How to Train Your Own ChatGPT: A Step-by-Step Resource Guide to Custom GPTs
How to Train Your Own ChatGPT: A Step-by-Step Resource Guide to Custom GPTs
If you have ever wished ChatGPT could just understand your style without you repeating yourself every time, a Custom GPT is exactly what you need.OpenGrowth (OpenGrowth Weekly Newsletter)
Foreign interference can be hidden in plain sight. Here’s how countries use ‘sharp power’ in Australia.
Op-ed by Ihsan Yilmaz, Research Professor of Political Science and International Relations, Deakin University - Ana-Maria Bliuc, Associate Professor in Social Psychology, University of Dundee - John Betts, Senior Lecturer, Monash University - Nicholas Morieson, Research fellow, Deakin University.
Last week, Australian authorities arrested a woman for foreign interference. The Chinese citizen and Canberra resident is just the third person ever charged under our foreign interference laws.
According to the Australian Federal Police, she was allegedly gathering information on, and may be involved in efforts to infiltrate, the Guan Yin Citta Buddhist association. The group is banned in China.
[...]
The story might seem unimportant. After all, it doesn’t involve defence secrets or political leaders, but a small, relatively obscure community.
But this is exactly why it matters. The case shows the Chinese Communist Party is deeply interested in Australia’s Chinese diaspora communities. It’s willing to disregard Australian law to police and manipulate them in ways that serve Beijing’s interests.
It also shows how authoritarian regimes use “sharp power”, or covert, manipulative influence, to do more than just spy. They also surveil, intimidate and control communities far beyond their borders.
[...]
Sharp power is different [from soft power and hard power in that] it manipulates and distorts the information people receive, quietly shaping how they see the world and the choices they think they have. It’s the use of covert, manipulative and often emotional tactics to shape how other countries think, decide and act, often without them realising it’s happening.
[...]
When China’s state news agency, Xinhua, operates openly in other countries, it is playing the soft power game. But when China Radio International secretly funds 33 radio stations in 14 countries, or when Turkey spreads anti-Western conspiracy theories and disinformation, it crosses into sharp power.
[...]
Sharp power in Australia
The Canberra spy case shows how Beijing can shape opinions by infiltrating local Chinese organisations. It can also control information and mobilise people in ways that serve its own political interests. It reveals how some authoritarian governments regard co-ethnic, co-religious, or culturally linked diasporas in the West as part of their national community and seek to influence them accordingly.
Australia’s universities have also been targets of China’s sharp power. Scholars critical of Beijing’s oppression of Tibetans, Uighur Muslims, and pro-democracy activists in Hong Kong have faced pressure from student groups aligned with Chinese state interests.
The Chinese language media in Australia has also become deeply influenced by Beijing’s narratives. Many once independent outlets now republish state controlled content, narrowing the diversity of views available to Chinese-speaking Australians. This also encourages them to remain loyal and connected to China.
[...]
For a multicultural society such as Australia, the challenge is to respond firmly to authoritarian sharp power attacks without undermining the openness and diversity that are among our greatest democratic strengths.
[...]
Foreign interference can be hidden in plain sight. Here’s how countries use ‘sharp power’ in Australia
Authoritarian nations are using new tactics, from emotional manipulation to digital surveillance, to sway diaspora attitudes in their favour.The Conversation
Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent fails to divest his financial holdings and hit with watchdog warning
Bessent, a former hedge fund manager, reportedly has a net worth of around $600 million
Pro-Ukraine ISW confirms 110km² losses in 24 hours
I plan to ignore the meeting with Trump, assuming he is going to keep demanding impossible concession.
Not a fan of these Xitter idiots but this was the source xcancel.com/GeromanAT/status/1…
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US | Flight diverted after skateboard-waving drunk passenger yelled racial slurs, police say
Airline staff put the passenger in restraints twice, but he was able to break free both times, authorities said
DC man arrested after he’s accused of throwing sandwich at federal officer and calling him a ‘fascist’
‘Why are you here? I don’t want you in my city!’ the man is accused of telling the officer
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South Korean Supreme Court dismisses US composer's 'Baby Shark' copyright claim
South Korea’s Supreme Court has rejected a 30 million won ($21,600) damage claim by an American composer who accused a South Korean kids content company of plagiarizing his version of “Baby Shark,” ending a six-year legal battle over the globally popular tune known for its catchy “doo doo doo doo doo doo” hook
South Korean Supreme Court dismisses US composer's 'Baby Shark' copyright claim
South Korea’s Supreme Court has rejected a 30 million won ($21,600) damage claim by an American composer who accused a South Korean kids content company of plagiarizing his version of “Baby Shark,” ending a six-year legal battle over the globally pop…Via AP news wire (The Independent)
Wyoming and South Dakota Age Verification Laws Could Include Huge Parts of the Internet
By omitting the "one-third" provision that most other states with age verification laws have adopted, Wyoming and South Dakota are placing the burden of verifying users' ages on all sorts of websites, far beyond porn.
Wyoming and South Dakota Age Verification Laws Could Include Huge Parts of the Internet
Last month, age verification laws went into effect in Wyoming and South Dakota, requiring sites hosting “material that is harmful to minors” to verify visitors are over 18 years old. These would normally just be two more states joining the nearly 30 that have so far ceded ground to a years-long campaign for enforcing invasive, ineffective methods of keeping kids away from porn online.But these two states’ laws leave out an important condition: Unlike the laws passed in other states, they don’t state that this applies only to sites with “33.3 percent” or one-third “harmful” material. That could mean Wyoming and South Dakota would require a huge number of sites to use age verification because they host any material they deem harmful to minors, not just porn sites.
Louisiana became the first state to pass an age verification law in the US in January 2023, and since then, most states have either copied or modeled their laws on Louisiana’s—including in Arizona, Missouri, and Ohio, where these laws will be enacted within the coming weeks. And most have included the “one-third” clause, which would theoretically limit the age verification burden to adult sites. But dropping that provision, as Wyoming and South Dakota have done, opens a huge swath of sites to the burden of verifying the ages of visitors in those states.
Louisiana’s law states:
“Any commercial entity that knowingly and intentionally publishes or distributes material harmful to minors on the internet from a website that contains a substantial portion of such material shall be held liable if the entity fails to perform reasonable age verification methods to verify the age of individuals attempting to access the material.”
A “substantial portion” is 33.3 percent or more material on a site that’s “harmful to minors,” the law says.
The same organizations that have lobbied for age verification laws that apply to porn sites have also spent years targeting social media platforms like Reddit and X, as well as streaming services like Netflix, for hosting adult content they deem “sexploitation.” While these sites and platforms do host adult content, age-gating the entire internet only pushes adult consumers and children alike into less-regulated, more exploitative spaces and situations, while everyone just uses VPNs to get around gates.
Florida Sues Huge Porn Sites Including XVideos and Bang Bros Over Age Verification Law
The lawsuit alleges XVideos, Bang Bros, XNXX, Girls Gone Wild and TrafficFactory are in violation of Florida’s law that requires adult platforms to verify visitors are over 18.404 MediaSamantha Cole
Adult industry advocacy group the Free Speech Coalition issued an alert about Wyoming and South Dakota’s dropping of the one-third or “substantial” requirement on Tuesday, writing that this could “create civil and criminal liability for social media platforms such as X, Reddit and Discord, retailers such as Amazon and Barnes & Noble, streaming platforms such as Netflix and Rumble,” and any other platform that simply allowed material these states consider “harmful to minors” but doesn’t age-verify. “Under these new laws, a platform with any amount of material ‘harmful to minors,’ is required to verify the age of all visitors using the site. Operators of platforms that fail to do so may be subject to civil suits or even arrest,” they wrote.I asked Wyoming Representative Martha Lawley, the lead sponsor of the state's bill, if the omission was on purpose and why. "I did not include the '33% or 1/3 rule' in my Age Verification Bill because it creates an almost impossible burden on a victim pursuing a lawsuit for violations of the law. It is more difficult than many might understand to prove percentage of an internet site that qualifies as “pornographic or material harmful to minor'" Lawley wrote in an email. "This was a provision that the porn industry lobbied heavily to be included. In Wyoming, we resisted those efforts. The second issue I had with these types of provisions is that they created some potential U.S. Constitutional concerns. These Constitutional concerns were actually brought up by several U.S. Supreme Court justices during the oral argument in the Texas Age Verification case. So, in short the 1/3 limitation places an undue burden on victims and creates potential U.S. Constitutional concerns."
I asked South Dakota Representative and sponsor of that state's bill Bethany Soye the same question. "We intentionally used the standard of 'regular course of trade or business' instead of 1/3. The 1/3 standard leaves many questions open. How is the amount measured? Is it number of images, minutes of video, number of separate webpages, pixels, etc. During oral argument, a Justice (Alito if I remember correctly) asked the attorney what percentage of porn was on his client’s websites. The attorney couldn’t give him an answer, instead he mentioned the other things on the websites like articles on sexual health and how to be an activist against these laws," Soye told me in an email. "The 1/3 standard also calls into question the government’s compelling interest in protecting kids from porn. Are we saying that 33% is harmful to minors but a website with 30% is not? We chose regular course of business because it is focused on the purpose of the business/website, not an arbitrary number. If you look into the history of the bill, 33% was a totally random number put in the first bill passed in Louisiana. Other states have just been copying it since then. We hope that our standard becomes the norm for state laws moving forward."
Kansas Is About to Pass the Most Extreme Age Verification Law Yet
The bill would make sites with more than 25 percent adult content liable to fines, and lumps homosexuality into “sexual conduct.”404 MediaSamantha Cole
A version of what could be the future of the internet in the US is already playing out in the UK. Last month, the UK enacted the Online Safety Act, which forces platforms to verify the ages of everyone who tries to access certain kinds of content deemed harmful to children. So far, this has included (but isn’t limited to) Discord, popular communities on Reddit, social media sites like Bluesky, and certain content on Spotify.
playlist.megaphone.fm?p=TBIEA2…
On Monday, a judge dismissed a case brought by the Wikimedia Foundation that argued the over-broadness of the new UK rules would “undermine the privacy and safety of Wikipedia’s volunteer contributors, expose the encyclopedia to manipulation and vandalism, and divert essential resources from protecting people and improving Wikipedia, one of the world’s most trusted and widely used digital public goods,” Wikimedia Foundation wrote. “For example, the Foundation would be required to verify the identity of many Wikipedia contributors, undermining the privacy that is central to keeping Wikipedia volunteers safe.”"As we're seeing in the UK with the Online Safety Act, laws designed to protect the children from ‘harmful material’ online quickly metastasize and begin capturing nearly all users and all sites in surveillance and censorship schemes,” Mike Stabile, director of public policy at the Free Speech Coalition, told me in an email following the alert. “These laws give the government legal power to threaten platform owners into censoring or removing fairly innocuous content — healthcare information, mainstream films, memes, political speech — while decimating privacy protections for adults. Porn was only ever a Trojan horse for advancing these laws. Now, unfortunately, we're starting to see what we warned was inside all along."
