I want regulation that divides all software into two categories: part of the hardware, or not part of the hardware, with specific requirements.
Part of the hardware:
- Can be restricted to specific devices
- Must be available under GPLv3, including anti-tivoization provisions (forced bootloader unlock)
- May not attempt to use TPMs, DRM, or other systems to support assertions about client devices
Not part of the hardware:
- May only interact with hardware through public, documented, APIs in the "part of hardware" category
- Using alternatives from competitors must be fully supported
- When made by a company that also makes hardware, must also work on competitors' hardware (at least one, more if technically feasible)
- May be under a proprietary license
- Must not attempt to assert anything regarding the hardware, so things like Google Safteynet are now illegal. Security boundary must be shifted to consider client devices insecure
This is, I think, a good compromise to allow software developers to get paid without taking away ownership of hardware devices. Developers can be paid for "part of the hardware" software with money from selling the hardware, and "not part of the hardware" software can be trivially commercialized under a proprietary license. But, there is no way for a user to end up unable to control their hardware, or incentivized to configure it in a specific way.
If your OEM can be coerced into pushing a backdoor in an OTA update, maybe our software habits are to blame.
We'll always be powerless to stop top-down attacks like this until we demand real audits and accountability in the devices we own. Shaming the UK only kicks the can down the road and further highlights the danger of trusting a black box to remain secure.
In some sense they are. But being protected either from a consequence of my own stupidity or a consequence of their lack of security. I think the worst part of all is that these "bandaids" are being used in place of actual security. I don't need to be protected from my own stupidity nor do I need security theater.
I didn't like or respect the guy but really that is probably the most reasonable thing he ever said (other than release the Epstein Files), if you believed the 2nd Amendment is important to have then you are essentially arguing for some gun deaths every year.
Note: I believe the 2nd Amendment is really the proof that the founding fathers weren't the super geniuses the mythology has them as, but hey, too late now.
I'm a little confused about exactly what is being claimed here - how do we know that Vinay is the one who made this "demand"? All the article says about this is:
> When YouTube notified Howard of the demand request, it included an email address for Prasad, which is identical to the email address that is linked to Prasad’s now inactive podcast, called Plenary Session.
What does "included an email address" mean exactly?
The reason I ask is that, if he did actually issue such a demand, this strikes me as wildly out of character for him. I don't know Vinay super duper well, but I've been on several multi-hour calls with him, and I have always found him to be a very thoughtful and high-integrity scientist.
It never occurred to me that he might have the hallmarks of a political operative, and certainly not a right-wing one. And he had thoughts about the nature of knowledge and the future of the internet that are consistent with what most of us here on HN observe.
Moreover, the content that was removed in this case was not anything that he'd be ashamed of; it was all fairly reasonable observations, mostly about the collateral effects of lockdown policies and the lack of a scientific framework for measuring their impact.
All of his more 'firebrand' content - especially his (IMO, warranted) criticism of Scott Gottleib and the underhanded influence of Pfizer at FDA, remain on the internet (much on his channels where, presumably if he was bothered by it, he'd remove himself).
I'd really like to know for sure that he himself issued this demand. That will be a really disappointing thing to learn.
Obviously whether it was him or just someone who put his email address on a takedown form, it's wrong for YouTube to capitulate to such a ridiculous demand.
It was a plastic card that you could place under a light to "charge" and then if you aimed a remote control at it and pressed a button - it would glow red.
It would kick up infrared passively into the visible light spectrum.
Sigh, it looks like I let myself get baited into a rant about this topic again. I really thought I had been doing better about this in the past few years, but I do feel myself slipping lately.
> Avoid using terms that have social history. Terms that can have historical significance or impact in regards to race, ethnicity, national origin, gender, age, mental and physical ability, sexual orientation, socioeconomic status, religion, and educational background.
> Avoid using idioms and jargons. These can exclude people who don’t have particular specialized knowledge, and many idioms don’t translate from country to country. Additionally, these sometimes have origins in negative stereotypes.
I can guarantee you, however, that they won't object if you use terms that deliberately make negative associations between "powerful" or "privileged" groups and various negative characteristics, that were specifically coined for activist or ideological purposes. And woe betide you if your own "particular specialized knowledge" doesn't extend as far as the "101" of their particular ideology.
I'm speaking from experience. If guidelines like these were applied fairly, we wouldn't see codes of conduct that preemptively reject claims of "reverse racism" or "reverse sexism" (which are not terms actually used by the people making such complaints). Yet I got banned (https://zahlman.github.io/posts/2024/07/31/an-open-letter-to... ; https://zahlman.github.io/pages/dpo/) from the Python discussion forums for (among other related things) objecting to such language, and then my objections were misrepresented as themselves being such claims — in the process, putting in my mouth the very words I consider invalid. (That incident is actually related to what brought me to HN a bit over a year ago.)
