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Cake day: January 23rd, 2024

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  • We need to get our politicians to do a lot more, a lot faster.

    So we’re still doomed, then? I’m sorry, I’m sure lots of this is meant to be incredibly uplifting, but it reads an awful lot like “green is cheaper, trust the market! Numbers go up, up, up!” when you consider that:

    • Climate change is impacting countless people in horrible ways
    • Climate change is still getting worse

    The important thing to note here being that, even if a brighter future awaits beyond, the worst is yet to come. I’ll get back to this in a moment.

    Yes, that the science to save the human race exists is nice. Really nice. There was a period in which I genuinely wondered if there was any chance humans wouldn’t extinct themselves. But that was years ago. I’ve since learned that “saving the human species” is a terrible, disgusting metric. The future of what I consider humanity remains grim.

    Now, if the worst is yet to come, and we can’t yet even accurately predict how much worse the worst really will be, take a moment to reflect on this: which part of humanity is better prepared to weather the incoming changes, and which part is more likely to be labeled “climate change refugees?”

    Humanity isn’t only the richest. It’s not merely the wealthiest and most developed nations. Humanity is also a lot of people who will suffer, people who I’m unconvinced will receive the aid and support they need and deserve.

    Because the root cause of these issues, the systems that govern our society, have led us here and are unlikely to go away anytime soon. Because these systems have shown incredible prowess at protecting select groups of people from certain issues, while failing at completely fixing them, despite not struggling due to a lack of resources and continuous technological advances. If the pattern holds…

    Then humans will survive. Many will live well.

    Humanity is still pretty screwed.

    TL;DR:

    “The tools are here, we’ll be alright, just need political will!”

    Who’s we? And if getting politicians to do what’s right was that simple, we wouldn’t be in this mess.

    P.S. I’m not advocating for doom here, I just wish more people understood that Americans buying cheap Chinese electric cars won’t save the people living nearby the mine in Africa where the cobalt for those batteries was extracted.


  • “The elephant in the room – and the opportunity – is how to solve for the industry-created problem that people don’t like and don’t trust advertising,” said Garcia. “Privacy-enhancing tech doesn’t make creepy and disruptive ads less creepy or disruptive in the eyes of the average user.

    Emphasis mine.

    Betting on your reputation that users will trust you to adequately handle an issue that really seems like it’d end up with a conflict of interest seems like a fancier manner of saying you’re risking taking a dump on your reputation.

    No way through but forwards now, eh. Not feeling particularly optimistic, but I’m cheering for them all the same. Their concerns and observations about the direction the industry is headed in are valid.




  • I stand corrected, I see your argument about the comparative difficulty and effect of banning a browser vs an extension. The discoverability of the extension alone is a big point.

    Not sure I agree with how you seemingly downplay the damage banning the browser could cause and fail to consider consider other ways people could organize to distribute extensions (even as you mention various ways to get Firefox, I’m a bit confused on this one). Others have already talked about this in the thread, so I won’t repeat it here.

    With all that said, it appears we were both fools. Mozilla has returned the extensions already. It was neither about protecting Firefox in Russia, nor a case of “Fuck Mozilla.”


  • Would you be happier if they ignored the demands and possibly got Firefox banned in Russia? Because if so, it’s not that we disagree over our views of the Russian government. Probably neither do Mozilla.

    We have different priorities. I want the average Russian to be easily able to use Firefox, even if it takes more work to load some extensions. From where I’m sitting, you seem to want to cut off your nose to spite your face.

    I’m genuinely curious why.




  • If you’re serious, please elaborate on your points. I genuinely don’t understand.

    Going by Wikipedia here,

    She was a huge part

    Please define huge part. She was a “key architect” in the starting years of a project that fell short of its goals.

    her entire work has to be viewed through that lens

    Why? It was, relatively speaking, an almost small part of her career. She didn’t stay until the end of the project. You even admit that her contributions to the field were many and meaningful.

    is every explicit way connected to modern conflicts where military misuses AI to murder children

    This feels like such a huge leap, that I don’t even know where to begin tackling it. Is Tim Berners Lee in every explicit way connected to the modern privacy hellscape that is the modern internet?

