of the Snake malware to steal data from hundreds of computer systems belonging to governments, journalists, and other targets of interest in at least 50 countries, according to the US Justice Department. After identifying and stealing sensitive files on victims’ devices, Turla exfiltrated them through a covert network of unwitting Snake-compromised computers in the US.

=> ↺ Michael Geist ☛ The Government’s Epic Bill C-18 Miscalculation on Mandating Payments for Links

• Meta executives faced another round of criticism at the Standing Committee on Canadian Heritage yesterday, yet beyond the usual outrage emanating from MPs that have labelled critics as racist or dismissed online news outlets at not news, was the growing realization that the company’s plan to block news sharing in Canada if Bill C-18 passes in its current form may not be a bluff. Meta has adopted a consistent position for months that the bill creates the prospect of unlimited liability for linking to news articles, the vast majority of which are posted by the media companies themselves. Paying for those links is viewed as uneconomic and untenable by the company, which would rather exit news sharing altogether in Canada rather than cough up millions of dollars for links.

• Canadian Heritage Minister Pablo Rodriguez has been asked about the prospect of blocked news sharing for months, but has been unable to provide a cogent response, relying instead on canned talking points about his disappointment with Meta turning to the “Australian playbook”. But that response won’t work if Bill C-18 becomes law and news sharing disappears on Facebook and Instagram in Canada.

=> ↺ NBC ☛ Leaked Google engineer memo warns that Big Tech could lose AI race to the little guys

• A Google spokesperson confirmed the memo was authentic but said it was the opinion of one senior employee, not necessarily the company as a whole.

• “We’ve done a lot of looking over our shoulders at OpenAI,” the memo said. “But the uncomfortable truth is, we aren’t positioned to win this arms race and neither is OpenAI.”

• “I’m talking, of course, about open source. Plainly put, they are lapping us,” it continued. “While our models still hold a slight edge in terms of quality, the gap is closing astonishingly quickly.”

=> ↺ The Hill ☛ MTV News to shut down amid Paramount layoffs

• The MTV — formerly “Music Television” — news division is expected to shut down amid a new round of layoffs made by Paramount Global, the company announced in a memo to staffers.

=> ↺ Variety ☛ Paramount Media Networks, Showtime and MTV Entertainment Studios to Lay Off 25% of U.S. Staff as MTV News Shuts Down

• Layoffs will be hitting 25% of employees across the Showtime, MTV Entertainment Studios and Paramount Media Networks groups in the U.S. Tuesday, following months of internal deliberations about integration amid Showtime’s rebranding into Paramount+ With Showtime.

=> ↺ NPR ☛ MTV News shut down as Paramount Global cuts 25% of its staff

• The shutdown of MTV News comes as Paramount Global, the parent company of CBS, Nickelodeon, Comedy Central and Showtime announced today that it is laying off some 25% of its staff.

• In addition to reports of a soft ad market, Paramount Global is doing considerable restructuring. Earlier this year, Showtime merged with MTV Entertainment Studios.

=> ↺ NPR ☛ Tucker Carlson says he’ll take his show to Twitter

• Carlson and the network have yet to work out the terms under which he departs, which could complicate or thwart his plans. On Tuesday afternoon, Axios reported that Carlson’s lawyer warned Fox that it cannot enforce the non-compete provision in his contract that prohibits him from hosting a show outside of Fox until early 2025. Axios reports the attorney, Bryan Freedman, says Fox has already breached the contract.

=> ↺ The Economist ☛ China’s new “Top Gun” normalises war with America

• Readers planning to watch the film should return to this spoiler-filled column later. Others should know that the movie breaks new ground in the “main melody” genre, as works promoting major party policies are known. Such films are shown to students, party members and government workers nationwide, alongside commercial screenings. “Born to Fly” is the highest-profile flick of this type to normalise the notion that the present-day PLA’s mission is to fight and kill Americans.

• The movie makes much of its realism. The film-makers have wheeled out PLA veterans to praise its authenticity and even the acting of its young male lead, Wang Yibo, an elfin former singer in a boy band. But its geopolitical premise is bogus. In the real world, China is locked in territorial disputes with many neighbours. Notably, China claims to control almost all of the South China Sea, building PLA bases atop disputed reefs and rocks. To challenge China’s unilateral claims and uphold the principle of freedom of navigation, America and other powers fly and sail through areas of the South China Sea deemed open to all by international law.

• “Born to Fly” twists such missions into acts of war. The film opens with foreign jets shattering windows and hurling Chinese fishermen and oilfield workers into the sea with low, supersonic passes. The aggressors chortle “well done” to one another. Told by radio that they are in an area under China’s jurisdiction, the foreigners retort: “We can come and go whenever we want.” They then proceed to outfly the PLA’s ageing planes. At the film’s end, the intruders return, firing without warning on Chinese fighters. This time, the PLA has advanced jets and drives them away.