By the way, "jargon" is a collective noun and shouldn't be pluralized here.
> Write inclusive examples. Try to avoid using examples in documentation that is culturally-specific to a particular country, and be sure to use diverse names.
Of course, we are also counseled to ensure that we treat men and women as equal in our writing — as we should; but in some cultures that is heretical.
And "using diverse names" is going to get you in trouble when you choose two names from cultures that hate each others' guts and depict them having a pleasant interaction. Or when you misspell them, or use a politically contentious romanization of them, or are wrong about what gender they connote in that culture, or....
Not to mention the premise that names are associated with cultures in the first place. And not to mention what happens when someone decides that your examples have a bias towards depicting people from certain cultures as more capable than people from others, even if you got the names from an RNG. And that will eventually happen.
> Language that has historical or social roots, often assuming one classification as dominant over another.
Well, no, it doesn't. The etymology simply isn't what you imagine it to be, and there's generally reams of documentation of that fact.
It's frankly offensive to have others try to tell me what my own words mean, and assign purpose to them. These interpretations are not reasonable, and reflect a failure to engage with the culture and history of others in the same way they'd like done for them.
But I mean, seriously, they object to "housekeeping". How, even? If you think there's a negative connotation in that word, and if you furthermore think that there's something discriminatory to tie to that connotation, I think that says more about you than about the person who used it.
> Language that either assumes the gender of the users and developers, or that makes assumptions of a gender.
It quite literally doesn't in most cases. This is ignorant of English etymology and should be considered offensive, especially by speakers of Germanic languages.
Besides which, sometimes your group actually does consist of all men, and interlopers like this want to limit the forms of camaraderie deemed socially acceptable. From outside the group.
You should absolutely be permitted to "assume" the gender of a hypothetical person you made up in your own head for the purpose of laying out an example in documentation. And individuals have as much right to be offended by being referred to as "they" as by "he" or "she", according to their own respective preferences. You cannot have it both ways: if everyone's gender self-identification is supposed to be taken at face value, then you cannot also have gender-neutral, one-size-fits-all solutions.
> Language that assumes a certain state of body or mind as superior to others.
There is no "assumption" taking place here.
Let me apologize, though. Above, I used the word "invalid" as an adjective, to describe something I don't consider valid. But this is also used as a noun to describe people who are "sickly or disabled", excuse me (Merriam-Webster, how could you feed me such horrible language?), in poor health or... you know what, I genuinely don't know how to continue this.
> Normal → typical, usual
> Abnormal → atypical, unusual
These are synonyms. The supposedly problematic terms don't even have anything to do with "states of body or mind" in the first place.
> Language that makes assumptions based on age or that reinforce an age-based stereotype.
... really? The harmful "stereotype" that... people would like to leave an inheritance to their descendants? Or that people who have lived longer have experienced policies that are no longer in effect? What?
> Violent language: Language that practices a degree of aggression or machismo.
Hold on, "machismo", you say? As in:
> Machismo (/məˈtʃiːzmoʊ, mɑː-, -ˈtʃɪz-/; Spanish: [maˈtʃismo]; Portuguese: [maˈʃiʒmu]; from Spanish macho 'male' and -ismo)[1] is the sense of being "manly" and self-reliant, a concept associated with "a strong sense of masculine pride: an exaggerated masculinity".[2]
This is where the mask slips, although I think it was transparent to begin with. (Sorry about the use of idiom.) Yes, the same people that tell us to avoid "language that makes assumption of a gender" will happily and freely associate violence with masculinity on the same page. Thanks a lot, really. I certainly feel more included now.
This is the standard strategy with these things it seems. Claim to remove the unpopular new idea, wait like 6 months and then secretly reintroduce it hoping the second wave have saturated the energy people feel like spending on it or that it goes under the radar.
Cultures are created to protect power structures. Culture is the enforcer of authority.
Culture distorts principles in order to defend the authority of evil. Culture must convince you that it is not wrong when law subjugates your worth and destroys your freedom. Culture convinces people of this by perverting the concept of morality.
Morality is liberty. Immorality is evil. The exercise and defense of freedom are moral. The destruction of freedom is immoral. This is the pure truth of morality.
Prudence is the proper application of principle. Imprudence is foolishness. Prudence is not morality. It is not immoral to kick a heavy stone with your bare foot, but it would probably be foolish. Prudence is a question of applying the principles and wisdom you have gathered in your life to achieve the goals you have for yourself. This is made possible by liberty. Without liberty, prudence is meaningless. Morality must come before prudence.