Updated 8/13 2:35 p.m. EST with comment from Rep. Lawley.
Updated 8/13 3:35 p.m. EST with comment from Rep. Soye.
Wikimedia Foundation Challenges UK Online Safety Act Regulations – Wikimedia Foundation
UPDATE: On Monday, 11 August, the High Court of Justice dismissed the Wikimedia Foundation’s challenge to the UK’s Online Safety Act (OSA) Categorisation Regulations.Wikimedia Foundation
We caught companies making it harder to delete your personal data online
We caught companies making it harder to delete your personal data online – The Markup
Dozens of companies are hiding how you can delete your personal data, The Markup and CalMatters found.themarkup.org
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My understanding is that they used the existing laws as a framework and then went a little above and beyond them. There is an org in the US that's is trying to get these sorts of laws passed in every state and they want to make sure they are all compatible with each other.
I think one of the big differences is that MN residents can request what data a business has and the have corrections made.
So no, the grass isn't all that greener on the other side.
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Software Development Company | USA, UAE & India | Serviots
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As someone who's been on the web since the 90s I hate this.
The web was designed to be user agent agnostic. Desktop, phone, fridge, ai agents, curl, python script - whatever agent you are using shouldn't matter for access. That's the whole point of open internet, period.
There are thousands of alternatives to github pages that will host your content for free. Taking your static website to a different host literally takes 5 minutes. At the scale of Github or Netlify your 1gb/mo bandwidth blog website is a rounding error and well worth the potential conversion price. The ignorance in this thread is astounding.
You can "disagree" all you want but reality is that information hosting made huge gains in the past 20 years to the point where the only cost to share a blog these days is the domain name. Even if you don't want to feed the "free corporate machines" then you can easily host it for 5$/mo and if you can't afford that I don't know what to tell you.
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Yes. It’s not clear if this was photoshopped or a bug that has been around for years, I believe related to GeForce NOW streaming. The two clients share some code, and GeForce NOW does have an age requirement.
Petition: Repeal the Online Safety Act
We want the Government to repeal the Online Safety act.Petitions - UK Government and Parliament
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Reminder that they already responded
The Government has no plans to repeal the Online Safety Act, and is working closely with Ofcom to implement the Act as quickly and effectively as possible
Wouldn't it be sick if y'all just responded on voting day?
Here's the pitch: Do you want to prevent horrible nonsense shit from happening? Do you like money? Are you okay with people in general? Fucking vote.
What will Labour do? Starmer's manifesto and election promises
The pledges made by the new prime minister as his Labour party claim a landslide victoryAmy Gibbons (The Telegraph)
I do not realize that, I'm not from there nor do I pay attention to their politics. This was more so a call to everyone everywhere to show up at whatever booth it may be and prevent shitty policies from being considered, let alone passed.
That said, I do appreciate the info, and moreso appreciate that you archived it and linked a paywall free version. That was thoughtful.
Yeah unfortunately one vote every 4 or 5 years is not enough granularity to weigh in on specific issues. Also, politicians lie about what they will do all the time.
Showing that a large amount of people are against an action, whether by petition or protest, is one of the tools we do have.
This particular piece of legislation has been in the works for two administrations of two different parties. We're kind of sick of both of them so I think many people will likely vote for a 3rd party the next time around. Possibly the more progressive splinter group of our 'left" party.
I hope you're right. But in my experience, every country ends up voting for 1 of the 2 largest parties because "that other party will not get even 5%" and the whole population ends up disregarding them. And this is by design.
Honestly, I pray that you're right and the UK people actually tells the main parties to fuck right off.
The game has been rigged.
Voting exists to stop you changing things.
It makes you believed you solved the problem
when you've actually accomplished nothing yet
The voting is game is lost before it began
with psychometric micro demographic targetting
they can convert money into votes with simple manipulation
it's just a matter of which money interest push more
on their preferred option
but neither of the two choices is on your side
None of the choices in democracy are working for you
Yes there are many choices, very similar degrees of ultimately the same thing. Same thing here in Canada.
Often it's the business elite party and the "business elite but pretending to care about the people's interest party" and that second one is also split so the straight up business elite party has a chance to win. Followed by series of do-nothing statistically insignificant, flavour-text parties just for the impression of diversity. It's all a little circus to give you the idea the population is in control while being completely out of the equation. It only really serves to dissipate their frustration and make them believe they've already done everything they could so we don't get guillotines in the streets.
Make no mistake Fukuyama is right, this IS the end of history, there will not be any democratically elected changes unless the powerful decide change is in their interest and will maintain or increase their power.
Nothing will change until the power is physically taken away from them and history restarts.
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(and if anyone can find an article or screen grab of the following... Let me know, I can't find any references 🙁)
I remember a game / joke where you would rub the Commodore 64 gameport with a wet finger, and the faster you went, the nicer the on-screen lady became... 😉
It's in the name... can't access graphic content without ID, can we?
/s
On a more serious note, what about AMD graphics cards?
Second world doesn't mean axis powers, it represented the Soviet Union and Soviet aligned countries.
Its a cold war term. The terms represent the two remaining superpowers after WW2.
1st world = The US and US aligned countries
2nd world = Soviet Union and Soviet aligned countries
3rd world = Non-aligned countries. Which just happened to be mostly under developed countries, which is why the term is now used for that. It didn't actually mean under developed at first. For example, Switzerland is technically a 3rd world country despite being rich and highly developed.
The actual Nvidia driver settings window or all the gamer crap build on top of it that demands you make an account?
Don’t get me wrong, this law is awful but also just deinstall that piece of bloat, good old Nvidia control panel is all you need and works entirely offline without account or did something chance since i left windows?
You'd have the same issue with this on Linux, no? It isn't OS-specific.
EDIT: I meant in general. Software on Linux is also subject to the UKs temper tantrum laws, same as on Windows. The Nvidia driver is just an example, you can also just download the driver on Windows without needing their companion app.
There's a learning curve, sure.
There was one for Windows too, but most people don't remember the hundreds of hours of learning that they've done to become competent users of Windows.
Just jump in, don't dual boot. Having no option of giving up and booting Windows makes you motivated to learn how to use Linux.
There's a community of people who will help (while also sometimes being insufferable assholes) and the skills you learn will be more durable. You're not going to see Linux 11 come along and mandate that you buy a new computer or anything.
Oh I've loved it so far. And you're right on the "what you learn is more useful". Like I'd done a fair amount of hobby/work prototype stuff on rasbian, and eventually went "man, it'd be great if this but more horsepower" and wound up Debian.
Anyway, my point is despite doing a fair amount of coding, and circuit level electronics including troubleshooting comms and all the fun things like race conditions that go into that, I had zero idea how a computer was actually arranged. Troubleshooting Debian helped me with that and is infinitely transferable as opposed to being a tip and trick with windows.
But my original comment was just about Nvidia cards. I've had some I just slot in and they work, and some I have to spend an afternoon troubleshooting. Still reinforces your point though, troubleshooting it the first time was how I learned how things actually get displayed.
There's a project working on making CUDA work on all (read: AMD) graphics cards. It's alpha-level, but the progress makes it look promising.
tomshardware.com/software/a-pr…
e: Tom's Hardware links are half the size of the article 😂
You don't need Linux, you just need to get the driver from Nvidia's website.
If they can't figure this out, they really don't belong on Linux.
Ryan: "A one stop shop consumer experience. You're chatting with your friends, you're talking about the latest music, about the election; all of it is happening in our virtual driver manager"
Philus: "Did the police sort the issue?"
Ryan: "Yes"
the people get exactly the government they deserve.
You are extremely naive about "democracy"
You are taking the fake choices at face value
This is not democracy
Voting once in a while is not democracy, it's not even politics
Look at the rotating cast of 100 or so loser leading just about every democracy, do you really believe that the current leaders really are these despicable, reprehensible, deceptive and bootlicking politicians are the best people among hundreds of millions of people ?
Of course not, what a crazy idea, and you want to blame the victim about it ? The victim which are US ??? How dare you !
Every country has their own version of first past the post, electoral college and all kinds of rules that ensure that even if they can't apparently influence politics, the politics have nevertheless NEVER left the hands of the power elites. The people who have always owned everything and will always own everything. You might be feeling some protest and the desire to point to some "rags to riches" story to rebut me, but no you know just as well as I do that these exception are far and few in between and they don't save the system.
The system designed to perpetuate the concentration of power into fewer and fewer hands, as much as possible, stopping just short of monopoly and kings unless we stopped looking.
Face it, our democracy is rotten bull shit ! It's NOT OUR FAULT, it was rigged from the start by GOD DAMNED SLAVE OWNERS !!!!!!
So stop repeating the thought terminating platitudes like "the people get exactly the government they deserve", "it's the worst system, except for all the others", "western liberal democracy is the end of history".
This was and always been fake no matter how much the elites want us to believe it.
Democracy was fake then, it is fake NOW and that is not even taking into account just how incredibly WORSE it is getting in recent years. Not only were the elites content with assassination of dissenters of anything that would champion any kind of change everywhere on Earth, from Martin Luther King to an endless series of political activists but now we have even worse and more deadly than assassinations going on.
Here are just a few of the new technology that ensure your old fake democracy will never EVER amount to anything and you will scientifically never matter to any kind of policy. (even though it was scientifically proven a decade ago that the people's preference have no effect on congess' policies)
The new nails in the airtight, steel reinforced concrete coffin of democracy are
1. Behavioral Microtargeting
Data-driven psychological manipulation that hijacks emotions to steer voter behavior without their awareness.
2. Algorithmic Information Control
Algorithms decide what people see and believe, shaping political reality to favor power.
3. Surveillance-Based Targeting
Every movement, message, and purchase is tracked and fed into systems designed to pre-empt resistance.
4. Neuromarketing & Biometric Influence
Ads and messages are engineered to exploit subconscious emotional and physiological responses.
5. Digital ID & Programmable Money
Financial and identity systems can be weaponized to reward obedience and punish dissent instantly.
6. Rigged Electoral Architecture
Voting systems and rules ensure only establishment-friendly candidates ever make it to power.