=> ↺ Common Dreams ☛ GOP Congressman and Serial Liar George Santos Reportedly Facing ‘Long Overdue’ Federal Charges

• Prosecutors at the U.S. Department of Justice have filed criminal charges against Republican Congressman George Santos of New York, sources familiar with the matter told multiple media outlets on Tuesday.

=> ↺ Axios ☛ GOP patience with George Santos wears thin

• House Republicans are expressing increasing weariness with Rep. George Santos’ (R-N.Y.) continued presence in their conference over news he is facing criminal charges from the Department of Justice.

=> ↺ Common Dreams ☛ Amid Growing Calls to Resign, Feinstein Heads Back to Capitol Hill

• Faced with mounting calls to resign due to the impact of her extended absence, U.S. Sen. Dianne Feinstein headed to Washington, D.C. on Tuesday after being away since late February while recovering from shingles.

=> ↺ The Nation ☛ Pay the Fine

=> ↺ Common Dreams ☛ Jury in Civil Case Finds Trump Sexually Abused, Defamed E. Jean Carroll

• A civil jury in New York City on Tuesday found former U.S. President Donald Trump civilly liable for sexual abusing and defaming—but not raping—journalist E. Jean Carroll and awarded her $5 million in damages.

=> ↺ Axios ☛ Sexual abuse verdict tests Trump’s Teflon armor

• In any other context, it would be a career-ender: A federal jury ordered the Republican presidential front-runner to pay $5 million after finding him liable for sexually abusing and defaming a famous writer.

=> ↺ Quartz ☛ Donald Trump was found liable for sexually abusing and defaming E. Jean Carroll

• Former US president Donald Trump sexually abused magazine writer E. Jean Carroll and then defamed her by accusing her of making up the charge, according to jurors in a civil trial at the Manhattan federal courthouse.

=> ↺ Common Dreams ☛ Billionaire Harlan Crow Also Bankrolled GOP Lawmakers Blocking SCOTUS Ethics Reform

• The Senate Judiciary Committee on Monday sent a letter asking Harlan Crow—the billionaire GOP megadonor who has secretly showered U.S. Supreme Court Justice Clarence Thomas with hundreds of thousands of dollars in gifts since the mid-1990s—to provide a full accounting of his financial ties to Thomas and any other judges on the high court.

=> ↺ The Nation ☛ What Gives You Hope Keeps You Fighting

• On a guitar, the difference between an A minor chord and an A minor seventh chord is raising one finger off the fretboard. It seems like a tiny change, but if you listen to a song with the minor seventh chord played in place of the minor chord, you can immediately hear the difference. A minor chord is melancholy, evoking sadness, while a minor seventh chord lifts the mood and creates anticipation for what comes next. Minor seventh chords often come before a resolution, because they compel the listener to breathe in before the following chord allows them to let it all out.

=> ↺ The Nation ☛ Chuck Klosterman’s Decade of Ambivalence

• The 1990s were a decade whose cultural flash points can now be readily summarized by the Twitter historian, the nostalgic TikToker, and anyone else who has processed years of received clichés into conventional wisdom. Nirvana remade rock music in the image of angst and flannel; the O.J. Simpson trial ushered in the reign of the 24-hour news cycle; the World Wide Web was slowly becoming a big deal beyond the world of nerds and losers; the travails of the Clintons polarized American politics. But surely the 1990s weren’t so easily reducible. We are a little more than 20 years removed from the final decade of the 20th century: a decade ripe for extended reappraisal as a distinct epoch of its own, yet one that is at risk of being engulfed by the hoary truisms and generalizations that reduce all historical eras into a collection of data points, rather than something that real people—many of them alive today—actually experienced.

=> ↺ The Nation ☛ You Don’t Need a Script to Speak to Your Child

• If you have a young child and a social media account, you may have encountered “gentle parenting” gurus and their favorite pedagogical tool: scripts for talking to your children. A prime example appears in Mike Mills’s 2021 film C’mon C’mon, which dramatizes the difficulties of this ascendant and demanding parenting approach. After he’s yelled at the child—his nephew—in his care, Joaquin Phoenix reads haltingly from a script identical to those that have hijacked my Instagram feed: “Then I say,” he grumbles, as though forced by a teacher to read aloud in class, “‘I feel badly about how I behaved. Are you feeling mad at me? It’s okay if you are. I would like to hear whatever you’re feeling and thinking.’” “Your mom does all this?” he asks his nephew, to which the boy replies, “Yeah, but she doesn’t have to read it from a stupid phone.”

