https://www.nytimes.com/2025/06/21/nyregion/voting-primary-nyc-heat.html

kevinboone.me/lineageos-degoog…

In an earlier article I wrote about my attempts to remove all trace of Google from my life. Part of that process, which is still ongoing, was to install Lineage OS on all my Android cellphones and tablets, replacing the original, vendor firmware. Doing this removes the egregious Google Play Services although, of course, this severely limits my ability to run Android apps. That’s a sacrifice I’m willing to make, although not without some regrets.

I’ve subsequently learned that hard-core de-Googlers eschew Lineage OS, because it remains too close to the stock configuration of the Android Open-Source Project (AOSP) on which it is based. There are certainly smartphone ROMs, like GrapheneOS, that are even more Google-free.

But I’ve grown to like Lineage. I don’t know what kind of future it has, but it works well for me, and it’s easy – as easy as can be expected – to install on all the devices I own. Installing and setting up Lineage is fiddly enough; I don’t want to make my life even more complicated, if I don’t have to.

Those of us who are divorcing Google worry most, I think, about Google’s intrusive data collection. Of course, Google is by no means the only business that engages in such practices – “surveillance capitalism” is big business. But Google presents a unique challenge because, not only does it collect a lot of data, it has a lot of clever ways to process it, and find connections between disparate data elements. Before my Google separation, it always amazed me how Google seemed to know where I was all the time, even with location services disabled on my smartphone. And Google’s advertisers seem to know what I’ve been shopping for, even when I’ve been doing my shopping in person at retail outlets. How Google does this, I don’t know; but I do want to reduce their opportunities to do so.

So I need to know what information my cellphone is sending to Google, even having removed all proprietary Google stuff.

I have to point out that I’m not talking about additional, 3rd-party apps that I might have installed on a Lineage OS device – all apps have the potential to create privacy problems, but I’m free not to use them. Here I’m just thinking about the platform itself.

Note
I run Lineage with no Google apps or services of any kind. If you do run Google services, you have to accept that absolutely everything you do with an Android device will be known to Google. There’s simply no point worrying about the trivial privacy breaches in this article – that would be like taking a cyanide pill and then worrying about your ingrown toenail.

In this article I’ll be describing various data leaks of which Lineage OS has frequently been accused, reporting which ones seem still to be present, and suggesting (well, guessing) how serious they might be.

The captive portal test

“Captive portals” are often found in hotels and entertainment venues. In a captive portal, all Internet traffic gets directed to the venue’s network filter, which ensures that the user has paid for a service or, at least, consented to some usage agreement.

Android performs a captive portal test every time the device enables a network connection. This test is a simple HTTP or HTTPS request on some publicly-accessible webserver. The request is expected to return a success (2XX) code if the server is reachable. In a captive portal, the service-providing organization will capture the HTTP(S) request, and return a redirection code to its own webserver. This server will provide a web page with further instructions.

By default Lineage OS uses Google’s webservers for the captive portal test. This means that Google knows every time a device raises a network connection.

Is this a problem? Google doesn’t get to find out anything except the IP number of the device, some limited information about the type of device, and the time of day. I’ve looked at the source code, and I don’t see any information other than this being sent – the code just uses the standard Java HTTP support to make the request. It’s plausible that, with a wide-area connection, the carrier might add additional information to the request, and Google might be able to infer your location from the IP number.

If you consider this to be too much of a risk, you can change the captive portal connectivity checker. Lineage provides no simple interface for this, but you can do it at the command line (e.g., by running a terminal app, or adb shell). You don’t need to root the phone to do this.

$ settings put global captive_portal_http_url http://my_server 
$ settings put global captive_portal_https_url https://my_server 

On the whole, I regard this (captive portal check) a relatively harmless breach of privacy. It isn’t telling Google anything they’re not going to find out about in other ways.

DNS

Every time you use a hostname to identify a remote server, there’s going to be a DNS lookup. This lookup translates the hostname into a numeric ID for use with the TCP/IP protocol.