7. Deplatforming & Soft Censorship
Unapproved voices are quietly erased, throttled, or discredited before they can gain traction.
8. Algorithmic Bureaucracy (AI Governance)
Opaque algorithms control critical life decisions with no transparency or accountability.
9. Weaponized Legalism ("Lawfare")
Laws are selectively enforced to crush dissent while protecting the powerful.
10. Manufactured Hopelessness
The system convinces people that resistance is pointless, ensuring compliance without force.We are totally boned, we should all go piss on the tomb of Edward Bernays and Ivy Lee in mourning because our democracy is NEVER COMING BACK
I remember in 2019 my workplace was doing large guest lectures from experts teaching how to work with millennials entering the workplace. The teacher early on tried to emphasize that most millennials at that point were late 20s up to almost 40 so everyone's been working with them for a good amount of time now and the crowd was not interested in that.
Just venting about their teenage children who were gen z but wasn't a term used much for a couple more years. Just as entertaining were old millennials in denial and certain they were gen x. Not as entertaining were old gen z that thought they were millennials but learned they were actually gen z and it was a moment of shrug shoulder and pretty much being like, "neat." Like thinking your astrological sign or zodiac animal was one thing your whole life but was off by one.
Similar to like 2021/2022 when I started hearing about how terrible gen z workers out of college were because of growing up on tiktok. Gen z in the workforce at that time grew up on Facebook, YouTube, Instagram, and Snapchat. Twitter was genz and millennials tertiary social media. When TikTok came out they had been working for years already or just about to finish undergrad college. 2021/2022 gen z who had the brain rot got that well before TikTok became popular
"They're" is a contraction of "they are"
"Their" is possessive
"There" is a directed place
"The problem with the MTV generation is they are kids" wouldn't make any sense
There's always going to be exceptions among those with a more natural tech based interest, but it used to be that everyone was exposed to using a desktop and not something that someone had to individually go out of their way to learn.
This article all day way from back in 2021 showed professors having to rethink how to teach the basics, since now skills that were expected to be known were starting to not be common knowledge.
Gradually, Garland came to the same realization that many of her fellow educators have reached in the past four years: the concept of file folders and directories, essential to previous generations’ understanding of computers, is gibberish to many modern students.
theverge.com/22684730/students…
So yeah people who are more interested in PC gaming, streaming, and even pirating are more likely to find resources to be self taught. But, the regular people who are increasingly growing up only using phones as their computing device aren't doing the same until forced to.
File not found
Modern college students aren’t organizing their files into folders and directories, forcing some professors to rethink the way they teach programming.Monica Chin (The Verge)
Yep. I feel like a failure of a father. I was talking to my 12 year old about some website and she was all "what app is that?"
It's not an app, it's a website.
But there's no website app.
You use a web browser? Like Firefox?
What's a a web bowser? Is Firefox a new furry?
I'd probably be the same if it wasn't for video games. Wanting to build my own PC was what educated me the most about computers and how they work and learning basic desktop usage. Especially getting into Skyrim and Minecraft mods. There whether someone wants to or not they will have to know basic folder structure and where things are saved and located.
But, without a self driven reason to dive further beyond mobile devices it doesn't seem like schools are teaching people computer basics anymore. So not something learned by everyone by just every day life.
Up until now, we've been hiding it in wikis and books, where we know nobody will look. 😂
There are some user friendly distributions, but even they will be uncomfortable and frustrating to use when you're new.
Having to relearn how to use a computer is daunting for people. It's a lot easier to just touch an app and have the instant gratification.
The point of all of these apps and services is to get people dependent on them so that they're unwilling to leave because the alternative requires effort. I don't know that Linux, as a whole, can ever be that user friendly. But, eventually some people will be tired of being squeezed for cash and spyed on just to save a few weeks of reading and learning.
in a friendly manner
Emphasis on “friendly” because there’s a big “RTFM” issue on some Linux communities. Sure, it can be annoying getting the same questions constantly. But the “RTFM” response is condescending and artificially inflates the barrier to entry. People shouldn’t be expected to read, understand, and remember 200 pages of dense documentation just to learn how to update their graphics drivers. If someone is learning how to drive, telling them “read the owner’s manual for your car” is just toxic. Sure the owners manual will have lots of useful info, but that doesn’t actually help the person who is trying to get started.
At the very least, point them in the right direction. You can say “RTFM” while still being helpful. Oh, you want to know how to do something specific via CLI? Cool, here’s a link to that specific section, which explains what the command you need does. As it currently stands, a lot of the most crucial info for newcomers is buried in obscure wiki articles and books. And longtime Linux users treat the struggle like a rite of passage. But not everyone is interested in that; They just want to ditch Windows because they can’t install Win11, and they’re looking for friendly alternatives.
I do agree with a lot of what you're saying.
Linux has historically been a space for tech people and so the default assumption is that the user is competent (jokes aside...) and capable of understanding technical writing.
So, naturally, if a person asks a question which is answered in the documentation then they're reminded that the answers exist already in the expected places and asking other people to do your own research for you rude.
The Linux demographic is shifting and we need to adjust, but cultural norms change slowly.
and they’re looking for friendly alternatives.
I think that this is part of the trap that keeps people stuck in the spyware/enshittification market.
Technology is complicated.
Try to imagine, from a technical point of view, how complex it is to run a service like Netflix. There are a lot of highly trained people designing, managing and maintaining the various systems to run the service that lets a user touch a picture on their phone screen to see a movie.
The user has an easy, friendly experience but that's only because Netflix handles all of the complexity. This seems like a good deal initially. I mean, ~~$10~~ ~~$12~~ ~~$15~~ $19.99/mo is a good price to pay to not have to know how to do all of that.
But, now the user is completely dependent on service providers to stand between them and the complexity of technology so they never have a chance to learn because they never see how anything works.
This Faustian bargain is what lets these companies continue to spy on people and jack up the price of services while offering less service. Where are the users going to go?
Linux and the open source community offer a different bargain. You have to learn how to do things for yourself, but now you have actual meaningful choices about how you use technology and a community of people who are trying to solve the same problems as you.
Sure, it isn't as easy. But easy isn't free, and I'm tired of paying what they want to charge.
My literal job consists of helping other (generally much less technically savvy) representatives provide support to our end users, and it being their literal job to provide "tech" help to users is still not enough of an incentive for 80+% of them to learn anything beyond basic computing. Sometimes it's like pulling teeth just to get a fucking click path or screenshot of what's actually happening.
Now expand that out to now I am not getting paid to help people and those asking for help are often VERY entitled that they deserve to have their hand held through the entire process. It's frustrating and often thankless.
There's an older manual for how to ask a "hacker" for technical help that I think is so spot on for setting proper expectations: catb.org/~esr/faqs/smart-quest…
I have been offering 1:1 chats on signal to anyone who wants help switching to Linux.
Asking questions in forums and social media is intimidating. I despise the snobbery that often represents this community. I just want to help people regain some control over their digital lives.
I would be interested. So far I can't say that I have ever been helped on social media or dedicated forums when it comes to Linux. It went mostly like this:
Me: "I have problem X. How can I solve it or at least get closer to a solution?"
Answer: "Lol, you idiot, you don't even know how to do that!"
Me: "No, I don't know. That's why I'm asking. So what do I have to do? Edit a certain script? Get a certain program?"
Answer: "Grow a brain you noob!"
(Rinse and repeat)
Alternative answer, rarely: (Crickets)
I came to two conclusions because of this. First: The Linux community has the highest density of trolls of all communities. By far. Second: None of those people actually knew the answer to any of my questions, otherwise narcissism would have kicked in at least once and made someone slip a solution, just to brag with their knowledge and skills. Which means that the Linux community is also the least tech-savvy community as well. By far. So if someone actually knows something about Linux, they can't be found in any Linux-dedicated place. At all.
Everything I learned about Linux to this day is based on trial-and-error. But I don't have the time anymore to do that and it's in general too time-consuming to reinstall distros over and over again because I went too far when trying something new. Currently I'm using Mint to browse the internet or do office tasks. But I would like to do more, like running certain Windows programs like DAWs with low latency. Or raising the polling rate of USB mice above 10 Hz (as in ten - that's not a typo). Fortunately, copying or moving more than 1 GB to or from USB sticks without crashing the entire machine (no matter if NTFS or ExFAT) was solved last year, probably because of a kernel update. Well, it's a work-in-progress-project, I know that Linux is more of a beta version of an OS and it's free, I'm not complaining about such issues. I'm experimenting, having a look what can be done.
I'm okay with things actually not being possible. I would never complain about ReactOS not running modern Windows programs either. But I'm tired of Linux trolls claiming all kinds of stuff without ever providing any description, tutorial or evidence. And I'm tired of them insulting me because I don't know something they obviously don't know either. It's ridiculous. So yeah, I'm still interested in talking to a single person who might actually know something and who is not part of "that Linux community".
Or raising the polling rate of USB mice above 10 Hz (as in ten - that's not a typo).
I don't know the answer, but I'm interested, what do you use that for?
Fortunately, copying or moving more than 1 GB to or from USB sticks without crashing the entire machine (no matter if NTFS or ExFAT) was solved last year, probably because of a kernel update.
I believe it has a lot to do with the default amount of dirty memory. dirty memory is mostly the write cache, which is unnecessary to have a lot of, as that does not improve anything after a certain point, but at best it can mislead you to believe that a copy opetation started with 200 MB/s and that it finished when it actually did not yet.
web.archive.org/web/2022082811…
kernel.org/doc/html/latest/adm…
you can fix these limits with sysctl files. they are loaded on boot on typical systemd systems. suggestions are in the manjaro post, relevant for any desktop linux system.
maybe it's worth to set these up even if you are good for now. It's good to hear a kernel change could have fixed it though. maybe they have finally revised the defaults, they wanted to do that for a few years now..
Decrease dirty bytes for more reliable USB transfer
I had an issue where transferring files to (not sure if same happens to from) USB drives would hang, and often not complete. The transfer/completion rates were also falsely reported.Manjaro Linux Forum
As a millennial, it, too, is insane.
Which begs the question: who thinks this is a needed thing and a good idea? Who is pushing this agenda?
somebody in another post a few days ago suggested that this was about gaining control of the media narrative by gradually locking down parts of the internet. The idea being that today it's adult content but tomorrow its about disagreeable narratives on YouTube, TikTok, and other secondary sources of Information.
-I'd think it were a stretch of the imagination but it was shown that the motives for trying to ban TikTok (in the U.S.) were the narratives shared on the platform about Israel's ongoing genocide.
Personally, I don't know.