=> ↺ Telex (Hungary) ☛ Intelligence Online writes about personnel changes in Hungarian government, which comments: fake news

• According to Intelligence Online, a website specialising in intelligence news, Hungary’s Ministry of Foreign Affairs and Trade may soon be split into two. Péter Szijjártó, who heads the ministry, would be in charge of trade and foreign trade, while Viktor Orbán’s current political director, Balázs Orbán, would be in charge of diplomacy.

=> ↺ Common Dreams ☛ Protests Erupt Across Pakistan After Former PM Imran Khan Arrested

• Supporters of Imran Khan took to the streets of Pakistan nationwide in angry protest Tuesday after the former Prime Minister was arrested on corruption and embezzlement charges—allegations the champion cricketer turned progressive politician has denied and says are politically motivated.

=> ↺ Quartz ☛ Protests erupted in Pakistan after former PM Imran Khan was arrested

• Former Pakistani prime minister Imran Khan was arrested by the military at the High Court in Islamabad on May 9, escalating a domestic political and economic crisis that has simmered since he was removed from power last year.

=> ↺ JURIST ☛ Arrest of former Pakistan PM sparks protests

• Pakistan authorities Tuesday arrested former Pakistan Prime Minister Imran Khan outside of the Islamabad courts. Fawad Chaudhry, a senior member of Khan’s party, known as Tehreek-e-insaf (PTI), confirmed the arrest on his Twitter. He wrote that Khan was abducted by “unknown people to an unknown location.

=> ↺ Common Dreams ☛ GOP Target Voting Rights Because They Recognize the Future Is Progressive

• A new progressive era is dawning in America, and almost nothing Republicans can do will hold back the tide — unless Republicans destroy democracy altogether (more on this in a moment).

Misinformation/Disinformation/Propaganda

=> ↺ Common Dreams ☛ ‘No Time to Waste’: Don’t Look Up Team Launches Studio to Push Back on Climate Disinformation

• The filmmaker-producer team behind Don’t Look Up launched a new climate-focused, “anti-bullshit” media venture Tuesday with a spoof advertisement for “Big Money.”

Censorship/Free Speech

=> ↺ Off Guardian ☛ Open Letter to Twitter’s Head of Trust & Safety (and Censorship)

• The following is an open letter to Ella G. Irwin, Head of Twitter Trust and Safety, and Elon Musk, CEO of Twitter, and anyone else at Twitter, Inc. who is responsible for censoring political speech and defaming people with fake “advisory” labels, among other such “visibility-filtering” tactics.

=> ↺ Hong Kong Free Press ☛ All members of student union cabinet resign after Hong Kong Baptist University probe

• All members of the Hong Kong Baptist University (HKBU) Students’ Union executive committee have resigned, according to a post on their Facebook page published on Monday.

=> ↺ The Nation ☛ The Arlington National Cemetery Will Finally Remove Its Racist Monument

• Confederate President Jefferson Davis has been yelling at me lately. Well, the person running a Twitter account in his name has been doing so. “Maj. Gen. Patrick Cleburne” has chimed in to call me a fraud, liar, and “an antisemitic activist on a mission to destroy history.” Other Confederates try to take a higher road: Since “anyone putting pronouns in their bio is broadcasting their cult indoctrination,” I should simply be ignored in favor of reading print-on-demand books with titles like Old Times There Should Not Be Forgotten: Cultural Genocide in Dixie.

=> ↺ Techdirt ☛ Techdirt Podcast Episode 352: Utah’s War On Porn

• We’ve been swamped with some big projects lately, and that put a bit of a dent in our podcast schedule. We’ve got a whole bunch of fresh new episodes lined up to record, so you can expect lots of original content soon — but to tide you over until then, this week we’ve got a cross-post of Mike’s recent segment on The New Abnormal podcast, where he and host Andy Levy discuss Pornhub cutting off Utah in response to its age verification law, and some of the other “protect the children” efforts in Congress.

=> ↺ Techdirt ☛ Wikipedia Tells UK Government It Won’t Comply With Proposed Age Verification Mandates

• The UK government still hopes to bend the internet to its will, but it’s constantly finding out it won’t be as easy as just declaring a bunch of stuff illegal. Tech companies from all over the world would be affected by its “Online Safety Bill” (originally more proactively titled the “Online Harms Bill“). Negatively affected.

=> ↺ Techdirt ☛ Adult Content Industry Sues Utah Over Porn Law

• Last week, Utah’s “porn license” age verification law went into effect, and the largest (by far) adult content company on the internet, Mindgeek (which runs Pornhub and a bunch of other sites), had all of its sites go dark for any Utah-based IP address. If someone visited from those sites, they got a video explaining how Utah’s new law was unworkable, and suggested that those Utah residents call their elected officials to complain about the unworkable law.