Internet service providers and mobile carriers operate DNS servers, but so does Google. DNS is potentially a privacy problem because the DNS server gets to learn every site you visit. It won’t see the actual URL of a web request – just the hostname. Still, that’s enough information to be concerned about. But it’s worth thinking about who the “you” is in “every site you visit”. To track you, personally, as an individual, the DNS server needs a way to relate your IP number to something that identifies you. There’s no definitive way for Google (or anybody) to do that; but there are statistical methods that can be very effective. They are particularly effective if you happen to use Google’s other services, because these will link a small number of personal Google accounts to an IP number.

Is this a problem for Lineage OS? While it might have been in the past, I don’t think Lineage now uses Google’s DNS, except perhaps as a fallback. Both WiFi and carrier Internet connections are initiated using protocols that can supply a DNS server. On my Lineage devices, I’m sure that these are the DNS servers that are being used. Still, there are references to Google’s DNS server – 8.8.8.8 – in the AOSP source code. So I can’t prove that Google’s DNS will never be used.

If you want, you can supply your own DNS server in the network configuration in the Settings app. But, unless you run your own DNS in the public Internet, you’ll be putting your trust in one mega-corporation or another. I suspect most are less worrying than Google, but perhaps not by much.

By the way – Lineage OS supports encrypted DNS. While that will prevent third-parties from snooping on your DNS traffic – including your mobile carrier or ISP – this won’t protect you from snooping at the DNS server itself. So encrypted DNS is no protection against Google, if you’re using Google’s DNS.

Assisted GPS

It takes a long time for a mobile device to get a robust fix on GPS satellites – a minute in good conditions, or several minutes in a weak signal area. Assisted GPS (A-GPS) primes the satellite fix using environmental data. This data might including a coarse location from a cellular network. With A-GPS, a satellite fix might take only a few seconds.

A-GPS data is processed by a remote server, that has the storage capacity to handle the large amounts of data involved. The main operator of such servers is, again, Google.

What can Google learn about a device using Assisted GPS? As in any Internet operation, it will find the device’s IP number, and it might find the coarse location. The Internet traffic associated with A-GPS can be encrypted but this, again, won’t protect it from Google. To determine the location of a specific individual, Google has to be able to relate the IP number to the individual. As discussed above, that can be done with a reasonable degree of confidence.

On recent Lineage versions, A-GPS is disabled by default. If enabled, it uses Google’s servers – so far as I know there are no widely-available alternatives. I just keep it disabled, and live with the disadvantage of longer GPS start-up times.

Time synchronization, NTP

At one time, Lineage OS used Googles’ time servers to set the time on the device. So far as I know, this is no longer the case – a general pool of NTP servers is used. Even if that were not the case, I can’t worry too much about leaking time synchronizing data.

WebView

I believe that WebView is the most troubling source of privacy concerns for Lineage OS, and the one whose ramifications are the least well-understood.

WebView is a component of Android that renders web pages. Of course, a web browser will do this, but many Android apps and services have a need to render pages without actually being a browser. The ‘captive portal’ support I described above is an example: the device needs to render a page for user to log in or purchase Internet access, even if no web browser is installed.

Lineage OS uses the WebView implementation from the AOSP, which is based on Chromium. Chromium is Google Chrome without the proprietary Google stuff, and it’s undoubtedly less of a privacy concern than Chrome would be. But Chromium, even though it’s open-source, is still primarily a Google product.

There are many known instances where Chromium will provide some user data to Google servers. For example, we know that Chromium downloads lists of ‘unsafe’ websites to support its ‘safe browsing’ feature. This will happen however Chromium is used. When used as a regular web browser, Chromium might send data to Google for its ‘hot word’ detection, for example.

When Chromium is only used to provide a WebView implementation, I’m not convinced that these minor privacy breaches are significant. It’s worth bearing in mind that the Jelly browser that is shipped with Lineage OS is just a wrapper around the Chromium WebView – if you use this browser, you’ll have the same privacy concerns as if you use Chromium itself.

There are a number of Google-free WebView implementations, like Chromite. GrapheneOS uses a WebView implementation called Vanadium, which is essentially a de-Googled Chromium. Installing one of these implementations on Lineage OS is not straightforward, or so it seems to me.