From en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lost_G… :
The Lost Generation was the demographic cohort that reached early adulthood during World War I, and preceded the Greatest Generation. The social generation is generally defined as people born from 1883 to 1900, coming of age in either the 1900s or the 1910s, and were the first generation to mature in the 20th century. The term is also particularly used to refer to a group of American expatriate writers living in Paris during the 1920s.[1][2][3] Gertrude Stein is credited with coining the term, and it was subsequently popularized by Ernest Hemingway, who used it in the epigraph for his 1926 novel The Sun Also Rises: "You are all a lost generation."[4][5] "Lost" in this context refers to the "disoriented, wandering, directionless" spirit of many of the war's survivors in the early interwar period.
[6]In the wake of the Industrial Revolution, Western members of the Lost Generation grew up in societies that were more literate, consumerist, and media-saturated than ever before, but which also tended to maintain strictly conservative social values. Young men of the cohort were mobilized on a mass scale for World War I, a conflict that was often seen as the defining moment of their age group's lifespan. Young women also contributed to and were affected by the war, and in its aftermath gained greater freedoms politically and in other areas of life. The Lost Generation was also heavily vulnerable to the Spanish flu pandemic and became the driving force behind many cultural changes, particularly in major cities during what became known as the Roaring Twenties.
Later in their midlife, they experienced the economic effects of the Great Depression and often saw their own sons leave for the battlefields of World War II. In the developed world, they tended to reach retirement and average life expectancy during the decades after the conflict, but some significantly outlived the norm. The Lost Generation became completely ancestral when the last surviving person who was known to have been born in the Lost Generation or during the 19th century, Nabi Tajima, died in 2018 at age 117.[7]
Because when you were born correlates with your cultural experiences and therefore your behaviors. Not always, bit broadly. And if you try to define groupings for those years, you can see clearly defined generations, that were really clear with the baby boomers, who were the American children of American soldiers coming back from world war 2, and then their resultant children, generation y/the "millennials", named thusly for coming of age around the time of the millennium.
Like sure, it's all social constructs. But, so is language.
Baby boomers generally got some of the biggest economical booms in history, along with the population "boom" of their births. But that was only if you were able, white, cisgender, heterosexual, and male. The civil rights movements of the 50s, 60s, and onwards were both possible but also necessary because of the empowerment of those demographics.
But also, because of that general success, a lot of baby boomers (cishet white men) took on the behavioral traits of being largely pieces of shit. Not all, just like "not all men". But, it's enough of a pattern of entitlement and sexism and repression and psychosocial behavioral resultant of lead poisoning, that that's what the baby boomer generation is kind've seen as, now, regardless if any individual does or doesn't fit any of those things.
And so, we can largely group and label the generation and attach it to a current age group and try to predict or explain behavior.
Unfortunately, this is also discrimination in many cases where it isn't true. Personally, I try to avoid profiling entirely because the habit is gross. But, I would be lying if I said I didn't clearly see a solid pattern. I know, that they're just people like the rest of us, and if we were in their shoes, we would entirely end up just like them. But then that again brings it to it being generational, and not just age.
You think I like being reminded and disappointed when people end up fitting their negative stereotypes? You think it's easy to try to be a good person against my own upbringing? It's not. But we have to try. And working to understand is a big part of that. More people need to ask "why", and, I know you were asking rhetorically, but you were close enough that I think it deserves recognition. So, good on you for that.
Whatever the millennial generation ends up being known for, I'm curious. But until then, we can't give up trying to make ourselves, the world, and each other better. Because once you give up.... Well... We can never give up.
"Why not?" Etc etc.
You can just use the manual search tool on nvidia to find your driver. My understanding is the 9 & 10 series support is going to end soon.
When you run the installer you have a choice to install their app or not.
Download The Latest Official NVIDIA Drivers
Download the latest official NVIDIA drivers to enhance your PC gaming experience and run apps faster.NVIDIA
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All of these people are future linux enjoyers, they just don't know it yet.
The trend has accelerated this year, corpos are data mining and they want to court proof data against you.
It has been at least 10 years coming but it is now very clear for what they are going for here.
Between Israeli genocide and pedos within the power structure, the anti resime sentiment is growing too strong and it seems for once, fake news can't change the narrative.
We are heading into the future where we won't be able to criticize genocide or pedophiles.
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any phone that aint grapheneOS, aint worth using imho
however, i doubt grapheneos team will be able to bring a phone to market. looks like US and EU will outlaw them anyway here soon.
Something like possession of in sanctioned device either related to terrorism or child abuze.
They will start light but it will have a cooling effect where only the brave will still do it and they will die off eventually.
GitHub - NVIDIA/nvidia-settings: NVIDIA driver control panel
NVIDIA driver control panel. Contribute to NVIDIA/nvidia-settings development by creating an account on GitHub.GitHub
Labour hasn’t been anywhere near the left since Tory Blair became leader
Well, there was that brief bright moment with Corbyn. But then he got the Julius Caeser treatment for siding with the Radical Islamist Extremism of the anti-genocide movement.
now they are hostile to the working class and the poor
Okay, but have you considered all the new AI they are helping create.
You can download the Nvidia driver directly from their website
People who care about privacy wouldn’t use the Nvidia app. (And wouldn’t be on Windows)
You are in violation of the Community Guidelines due to not marking the comment "NSFW".
Of course we are not going to tell you why, but you get 1 strike.
/s
No it is not. Dont be a fucking ridiculous idiot.
Nvidia app is DEI woke. Gotta protect the kids.
gamingonlinux.com/2025/08/nvid…
Looks like they are working on it.
NVIDIA are working on a "general optimization" for VKD3D / DirectX12 games on Linux
For a while now Linux users with NVIDIA GPUs have been reporting performance issues with DirectX12 titles using VKD3D, but a fix may finally be coming.Liam Dawe (GamingOnLinux)
Running a 3060, no issues I can tell.
YMMV obviously: There was some driver fuckery I had to sort out because I'm stupid (curious and clueless is a dangerous mix), and I might not be running the most demanding games or programs (Jedi: Survivor might be one of the heavier ones? I have no idea)
I also might have lower standards: I'm playing 1080p 60fps and generally don't notice FPS issues unless it drops below ~45, because I grew up using to an old-as-fuck laptop to play Skyrim at 20fps (unless there were too many spells flying around and it dropped to 5-10).
Still, the consensus seems to be that AMD is better for Linux, and I'm coming around too.
If there are Linux applications that aren't complete janky shit, I'll switch.
I need a multitrack DAW recorder that understands older and newer audio interfaces and a good multi-camera video editor.
from the evil NVIDIA app?!\
\
serious talk tho the overreach was unsurprising
The funniest thing about proprietary nvidia drivers on linux is that they're still easier to install than using the GeForce app lmao.
dnf install akmod-nvidia
No sign in to a fat game launcher ad ridden app to upgrade your GPU driver
Chinese firm to be banned for stealing Samsung's OLED tech
Samsung fires another legal torpedo against its main Chinese rival
BOE is one of China's biggest display manufacturers and it's also fast becoming a serious competitor to Samsung Display globally. Even Apple has been buying OLED panels from BOE, most recently for its new iPhone SE.Asif Iqbal Shaik (SamMobile)
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I would believe when people think about the word ignorant they think about MAGA and those people seem pretty damn miserable.
Sure some would even say they're happy but their actions certainly don't look like someone that is anything close to happy.
I'd argue people who lack critical thinking skills are more likely to be scared and/or angry than they are to be happy.
They're told that people like immigrants, the LGBT community, the poor etc are trying to take valuable resources away and force their culture/agenda. That these groups are dangerous, inferior, and deserve harsher treatment.
They're told that we need to give up personal liberties in the name of security. That sites requiring ID to confirm your age is a good thing to protect the children.
They're told that climate change is a hoax created by liberals to take away their right to use gas cars and funnel money into renewable energy.
I'm sure there are other talking points but I got tired just thinking about it.
It's all equally exhausting if you ask me.
all this is true, and i want to add they're also told that there are people that can fix things for them if they just believe in them and give them whatever they need to return to the "good old days"; in the united states; this is always a republican leader.
i think that this gives them hope for a brighter future and this hope makes them seem happier than others. they're fooled into having faith that things will eventually get better, so long as they keep showing up to vote for their "protector" (and they VERY MUCH reliably do) or else someone else with take charge who will then let those evil lgbt, poor, immigrants, etc. destroy the country. in the united states this someone else is always a democratic leader.
liberals have to find their own source of hope and; in the united states; most place it upon a democratic leader, but liberals see their leader less as a protector and more like a stop-gap or as someone who is a lesser evil. it doesn't matter than the democratic leader is virtually the same as the republican leader, it only matters that they're more socially progressive than the republican leader; even if only by a hair.
this means that the regressive policies that both the democratic and republican leaders share invariably bites a person in the ass where it either reinforces a conservative's faith in a protector or it disillusions a liberal. the liberal then, either rebuilds their broken sense of hope and invests it again into a new democratic leader or checks out of the system to become either a doomer and/or a non-voter.
I think if you lack critical thinking skills but have all your material needs met, have a non alienating job that is satisfying, and aren't constantly seeking answers for why your life sucks (that the media loves to provide in the form of lies), you're probably going to be pretty happy.
I guess my point is that it's not necessarily the lack of critical thinking alone. It's the combination of that with people's material circumstances.
Basically I'm just describing that I see it through a lense of dialectical materialism.
It's why I want racist or homophobic idiots to also have free universal healthcare, education, and a fulfilling job. Because I don't think you can solely "educate" away the conditions that lead people to look for answers to their poor conditions. Answers that Twitter Nazis and media outlets are happy to fill with xenophobia and bigotry.
White working class people definitely still have privileges and advantages. But you can't educate away their feelings of "well, my parents owned a house at 19 and lived off a single salary. I'm driving for Uber and have 3 roommates". And the bigotries are there to offer them reasons for why it's not their own failure and (most importantly) why it's not the failures of capitalism.
Can't we do anything as google is killing AOSP and custom ROMS
It feel like we’re losing to Google, day by day. They aren’t killing AOSP directly, but they are making it useless step by step.
Now it’s Google Play Services, Play Integrity checks, installation source checks… more and more apps just refuse to run without GMS. Banking apps? Most of them don’t work. And it’s only getting worse.
I run vanilla AOSP on my main profile, no Play Services. I keep GMS only in my work profile for the apps that absolutely need it. But now even some regular apps that don't need any play services won’t work on my main profile anymore. They simply block your from running , like le chat.
Maps is google's most important app there is no way to run without play services. Sure we can use webview or gmaps wv, but they don't provide turn-by-turn directions.