=> ↺ RFA ☛ Authorities shut down artwork referring to China’s “last generation”

• Authorities in the southern city of Shenzhen shut down an art exhibit that described young people in China as the “last generation,” a reference to a viral video from the 2022 Shanghai lockdown, in which a young man tells police officers threatening him that he won’t be having kids.

=> ↺ NPR ☛ Imran Khan, Pakistan’s former prime minister, is arrested in Islamabad

• According to videos shared by Khan’s media team, the former prime minister’s supporters — mostly men, but also some women — appeared to overrun a gate leading into the compound of Pakistan’s military headquarters in the city of Rawalpindi. Shouting “Allah Akbar,” or God is great, they are seen in the videos using sticks to smash through the first gate that separates the compound from the road beyond.

• It was the first time many Pakistanis could recall such a brazen move against the military.

• The military did not respond to NPR requests for comment or verify the videos.

=> ↺ Dawn Media ☛ Mobile broadband suspended across country on interior ministry’s instructions: PTA

• The Pakistan Telecommunication Authority on Tuesday confirmed that it had suspended mobile broadband across the country on the interior ministry’s instructions.

• Meanwhile, Netblocks, an organisation that tracks internet outages, said access to Twitter, Facebook and Youtube was restricted across Pakistan amid PTI Chairman Imran Khan’s arrest earlier today from the Islamabad High Court’s premises in the Al-Qadir Trust case.

• The organisation further said that “total internet shutdowns have been observed in some regions” in a report.

=> ↺ Netblocks ☛ Internet disrupted in Pakistan amid arrest of former PM Imran Khan

• Real-time network data show the disruption in effect on some but not all mobile and fixed-line internet providers in Pakistan at the time of writing. The study is taken from a sample size of 120 measurements from 60 vantage points across Pakistan. This class of disruption can be worked around using VPN services, which are able to circumvent government [Internet] censorship measures. However, the mobile broadband disruptions cannot be circumvented and will be experienced as a total internet shutdown by those affected.

=> ↺ Dawn Media ☛ Controversial film The Kerala Story banned in India’s West Bengal

• The film, The Kerala Story, claims that 32,000 Hindu and Christian women from the mixed-faith state of Kerala have converted to Islam, and that some were recruited by the militant Islamic State (IS) group. Critics have called the film out for peddling lies aimed at fomenting communal polarisation and unrest.

=> ↺ Meduza ☛ Russian police reportedly beat man holding Ukrainian flag at Moscow metro station, charge him with ‘discrediting’ Russian army

=> ↺ Scheerpost ☛ Russian & Soviet Flags Banned at Berlin Victory Day

• A court in Berlin has outlawed the display of the Russian and Soviet flags on May 8 and 9 celebrations of victory over Nazi Germany because they can “convey a readiness for violence.”

=> ↺ Mint Press News ☛ Did Intel-Linked Dataminr Play Sinister Role in Hunter Biden Laptop Suppression?

• How a CIA-linked social media spying tool may have been used to monitor, censor, suppress, and even ban anyone who liked, linked, or commented on the Biden Hunter laptop story.

=> ↺ New York Times ☛ Tucker Carlson Says He Will Start New Show on Twitter

• His claim, made on Twitter, suggested that his negotiations to reach an amicable separation with the network had broken down.

=> ↺ US News And World Report ☛ Tucker Carlson Says He’s Coming Back With Show on Twitter

• Fired Fox News host Tucker Carlson says he’ll be resuming a version of his old show on Twitter

=> ↺ Axios ☛ Scoop: Tucker Carlson accuses Fox of fraud, contract breach

• Tucker Carlson, two weeks after being ousted by Fox News, accused the network Tuesday of fraud and breach of contract — and made a host of document demands that could precede legal action.

• Why it matters: The aggressive letter from his lawyers to Fox positions Carlson to argue that the noncompete provision in his contract is no longer valid — freeing him to launch his own competing show or media enterprise.

=> ↺ RFA ☛ Hong Kong police seize Tiananmen massacre sculpture as evidence in ‘subversion’ case

• Act is symbolic of the clampdown on freedom of expression in city, Danish sculptor says.

=> ↺ RFA ☛ ​​Newly published documents reveal how China skirts forced labor scrutiny in Xinjiang

• Historic models were not designed to evaluate the political nature of state-sponsored forced labor, expert says

Freedom of Information / Freedom of the Press

=> ↺ Scheerpost ☛ DeSantis’ Anti-Press Bills Seem Dead, but Don’t Celebrate Yet

• The right’s broad agenda still includes a decimation of media outlets that spotlight corporate and governmental misdeeds.