    Make no mistake, if she really did want to help develop artificial intelligence for the military’s sake, fuck her. I can respect someone’s achievements while also thinking they’re trash as a person.

    But I don’t think that’s the case here, and I’m lost as to what point, exactly, you’re trying to make.







  • Had a sound issue: output device options only listed “Dummy Output” and nothing was listed for input devices. I eventually got my headset to be recognized again, but sadly couldn’t tell you what did it, since I tried so many things and I lack proper understanding of the Linux sound scene.

    Just in case it’s useful to someone, here’s a collection of ideas I found while working through the issue:

    • Make sure wireplumber service is enabled and running OK
    • Plug in an HDMI device and reboot (some people said this permanently fixed a similar issue)
    • Backup, then delete $XDG_STATE_HOME/wireplumber and reboot
    • Check if you have installed the packages:
      • kernel-modules
      • alsa-sof-firmware

    Note, however, that I really don’t understand what some of these do. You should be very wary of taking suggestions from people who don’t know what they’re talking about… unless you’re desperate enough and want your sound back, perhaps.

    …Also, here’s a gentle reminder to test your sound device with other equipment and try different ports/adapters, if available. Wasn’t my case, but sometimes stuff simply breaks at inopportune times.


  • Generally, I agree, but there’s some nuance.

    Discussions are better when those who intend to participate read the content first. Realistically, though, we know many read the headline and jump straight into comments. I think that’s a culture issue, and that’s difficult to fix.

    The bot can alleviate its impact by giving these people more context. Without changing culture, however, removing the bot from these discussions could ironically make them worse. At least, that’s how I see it.

    I don’t really like it, but I believe it helps.

    What actually confused me, though, is that if you lump in some privacy/accessibility/convenience concerns, I could kinda see the point of a “Saved 0%” tldr.

    But, on a phoronix article? They’re one of the few tech journalism websites I still trust and am grateful for, that I turn uBlock off for. It’s like I’m missing some context, I need more info.



  • I will attempt an oddly serious answer, unlike my previous comment, since I feel this deserves one.

    Sort of, and technically correct. Both the suicidal and the oil baron have no reason to care what happens after they’re dead. But I don’t know if that’s relevant here.

    Powerful people ruining the world do so because of incentives and… because they can. The only thing that will stop them and those that come after is meaningful societal change. Convincing people to participate in bringing about this change is important too, make no mistake, but it’s because of what they can achieve united. It’s voting, protesting, and building a world where the powerful can’t screw over the world and everyone in it.

    Hoping a change in culture alone will save the world is useless, because the rich and powerful will not follow that new culture. There’s no trickle-up morals, and telling suicidal people they should be mindful of how they die (if serious) is barking up the wrong tree. It won’t stop the oil baron from continuing to pollute more than everyone in this thread combined, nor will it make a meaningful difference even should the person follow your advice, because it’s a drop in the bucket—and maybe the last one they’ll ever make.

    Trying to put it shortly, my point is that mentality is only the start. The world is broken (e.g. climate change is a thing), not just because of mentality, but because those high above do all in their power to stay there and shape the world in ways that suit them. Changing people’s mentality is good, but is “use hydrogen instead of helium” really the last thing a suicidal person should have to hear from you?

    Of course, this is a meme community in the end, so apologies if this comment was unnecessary because no one is seriously saying that. But anyone who thinks so should also be able to read my previous comment in its intended humor as well.



  • I think they’re just keeping up the banter. As in, humourously acting like they don’t get your point just to keep the joke going (“So what if you’re a girl? That’s clearly you rn, just replace them with a short girl. Or are you saying girls cannot study the blade?”). Supporting that idea is the fact that “Study the blade” is a relatively well known internet meme at this point.

    But I’m just an unrelated individual inserting myself into a random conversation with little reason, trying to interpret another person’s comment on a shitposting community.