Earlier maps used to work without play services, but two years ago, an update stopped it from working. Now that old version is out of date and no longer works.
Google is slowly making GMS very important to run.
The problem with GMS is they require to run as system app and has to have all the permissions by default.
Hope EU puts pressure to make google allow apps to run independently without GMS or atleast install them as user apps(like graphene os sandboxed play services).
If we keep going on like this, AOSP can only run fdroid apps in the future.
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tHeSe qUeStIoNs
It was one question, and it's a relevant one. If you are worried about Google cutting support for Google Maps on AOSP, the solution is not to double down on the Google ecosystem. There's not going to be some magical perfect replacement for Google Maps out of nowhere, the only way its competitors improve is if people use them.
If you don't want to, that's fine, just don't start crying when Google pulls support out from under you.
There's many navigation apps that have traffic, like Magic Earth which 100% runs without GMS.
For review you can use gmaps wv or TripAdvisor.
Here We Go has traffic and TripAdvisor integration, but I'm not sure whether it runs without GMS.
I can't speak to any other countries, but in the states, Magic Earth has been great for me. Been using it for over two years now, several different regions of the USA. It's not as good as Google Maps, but it's plenty good enough for my needs.
Navigation and routing is solid, traffic data is acceptable, and the dashcam feature is awesome.
It's easier and nicer. But it's also shitty because of what you mentioned.
The thing is, that's how it's going to stay unless people stop using it. You can get this info you mentioned somewhere else, or simply don't need it, as I said, yes it's harder and less nice to live without it, but it's not like you can't live without live traffic data or whatever. Start using CoMaps, contribute to open street map, leave reviews on other review aggregators, etc etc
What is a good alternative that actually does navigation and searches on places as well as gmaps? I've been using OsmAnd and it's absolutely dogshit compared to it. Even the navigation, the arguably most important part, is pretty bad.
Edit: actually spent some time looking again, and CoMaps does this quite well. This is replacing OsmAnd+ for me.
comaps
The main code repository of CoMaps, a community-led fork of Organic Maps. Reinforced with commitment to transparency, privacy and being not-for-profit.Codeberg.org
if you don’t know the specific address of a place you’re pretty much SOoL
Look the address up and put it into the map app...problem solved.
I'm not expecting perfect matches, but what is considered basic proper functionality. Expecting a navigation app that is not just on par (or even worse) with a 25 year old TomTom is really not setting the bar high or expecting too much IMO.
And I do still use inferior apps to avoid big tech, but the constant shortcomings (some minor, some major) is extremely annoying, so yeah I'm venting some of that.
Co maps is mostly garbage for places. Is missing my Wegmans for fucks sake 🤣
Just a heads up for your continued testing.
CoMaps uses OpenStreetMap data, which is populated by the public, so you can fix your problem easily yourself by submitting the data you need that's missing.
You can do this right from inside CoMaps, but also StreetComplete is another great app option for doing so.
I've done this for missing stuff in my area, my edits got verified and accepted very quickly. It's much nicer than waiting for Google to maybe update their shit when it's wrong.
rooting your phone gives you ability to fake a lot of the requirements to make stubborn apps run.
Rooting also completely breaks the ability to run some apps with no recourse for spoofing the fact that it's a rooted device.
[GUIDE] 🛡️ How to Pass Strong Integrity on Android (Step-by-Step Guide)
This tutorial will help you successfully pass Basic, Device, and Strong Integrity checks in both Legacy and New Play Integrity responses. Make sure to follow each step carefully. 🔧 Step 1...Rajarshi Khatua (XDA Forums)
Banking is easily accessible thru a web browser
Until your bank 2nd factor requires google play services and all the banks in your country have the same requirement.
Yeah, that's my case as well with my main bank. So I have a separate phone that remains off until I need it (and some other crappy apps for electricity, customs and other stuff). Otherwise I'm still rocking my trusty Pixel 8 Pro running on GrapheneOS from day 1. Now, it is highly likely that, from Pixel 10 and in GrapheneOS won't be able to keep developing (I certainly hope I'm wrong), so I'm thinking on switching my 8 Pro for a 9Pro XL and keep it until GrapheneOS lands and agreement with an OEM to launch their own devices.
I guess all we can do is wait and see what happens in a month or so.
I am with you on this!
Need to buy a VPN? check F-Droid first. Need any other utility? check F-Droid first, I am ready to suck up a lot of inconvenience with the apps that aren't polished (Most of the time they are superior). Feeling generous? donate and help make the world a better place.
I sucked up a lot of inconvenience using Linux for last 2 decades or so, so I am well prepared.
LINux on MOBile
LINMOB.net is a blog about LINux on MOBile devices. With the PinePhone (Pro) and Librem 5 shipping it is back to report on GNU+Linux on mobile devices.LINux on MOBile
It'll be awhile. They've been in a development state since the launch of the original pinephone in 2020. And even the pinephone is going to be unavailable in two years as pine64 is ceasing sales on it. Not trying to crap on devs. I bought two pinephones (Braveheart & Mobian bundle). Tested multiple distros and excitedly followed their progress for years. I never had a reliable working phone in that four year span. IMO SailfishOS and Post Market OS are the two most usable mobile distros. SailfishOS now requires an ongoing subscription to use which I don't like.
liliputing.com/pinephone-pro-l…
PinePhone Pro Linux smartphone has been discontinued, but the original PinePhone is still available - Liliputing
PinePhone Pro Linux smartphone has been discontinued, but the original PinePhone is still availableBrad Linder (Liliputing)
Sailfish only needs a subscription to get updates, you can use it without a sub.
I use danctnix on my pinephone, which is basically arch. It does the basics, that's about it. What's missing is more convenient apps. Most of the stuff is catered to desktop.
Of all the OSes I tried, I liked ubports the best, but it was not updated and not all hardware worked iirc, and suffered the same problem of apps. At least arch gets updated constantly.
Linux based phones have been in development for more than a decade now. I had a Neo Freerunner from OpenMoko in 2008… it kinda worked, but it was not good enough for a daily driver.
What we have now is much better, but there’s still some ways to go before I'm able to ditch my non-linuxy smartphone.
the problem is that google is capable of slurping all of your data and your phone becomes an enhanced avenue for access; the linux phones are the solution to this.
i'm convinced that the "it just works" mantra is the reason why google or apple or microsoft is able to do this sort of asshattery and i can understand why people would want something that simply works.
however, the trade off for this mantra is that you're giving yourself over to a corporation that not only doesn' t have your best interest at heart but has proven will happily sell your control for a penny.
i can also understand why someone wouldn't think that any of this matters and; if you're lucky; it won't matter all, but for the rest of us unlucky sob's (and the people who don't want to put their faith in luck), linux phones matter.
They're actively trying to solve:
- e-waste and making devices last longer (contributing upstream)
- escaping data harvesting and surveillance
- offer an alternative to the mobile duopoly
I'm baffled that they even bother, given how much people complain about it not being good enough. But I'm glad they do, and I think it's awesome.
They're not a multi-billion dollar company. If you don't like it, then don't use it. That's your choice.
But please stop talking nonsense about them not addressing real problems. Because they are. And they deserve credit for that. Not whining about the imperfections of a work in progress.
Who wants to run scaled down desktop apps on their phone
I believe the UI of most apps could be made to work well with phone display sizes and resolutions.
and who wants a terminal on a phone either?
Well, I do! It's great when you want to connect, do or automate something there isn't an app for. For now I sometimes run Termux on Android. Among smartphone users in general I'm probably an edge case, but among Linux users, I must say, using a terminal on the phone doesn't seem that crazy to me.
What stops anyone from making new GUIs, maybe even a new framework for doing that, optimised for touchscreens rather than keyboard and mouse?
Maybe I'm just unknowledgeable, but to me that idea doesn't sound very far-fetched.
I have used postmarketOS, and I thought the interface (Plasma Mobile) was OK, but could use some improvements. How long ago did you use it?
Edit: Now that I think about it, I think the last time I tried the Pinephone it was using Manjaro, not postmarketOS. I have used that before though, but you may want to give it another try as it is vastly improved IMO. That being said, the Pinephone itself still kinda sucks from a hardware perspective.
As per my 30min research, GrapheneOS depends heavily on pixel internals, but I will highjack one of the mastodon posts maybe somebody will spoonfeed me the definitive answer.
I live in a very low cost area, hopefully I will manage to get a nameless phone to run GrapheneOS or LineageOS at low cost, forward most of the income to the open source projects.
It might be too naive but I am giving it a shot.
Thank you! GrapheneOS isn't an option then, I will wait for their phone.
I guess I could still shoot my shot with LineageOS.
If you wanted to talk to the Graphene folks the best spot seems to be their matrix rooms rather than masto.
matrix.to/#/#general:grapheneo…
Matrix - Decentralised and secure communication
You're invited to talk on Matrix. If you don't already have a client this link will help you pick one, and join the conversation. If you already have one, this link will help you join the conversationmatrix.to
The GrapheneOs team is quite particular about hardware.
I would gladly purchase a phone that came preloaded with LineageOS.
"Better than we have now." often wins over waiting for perfection.
I only use Lineage and have done so for years without any problems since CyanogenMod 10.1.
Do remember that it is the choice of the developers to use google services and nothing to do with google.
When you say "Le Chat", do you mean Mistral AI assistant/chatbot? Its probably stopped working since GPT‑5.
Currently it is not possible to run "Le Chat" ai on a phone without google,
Again its the devopers choice. They could develop a non-google Le Chat.
who on earth needs a chatbot on a phone?
I have never have any problems finding open source alternative apps.
MAPS: Comaps, Organic Maps and MagicEarth, all provide Turn by Turn navigation
en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Turn-by-…
I dont use any Banking Apps. Why do you need a banking app? I login to my bank in the comfort and safety of my home.
Lineage:
If you must use google try E/OS. It Uses MicroG and works very well.
microG is a FLOSS implementation of Google play services
With a web browser and user agent spoofing, that's basically how it works. I don't want any Facebook/Meta apps on my phone, so I use a desktop Google Chrome rule for all Meta URLs in my browser and user the web versions. Mobile is slowly taking over, but most things have a web version.
Unfortunately, that doesn't work for everything. The Quest 3 requires an Android or iOS device to set up. At least an old cell phone on a throwaway Google account works for most of these, since they don't need to be used often.
Hike, Bike, Drive Offline Navigate with Privacy
Discover more of your journey -www.comaps.app
Powered by the community
CoMaps is quite nice.
There are also still companies selling navigation devices that mount in a car windshield, assuming the car doesn't already have one built in.