=> ↺ Broadband Breakfast ☛ TikTok’s Response to Congress, Widening ‘Data Divide,’ New NTIA Reports and Dashboard

• The letter also addressed the revelation that TikTok employees tracked the physical location of at least one U.S. journalist on behalf of parent company ByteDance — referring to the incident as “the Misguided Effort.”x

=> ↺ Scheerpost ☛ Media Monopolies and Prosecution of Assange Drive Drop in US Press Freedom Rank

• “Major structural barriers to press freedom persist in this country,” according to Reporters Without Borders.

=> ↺ Meduza ☛ AFP video journalist Arman Soldin killed in Ukraine — Meduza

• Agence France-Presse, an international French news agency, reports that video journalist Armin Soldin was killed today by rocket fire near Chasiv Yar, close to Bakhmut in eastern Ukraine.

=> ↺ The Dissenter ☛ NYPD Arrest Photojournalist Who Was Covering Their Response To ‘Justice For Jordan Neely’ Vigil

=> ↺ Democracy Now ☛ Justice for Jordan Neely: Friend Remembers Dancer as “Gentleman” as Calls Grow for Killer’s Arrest

• Eleven people were arrested at a protest in New York on Monday demanding justice for Jordan Neely, a 30-year-old unhoused Black man who was choked to death on a subway car last week by another passenger. Neely was well known as a dancer and Michael Jackson impersonator. He was crying out that he was hungry, when he was fatally attacked on the train by a 24-year-old former marine named Daniel Penny, who was questioned by police but released without charges. The city medical examiner has ruled Neely’s death a homicide. The subway killing comes as New York is facing a growing population of unhoused people who lack the support they need, with many facing a mental health crisis. “What we need to see is not a mobilization of violence, but a mobilization of care,” says Jawanza Williams, director of organizing at the community group VOCAL-New York. We also speak with musician Lorenzo Laroc, who knew Neely for decades as a fellow busker in the New York subway system. “He gave freely to the city of New York and brought nothing but joy to this town for decades,” says Laroc, calling Neely a “gentleman” and a “consummate professional.”

Civil Rights/Policing

=> ↺ Variety ☛ Scarlett Johansson Opens Up About the Pain and Triumph of Disney Legal Battle Over ‘Black Widow’ and Wes Anderson’s ‘Liberating’ Cannes Film

• As she’s become a bigger and bigger star, Johansson has grown more comfortable raising that voice when she feels she’s been screwed over. Case in point: She shocked the industry in July 2021 by stepping into the ring with Disney, the most powerful entity in Hollywood. The actress was quarantining in her Upper East Side apartment, days away from giving birth to Cosmo, her second child, when she filed an explosive lawsuit against the studio shortly after the release of its Marvel prequel “Black Widow.”

=> ↺ Vice Media Group ☛ America Has Decided That Homeless People Aren’t People

• Neely’s killing is, among other things, a consequence of the political rhetoric around homelessness: NYC, like many cities across the country, has turned itself inside out to make homelessness prolonged and painful in an effort not to protect the lives of people who are unhoused but to placate those who feel unsafe looking at people who are unhoused. The U.S.’s legal system, its housing system, its benches and public places, its retail stores, sidewalks, public transit systems, even its shelter systems are organized around the idea that homelessness should be painful, invisible, and easily ignorable. People without homes are regularly called “blight.” Or they’re solely blamed for the opioid crisis and called “zombies.” Frequently, they’re used as punching bags by political candidates.

=> ↺ Scheerpost ☛ Cop City Protesters Face Felonies for Flyering as Police Repress Student Sit-Ins

• Truthout obtained Cop City’s certificate of insurance as activists and students target the project’s investors.

=> ↺ The Washington Post ☛ A police chief got rid of a neo-Nazi. Then came the hard part.

• It is difficult to measure the creep of far-right beliefs among the more than 650,000 police and sheriff’s patrol officers the U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics counts nationwide, but the issue is of growing concern, with dozens of prominent examples in recent years, including current and former law enforcement officers charged with taking part in the attack on the U.S. Capitol on Jan. 6, 2021.

• Others have been linked to far-right militia groups and white-supremacist factions, or have been identified as contributing racist posts on police message boards. An Oklahoma sheriff made national headlines in recent weeks after he was recorded reportedly talking about killing journalists and lynching Black people.

=> ↺ NBC ☛ South Carolina police shooting survivor says deputies opened fire on him and his mother ‘immediately’

• Bodycam video obtained by NBC News shows the deputies with their guns out converging on the pickup and yelling “Let me see your hands” before opening fire while Mullinax’s mother, Tammy Beason, is still standing beside the truck and talking to her son through the driver’s side window.

