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Joined 1 year ago
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Cake day: September 10th, 2023

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  • Just clearing up the argument.

    1. The files will be scanned
    2. They’ve been doing for decades

    There’s a difference here in principle. Exemplified by the answer to this question: “Do you expect that things you store somewhere are kept private?” Where, Private means: “No one looks at your things.” Where, No One means: not a single person or machine.

    This is the core argument. In the world, things stored somewhere are often still considered private. (Safe Deposit box). People take this expectation into the cloud. Apple, Google, Microsoft, Box, Dropbox etc - only made their scanning known publicly _after they were called out. They allowed their customers to _assume their files were private.

    Second issue: Does just a simple machine looking at your files count as unprivate? And what if we Pinky Promise to make the machine not really really look at your files, and only like squinty eyed. For many, yes this also counts as unprivate. Its the process that is problematic. There is a difference between living in a free society, and one in which citizens have to produce papers when asked. A substantial difference. Having files unexamined and having them examined by an ‘innocuous’ machine, are substantial differences. The difference _is privacy. On one, you have a right to privacy. In the other you don’t.


    an aside…

    In our small village, a team sweeps every house during the day while people are out at work. In the afternoon you are informed that team found illegal paraphernalia in your house. You know you had none. What defense do you have?








  • proven. there’s a list of new inventions that were proven safe in 1950. Do we think they were just idiots back then?

    Also its about directing cash from the sale of ‘Golden rice’ far more than about having these folks afford good food.

    https://grain.org/en/article/10-grains-of-delusion-golden-rice-seen-from-the-ground

    I’m no expert but these folk are almost

    While many doubt the ability of golden rice to eliminate vitamin A deficiency, the machinery is being set in motion to promote a GE strategy at the expense of more relevant approaches. The best chance of success in fighting vitamin A deficiency and malnutrition is to better use the inexpensive and nutritious foods already available, and in diversifying food production systems in the fields and in the household. The euphoria created by the Green Revolution greatly stifled research to develop and promote these efforts, and the introduction of golden rice will further compromise them. Golden rice is merely a marketing event. But international and national research agendas will be taken by it.

    The promoters of golden rice say that they do not want to deprive the poor of the right to choose and the potential to benefit from golden rice. But the poor, and especially poor farmers, have long been deprived of the right to choose their means of production and survival. Golden rice is not going to change that, and nor will any other corporately-pushed GE crop. Hence, any further attempts at the commercial exploitation of hunger and malnutrition through the promotion of genetically modified foods should be strongly resisted.





  • Media Contact: Office of Media Relations [email protected] For Immediate Release FCC VOTES TO REQUIRE CABLE AND SATELLITE TV PRICING TRANSPARENCY New ‘All-In’ Pricing Rules Will Address Consumers’ Confusion on Hidden Fees in Cable and Satellite TV Billing

    WASHINGTON, March 14, 2024—The Federal Communications Commission today adopted new rules requiring cable and satellite TV providers to specify the “all-in” price clearly and prominently for video programming service in their promotional materials and on subscribers’ bills. The FCC aims to eliminate the misleading practice of describing video programming costs as a tax, fee, or surcharge. This updated “all-in” pricing format allows consumers to make informed choices, including the ability to comparison shop among competitors and to compare programming costs against alternative programming providers, including streaming services. TV providers often use deceptive junk fees to hide the real price of their services. The FCC is putting an end to this form of price masking, increasing competition, and reducing confusion among consumers. These new rules require cable operators and direct broadcast satellite (DBS) providers to state the total cost of video programming service clearly and prominently, including broadcast retransmission consent, regional sports programming, and other programming-related fees, as a prominent single line item on subscribers’ bills and in promotional materials. The record demonstrates that charges and fees for video programming provided by cable and DBS providers are often obscured in misleading promotional materials and bills, which causes significant and costly confusion for consumers. These new rules continue a series of consumer-focused proposals to combat junk fees and support transparency for consumers. In addition to this “all-in” pricing, the Commission is preparing to upcoming launch of the mandatory Broadband Consumer Labels and has proposed to eliminate early termination fees from cable and satellite TV providers. Action by the Commission March 14, 2024 by Report and Order (FCC 24-29). Chairwoman Rosenworcel, Commissioners Starks and Gomez approving. Commissioners Carr and Simington dissenting. Chairwoman Rosenworcel, Commissioners Carr, Starks, and Simington issuing separate statements. MB Docket No. 23-203


  • For more thinking about this issue for software/hardware makers a good read is “Enchanted Objects” by David Rose.

    iirc. He says we’re in a ‘Glass Rectangle’ phase, where makers are stuck on screens, Like Xhibit in Pimp my ride - we put 22 screens in your car. They know how to “screen” and they use it the solution to all problems. It’s like an infatuation, where you just can’t see another way. There are entire sciences of Human Machine Interaction that explain why these designs are messed up, and the designers are aware, and have chosen otherwise.

    2016 Actor Antov Yelkin who played Checkov is killed by his 2015 Jeep Grand Cherokee, pinning him to his mailbox and fence. Because it didn’t have a gearshift. It has a thing that looks like a shift but is a joystick.


  • late to the party. Q: What is it that corporations will not tolerate about online commmunity, crowdsourced news and info?? Digg, Delicious, Slashdot, Reddit… all eaten and changed?

    Silly thoughts…

    • the life in a discussion site is the exchange of ideas/thoughts. For that to happen users need to actually listen, process, and discuss. Reddit’s structure has discouraged that for years.

    • signal to noise ratio - in order for the discussion board site to be useful, there’s some magic signal to noise ratio that has to be maintained. Otherwise, its some style of chaos.

    • Why I left - in a technical subreddit, someone asked a technical question ‘Who still uses XYZ, and why?, I never quite understood it’, I gave a short primer on how it worked, with a couple analogies. The OP replied testily ’ I don’t need anyone to explain to me how it works.'. And then testily to other helpful responses, and then deleted their acct.

    • The experts left most of the technical subs I am in 5-10 years ago. My guess is that discussions are mostly noise: things I could have learned if I read the instructions, or how can I do this without understanding anything about it.

    • somewhere I read that the upvote/downvote counts on the front page are made up… modified by reddit… so that people don’t know what they need to do to get to the front. By adding this, they gave themselves full editorial control of the front page. It’s downhill from there.