I don’t use Jelly or Chromium itself as a web browser – I install a browser that is not based on Google code, like Firefox. This limits my exposure to Chromium to occasions where WebView is used other than as a browser. In my normal usage, I don’t think there are many of those occasions, so I’m not too worried about WebView.

Nevertheless, it remains a slight concern and, if I could replace it without a lot of effort, I would.

Are we in tinfoil hat territory now?

I don’t like Google knowing so much about me, but I don’t believe Google’s data collection is directly harmful to me. My disapproval of Google’s activities (and I know Google is not the only culprit) is mainly one of principle. I don’t want to be a source of revenue for Google, or to legitimize their behaviour by my own inaction. I don’t want Google to make the Internet more of a hellscape that it currently is.

But I’m not paranoid. I don’t think Google is out to get me, or is in league with people who are. My rejection of Google falls short of doing things that will make my life hugely more difficult.

I am aware, all the same, that I have one foot in tinfoil hat country.

I know a few people – some in my own family – who eschew smartphones because they create time-wasting distractions. I certainly know people who don’t give smartphones to their kids, because of the well-known risks that social media poses to their mental health. But almost nobody avoids Google because they believe, as I do, that the surveillance economy is detrimental to society in the long term. Even those few who do believe this are mostly not willing to take action, because they believe (or convince themselves) that the benefits of a connected world outweigh the costs of a total lack of privacy. For me that’s like understanding the risks of climate change, and yet choosing to run two or three gas-guzzling cars because it’s a half-mile walk to the shops.

The few people who do believe as I do, and are willing to act on their beliefs, tend to be people who also believe that they’re being monitored by the CIA, or that Covid vaccines are implanting mind-control receivers. That’s not a gang that I want to run with.

On the whole, I’m satisfied that Lineage OS, as I use it, is preventing nearly all of Google’s data collection. I don’t install or use any Google services, I don’t enable A-GPS, I don’t use Chromium or the built-in browser. I could eliminate more arcane aspects of data collection – like the Internet connectivity check – if I wanted to take the trouble.

I don’t think that taking reasonable precautions to avoid becoming part of Google’s data collection economy makes me a tinfoil-hatter. Nevertheless, I would probably use GrapheneOS instead, if I had devices that supported it. Ironically, if I wanted to use GrapheneOS, I’d have to buy Google-branded mobile devices, which is an irony that really stings.

Well, I'm back online after a 4 hour blackout due to the heat in Brooklyn.

I found out that my ISP Optimum had issues with their equipment in Brooklyn due to the heat and humidity set on by this week's weather.

Now I'm worried that things will be really harsh on my equipment in the living room.

Any suggestions on how to keep the modem/router from overheating and causing problems?

cross-posted from: lemmy.ml/post/32115867

By Jonah E. Bromwich
June 22, 2025 Updated 8:10 p.m. ET

The administration argued that he had contributed to the spread of antisemitism through his role in the protests at the university.

But Mr. Khalil, a Palestinian born in a Syrian refugee camp, rejected the idea that protesting against Israel is inherently antisemitic.

“I was not doing anything antisemitic,” he said. “I was literally advocating for the right of my people. I was literally advocating for an end of a genocide. I was advocating that the tuition fees that I and other students pay don’t go toward investing in weapons manufacturers. What’s antisemitic about this?”

archive.ph/wip/yMJLn

Peter Link

2025-06-23 01:55:35

Mahmoud Khalil Discusses 3-Month Detention in First Interview Since Release

By Jonah E. Bromwich
June 22, 2025 Updated 8:10 p.m. ET

The administration argued that he had contributed to the spread of antisemitism through his role in the protests at the university.

But Mr. Khalil, a Palestinian born in a Syrian refugee camp, rejected the idea that protesting against Israel is inherently antisemitic.