=> ↺ New Indian Express ☛ After drive against child marriage, Assam mulls banning polygamy

• The Assam government has decided to form an expert committee to examine whether the government has the authority to ban polygamy, Chief Minister Himanta Biswa Sarma said on Tuesday.

• The committee, to be constituted with legal luminaries, will scrutinise the provisions of Muslim Personal Law (Shariat) Act, 1937, along with Article 25 of the Constitution of India, in relation to the directive principle of state policy for a uniform civil code.

=> ↺ US News And World Report ☛ What Is Title 42 and How Has US Used It to Curb Migration?

• This week marks the end of coronavirus restrictions on asylum that have allowed the U.S. to quickly expel migrants at the southern border for the last three years

=> ↺ France24 ☛ US sends reinforcements to border as migrants gather ahead of rule change

• The Biden administration and Texas state government are sending reinforcements to the US-Mexico border to prepare for a possible increase in illegal immigration when COVID-19 restrictions known as Title 42 are set to end on Thursday.

=> ↺ Press Gazette ☛ GB News breaches Ofcom rules for second time with ‘unopposed’ Covid-19 vaccine claims

• Ofcom said Dr Naomi Wolf promoted “a serious conspiracy theory without challenge or context”.

=> ↺ US News And World Report ☛ White House Eases COVID Protocols as Emergency Lifts

• Pandemic-era rules on COVID-19 testing for White House journalists are being loosened as the public health emergency declaration expires Thursday

=> ↺ US News And World Report ☛ Biden Revokes COVID Travel, Federal Employee Vaccine Requirements

=> ↺ The Nation ☛ White Supremacists Don’t Have to Be White

• I didn’t like the book How the Irish Became White, by the late Noel Ignatiev. I still don’t understand how he took arguably the second-most-despised and discriminated group (behind Black people) in mid-19th century America, Irish Catholic immigrants, and decided they uniquely and resoundingly attacked Black people in order to punch their ticket to whiteness. You could also write books on how Italians, Greeks, Jewish immigrants, and everyone who is not white Anglo-Saxon Protestant learned how to climb into the American melting pot on the backs of Black neighbors or coworkers, people who would work for less money because that was the only money they could earn.

=> ↺ The Nation ☛ The Phony Solidarity of the American Pundit Class

• The horrific murder of Jordan Neely on a New York subway spoke volumes about the tolerance of racial violence in the American social order. Think of the very medium that publicized the killing: The first response of a bystander to a lethal assault in a public setting was to record it, rather than to intervene on behalf of the victim. Equally chilling was the dialogue edited out of the recording that first circulated, which captured the words of a passenger who was restraining Neely as the attacker, Daniel Penny, choked him. The accomplice is heard dismissing a warning that Neely had defecated on himself—a common sign that someone being strangled is about to die—while denying that Neely’s killer was even “squeezing” his neck.

=> ↺ LGBTI+ groups in Turkey voice concern over increasing hate speech ahead of elections

• While Erdoğan has accused the opposition of being pro-LGBTI+ at almost every election rally, some opposition leaders reproduced hate speech in their responses, rights defenders say.

=> ↺ RFA ☛ Plea for help from telephone scam victims falls on deaf ears among Chinese officials

• They are just a few of the thousands tricked and trapped to work in Myanmar border town

=> ↺ Quartz ☛ Goldman Sachs is paying $215 million to settle a gender discrimination case and avoid an embarrassing trial

• Goldman Sachs has agreed to pay $215 million to settle a case concerning about 2,800 current and former female employees who accused the Wall Street bank of systematically underpaying and under-promoting women.

Internet Policy/Net Neutrality

=> ↺ RIPE ☛ The Global Digital Compact: Unpacking the RIPE NCC’s Contribution

• The Global Digital Compact (GDC) is a document that, according to the UN Secretary-General’s Our Common Agenda report, aims to “outline shared principles for an open, free and secure digital future for all”. It represents the latest step in a long policy journey to toward a shared understanding of key digital principles globally and common rules that will guide the development of our digital future.

• The idea of a Global Digital Compact has its roots in the 2019 report The Age of Digital Interdependence and the 2020 Roadmap for Digital Cooperation, both issued by the UN Secretary-General’s High-Level Panel on Digital Cooperation. The latter laid out a roadmap in which “all stakeholders play a role in advancing a safer, more equitable digital world, one which will lead to a brighter and more prosperous future for all”. The GDC should be finalised and agreed on by the Member States at the Summit of the Future in September 2024.