Pro tip - those navigation devices also often have an accident camera that records if it feels an impact - which is a good idea anyway.
Wow, supports Android Auto too!
Edit: Says it supports Android Auto, to be clear - not tested by me, and issue(s) reported below.
I was using it in a restricted profile with only proprietary apps (like banking apps).
Comaps is a fork of organic maps so it should work too.
I'm not sure what the point of the post is? Is it to share frustration? Searching for a solution? Sorry, I may be not good at inferring this, but I don't get it.
IF you are in solution-finding mode, then there are a few things that you can do.
- You can use those banks that work without google. I've found 2 in the Netherlands, for example. One of them stopped working a while ago, I've wrote about that to their support and had to discontinue, withdrawing all my funds using a Dutch procedure for full withdrawal from a bank. After half a year or so I've noticed they've fixed it and work without google again. I've returned as well (it's convenient for me to have 2 banks). I'm sure as hell banks watch for their usage statistics and wouldn't like seeing people leave their bank if it can be fixed with a simple reversal of whatever the dev team did lately.
- You could try Linux phones such as PinePhone to see which use cases can it already cover. 30%? 70%? 90%? You'll know what to even wait for in the Linux landscape to be able to switch. You'll get a bit of power or mental control if you acquire this knowledge.
- Funnily, you can expect some good news coming from all those fights between US and China, because that makes a LOT of devices ship without google services. And some people in your county (I assume it's not China, otherwise you wouldn't have these problems) may have phones bought there, so you won't be alone when pushing for such changes.
Dutch banks working without google are: BUNQ and ASN Bank (EDIT: and Triodos).
BUNQ has the built-in QR scanning functionality broken (the one for iDEAL, if you're living in NL you know), but that's acceptable because it works to scan the QR in Binary Eye, which in turn opens the bunq app and the payment can be made easily.
ASN just works, all features that I've tried I think. (This one is only in Dutch though.)
Banks that I've tried few years ago and they didn't work: ING, ABN AMRO, Rabonbank, Tridos, possibly few others that I forgot.
Also, lately I've started using some of those "international" ones, not so focused on NL. I've found that Wise (pure web, haven't even tried their app) and Revolut (app) seem to work well on my de-googlified phone. Hope that helps!
EDIT: re-worded the first line of my message to be indexable by search engines, because that may be useful for future readers.
Thanks for the useful feedback.
Wise requires me to use the app as 2FA in order to log into their web interface. How do you log in without the app?
You can use andOTP if you want a FOSS app on Android. If you're a hardcore no-Android-at-all user (or considering), you can use KeePassXC on the desktop. This kind of defeats the purpose of 2FA, but on the other hand people with KeePassXC tend to have strong passwords due to ease of their maintenance, so you don't need 2FA as much to begin with.
TL&DR; use andOTP on Android or KeePassXC on Linux Desktop.
What puzzled me was that I had no option to input a TOTP. The website would only send me a notification through the Wise app to allow the login.
I have just discovered that the waiting screen on the website had a small, clickable text 'Did not receive a notification?' that leads to other options, including TOTP. That's so much better!
Thank you, I would never have discovered this if you had not said that this was possible.
And shoutout to @vas for actually telling banks and presumably other institutions that they need to be platform neutral or lose their custom. That's my preferred way out of this mess. Goog luck ungoogling, everyone
Hope EU puts pressure to make google allow apps to run independently without GMS or atleast install them as user apps(like graphene os sandboxed play services).
I doubt they will put any pressure. EU decided to rely on GMS for their upcoming Digital ID app. While they claim they want to switch to open source alternatives of big tech services, they designed their app so that it forces EU citizens to either comply with Google's ToS, or Apple's.
Related discussion:
github.com/eu-digital-identity…
Do not add Google Play Integrity integration
In the README, the following is listed: App and device verification based on Google Play Integrity API and Apple App Attestation I would like to strongly urge to abandon this plan. Requiring a depe...TheLastProject (GitHub)
Well spotted, my bad!
The link the new discussion is here: github.com/eu-digital-identity…
Do not add Google Play Integrity integration · eu-digital-identity-wallet av-doc-technical-specification · Discussion #19
In the README, the following is listed: App and device verification based on Google Play Integrity API and Apple App Attestation I would like to strongly urge to abandon this plan. Requiring a depe...GitHub
Damn we are stupid in the EU!
What do we want: digital sovereignty
When do we want it: ehrm.. Well.. We have some things in pipeline and it is really hard...
They know that NSA is directly spying on us and they don't care
Keep in mind GMS does not need to run as a system app. On GrapheneOS it does not.
At least for me only about 15% of my apps need GMS and I only run GMS in my private space which most of the time I lock.
So yes I do not like needing GMS but it is not so doom and gloom.
Does what work? If you mean GMS sandboxing, that is ROM specific. Up to what the ROM supplier does.
Why would one need another ROM. GrapheneOS is one of the best. So is Google hardware in terms of lifetime cost, capability, and security. What other supplier gives 7 year support?
Generally with android it is best to choose the ROM and then the best hardware for it anyway. The best ROMs often have limited hardware support. There are not that many reasonable ROMs anyway. Nor are there many hardware choices that aupport most ROMs fully.
Yeah, this is a problem. I attempted to switch to GrapheneOS just a month ago and had to roll back to stock Android. One of my banking apps worked, but 3 others didn't. My 2FA app didn't work. I stopped receiving important texts as they were previously RCS and that refused to validate no matter what I did.
Google has made it extremely hard to degoogle.
There is always a trade-off with privacy and security. It's totally okay to decide you prefer convenience over privacy.
If you wanted to give it another shot:
- You could use a different 2FA app - I know Bitwarden works well
- You can use a soft phone SMS, bonus that you can send and receive from a computer
That was why I wanted to move to GrapheneOS, I could selectively use Google services or apps for convenience while still being more secure than stock Android. I'll have to plan my next attempt out instead of Yolo and adapt, lol.
I do plan to migrate to a new 2FA, but Authy made that hard by getting rid of their desktop app so you can't port and have to go to each service and manually sign up a new app one by one. I tend to boycott services when they get that anticonsumer/anticompetitive out of principle.
My work 2FA is physical token based, it is my personal 2FA that causing me problems. Email and text authentication is insecure enough that I try and use a software authenticator whenever possible.
Great point about the work phone. I don't want a work phone as I don't have any desire to be reachable 24/7 outside of the rotating week I'm on call, but if I was expected to have email and Teams and everything on my phone I would definitely require one. Thankfully my work texts are all for team updates, heads up about issues, scheduling matters, etc, but I still consider those to be important while not riding to a separate work phone
Convenience and security probably.
The website version of a lot of banks require you login (each time) with a customer numer and then random letters from your password and or pin, which takes forever so I never bother unless I need the website.
Im (more) paranoid whenever I use a sensitive website. Quadruple checking the domain name, am i on https (even tho i use no-http and have a password manager). It's a bit more relaxing using an app.
Theres probably some security downsides (other than user error), but a modern banking site shouldn't suffer much since they invest heavily in locking down their shtuff.
Google has made it extremely hard to degoogle.
Just remember that there are no nice reasons why they are working this hard to keep your phone captive.
We can argue about how bad it will get, but there's only worse things coming from this effort.
Oh, totally, which is why I am working towards as much decoupling as possible. I plan to replace my Nest gear with Ubiquity for cameras and stuff as I can afford it, and eventually set up my own offline automation server. This can only end badly for consumers.
The collusion between services like Authy and Google indicates this to me, but it's also effective and means I have to pivot in slower degrees. I am encountering similar issues moving to Linux from Windows, so this is a full Silicone Valley issue.
With respect to 2FA, if you want to be more ready for any future next time, you could migrate to an open-source TOTP app. E.g. andOTP. I use this one, it's fine. The underlying standards don't change in decades, so you can choose any compatible client and be without trouble for years and years. And it may be good to do in any case, googlified phone or not. Good apps also tend to provide password-protected backups.
I have no knowledge about RCS though, never used it so can't tell. Otherwise GrapheneOS user for ~2 years, before that LineageOS, before that CopperheadOS for another few years.
One of my banking apps worked, but 3 others didn't.
Same issue, I just did web browser instead
My 2FA app didn't work.
I suggest just exporting and using a different 2FA app, especially an open source one like Aegis
I stopped receiving important texts as they were previously RCS and that refused to validate no matter what
RCS on GrapheneOS is very finicky and requires using AppOps to enable READ_DEVICE_IDENTIFIERS, and you have to let carrier services and google messages have more permissions to work. You also might have to deregister your previous phone to use the number (i.e. my old iPhone still had my number in the settings, had to remove it). There's a very long GrapheneOS thread about it, but the link should be the solution.
I suggest just exporting and using a different 2FA app, especially an open source one like Aegis
Authy dropped their desktop app and killed the ability to export. I will have to start from scratch, but I definitely plan to.
I spent a week with that discussion your linked plus several other posts, I just couldn't get it working. I might have better luck next time I try it though.
Yeah, I got fucked by Authy too and did it the hard way last year.
The RCS forum post was very tedious and I came back a few months later cause RCS broke, but it's been good for almost a year now so I think I got it. Some extra details to note are your carrier, deregistring old phones, verifying app permissions, and just waiting a week or so.
I totally understand your frustration though, as I went through it 😅
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GMS apps work fine. The only ones that don't work are ones that act invasively enough to notice they are sandboxed and disable themselves.
Mostly bank apps. Which is irritating, since they all have mobile friendly websites that work fine without needing to know my location and everything else about my phone.
That's a pretty good description of what GrapheneOS does with the sandboxed Google services.
I have found that the only apps that don't work well with Samdboxed Google services are ones that work hard to invasively probe their runtime environment.
Thwy usually fall into these three categories:
- Bank apps that do it "for my safety". Nevermind that a website version exists for attackers to target without the same (dubious, invasive) "protections".
- Streaming apps that do it "because this paid subscriber might be some kind of dark web pirate and we need to protect our content from being uploaded to the dark web one more time."
- Apps whose developers are shitty at writing code for memory management. But GrapheneOS has good options to allow these to run, anyway.
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EU won't be too friendly either given the nature of their recent identification app. You should still write to your legislators, but they're a mostly tech-illiterate bunch, so expect it to be a low ROI activity.
Really do consider donating to projects like GrapheneOS. The GrapheneOS team are a very passionate and clever group, and I'd like to think that they can at least give us something to work with, even if Google completely cuts the cord. Hopefully they can also secure an additional revenue stream once they release their own phone.