“I was not doing anything antisemitic,” he said. “I was literally advocating for the right of my people. I was literally advocating for an end of a genocide. I was advocating that the tuition fees that I and other students pay don’t go toward investing in weapons manufacturers. What’s antisemitic about this?”

archive.ph/wip/yMJLn

https://www.nytimes.com/2025/06/22/nyregion/mahmoud-khalil-interview-trump.html

cross-posted from: lemmy.ml/post/32115867

By Jonah E. Bromwich
June 22, 2025 Updated 8:10 p.m. ET

The administration argued that he had contributed to the spread of antisemitism through his role in the protests at the university.

But Mr. Khalil, a Palestinian born in a Syrian refugee camp, rejected the idea that protesting against Israel is inherently antisemitic.

“I was not doing anything antisemitic,” he said. “I was literally advocating for the right of my people. I was literally advocating for an end of a genocide. I was advocating that the tuition fees that I and other students pay don’t go toward investing in weapons manufacturers. What’s antisemitic about this?”

archive.ph/wip/yMJLn

https://www.nytimes.com/2025/06/22/nyregion/mahmoud-khalil-interview-trump.html

By Jonah E. Bromwich
June 22, 2025 Updated 8:10 p.m. ET

The administration argued that he had contributed to the spread of antisemitism through his role in the protests at the university.

But Mr. Khalil, a Palestinian born in a Syrian refugee camp, rejected the idea that protesting against Israel is inherently antisemitic.

“I was not doing anything antisemitic,” he said. “I was literally advocating for the right of my people. I was literally advocating for an end of a genocide. I was advocating that the tuition fees that I and other students pay don’t go toward investing in weapons manufacturers. What’s antisemitic about this?”

archive.ph/wip/yMJLn

https://www.nytimes.com/2025/06/22/nyregion/mahmoud-khalil-interview-trump.html

Sorella di Perfezione - le poesie di Giuseppe Iannozzi - in libreria e negli Store online - LFA Publisher

**youtube.com/shorts/hk8RXKTvNTw…

Ulteriori informazioni su "Sorella di Perfezione"

**iannozzigiuseppe.wordpress.com…

“Sorella di Perfezione” di Giuseppe Iannozzi – booktrailer – LFA Publisher

Sorella di Perfezione offre al lettore poesie che trattano molteplici temi: amore, amicizia, erotismo, vita, morte, tristezza, solitudine, paranoia, ossessione, spiritualità. L’autore Giuseppe Iann…

^{Iannozzi Giuseppe - scrittore e giornalista}

Still to the east of Icefields Parkway the Cline river feeds into the N. Saskatchewan river. You’ll hike above the canyons carved over time by the Cline for 2 miles before heading back while seeing 3 or 4 waterfalls (still frozen at time of hike) and have sweeping views of Sentinel mountain. On the return, you can come back the way you came (recommended) or return via a horse trail that loses the majority of the view. Hiked 5/21

The Cline river flows away from Sentinel Mountain before cutting its way into the canyon below.

The Cline river cut through this ridge over time, creating the entrance to a slot canyon. The stream quickly redirects itself as it hammers into the cliff wall.

The still frozen waterfall shows some life as a small trickle finds its way out the lower section. There were 3 or 4 still frozen falls along the trail. Black and white.

The Cline river exits a slot canyon with Sentinel mountain off in the distance.

We will use Grok 3.5 (maybe we should call it 4), which has advanced reasoning, to rewrite the entire corpus of human knowledge, adding missing information and deleting errors.

Then retrain on that.

Far too much garbage in any foundation model trained on uncorrected data.

Source.

::: spoiler More Context

Source.

Source.
:::

We will use Grok 3.5 (maybe we should call it 4), which has advanced reasoning, to rewrite the entire corpus of human knowledge, adding missing information and deleting errors.

Then retrain on that.

Far too much garbage in any foundation model trained on uncorrected data.

Source.

::: spoiler More Context

Source.

Source.
:::

Is this real?

Where is Nvidia CEO???

reddit.com/r/linux/s/DkgGPXcrf…

Amazingly enough, the zoo let me bring a tripod in, as long as I had left before noon, once it got busy. I took this time with few people and no crowds to take some pretty good photos. I'm starting to get the hang of this!

Thanks for seeing some necks!