The great lie of culture is that authority is not bound by morality, and that authority can enforce its own prudence upon you. The great lie of culture is that you are worth less than law.
Cultures teach that intentions of prudence can be enforced by law. In this fashion they gain excuse to control the lives of people.
In order for people to learn, grow, and find happiness, people must be free to test their understanding of principles. With freedom, they can do this by a process of faith, trial and error. In this fashion children grow from immaturity to maturity. In this fashion human beings gain wisdom.
Cultures are agents of evil. The objective of evil is the damnation of your ability to grow strong in wisdom. The objective of evil is the destruction of your worth. In order to gain control over you, culture spreads the lie that authority is not bound by morality. It teaches that authority can destroy freedom at will, and claims prudence as the reason you should willingly submit. In the name of defending you, culture claims that the destruction of freedom is morality. Cultures pretend that evil is good and that good is evil.
Prudence can be found all around you. It is found in the choices you make every day. Even when a mistake is made, you learn prudence. Prudence cannot be enforced. To enforce prudence is law. Law is lie. Without the freedom to choose, you cannot learn prudence. You cannot be happy.
Morality can be found all around you. Wherever you find it, you will find joy. Wherever you find immorality, you will find misery. Culture enforces authority by destroying freedom with law. This is immorality.. - The End of all Evil, Jeremy Locke
You have invested in an idea that has been created by power structures through culture, that you are getting harmed by someone else's freedom. The people that will/want to support your work will do so out of a desire to do so, not because law says its right.
Many people are deceived that law breakers are immoral and harmful to society, but I don't think that's the case. Most laws are created to subjugate people, (I.E, take away there agency) Law's created by power structures which are ultimately designed to benefit the creators or supporters have done a very good job and convincing the subjugated that their interests align. Those that have been deceived by a system of laws that benefit the powerful are too invested in demanding a return for their efforts. What ever happened to the priority of making the world a better place first and foremost and having faith that you will be compensated in some fashion for your efforts?
Also a good example at how technology has made things slower. An analog TV can change channels mid-frame; try that on a digital TV and you're met with a 0.5 to 1 second delay, just like on this site. It's not much, but it adds up.
This is at least partly because the people opposing it don't know how to make a mainstream political case.
The case for is "catch child abusers".
People opposing it are talking in abstractions like privacy and right to use encryption. Which are important but you need to identify concrete harms that ordinary people identify with. You can't oppose a harm people can visualise and feel emotional about with an abstraction.
Opponents need to say "if this passes your kids might be taken away because of a bot looking at your photos" . "Even if you send a picture of your own kid to your own mum, you will have to think about whether it could be mistaken for child abuse by some minimum wage worker at G4S from a completely different culture, who has to process 20 pictures a minute"
The opposition mostly sounds butthurt that politicians are making tech decisions. And I say that as someone who genuinely thinks chat control is a terrible idea.
My favorite Samuel Delany story is about a woman in a village who invents writing, and teaches it to all the children. She makes a rule that you're never allowed to write down people's names, as it will inevitably lead to keeping records comparing people, and thus leading to strife...
Many things don't have to be the way they are. But as long as the powerful big tech can subsidize their costs on the commons of the environment in the form of environmental damage without regulation, they will only pay lip service to making things more efficient. Money is a much more powerful motivator to the unscrupulous than protecting the long-term health of the commons.
In the previous years, I did not have many problems with Cloudflare.
However, in the last few months, Cloudflare has become increasingly annoying. I suspect that they might have implemented some "AI" "threat" detection, which gives much more false positives than before.
For instance, this week I have frequently been blocked when trying to access the home page of some sites where I am a paid subscriber, with a completely cryptic message "The action you just performed triggered the security solution. There are several actions that could trigger this block including submitting a certain word or phrase, a SQL command or malformed data.".
The only "action" that I have done was opening the home page of the site, where I would then normally login with my credentials.
Also, during the last few days I have been blocked from accessing ResearchGate. I may happen to hit a few times per day some page on the ResearchGate site, while searching for various research papers, which is the very purpose of that site. Therefore I cannot understand what stupid algorithm is used by Cloudflare, that it declares that such normal usage is a "threat".
The weird part is that this blocking happens only if I use Firefox (Linux version). With another browser, i.e. Vivaldi or Chrome, I am not blocked.
I have no idea whether Cloudflare specifically associates Firefox on Linux with "threats" or this happens because whatever flawed statistics Cloudflare has collected about my accesses have all recorded the use of Firefox.
In any case, Cloudflare is completely incapable of discriminating between normal usage of a site by a human (which may be a paying customer) and "threats" caused by bots or whatever "threatening" entities might exist according to Cloudflare.
