Mastodon Feed: Posts

pzmyers@freethought.online ("pzmyers 🕷") wrote:

The future has turned out to not be very Disney.

https://freethoughtblogs.com/pharyngula/2025/09/21/a-very-chesley-bonestell-future/

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

Boosted by jsonstein@masto.deoan.org ("Jeff Sonstein"):
bsky.app.profile.kenwhite.bsky.social@rss-parrot.net ("🦜 @kenwhite.bsky.social on Bluesky") wrote:

bsky.app/profile/kenwhite.bsky.social/post/3lzcjk2vhwk27

Even if you take the most lenient possible interpretation -- that SCOTUS has made it increasingly hard to prosecute bribery and corruption -- you still have to ask what kind of crooked-ass administration hires a guy who just took $50k cash. [contains…

Boosted by jsonstein@masto.deoan.org ("Jeff Sonstein"):
wi8x@mastodon.radio ("Chris - WI8X") wrote:

From N4RTD VIA WI8X@O717AM EDT on 9/21/25:
Good Morning Folks! The Sunspot Number has risen to 157. The Solar Flux Index has risen to 166. Space weather for the next 24 hours is predicted to be minor. Geomagnetic storms reaching the G1 level are likely. Chance of flares today: 40% for M-Class, 5% for X-Class.

jsonstein@masto.deoan.org ("Jeff Sonstein") wrote:

https://www.reuters.com/business/media-telecom/disneys-kimmel-suspension-shows-trumps-increasing-grip-over-media-2025-09-20/

jsonstein@masto.deoan.org ("Jeff Sonstein") wrote:

‘Meta Platforms disbanded its third-party fact-checking program in the United States, changes that affected Facebook, Instagram and Threads.

The company elected Dana White, a Trump ally and the chief executive of Ultimate Fighting Championship, to its board, and elevated prominent Republican policy executive Joel Kaplan as global affairs head.’ [2/3]

jsonstein@masto.deoan.org ("Jeff Sonstein") wrote:

‘Elon Musk acquired Twitter in 2022, which had banned Trump for “incitement of violence” after the January 6, 2021 riot at the U.S. Capitol, pand promised to restore "free speech" to the platform. Renamed X, Musk eliminated its Trust and Safety team in favor of a system that allows its users to fact-check posts, and restored accounts of conservatives who previously had violated Twitter's policies.’ [1/3]

jsonstein@masto.deoan.org ("Jeff Sonstein") wrote:

‘"We've reached a point where it's just too many mistakes and too much censorship. It's time to get back to our roots around free expression," CEO Mark Zuckerberg said in January.’ [3/3]

slightlyoff@toot.cafe ("Alex Russell") wrote:

For the web as an ecosystem, and the SDOs that depend on its viability, to thrive we have to reject all of the posturing and cookie-licking.

If a problem needs solving, we should start in the CGs and the BOFs, rather than waiting on people whose job is to transcribe the recent past to invent the future. Standards and working groups are critical to defending the good things we create, but they do not invent them, and never could.

slightlyoff@toot.cafe ("Alex Russell") wrote:

I expect push-back on this piece from folks who participate in WGs that have historically under-performed.

Proposing that under-performing groups need farm teams (rather than trying to invent in committee), or that their failures aren't simply Delphic meditations, will not make me popular.

slightlyoff@toot.cafe ("Alex Russell") wrote:

This (charter document-based) understanding of the proper roles of WGs and CGs will likely also be unpopular with the management staff of SDOs, as it's Working Groups, not CGs, that bring in membership dues.

There's an instinct, as a result, to venerate WGs as the source of ideas, and diviners of feature readiness. This is silly and self-destructive.

The only test that matters is the market, and the best ideas come from conversations between web developers and browser engineers.

slightlyoff@toot.cafe ("Alex Russell") wrote:

Nobody on the inside wants to spell out that incubation, not standardisation, gets us a better platform, and that the role of WGs is to water and tend green shoots that others plant.

But it's foolish for SDOs to deny the heart of their relevance is incubation, because eventually it renders them irrelevant.

jscalzi@threads.net ("John Scalzi") wrote:

Don't fall for it, this is the newspaper that told us to put peas in fucking guacamole

https://www.nytimes.com/2025/09/17/t-magazine/aspic-savory-jelly.html?unlocked%5Farticle%5Fcode=1.nk8.nD87.GadUYnYXEbMm&smid=url-share

slightlyoff@toot.cafe ("Alex Russell") wrote:

It's common for folks who should know better — including people who work on browsers — to claim some vendors "don't follow standards" when attacking certain designs. This isn't just wrong, it hurts our ability to think clearly about how make a better web:

https://infrequently.org/2025/09/standards-and-the-fall-of-iamus/

ChrisWere@toot.wales ("Chris Werewolf ⁂🐧🌱☕ 🎃💀🕸🐺") wrote:

Been working a fair bit on https://freebooter.uk/ lately. Pretty happy with it so far.