New Orleans has emerged as a flashpoint in debates over real-time facial recognition technology. The city’s leaders are weighing a landmark ordinance that, if passed, would make New Orleans the first U.S. city to formally legalize continuous facial surveillance by police officers.

The move follows revelations that, for two years, the New Orleans Police Department (NOPD) quietly used automated alerts from a privately operated camera network known as Project NOLA that bypassed the strictures of the city’s 2022 ordinance which explicitly banned such practices. Project NOLA is a non-profit surveillance network founded by ex-police detective Bryan Lagarde.

Despite this, Project NOLA’s network was set to continuously and automatically scan public spaces. Every face that passed within view was compared in real time, and officers were pinged via an app whenever a watchlist match occurred, leaving no requirement for supervisory oversight, independent verification, or adherence to reporting standards.

Opponents argue that automated surveillance everywhere in public spaces raises profound threats to privacy, civil rights, and due process. The American Civil Liberties Union (ACLU) of Louisiana described the system as a “facial recognition technology nightmare” that enables the government to “track us as we go about our daily lives.”

The wrongful arrest of Randal Reid based on misidentification from still-image facial recognition is touted as highlighting the real-world dangers of facial recognition. Reid is a 29‑year‑old Black logistics analyst from Georgia who was wrongfully arrested in late 2022 and held for six days due to a false facial recognition match.

The ACLU has urged the City Council to reimpose a moratorium and demand an independent audit covering privacy compliance, algorithmic bias, evidence admissibility, record retention, and public awareness. The organization said that NOPD currently lacks any system for logging or disclosing facial-recognition-derived evidence, and Project NOLA operates outside official oversight entirely.

A vote by the City Council is expected later this month. If passed, NOPD and any authorized third party will be legally empowered to scan live public feeds using facial recognition, provided reports are submitted according to the new law.

Meanwhile, NOPD is awaiting the outcome of its internal audit and Kirkpatrick has stated that policy revisions will be guided by the council’s decisions. Meanwhile, the ACLU and partners are preparing to escalate their opposition, pushing for either outright prohibition or deeply strengthened accountability measures.

The decision facing New Orleans encapsulates the broader tension between embracing AI-based public safety tools and protecting civil liberties. Proponents emphasize the edge that real-time intelligence can provide in stopping violent crime and responding to emergencies, while critics warn that indiscriminate surveillance erodes privacy, civil rights, and due-process safeguards.

A few things I feel are very important that none of the recent June articles about this mention:

1. The city has managed to keep this all relatively under wraps. Few people are even aware of this, and even if they are they are not aware of the level of surveillance.
2. This seems to be being kept in the dark even by people that we should be able to trust. I only found out about the City Council vote this month bc I make a habit of searching for updates about this every so often. I cannot find any information about when the vote is actually scheduled, just sometimes at the end of June. This is the last week of June so presumably this week?
3. State Police and ICE can't be regulated by city government. There is a permanent state police force in New Orleans that was established as of last year by Governor Landry.

I believe they have continued using this technology however they please, and there is no real way for the city to regulate how they use it, and who they share it with.

New Orleans debates real-time facial recognition legislation

The landmark ordinance, if passed, would make New Orleans the first U.S. city to formally legalize continuous facial surveillance by police officers.

^{Anthony Kimery (BiometricUpdate.com)}

cross-posted from: lemmy.sdf.org/post/37225074

Archived

Frequent TikTok users in Taiwan are more likely to hold certain political views aligned with Beijing's narratives, according to a recent survey by Taiwan-based NGO DoubleThink Lab.

Conducted in March and released on June 5, the survey compared "active" TikTok users - defined as those who use the app several times a week for over 30 minutes per session or several times a day with shorter sessions - with "inactive" users who spend less time on the platform. It explored their views on a range of issues including cross-strait relations, democracy and U.S. support for Taiwan.

[...]

Frequent Taiwanese TikTok users more likely to hold pro-China views: Survey - Focus Taiwan

^{Focus Taiwan - CNA English News}

The former billionaire, who inherited a coal mining business from his father, presides over a state where 29% of residents are on Medicaid

When Senator Jim Justice of West Virginia was asked about the Senate Republicans' newly released portion of the proposed spending bill that requires parents of children older than 14 to work for Medicaid, he said, "biblically, we are supposed to work."