=> ↺ Techdirt ☛ Starlink Ditches Caps, But Congestion, Price Hikes, And Slower Speeds Remain A Problem

• Analysts had been quietly noting for a while that Starlink satellite broadband service would consistently lack the capacity to be disruptive at any real scale. As it usually pertains to Musk products, that analysis was generally buried under product hype. A few years later, and Starlink users are facing obvious slowdowns and a steady parade of price hikes that show no signs of slowing down.

=> ↺ Techdirt ☛ Regulators Are Rewarding Sinclair Broadcasting For Lobotomizing Local Broadcast News

• Despite oodles of regulatory favors and millions of dollars in spectrum sales, Sinclair Broadcasting is shuttering what passes for local “news” in another five markets, continuing a wave of layoffs making an already bad problem worse.

=> ↺ EFF ☛ As Platforms Decay, Let’s Put Users First

• As regulators and lawmakers think about making the internet a better place for human beings,their top priority should be restoring power to users. The internet’s promise was that it would remove the barriers that stood in all our way; distance, sure, but also the barriers thrown up by large corporations and oppressive states. But the companies gained a toehold in that environment of lowered barriers, turned right around, and put up fresh barriers of their own. That trapped billions of us on platforms that many of us do not like but feel we can’t leave. 

• Platforms follow a predictable lifecycle: first, they offer their end-users a good deal. Early Facebook users got a feed consisting solely of updates from the people they cared about, and promises of privacy. Early Google searchers got result screens filled with Google’s best guess at what they were searching for, not ads. Amazon once made it easy to find the product you were looking for, without making you wade through five screens’ worth of “sponsored” results. 

• The good deal for users is only temporary. Platforms today use a combination of tools, including taking advantage of collective action problems, “Most Favored Nation” clauses, collusive back-room deals to block competitors, computer crime laws, and Digital Rights Management to lock their users in. Once those users are firmly in hand, the platforms degrade what made users choose the platform in the first place, making the deal worse for them in order to attract business customers. So instead of showing you the things you asked for, your time and attention is sold to businesses by platforms.

=> ↺ New York Times ☛ ‘Rip and Replace’: The Tech Cold War Is Upending Wireless Carriers

• As China and the United States jockey for tech primacy, wireless carriers in dozens of states are tearing out Chinese equipment. That has turned into a costly, difficult process.

Digital Restrictions (DRM)

=> ↺ IT Wire ☛ Microsoft issues patches for 38 flaws, including zero-day in Secure Boot

• Narang said another zero-day attacked Secure Boot. “CVE-2023-24932 is a security feature bypass vulnerability in Secure Boot. This vulnerability was exploited in the wild as a zero-day and was publicly disclosed prior to patches being made available,” he explained.

• “It appears to be related to a report from ESET from March regarding BlackLotus, a Unified Extensible Firmware Interface bootkit that has been available to cyber criminals since October 2022 and can be purchased for US$5000 on hacking forums.

• “The report said at the time that the bootkit was capable of bypassing the UEFI Secure Boot security feature on fully patched systems. An attacker could exploit this flaw if they had physical access or administrative rights to a vulnerable system.”

Monopolies

=> ↺ The Verge ☛ Google AMP: how Google tried to fix the web by taking it over

• But AMP came with huge tradeoffs, most notably around how all those webpages were monetized. AMP made it harder to use ad tech that didn’t come from Google, fraying the relationship between Google and the media so badly that AMP became a key component in an antitrust lawsuit filed just five years after its launch in 2020 by 17 state attorneys general, accusing Google of maintaining an illegal monopoly on the advertising industry. The states argue that Google designed AMP in part to thwart publishers from using alternative ad tools — tools that would have generated more money for publishers and less for Google. Another lawsuit, filed in January 2023 by the US Justice Department, went even further, alleging that Google envisioned AMP as “an effort to push parts of the open web into a Google-controlled walled garden, one where Google could dictate more directly how digital advertising space could be sold.”

=> ↺ Salon ☛ If Kroger and Albertsons merge, communities will lose their grocery stores. Could Amazon save them?

• But the grocery landscape has also changed a lot in the now-nearly 20 years since Amazon first launched Fresh. Most notably, our country is on the precipice of having Kroger and Albertsons, two of its largest supermarket companies, merge in a deal that is hotly contested by both food security advocates and grocery union representatives. As part of this merger, the combined companies are expected to divest at least 500 stores across the country. (The deal is currently under review by the Federal Trade Commission.)

=> ↺ Terence Eden ☛ I’m quoted in this Verge article about AMP

• Regular readers know I have been a vocal critic of AMP even when I was serving on its advisory committee. Nowadays, well, I can’t remember when I last saw an AMP page (yay Firefox!) and I’ve never had a client ask me to develop an AMP site.