Boosted by slightlyoff@toot.cafe ("Alex Russell"):
briankrebs@infosec.exchange ("BrianKrebs") wrote:

All the feckless scheming by the Democrats isn't going to unseat the Orange Tyrant in the White House. It's going to take mass public demonstrations, extended work stoppages/strikes, govt shutdowns, and sustained and viral boycotts of companies that bent the knee for profit or because they have spineless leaders.

Not saying it's going to be easy, but violent resistance is not the answer, as the Cheetoh-in-Chief would like nothing more than that. Nonviolent resistance works, and has a long history of unseating despotic leaders.

From today's NYT:

"President Trump demanded on Saturday that his attorney general move quickly to prosecute figures he considers his enemies, the latest blow to the Justice Department’s tradition of independence."

“We can’t delay any longer, it’s killing our reputation and credibility,” Mr. Trump wrote in a social media post addressed to “Pam,” meaning Attorney General Pam Bondi. “They impeached me twice, and indicted me (5 times!), OVER NOTHING. JUSTICE MUST BE SERVED, NOW!!!”

Mr. Trump named James B. Comey, the former F.B.I. director; Senator Adam B. Schiff, Democrat of California; and Letitia James, the New York attorney general, saying he was reading about how they were “all guilty as hell, but nothing is going to be done.”

"Asked later by reporters about his message for Ms. Bondi, Mr. Trump said, “They have to act. They have to act fast.”

https://www.nytimes.com/2025/09/20/us/politics/trump-justice-department-us-attorneys.html

Boosted by slightlyoff@toot.cafe ("Alex Russell"):
timbl@w3c.social ("Tim Berners-Lee") wrote:

Thank you to everyone reading my new memoir - you’ve made it an instant Sunday Times bestseller 🗞️

This Is for Everyone is available now from http://thisisforeveryone.timbl.com

Boosted by slightlyoff@toot.cafe ("Alex Russell"):
bendelarre ("Ben Delarre") wrote:

@slightlyoff yeah folks arguing against browsers shipping early prototypes clearly have never actually worked at the edge.

I remember seeing the progress of the storageFoundation API back in 2021. This shipped in Chrome only and projects like Photoshop tested it out and developed against it. Issues were found, the design was honed and then eventually rehomed under the File System Access API and adopted broadly.

While messy and requiring a few restarts this process was a huge win for the web.

Boosted by kornel ("Kornel"):
oglaf@socel.net ("Oglaf") wrote:

https://www.oglaf.com/polytheism/

fromjason ("fromjason.xyz ❤️ 💻") wrote:

Stickered again by the sticker bandit (my niece)

baldur@toot.cafe ("Baldur Bjarnason") wrote:

Muting this thread because it’s escaped containment which means there’s both a tonne of silly replies and too many non-silly replies for me to ever manage to respond to them all

Boosted by denschub@schub.social ("Dennis Schubert"):
sophie@catgirl.cloud ("⛧-440729 [sophie raven]") wrote:

jutebeutel, schlechte beutel

jscalzi@threads.net ("John Scalzi") wrote:

Sinclair enjoys tacos

https://deadline.com/2025/09/sinclair-moves-charlie-kirk-special-youtube-not-kimmel-slot-1236551675/

Boosted by cstanhope@social.coop ("Your friendly 'net denizen"):
kestral@masto.hackers.town ("Kestral") wrote:

Do you remember?

Boosted by cstanhope@social.coop ("Your friendly 'net denizen"):
mutinyc@ni.hil.ist ("to wound the autumnal Mutiny") wrote:

Not all of
A Softer World
aged well, but

the best ones still
hold up.

jsonstein@masto.deoan.org ("Jeff Sonstein") wrote:

https://youtube.com/watch?v=HMGD1KCYFOw&si=lHMO--1wXXp21QNs

Boosted by cstanhope@social.coop ("Your friendly 'net denizen"):
chrisjrn@social.coop ("Christopher Neugebauer") wrote:

In March this year I gave a talk at #Monkigras about how Free Software didn't understand it had invented a labour organising movement, and the the predictable consequences of that realisation. It wasn't recorded.

Here's a repeat I gave at #PyConAU this week. ENJOY! https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=WsbUzGailCw

cstanhope@social.coop ("Your friendly 'net denizen") wrote:

Also (not that David Byrne needs my free promotional efforts) Byrne did just release a new album:

https://davidbyrne.bandcamp.com/album/who-is-the-sky

Boosted by jsonstein@masto.deoan.org ("Jeff Sonstein"):
aphclarkson.bsky.social@bsky.brid.gy ("Alexander Clarkson") wrote:

Boiue makes good points, but it is David French who goes on to nail the central question surrounding the future of the US that means the midterms may be a crucial turning point. If this was any other country there would already be discussion of severe potential risks of civil conflict.

RE: https://bsky.app/profile/did:plc:n5ammsjicqo4v44eezcpqkfv/post/3lzdyzyggyc2n

fromjason ("fromjason.xyz ❤️ 💻") wrote:

Corporations are not our allies.

#USpol #capitalism

Gargron ("Eugen Rochko") wrote:

#SilentSunday