Republican Senator callously says 'biblically, we are supposed to work' to millions set to lose health care

^{Peter Rubinstein (Irish Star)}

Sembra assurdo doverlo realizzare così a caso, ma stranamente (…o forse no?) al mare già è più o meno pieno di pazzi. Siamo appena verso la fine di giugno… ossia tecnicamente proprio all’inizio dell’estate, anche se non sembra (e a proposito, ieri era il solstizio, quindi ora tramonterà sempre più presto la sera… preparatevi a […]

octospacc.altervista.org/2025/…

minioctt

2025-06-22 17:59:15

pazzia marittima già nella spiaggia del paese italico

Sembra assurdo doverlo realizzare così a caso, ma stranamente (…o forse no?) al mare già è più o meno pieno di pazzi. Siamo appena verso la fine di giugno… ossia tecnicamente proprio all’inizio dell’estate, anche se non sembra (e a proposito, ieri era il solstizio, quindi ora tramonterà sempre più presto la sera… preparatevi a soffrire!!!)… e già al lido se ne vedono veramente di tutti i colori. Nulla di troppo grosso eh, il solito… ma, pure a rischio di sembrare io la pazza, certe cose vanno dette per come stanno, e quindi ecco: è un delirio. 🤯

Come primo, c’è il fatto che da questa settimana il lido ha messo la musica, nella rotonda (che non è troppo lontana dagli ombrelloni, quindi ops)… e il problema è che in qualche modo non riescono a mettere roba decente neanche per sbaglio! Solo canzoni italiane (nemmeno spagnole finite in mezzo per errore, mi sa!) dell’ultimo decennio, che già è molto dire… ma nemmeno per idea qualche canzone “importante”, sempre e solo le solite “da mare” trite e ritrite; e ho detto tutto! Ma come si fa a trattare l’arte musicale con così tanta superficialità… cioè, a questo punto mettete in riproduzione una radio, piuttosto che questa playlist fatta con lo stampino… 😭

Poi boh, si scende sempre più nella crisi di nervi intanto: noi abbiamo l’ombrellone fisso, mentre a quanto sembra quello subito più avanti ogni giorno ha sempre persone diverse dal giorno prima (…ammesso non sia io incapace di vedere, che è un’ipotesi non escluderei purtroppo…). Anche qui, apparentemente nulla di strano… se non fosse che in qualche modo, sotto quell’ombrellone finisce sempre per esserci qualcuno che fuma le fottute sigarette!!! E quindi, pure stando a 3 metri buoni di distanza, ti arrivano i tumori direttamente nel naso, perché il vento convenientemente soffia sempre dal mare in dentro; mai di lato o nel verso opposto. Ci sarebbe un intero discorso a parte da fare sul fatto della gente che ancora compra ed usa in pubblico quei bastoncini al cancro, però che cazzo!!! 🤮

Almeno qualcosa di non snervante, seppur comunque in qualche misura preoccupante, l’ho vista oggi: dei bambini in tarda infanzia che facevano degli strani balli sotto le docce… mi chiedo se stessero copiando Fortnite, TikTok, altre diavolerie dei giorni loro, oppure semplicemente avessero freddo durante il paio di minuti buono che hanno speso sotto l’acqua, e se quelli fossero quindi semplicemente riflessi corporei… non lo sapremo mai, ma ho riso… Mentre invece non ho affatto riso all’andata, per la via, dove in qualche modo si è veramente visto il traffico peggiore di tutti i tempi; giuro, mai in anni e anni abbiamo visto tutto quel traffico in quella direzione, che per giunta per qualche motivo avanzava a tratti anziché fluidamente… e non ci abbiamo capito niente della causa, perché da che era tutto incastrato a un certo punto si è iniziati a fluire, e vaffanculo al secchio. 🦏

m.youtube.com/watch?v=4XX7r1ga…

#estate #giugno #lido #mare #spiaggia

- YouTube

Profitez des vidéos et de la musique que vous aimez, mettez en ligne des contenus originaux, et partagez-les avec vos amis, vos proches et le monde entier.

