The Mastodon founder, Eugen Rochko, has just announced that “We’ve moved our internal communications from Discord to Zulip at Mastodon”.

https://mastodon.social/@Gargron/116041405748460511

Zulip is probably more focused toward work than TTRPGs, but it can’t hurt to try it. (I haven’t tried it personally, yet.) It is self-hostable.

https://zulip.com/

Well they cite intelligence sources, surely they can’t lie. /s

Can we stop needlessly sharing Elmo’s deranged utterances? The topic of social media policy (much as anything else) is too important than to concern ourselves with his weird tweets.

Relevant 39c3 talk (but dealing with civilian sattelites): Don’t look up

For Germans (and anyone who cares about German politics), suffice it to know that Politico is Springer-Presse.

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Yeah I’m not sure about that so I deleted the comment. But just try it out: install it and see what it shows you, and then work from that.

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I also read it as “left=left-wing” at first, but read closely: Here, “left” is the participle of “leave”, i.e. “the populists are left reeling” (and not “the populist left is reeling”).

So Republicans call “AI moratorium” something that is actually the opposite of a moratorium: a ban of regulation on “AI”.

Not that it is surprising they employ double-speak, but just to set things straight.

And, most importantly, it’s about so much more than just the banners. For example:

(1) A new GDPR loophole via “pseudonyms” or “IDs”. The Commission proposes to significantly narrow the definition of “personal data” – which would result in the GDPR not applying to many companies in various sectors. For example, sectors that currently operate via “pseudonyms” or random ID numbers, such as data brokers or the advertising industry, would not be (fully) covered anymore. This would done by adding a “subjective approach” in the text of the GDPR.

Instead of having an objective definition of personal data (e.g. data that is linked to a directly or indirectly identifiable person), a subjective definition would mean that if a specific company claims that it cannot (yet) or does not aim to (currently) identify a person, the GDPR ceases to apply. Such a case-by-case decision is inherently more complex and everything but a “simplification”. It also means that data may be “personal” or not depending on the internal thinking of a company, or given the circumstances that they have at a current point. This can also make cooperation between companies more complex as some would fall under the GDPR and others not.

(2) Pulling personal data from your device? So far, Article 5(3) ePrivacy has protected users against remote access of data stored on “terminal equipment”, such as PCs or smartphones. This is based on the right to protection of communications under Article 7 of the Charter of Fundamental Rights of the EU and made sure that companies cannot “remotely search” devices.

The Commission now adds “white listed” processing operations for the access to terminal equipment, that would include “aggregated statistics” and “security purposes”. While the general direction of changes is understandable, the wording is extremely permissive and would also allow excessive “searches” on user devices for (tiny) security purposes.

(3) AI Training of Meta or Google with EU’s Personal Data? When Meta or LinkedIn started using social media data, it was widely unpopular. In a recent study for example only 7% of Germans say that they want Meta to use their personal data to train AI. Nevertheless, the Commission now wants to allow the use of highly personal data (like the content of 15+ years of a social media profile) for AI training by Big Tech.

“We’re getting rid of the cookie banners” and “removing overly rigid regulation” is apparently how this massive proposal is being framed now, but what it chiefly does is—of course—benefit giant corporations, do little if anything for smaller companies, and fuck over people’s privacy.

Licensing terms only govern the legal aspects, not social and moral aspects.

And not to forget: FUTO is evil.

Till Steffen is a German lawyer and politician of Alliance 90/The Greens who has been serving as a member of the German Bundestag since the 2021 elections, representing the Hamburg-Eimsbüttel district. (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Till_Steffen)

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Keep organizing and slowly things will get better

Not to say such knowledge gaps can’t limit her effectiveness, but from what (little) I’ve read and heard of her, she seems to be fundamentally a community organizer and as mayor will probably work accordingly: She may or may not successfully make up for such gaps by knowing whom to trust both integrity- and competence-wise.

Not to forget: FUTO is evil.

Today some 70% of Swedish workers are members of a trade union, and 90% are covered by a collective agreement.

Thank goodness America is spared all this Scandinavian negativity.