I am really annoyed by the incompetent programmers who implement such dumb "threat detection solutions", which can create major inconveniences for countless people around the world, while the incompetents who are the cause of this are hiding behind their employer corporation and never suffer consequences proportional to the problems that they have caused to others.
Some interesting points: ~40% of tipped workers don't make enough to get taxed anyway, no tax on tips would actually advantage better paid workers like casino dealers who don't need the help. NToT is described as a campaign to distract from minimum wage increase initiatives.
Having communism around kept capitalism honest. Without competition, it turned into "Greed is good, greed works". The best years for American workers were the post WWII years, when communism looked like a real threat.
I was about to talk about how online help files are forgotten these days, and should guide you to the right information to set up an ad-hoc network, but I was disappointed three times over by macOS.
macOS does not have any offline documentation like pretty much every OS used to. When I turn off my WiFi and then open "Mac User Guide" or "Tips for your Mac", they both tell me they require an internet connection.
When I re-enable my internet connection, neither of those apps have information about how to set up an ad-hoc wifi network.
When I looked up how to create an ad-hoc network in other sources, I discovered that the ability to create an ad-hoc network was apparently removed from the GUI in macOS 11, and now requires CLI commands.
I hate how modern tech companies assume that everybody always has access to a high speed internet connection.
Games used to be fun through their gameplay mechanics and physics, rather than through their progression mechanics (legendary gear, maxed levels). Giving yourself max-stats would ruin most modern games, because the game world stops being interesting without the progression ladder.
Also, making a Nintendo-brand version of these would have been easy money, dunno why Nintendo stockholders were okay with less money.
I run a media-lab at a art university and both HDMI and USB-C is flaming garbage. What you want is a digital video standard that simply pushes an A/V stream over the wire and negotiates the acceptable resolution on the fly. What you get is something that does too much, doesn't work half the time and does things nobody cares about. Last time I plugged in an HDMI source and the darn "smart" television showed the image for 0.5 seconds before displaying a menu that asks me to press a button on the remote to show the image. And don't get me started on DRM/HDCP..
The number of broken HDMI cables (as fraction of cables rented out) is way bigger than for any other connector, suggesting it is completely unsuitable and a broken design.
Whenever I can I go for SDI video, I do. You plug it in and it works. Why "consumer" techology has to be so much more pain than pro stuff makes me wonder.
> Democracy, haha, you think the algorithms will let you vote to kill them? Your vote is as decoupled from action as the amount Uber pays the driver is decoupled from the fare that you pay.
Relevant here, all the way from 1975:
"...In any technologically advanced society the individual’s fate MUST depend on decisions that he personally cannot influence to any great extent. A technological society cannot be broken down into small, autonomous communities, because production depends on the cooperation of very large numbers of people and machines. Such a society MUST be highly organized and decisions HAVE TO be made that affect very large numbers of people. When a decision affects, say, a million people, then each of the affected individuals has, on the average, only a one-millionth share in making the decision. What usually happens in practice is that decisions are made by public officials or corporation executives, or by technical specialists, but even when the public votes on a decision the number of voters ordinarily is too large for the vote of any one individual to be significant. Thus most individuals are unable to influence measurably the major decisions that affect their lives. There is no conceivable way to remedy this in a technologically advanced society. The system tries to “solve” this problem by using propaganda to make people WANT the decisions that have been made for them, but even if this “solution” were completely successful in making people feel better, it would be demeaning."
- Industrial Society And Its Future, Ted Kaczynski (1975)
I agree with the meat of what you say, but is selective enforcement really so unique to authoritarian governments?
In the US, even before recent administrations, we’ve long had evidence of uneven application of laws. Police love power. Criminalizing more stuff gives them more power to decide who to target.
Look how the war on drugs and policies like stop and frisk have targeted black folks. Even innocuous sounding things like seatbelt laws give police the ability to criminalize “driving while black.”
Meanwhile we’ve long ignored white collar crimes like wage theft. You know rich families aren’t going to be affected by anti-abortion laws.
My heavily tattooed White friends and I recently ignored no trespassing to swim in a nice river in TX. We agreed that if the cops came, I (non tattooed, White) would do the talking.
Anyway, the police have never been interested in holding the rich and powerful to account.
This statement in the introduction applies to so many things in CS:
I have the
uncomfortable feeling that others are making
a religion out of it, as if the conceptual
problems of programming could be solved by
a single trick, by a simple form of coding
discipline!
We should be encouraging people to produce food, not severely punishing someone for it. Do we need a campaign for a right to basic agriculture? This reminds me a lot of the right to repair, in that it feels like a violation of how we expect to be able to use our property.