If it really does all fall through and there's no deGoogled way to run Android apps, I'll keep a separate phone, preferably with a removable battery, with regular Android just to host the proprietary apps. Treat it as a work phone, i.e. power off when not needed, don't connect to my main home network, don't do anything that doesn't need to be done on it. Proprietary apps only make up a small fraction of my mobile workflow, so everything else stays on another phone that respects my privacy.
they're a mostly tech-illiterate bunch
Y'all keep saying this.... These people are not stupid, they are corrupt. Start calling spade a spade. You are giving them something to hide behind jfc.
It is only slightly on topic, but I'd like to give a hateful shout out to Ticketmaster/Live Nation's new "mobile only" ticketed events that require you to have an iPhone or fully Google blessed Android phone. They do not allow you to use a QR code or printed ticket anymore, only their app with a constantly changing bare code or Google wallet (unsure of the IOS experience).
I am going to a concert this weekend and I either have to dig up some old phone that can work with this app or sell my tickets.
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Someone recently crack their shit code. Can use offline app after extract secret once. Will link once find.
Edit: conduition.io/coding/ticketmas… app (javascript) github.com/conduition/ticketgi…
Reverse Engineering TicketMaster's Rotating Barcodes (SafeTix)
"Screenshots won't get you in", but Chrome DevTools will.Conduition
How do I use Mobile Entry tickets?
When your event is Mobile only, or you selected Mobile Entry at checkout, you’ll only be able to access your tickets on your phone. Tickets can’t be printed from your account or get emailed to you....Ticketmaster Help
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I've been quietly boycotting them for over 13 years now, shortly after online scalpers started having their field day with their sites. It sucks not being able to go to any major shows but I have made myself compromise by going to small local shows only and it hasn't been that bad.
Everyone votes with their wallets, so as long as people keep paying, they'll keep making us jump through more and more hoops.
Of the largest android sellers, only samsung requires gplay. Xiaomi, vivo, oppo, realme, honor, are all chinese companies that require non-bundled google play for their domestic (and maybe other countries?) releases. Google can't alienate these sellers, and if they did, all of these companies would create their own AOSP fork (or just switch to HarmonyOS)
I recently bought a xiaomi android tablet that doesn't have google play services luckily.
Android phone manufacturer market share (Aug 2025)
The most up-to-date data about the phone manufacturersAppBrain
If the goal is too swap one parasite for another, this is a valid strategy BUT
Custom ROM is the only proper solution, ideally GrapheneOS, if you actually care about security and privacy.
I use Shelter to enable the work profile. It permits to copy apps between standard and work profile. So it is possible to have google services (with an account set I mean) in the work profile.
Apps like for Banks can't be copied though. But most of the others can.
Shelter | F-Droid - Free and Open Source Android App Repository
Isolate and run multiple instances of apps using Work Profilesf-droid.org
Maps?
Use OsmAnd and MagicEarth?
I've been doping it for years now. Works fine.
Run as many open source apps as you can is about the best option. Also, OSMAND does provide turn-by-turn directions.
What it does not do well is street addresses, so at times you may find that you have to use the GPS coordinates of the place you are going to in order to get directions.
It's never had any trouble with street addresses for me. It's using open street map so if there are addresses that aren't right you can submit changes.
Where it has trouble for me is on long trips over great distances. If you ask it to route a 6-hour trip to another state through a couple of metropolitan areas It has a pretty good chance of sending you a non-optimal route.
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The normie is the battle ground.
They need better info and they need to be hurt by corpos for change to heppen.
Uk age verification should see a bump in freedom enjoyer ranks
Normie is not an insult or derogatory. It just means "normal person", who is usually not very tech savy.
Most Normies don't care about privacy. They know, accept and are ok with their data being collected and sold in "free" services.
It's different for every one, but for me it would mean, I can't use Microsoft authenticator, so I can't do my job anymore, as it is required to access my mail, teams, files, logging worked hours, etc etc.
I can't use any of my bank apps anymore, I can't use my phone anymore for paying in a store or checking in public transportation.
And many more apps that would stop working.
Tell your employer to provide you a corpo phone.
You shouldn't be using personal device for anything related to your job imho
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You have accurately identified a major part of the problem. Many people are unwilling to change their habits, or don't have the patience to learn new tools.
The other element though is time, many people don't have the time to stop and learn. Especially when a problem like privacy is a lot less immediate than hunger or healthcare.
If they really had interest in stopping you they could definitely stop you. That's the direction they're heading with all of these apps that are doing the integrity check. It's just a matter of time that it'll take for them to do it gradually enough not to make everything backward compatible explode.
Microg and stuff like that are probably on their way out within the next few generations.
When postmarket finally manages to reverse engineer the modems and the voice and support something with a half decent camera I'll readily leave the ecosystem.
ITT: no one has any idea.
hint: class war
Mainline linux on mobile is solving this problem as we speak: postmarketos.org/
I expect a full collapse of the Google Android behemoth about the same time we get Half Life 3.
postmarketOS // real Linux distribution for phones
Aiming for a 10 year life-cycle for smartphonespostmarketOS
Realistically, change your approach to how you use your phone.
A majority of apps are not actually apps. They are a web app packaged in an apk so they can get elevated permissions and more data. Dont download apps, instead just install them from your browser as the web app they are. This is far more secure and far less invasive as generally a web app is containerized, at least thats my understanding in regards to firefox.
Instead of google maps, explore the world of open source navigation apps. Osmand has worked great for me, and tends to provide better info so im not panic merging at the last second. Theres a lot of them out there, and google maps has stagnated for so long that many of them are caught up in features. While its not open source, ive sesn a lot of people praise Magic Earth as well.
Buy phones on the premise of being allowed to use a custom rom. As much as i dont want a pixel because it is google, graphene os is battle tested and much more secure than stock android. But theres also lineage OS, eOS, and a few others out there.
If you need google play services, containerize it. I keep all apps i dont want having special permissions on a work profile. Funnily, i also keep my work apps on that profile, so if google wants my works data then they can handle the lawsuit if something bad happens lol.
I think a lot of people have forgotten that phones are tiny computers. The only real difference is the cell network, but we already have devices that can use those networks that arent phones, so it isnt an exclusive feature to phones. Android can be forked, but also we can emulate android on linux and there are already linux phones out there. If we grow the linux space for phones, then we effectively lose nothing of value while gaining increased freedom. For now, change how you use your phone, and only download apps if you have no other choice.
SemanticWebBrowser - A browser for the semantic web with a controlled natural language as the primary interface
(which is not possible when starting from a ChatGPT-like app); and to capture this new paradigm in a new type of browser that has natural language as its primary interface, here called a semantic web-first browser.
Il colosso d'acciaio rimorchiato nell'Atlantico per mantenere operative le navi di Sua Maestà - Il blog di Jacopo Ranieri
Il colosso d'acciaio rimorchiato nell'Atlantico per mantenere operative le navi di Sua Maestà - Il blog di Jacopo Ranieri
Un migliaio di chilometri d’Oceano dal continente più vicino ed appena 53 totali d’estensione: in un luogo dove si è tentato di sfruttare fino all’ultimo angolo di terra emersa, per non parlare dei preziosi punti d’approdo, può sembrare strano che un…Jacopo (Il blog di Jacopo Ranieri)
Ideas coming down the track
Ideas coming down the track
Transport: New train technologies are less visible and spread less quickly than improvements to cars or planes. But there is still plenty of innovation going on, and ideas are steadily making their way out onto the railsThe Economist
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GitHub - todotxt/todo.txt: ‼️ A complete primer on the whys and hows of todo.txt.
‼️ A complete primer on the whys and hows of todo.txt. - todotxt/todo.txtGitHub
LOL GitHub [2018]
jwz: LOL Github
So MICROS~1 bought Github and everybody's freaking out right now trying to re-host their projects on someone else's service. THIS IS WHAT HAPPENS WHEN YOU STORE YOUR DATA IN THE CLOWN.www.jwz.org
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Samsung → iPhone: Need Your De-Google Tips
cross-posted from: sopuli.xyz/post/31024070
Making the jump from Samsung to iPhone soon, mainly for privacy reasons.
Want to cut Google out as much as possible while I'm at it.What I'm planning so far:
- Mailbox.org instead of Gmail
- DuckDuckGo for search, would prefer something even better
- Safari with all the privacy stuff turned on
Where I'm stuck:
- What about YouTube? Just use the web version?
- Google Drive alternatives that actually work well?
- Best way to store photos that aren't big greedy corps?
Questions:
- Any must-have privacy apps once I get the iPhone?
- Settings I should change immediately out of the box?
- Services I'm forgetting that are probably feeding Google my data?
Samsung → iPhone: Need Your De-Google Tips
Note: I prefer Apple over Google and I’m not ready to go full privacy-hardened, I want to find a balance between convenience and privacy protection.So I'm moving from Samsung to iPhone soon, mainly because I despise Google.
Want to cut Google out as much as possible while I'm at it.What I'm planning so far:
- Mailbox.org instead of Gmail
- DuckDuckGo for search, would prefer something even better
- Safari with all the privacy stuff turned on
Where I'm stuck:
- What about YouTube? Just use the web version?
- Google Drive alternatives that actually work well?
- Best way to store photos that aren't big greedy corps?
Questions:
- Any must-have privacy apps once I get the iPhone?
- Settings I should change immediately out of the box?
- Services I'm forgetting that are probably feeding Google my data?
UK police treated to 10 new LFR vans in fresh expansion
A fresh expansion of UK crimefighters' access to live facial recognition (LFR) technology is being described by officials as "an excellent opportunity for policing." Privacy campaigners disagree.
The Home Office said today that more police forces across England will gain LFR capabilities thanks to ten new "cutting edge" vans being wheeled out, adding to those already in use by London's Metropolitan Police and forces in South Wales.
Seven forces will gain access to LFR vans as part of the latest expansion. These are: Greater Manchester, West Yorkshire, Bedfordshire, Surrey and Sussex (jointly), and Thames Valley and Hampshire (jointly).
UK expands police facial recognition rollout with 10 new vans heading to a town near you
: Seven additional regions across England will now have access to the controversial techConnor Jones (The Register)
New De-Google and De-Amazon challenges
Thanks to everyone who participated in the first 5-Week De-Google Challenge on Signal!
I'm about to start another de-Google challenge AND a de-Amazon challenge on Monday.
Here is info on the de-Amazon group. (Signal group and PDF plan)
The de-Google Signal group is here.
And for the de-Google challenge we'll be using this checklist
I hope you'll join (and share) one...or both!.
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You’re right, de-AWS will be difficult but maybe you can critique this Github* list.
