Lou Katz @lou@entropyservice.com

It's endlessly amazing -- or maybe not, since it keeps happening -- that Big Journalism treats Trump like their assignment editor and even copy editor.

The NY Times, for example, headlines its story today about the Trump criminal trial in NY "a case related to hush money paid to a porn star."

No, it's about (among other things) falsifying financial records to keep the public in the dark before the 2016 election.

5 years of Netflix US profit: $15.1 billion

5 years of Netflix executive pay: $652 million

5 years of taxes paid by Netflix: $236 million

In a 5-year span, Netflix paid their top executives nearly 3x what they paid in federal income tax.

Our tax system is corporate-rigged.

Donald Trump has a private jet.
Donald Trump lives in private clubs.
Donald Trump assembled a private militia to attack the Capitol.

Now he gets his own private system of justice — available to him alone.

NO ONE ELSE would get the special treatment he gets.

NO ONE should.

We’ve reached an absurd & dangerous point where most of Trump’s net worth will tied up in a publicly traded media company, “DJT.”

What foreign countries and funds will take shares in DJT, and what kind of leverage will that grant them? The media must report more on this threat!

Kade Crockford [ @onekade ] the program director for the ACLU’s Technology for Liberty, told GBH news there are “three core problems” with ShotSpotter. They say it’s unreliable, ineffective and raises civil rights concerns for communities of color living in neighborhoods with ShotSpotter devices. Crockford says that data from communities across the country supports these concerns. Other cities,such as Chicago, have ended their use of the controversial system.

https://www.wgbh.org/news/local/2024-03-22/somerville-considers-ending-use-of-gunfire-detection-technology

When considering legislation, we should always ask of it, "What could someone operating in bad faith do with this law?"

https://www.dallasnews.com/news/politics/2024/03/25/under-new-immigration-law-dps-plans-to-arrest-only-migrants-seen-crossing-rio-grande/

'Trump fans' are likely to lose their shirts with Truth Social: analysis https://www.alternet.org/trump-truth-social-merger/?utm_source=dlvr.it&utm_medium=mastodon

'Looks like a Ponzi scheme to me': Questions raised about Trump's Truth Social value https://www.rawstory.com/trump-truth-social-merger/?utm_source=dlvr.it&utm_medium=mastodon

Better to remain unpublished, and be thought a fool, than to have ChatGPT ghost write for you, and remove all doubt.

If you give someone a program, you may frustrate them for a day.

If you teach someone how to program, you can frustrate them for a lifetime.

Every financial advice article: If you deprive yourself of all joys in life, then you can save up enough money to maintain your joyless lifestyle until you die.

I don’t think it’s productive or healthy to spend a lot of time being righteous about this

But four years into the abject Covid shitshow, we now know conclusively who is:

- a systems thinker
- in solidarity with those who have less economic power
- fighting eugenics and ableism
- able to resist peer pressure
- resolved in their convictions
- thinking for the long term

spoiler: it’s our friends who still mask, it’s organizers who sweat the details of air quality

to the stubborn minority: ✊🏽❤️

@grimalkina I was having a conversation some years back with someone with a neuroscience PhD and a psych background. I acknowledged that I was feeling real insecurity about having recently joined “a really high performing team”.

She says to me “You know who else is high performing? Dogs in dog shows.”

I will never stop thinking about that.

Just booted an ancient computer for the first time in years. The apps open immediately, even with no internet connection. There are no popups, logins, 2FA, ads, or AI. They just work, fast, and will as long as the machine does. I miss that world so much.

@lauren @mattblaze @not2b That you sound, frankly, cut from the Zuckermusk mold here. I've known you (far more distantly than Matt) for long enough to wonder if you really want that.

“the California DMV wallet app, has a lack of options for selective disclosure…The holder has to agree to TruAge’s terms and service and generate a separate TruAge QR Code.” https://mastodon.social/@eff/112151962625732465

@trcwm @brouhaha as a Debian Developer and Debian only guy i am not going to touch Snap infested Ubuntu.

Israel's answer to Biden is a raised middle finger: https://www.washingtonpost.com/world/2024/03/22/israel-largest-west-bank-settlement-blinken-visit/

If you feed AI an MRI, it will happily write a detailed and very convincing diagnosis...

even if the patient is a dead salmon.