=> ↺ Common Dreams ☛ Reader Beware: Not Every “Former Antitrust Official” Is a Neutral Expert

• The Federal Trade Commission (FTC) and DOJ Antitrust Division have long served as an essential stop for antitrust experts looking to maximize opportunities, influence, and compensation at BigLaw firms and monopolistic corporations. By spending some time learning the ins and outs of government investigations and enforcement efforts, revolvers are seen by potential corporate employers to be better equipped to assist corporations in antitrust lawsuits against their former government employers.

Trademarks

=> ↺ Techdirt ☛ Harpo Settles With ‘Oprahdemics’ Podcast, Gets Name Change That’s Silly

• Last summer, we discussed a fairly silly trademark suit brought by Harpo Inc., Oprah Winfrey’s production company, against Roulette Productions, responsible for the “Oprahdemics” podcast. While the name of the podcast is obviously a nod to its main subject matter, Oprah, it’s also the case that the podcast is a journalistic endeavor covering the history of Oprah and her show. That puts this squarely in the nominative fair use arena. How is anyone supposed to make a podcast about the history of Oprah without a title that nods towards the subject matter?

=> ↺ TTAB Blog ☛ Precedential No. 15: Finding Essential Oil Dispensers to be Illegal Drug Paraphernalia, TTAB Affirms Refusal of Two Proposed Marks

• The Board upheld the refusals to register the marks BAKKED (in standard characters) and a stylized drop design, for “essential oil dispenser, sold empty, for domestic use,” finding that the goods are illegal drug paraphernalia under the Controlled Substances Act (CSA), and therefore the marks are ineligible for registration. The Board rejected applicant’s arguments that because the goods are legal under Colorado state law, or are traditionally used with tobacco products, they fall within either of two exemptions set forth in the CSA. In re National Concessions Group, Inc., 2023 USPQ2d 527 (TTAB  2023) [precedential] (Opinion by Judge Cindy B. Greenbaum).

=> ↺ Creative Commons ☛ Laksmi Sugiri — Open Culture VOICES, Season 2 Episode 14

• Open Culture VOICES is a series of short videos that highlight the benefits and barriers of open culture as well as inspiration and advice on the subject of opening up cultural heritage. Laksmi is a project manager at Museum Pasifika where she has worked with Wikipedia to develop an open access and open data project for the collections.

Librarians of the world unite: call for action on ebooksThe terrible lawsuit against the Open Library for daring to increase access to books during the Covid pandemic is not just an attack on the Internet Archive’s selfless work. It is a broader attack on the very idea of the library, and on the vital services that libraries provide to society. These include offering ready access to information, education, research and culture in a way that is available to all, regardless of their income or social status.As library associations across Europe write in a new joint letter, libraries also “support a healthy civic and community life, underpin science and innovation, and ensure the safeguarding of the memory of the world.” The publishing industry’s attack on the Internet Archive is thus a threat to all those vital functions provided by libraries.Soylent News ☛ Sony Bono and the SupremesThe article was about a pop songwriter being sued by the late Marvin Gaye’s estate for copyright infringement. The greedsters lost the case, thankfully. BUT,Those Marvin Gaye songs wouldn’t be under copyright any more and this case could never have come to trial had it not been for Sony Bono and a corrupt judicial system.Digital Music News ☛ TikTok Quietly Introduces ‘Work With Artists’ Feature — Here’s What We KnowTikTok appears to be working on a new feature that allows users to create monetization campaigns with their favorite creators. Here’s a peek at TikTok’s ‘Work with Artists’ feature and how it works. The new feature is called ‘Work with Artists’ and it was spotted by musician Jonah Manzano yesterday. Torrent Freak ☛ DAZN Joins ACE: IPTV Piracy & Billions in Losses Challenge ‘Netflix of Sport’After a limited launch in 2016, DAZN’s promise to provide affordable access to live and on-demand sports content was hotly anticipated. When DAZN announced the death of PPV, fans were ecstatic, and piracy was rendered less relevant. After introducing PPVs and doubling its prices, DAZN was unveiled this week as the latest member of ACE, the world’s leading anti-piracy coalition.Torrent Freak ☛ Bungie Wins $6.7 Million in Damages From LaviCheatsGame developer Bungie has won a default judgment against the Indian operator of cheat reseller LaviCheats, who failed to appear in court after being sued two years ago. A federal court in Washington awarded over $6 million in copyright infringement and trademark damages related to various Destiny 2 hacks sold by LaviCheats. Share in other sites/networks: These icons link to social bookmarking sites where readers can share and discover new web pages. Permalink  Send this to a friend

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