^{m.youtube.com}

The European Union’s chief diplomat has called for all sides in the Middle East conflict to “step back” and return to negotiations after the U.S. struck key Iranian nuclear facilities on Saturday.

Kaja Kallas posted on the X platform that an Iranian nuclear capability would represent a global security threat and urged all sides not to escalate.

“I urge all sides to step back, return to the negotiating table and prevent further escalation,” she wrote, adding that EU foreign ministers will meet on Monday to discuss the latest developments.

The U.S. entered a conflict on Saturday that has raged between Israel and Iran since June 13 when Tel Aviv launched airstrikes against Iranian nuclear and military targets.

Since then, the two sides have exchanged air attacks resulting in hundreds of deaths and injuries.

Having said on Thursday he would decide within two weeks whether to enter the fray, U.S. President Donald Trump authorized a heavy assault on three Iranian nuclear development facilities on Saturday and warned of further action should Tehran retaliate.

Against the backdrop of escalating hostilities in the Middle East, Poland’s foreign ministry advised on Sunday against all travel to Israel.

Spokesman Paweł Wroński told a press conference the ministry is not a “travel agency” after Polish authorities repatriated around 200 people from Israel last week.

“It is not the case that we will always be able to help people.” he said.

EU top diplomat calls for restraint after US obliterates Iran’s nuclear sites

EU foreign minister will meet on Monday to discuss the latest escalation.

^{ej/ew (Telewizja Polska S.A)}

cross-posted from: slrpnk.net/post/23702048

archived (Wayback Machine)

Searching for Hidden Fungi in the Sonoran Desert - Inside Climate News

Mycorrhizal fungi are vital to ecosystems around the world, but remain largely understudied, especially in arid regions. They may prove critical to the survival of fragile deserts stressed by climate change.

^{Inside Climate News}

cross-posted from: lemmy.world/post/31809376

Prime minister says Iran’s nuclear programme is a ‘grave threat to international security’

Keir Starmer has backed the US strike on Iran’s nuclear facilities and called on Iran to return to negotiations, saying the country’s nuclear programme was a “grave threat to international security”.

Donald Trump announced overnight that the US had bombed three nuclear sites in Iran, joining Israel’s attack on the Tehran regime.

There was no UK involvement in the action. Starmer and the foreign secretary, David Lammy, had pushed for a diplomatic solution amid fears a wider action could further destabilise the region.

Starmer backs US strike on Iran and calls for Tehran to return to negotiations

UK prime minister says Iran’s nuclear programme is a ‘grave threat to international security’

^{Jessica Elgot (The Guardian)}

I see a lot of misinformation about bluesky here, so I want to address a lot of the talking points against atproto/bluesky.

This is partially inspired by accounts like mastodon migration and feditips being really annoying about bluesky.

How Bluesky Works

I see a lot of people misunderstanding how it works.
The network has three main parts:
1. A PDS -- This stands for Personal Data Server. These store information in records, like who you are following, your posts, who you are blocking and your images.
2. A relay -- These crawl PDSes and keep a copy of all the records on them. They give a "Firehose" of all the data on the network (that they crawled).
3. An AppView -- These index and work through the data from the firehose. All interactions are handled through these, meaning if someone follows me on bluesky, that app.bsky.graph.follow record will be crawled by the relay, and recieved by the AppView. bsky.app/ is an Appview. Appviews don't always have to use the relays, whtwnd.com/ connects to PDSes directly.

This is different to ActivityPub, where if I follow someone, my server sends that information directly to the other person's server.

Common misconceptions

An atproto relay is too expensive to run.

atproto.africa/ is a second full-network relay run by the blacksky team. We already have a second relay, and they're not even that expensive to run anymore, a lot of people run non-archival (meaning it doesn't backfill every post) relays for less than $40 a month.

