Little Bits: Issue #23 For March 2025
A mountain of bits (links) awaits in exploration along with a message to remember to enjoy and be gracious to ourselves with intention.
tech
New from Francesca D'Annunzio: Under Governor Greg Abbott's multi-billion dollar border security bonanza, Operation Lone Star, the Rio Grande no longer holds back law enforcement efforts. Today's digital border reaches across Texas and beyond. https://www.texasobserver.org/texas-dps-surveillance-arsenal-artificial-intelligence-lege/
This story is presented in partnership with the Pulitzer Center.
#surveillance #tech #SocialMedia #GregAbbott #police #border #privacy #security #USpol #politics #news
Edited 68d ago
At some point Google Drive started preventing the context menu from appearing when you right-click something. I installed a browser extension that re-enabled this function. The modern web is quite tiresome.
#tech #dev #web #DarkPatterns #GoogleDrive
#tech #dev #web #DarkPatterns #GoogleDrive
Representatives Demand Housing Agency Halt Any Cryptocurrency Experiments
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Following reporting by ProPublica, three Democrats on the House Financial Services Committee have warned HUD against using crypto, which they said could be “dangerous, speculative, and harmful to working families.”
https://www.propublica.org/article/hud-cryptocurrency-blockchain-democrats-maxine-waters?utm_source=mastodon&utm_medium=social&utm_campaign=mastodon-post
#News #Housing #Tech #Congress #Democrats #Crypto #Cryptocurrency
Microsoft Hooked the Government on Its Products With Freebies. Could Elon Musk’s Starlink Be Doing the Same?
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The tech billionaire and Trump adviser “donated” Starlink service to the White House. The move resembles a previous maneuver by Microsoft, which used “free” trials to lock in costly upgrades across the federal government.
https://www.propublica.org/article/elon-musk-starlink-trump-white-house-spacex-microsoft?utm_source=mastodon&utm_medium=social&utm_campaign=mastodon-post
#News #Musk #ElonMusk #Starlink #Microsoft #Trump #Government #Tech
Today I launch “Amped Up w/ Cliff Schecter,” my new #Substack show every Thur 2pm et!
@ 2pm et TODAY I talk w fab co-host David Shuster & great guest Joe Walsh w some righteous anger & cutting humor re Trumpy & Co
Exclusively on Substack https://open.substack.com/live-stream/21418?r=j0lyx&utm_medium=ios #news #politics #tech #ai #usa #us #eu #europe #tariffs #stockmarket #media #donaldtrump #elonmusk #trump #tv #musk #press #nato #canada #china #russia #ukraine #america
So Much Content At SUBSTACK! Head Over, Become A SUBSCRIBER!!
" #Trade & #security Aren't a GoFundMe! The #usa Wasn't Played—We Wrote the Rules!" https://www.blueamp.co/p/trade-and-security-arent-a-gofundme #news #press #politics #us #america #media #ai #elonmusk #musk #donaldtrump #tv #trump #tariffs #stockmarket #tech
Oh, your service logged me out for my security? Great, I'll just open up the vault that contains my private keys so that I can open up the password manager with the master password of my other vault, which has the credentials I'll use to log back into my account. And then to finish the login process you'll send me a one-time password in clear text through SMS or email because those are the only options you offer for a "second factor". I feel much more secure now thank you.
(For clarity this is a sardonic post).
#InfoSec #cybersecurity #security #web #dev #tech
(For clarity this is a sardonic post).
#InfoSec #cybersecurity #security #web #dev #tech
Ditch of #us #tech dont forget to #goeuropean https://www.goeuropean.org/
Flipboard fans, we have an update for you! Meet Trending — your new destination for what’s making headlines, from world news to culture picks.
Here's a blogpost about the new tab, which makes it even easier to find up-to-date information from reliable sources in the Flipboard app or on the website.
https://about.flipboard.com/inside-flipboard/introducing-trending/
Software "agents" were a hype-y topic when I was a graduate student 25 years ago. I wrote one for a class. I feel like what's being called "agents" or "AI agents" these days are even less capable than what seemed possible a quarter of a century (1) ago when I was in school.
What I thought then is still true today: to make something like a software agent legitimately useful for a lot of people would require a large amount of low-level grunt work and non-technical work (2) of the sort that the typical Silicon Valley company is unwilling to do. (3) The technology is the absolute easiest part of this task. Throwing a Bigger Computer at the problem leaves all those other pieces of work undone. It's like putting a bigger engine in a car with no wheels, hoping that'll make the car go.
By the way #AI companies and VCs, I'm available for contract work and have done due diligence research before if you ever want to stop wasting everyone's time and money!
#AI #GenAI #GenerativeAI #LLM #agents #hype #SiliconValley #VentureCapital #dev #tech
(1) Which we've been told repeatedly is essentially infinite time in the tech world.
(2) Establishing semantic data standards and convincing a large enough number of people to implement them being an important component. LLMs do not magically develop protocols and solve all the ETL-style problems of translating among different ones. The Semantic Web didn't really stick for a lot of reasons, but one reason is that it's hard!
(3) Back when I was still in the startup world I was asked several times by VCs to tell them what I thought about some new startup that claimed to be able to magically clean and fuse data. I think they're still very keen on investing in this style of magic, because it requires an intense amount of human labor, but I think where companies landed was invisibilizing low-paid workers in other countries and pretending a computer did the work they did. Which has also been happening for well over a quarter of a century.
What I thought then is still true today: to make something like a software agent legitimately useful for a lot of people would require a large amount of low-level grunt work and non-technical work (2) of the sort that the typical Silicon Valley company is unwilling to do. (3) The technology is the absolute easiest part of this task. Throwing a Bigger Computer at the problem leaves all those other pieces of work undone. It's like putting a bigger engine in a car with no wheels, hoping that'll make the car go.
By the way #AI companies and VCs, I'm available for contract work and have done due diligence research before if you ever want to stop wasting everyone's time and money!
#AI #GenAI #GenerativeAI #LLM #agents #hype #SiliconValley #VentureCapital #dev #tech
(1) Which we've been told repeatedly is essentially infinite time in the tech world.
(2) Establishing semantic data standards and convincing a large enough number of people to implement them being an important component. LLMs do not magically develop protocols and solve all the ETL-style problems of translating among different ones. The Semantic Web didn't really stick for a lot of reasons, but one reason is that it's hard!
(3) Back when I was still in the startup world I was asked several times by VCs to tell them what I thought about some new startup that claimed to be able to magically clean and fuse data. I think they're still very keen on investing in this style of magic, because it requires an intense amount of human labor, but I think where companies landed was invisibilizing low-paid workers in other countries and pretending a computer did the work they did. Which has also been happening for well over a quarter of a century.
Edited 51d ago
🚀 New on #TheFutureIsFederated 👩🚀
"This is what resistance to the digital coup looks like"
https://news.elenarossini.com/this-is-what-resistance-to-the-digital-coup-looks-like/
mentioning @jaredwhite @anildash @ghost @caseynewton @molly0xfff @404mediaco @Daojoan @theindex @dangillmor @ryanbroderick @micahflee @melaniebartos @kleisli
I'd love to hear what you think about #AdoptAWriter ✨
#tech #Fediverse #activism #BigTech #SocialMedia #FOSS #FLOSS #blog #resistance #SaveSocial