Lou Katz @lou@entropyservice.com

And speaking of things I've done that infuriated people, nothing prepared me for the absolutely unhinged fury this paper, published in the IEEE Security and Privacy journal, unleashed in the US locksmithing community. They don't, it turns out, appreciate it when irresponsible outsiders like me infringe on their turf or reveal weaknesses in their products.

https://www.mattblaze.org/papers/mk.pdf

SUNDAY SILLY

#AureFreePress

We're watching the largest and most dangerous 'cult' in American history https://www.alternet.org/alternet-exclusives/trump-cult-dangerous/?utm_source=dlvr.it&utm_medium=mastodon

'Bring your felon to work day': Dems slam Trump-D.C. visit as GOP enjoys 'mandatory fun' https://www.alternet.org/bring-your-felon-to-work-day-dems-slam-trump-d-c-visit-as-gop-enjoys-mandatory-fun/?utm_source=dlvr.it&utm_medium=mastodon

The PL/I programming language has many keywords, but none are actually reserved words, so you can have variables named IF, THEN and ELSE, and write statements like:

IF IF = THEN THEN THEN := ELSE; ELSE ELSE := IF;

I've long wondered about how to write a scanner and parser for it.
1/
#ProgrammingLanguage design

@kaydenpat #altText4you
I don't mind having to pay taxes when the poor can't.

What upsets me is having to pay taxes when the rich won't.

As dissent and protest get increasingly criminalized, it's vital for protesters and dissenters to protect themselves -- to the degree possible -- from surveillance.

The @eff offers a useful guide.

https://www.eff.org/deeplinks/2024/06/surveillance-defense-campus-protests

Note: You should read this even if you aren't a protester, because the right wing (and sadly some misguided folks on the left) are increasingly willing to trample freedom of expression.

Hope for the best, prepare for the worst.

There is no sign of #SarsCoV2 mutation rate slowing down.

The march upwards in Immune Escape & ACE2 binding strength continues.

There is no sign #SARS2 is running out of evolutionary space.

🧵@TRyanGregory
https://threadreaderapp.com/thread/1801997622376354200.html

#SARS2 #COVID19 #CovidIsNotOver #ForeverCovid

Israeli forces have destroyed all the water wells in northern Gaza.

The lack of water is making the near-famine conditions across the Strip worse, and most children and adults there don’t have access to clean drinking water.

"If water is life, then it's denial is certain slow death."

Video shows children drinking water from puddles & collecting seawater.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3ALG-rlI4lM

@palestine
#Gaza
#water

@joesteel More seriously, every time I see touch-based car controls I say “no.” I want physical buttons and dials that exist in meatspace and my hand get used to using them.

I was driving a Ford Mach-E as a rental a few weeks ago. Mostly actually loved it! But the huge central A/V + HVAC control panel was very easy to press and screw things up that were not safely recoverable on a highway.

Senate Republicans blocked legislation establishing a binding code of ethics and stricter recusal requirements for Supreme Court justices.

A day later we learned that Clarence Thomas received even more free vacations from GOP megadonor Harlan Crow.

You can't make this stuff up.

Trump floated eliminating the federal income tax and replacing it with tariffs on imports.

This would lead to huge price hikes, which would hurt everyone but the wealthy.

Think the cost of living is high now? Just wait and see what happens if Trump gets another term.

Running against the Supreme Court has the added benefit now of also playing well in a swing state on their bump stock decision.

#Nevada #guns #election #scotus #SupremeCourt

Since people seem to be pissed off at me today about private messages for some reason, now is as good a time as any to repost my blog on how to test Faraday containers, which also, inexplicably, seems to infuriate a small set of people.

https://www.mattblaze.org/blog/faraday/

First Sundar Pichai, now Tim Cook, both admitting that generative "AI," by dint of its very foundations (cf. "Bias Optimizers"), will not and cannot stop bullshitting (cf. "On Bullshit Engines").

Look at me. Listen to me: If someone is selling you a "search" and "knowledge" product they claim is smarter and better and faster than you, but it literally cannot be guaranteed to give you simple true facts about consensus reality when asked, then that product DOES NOT WORK and SHOULD NOT BE USED.
https://futurism.com/the-byte/tim-cook-admits-apple-ai-stop-lying

GOP Attorneys General Seeking to Block Climate Lawsuits Are Funded by Big Oil https://truthout.org/articles/gop-attorneys-general-seeking-to-block-climate-lawsuits-are-funded-by-big-oil/?utm_source=dlvr.it&utm_medium=mastodon

@seb @mattblaze Because I have so many followers, I see it happen. Once every month or two I get what are clearly intended to be “private” messages that unfortunately mention another user, which exposes the thread to them. It’s not a hypothetical problem. It happens. So by definition the feature has a serious problem.

Apple continues w on-device processing - which is good - but only to a certain extend. It also mimicks OpenAI/Microsoft, Google etc in scraping ‘publicly available content’ and thus disregarding copyright - while really being tough on its own rigts on patents, logos etc. So double standard! #apple #genai #ai #copyright

https://www.theverge.com/2024/6/13/24175985/apple-intelligence-ai-model-local-cloud-privacy-how-it-works