There is no instances available except for bsky.social

bsky.social isn't actually an instance, its just the domain name assigned to users by default. This is explained here: app.wafrn.net/fediverse/post/f…

Wafrn has (opt-in) bluesky support, they act as a PDS and AppView, so if bluesky disappears tomorrow they can switch to the atproto.africa relay. (There is DID:PLC which is a problem, but I'll get to that later.)

You can't defederate bsky.social, this proves atproto is centralised!

app.wafrn.net/fediverse/post/f… also explains this, bsky.social is just the name assigned to users, each PDS has names like brittlegill.us-west.host.bsky.… (where my account is).

While you could ignore records from a specific PDS on the App layer, its pretty pointless, since atproto is portable/content addressed, meaning a user could seamlessly move to another PDS. (AP does support moving, but its pretty seamful.)

(While I was writing this someone posted a pretty good blogpost about this: blog.cyrneko.eu/there-is-no-bs…)

Bluesky can censor people in turkey, this proves they're centralised!

Those posts weren't removed, people on third party bluesky apps in turkey could still see them.
People in Turkey are automatically subscribed to a Moderation Service which hides those posts, as the government requires it.
If a person unsubscribes, or uses a third party app/server the posts are still there.

Bluesky isn't decentralised as someone was banned for pointing out the head of T&S liked jailbait porn.

That person came back on a different PDS. They literally are still on bluesky because they joined a different server.

Bluesky went down due to a DDoS, this proves they are centralised!

The DDoS only crashed the Bluesky PDSes. People self hosting were fine.

Wafrn

Wafrn is a federated tumblr alternative. It started off as a tumblr clone, the dev added AP support, and eventually, Atproto support.
Its a great example of how bluesky can be built on.
If bluesky disappeared tomorrow, Wafrn could switch relays to atproto.africa, and still interact with people on other PDSes.

The main reason I made this post is because so many people are blindly anti-atproto, without fully understanding how it works and how it can be improved.

There is obviously problems with it, but it does a lot right. (There's a lot ActivityPub should do, like content addressing, DIDs and composable moderation).

I also think we could do with a better bridge. bridgy isn't really cutting it right now.

Note on did:plc, its the only centralised part of the network as of now, its essentially the underlying ID every account has. It is possible to use a did:web id instead, which is tied to a website name.

Bluesky

Social media as it should be. Find your community among millions of users, unleash your creativity, and have some fun again.

^{Bluesky Social}

Alexia ΘΔ

2025-06-19 12:36:55

Well to answer that we must first look at how bsky.social is just the auto-assigned domains for new users

the underlying servers are all hosted at subdomains of .bsky.network, luckily mary-ext / mary.my.id has a neat lil' GitHub repo that collects them all in one place: github.com/mary-ext/atproto-sc…

Now if we wanna specifically exclude content from the PDS that JD Vance is on, all I'd have to do is look up which one of these PDS instances vance's account is, nuke it from our database and stop ingesting content from that PDS through the firehose

For reference, we can use pdsls.dev to look up JD's server and determine it to be https://woodear.us-west.host.bsky.network/

problem is, unlike how fedi tends to work, the underlying PDS instances are assigned automatically; Vance didn't choose that PDS, it was chosen for him. As such straight up blocking this PDS from being indexed has about the same impact as blocking a large Mastodon instance like mastodon.social or something along those lines would have: We would hit lots of people that have nothing to do with vance, or are even actively blocking and shaming him

Now you are right in the observation that Bluesky PBLLC is choosing to platform vance, jesse singal and others; Their moderation is very akin to centrist beliefs, and as such quite weak in protecting especially those most vulnerable.

It's just that from a technical standpoint with how ATProto works, it doesn't quite make as much sense to block the server vance is currently on, it makes much more sense to block the account and associated did:plc identity ← This makes sure that even IF vance moves his account (although I'd doubt it) to another PDS, he will stay blocked on our infra.

#bluesky

GitHub - mary-ext/atproto-scraping: Git scraping of AT Protocol/Bluesky instances

Git scraping of AT Protocol/Bluesky instances. Contribute to mary-ext/atproto-scraping development by creating an account on GitHub.

^GitHub