*Github’s is owned by Microsoft.
GitHub - guenter/aws-oss-alternatives: Open Source Alternatives to AWS Services
Open Source Alternatives to AWS Services. Contribute to guenter/aws-oss-alternatives development by creating an account on GitHub.GitHub
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AWS, Google Cloud,
That's half the market... Add microshit and you got the market
New De-Google and De-Amazon challenges
Thanks to everyone who participated in the first 5-Week De-Google Challenge on Signal!
I'm about to start another de-Google challenge AND a de-Amazon challenge on Monday.
Here is info on the de-Amazon group. (Signal group and PDF plan)
The de-Google Signal group is here.
And for the de-Google challenge we'll be using this checklist
I hope you'll join (and share) one...or both!.
New De-Google and De-Amazon challenges
Thanks to everyone who participated in the first 5-Week De-Google Challenge on Signal!
I'm about to start another de-Google challenge AND a de-Amazon challenge on Monday.
Here is info on the de-Amazon group. (Signal group and PDF plan)
The de-Google Signal group is here.
And for the de-Google challenge we'll be using [this checklist](punchinguppress.com/post/shake…
I hope you'll join (and share) one...or both!).
Russia clamps down on WhatsApp and Telegram over data sharing
Russia clamps down on WhatsApp and Telegram over data sharing
Calls via foreign-owned platforms curbed as critics say Kremlin is pushing for greater control over Russia’s internetGuardian staff reporter (The Guardian)
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presente pignanza con aggiornamenti stellari ci porta al futuro sempre più conifero (aggiornamenti Pignio)
Nonostante il corrente clima della mia terra ormai sia talmente tanto seccante da portare quasi difficoltà a respirare, figurarsi esistere (…nonostante sia un clima umido, che assurdo paradosso), stranamente in questo agosto non sto scadendo troppo nel rotting… e, infatti, piano piano il Pignio (che, manco a farlo apposta, sotto sotto in questo periodo dell’anno […]
octospacc.altervista.org/2025/…
presente pignanza con aggiornamenti stellari ci porta al futuro sempre più conifero (aggiornamenti Pignio)
Nonostante il corrente clima della mia terra ormai sia talmente tanto seccante da portare quasi difficoltà a respirare, figurarsi esistere (…nonostante sia un clima umido, che assurdo paradosso), stranamente in questo agosto non sto scadendo troppo nel rotting… e, infatti, piano piano il Pignio (che, manco a farlo apposta, sotto sotto in questo periodo dell’anno ci sta benissimo, ricordando le pinete a mare insomma) sta ancora crescendo, e ad ora credo sia tipo in quello stato perfettamente a metà tra la goduria infinita data dall’idea passata del primo rilascio, e la cristallizzazione definitiva come prevista da una versione finale più futura che inglobi tutto quello che deve essere necessario per godere non solo infinitamente, ma sul serio… 😤Quindi eh eh… ehh boh. Nonostante io non abbia ancora completamente sistemato le robe di multi-utente, e in generale mancano ancora diverse cose relative ad un uso più da social network (per copiare Pinterest proprio per benino, insomma), le funzioni generali sono già di livello pazzo: feed Atom (in uscita) messo a punto, OCR automatico per le immagini tramite Tesseract (…nonostante faccia assolutamente schifo su foto con font strani o colori merdosi, purtroppo, ed è tutto dire che sia comunque la libreria open-source di OCR che funziona meglio al mondo), il salvataggio dei video che ora funziona bene… wow… (Ci sono poi anche miglioramenti generali sull’interfaccia, tipo che ho migliorato ancora un po’ le pagine di gestione e visualizzazione, oltre ad aver aggiunto la localizzazione in italiano oltre che in inglese… ma queste cose puntualmente quando ci sono non vengono apprezzate, e quando mancano invece arrivano i reclami, di utenti per giunta mai paganti…) 😻
Però, il pezzo proprio grosso ora sono i nuovi tipi di elementi supportati, perché con questi si passa davvero da “ma che è, Pinterest senza glitch?” a “wow, o’ Pign!!!“… perché per foto e video sono bravi tutti, ma i file audio molti se li dimenticano, i post di puro testo ma con immagini di sfondo non esistono da nessuna parte (…se non su Facebook, dal quale ancora non ho finito di copiare cose), i documenti (PDF) nessuno sa come visualizzarli, e i modelli 3D sono praticamente inconcepibili… e invece il Pignio ha già tutto ciò, ora!!! (E le faville arriveranno a breve.) Non ho finito finito, c’è ancora lavoro da fare per perfezionare queste categorie, ma intanto io delivero (…e solo per stavolta risparmio il mondo dal raccontare l’irreale trafila dell’orrore che renderizzare testo potenzialmente non-ASCII sotto forma di immagini lato server implica, ma il README ne fa indirettamente accenno). 💣
Ecco però, a proposito di cose fatte a metà… Per questi nuovi elementi, che potrebbero in alcuni casi non avere proprio una miniatura visiva (come molti file audio), o per cui comunque non ho ancora potuto aggiungere una generazione automatica, ho aggiunto semplici emoji come icone segnaposto nell’interfaccia, che comunque è basata su queste liste a griglia e su elementi che hanno una certa presenza fisica visuale… e il fatto tremendo è che ho accidentalmente scatenato delle vibe che mi sembrano irrealmente buffe. Non tanto il foglio di carta per indicare i documenti, che non è nulla di strano, e nemmeno le scatole per indicare modelli 3D, che non è troppo una forzatura nonostante faccia ridere pensare che quella è una scatola che contiene l’oggetto 3D, che quindi si apre cliccandoci, rivelando l’oggetto… quanto le note musicali per i file audio, e qui ormai capisco che sono completamente da buttare. 🤧
Io giuro che, per qualche motivo evidentemente inspiegabile, pure a distanza di 2 giorni, ancora mi viene assolutamente da ridere a guardare (ma anche solo ad immaginare, poverannuj!!!) questa schermata. Semplicemente i controlli di riproduzione sotto, e l’emoji della nota musicale sopra che funge da icona… non c’è una ceppa di buffo, non c’è un cazzo da ridere, eppure il mio cervello non ne vuole sapere! E non è nemmeno il brano del caso che magari è meme o che; è proprio che la pura idea di questo fatto mi fa pisciare. Boh, o sarà il pacchetto emoji di Windows 10 che è particolarmente buffo a vedersi, o altrimenti ormai è ufficiale che anche il mio senso dell’umorismo, così come altri tratti della mia personalità, si è corrotto… ma ormai l’unica cosa importante è che non si corrompa l’archivio del mio Pignio!!! (E pure se succede, di quello ho frequenti backup.) 🤗
Brussels Airport ground staff unions refuse to service 'Israel'-bound flights
Unions representing workers at Alyzia, a ground services company operating at Brussels Airport, have called on management to stop providing services to 'Israeli' airline El Al and any other carriers flying to or from 'Israel'.
In a letter sent to company leadership, union representatives demanded that employees be given the choice to opt out of handling baggage or cargo for these flights. The move follows Brussels Airlines’ decision to resume flights to Tel Aviv on Wednesday, August 13, a plan that unions say should only proceed with fully voluntary participation from staff.
In an official joint statement, the Alyzia unions, including Pulse, CNE, and ACV-CSC Transcom, said:
“Since October 2023, genocide has been underway in Gaza and the West Bank against the Palestinian population. Serious violations of humanitarian law and international law continue. Despite this, some airlines have decided to resume flights to Tel Aviv (TLV). Our affiliates refuse to participate in these operations. We will not serve these flights.”
Brussels Airport ground staff unions refuse to service 'Israel'-bound flights
Brussels Airport staff memberRoya News
How to disable Firefox's battery-draining AI features
browser.ml.chat.enabled = false
browser.ml.chat.shortcuts = false
browser.ml.chat.shortcuts.custom = false
browser.ml.chat.sidebar = false
browser.ml.enable = false
browser.tabs.groups.smart.enabled = false
The AI Tool That Could Make Manufacturing Faster and More Efficient — by Using Lego Bricks
The AI Tool That Could Make Manufacturing Faster and More Efficient — by Using Lego Bricks
A new AI-powered tool created by researchers at Carnegie Mellon University’s School of Computer Science could change the way we manufacture and build things.News
Kobi refused a doctor's AI. She was told to go elsewhere
Kobi refused a doctor's AI. She was told to go elsewhere
Unregulated AI scribes raising privacy, security concerns.Information Age
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Ecosia teaches how to activate ads for Ublock, but not for Ublock Origin.
Karate or Tae Kwon Do for kids?
Which one do you think could fit better for her age and also considering she likes it which is better in the long term?
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Is it possible to run qbittorrent and protonvpn in a VM?
Does anyone know how to run qbittorrent and protonvpn in a VM? When I try to run the qbittorrent setup app I get this message (image below) and I don't see anything mentioning a VM in the qbittorrent [dot] org forum.
I am new to torrenting, so I don't really know what to do. I figured/assumed that torrenting/seeding in a VM might be safer as it is another layer deep, and that it may help keep traffic separate (inside the VM: I'd be using a vpn and torrenting, and outside the VM: I'd not be using a vpn and just regular internet surfing). Is this possible?
Thank you.
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Yes that would work fine, you can pretty much run anything inside a VM. So yeah a properly set up VM with internet access + VPN client + anything else you want to install will work.
Not too sure what the issue is that you are encountering, you'd need to update your post with a lot more info. My suggestion is to start over and make sure the VM is set up correctly e.g. install the OS in the VM, verify it has normal internet access. Then install the VPN client in the VM, verify VPN is working properly. After that qBittorrent or anything else can be installed inside the VM. (probably best to save snapshots of your VM after each step in case you screw up and need to roll back)
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Hmm I think your issue is specific to Windows Sandbox. I've only ever used full VM software (Microsoft Hyper-V, VirtualBox, etc.).
Never touched Windows Sandbox but it sounds like a sort of hybrid VM/Container thing.. I could be wrong 😀 hopefully someone else knows more about using that or maybe you'll need to post in another community to ask about it.
EDIT: Looking into it a bit more, Windows Sandbox isn't actually a VM. So you're really asking if you can run multiple apps (VPN+torrent client+whatever) inside a sandbox app like Windows Sandbox..I don't think that's how sandbox apps work, they usually are for sandboxing a single app, so you may need to experiment and figure it out. Everyone looking at your post is thinking you're asking about VMs, not sandboxes 😛
e.g. see this superuser.com/a/1775271 answer
also learn.microsoft.com/en-us/wind…
Doesn't Windows Sandbox require Hyper-V to run? How is it working with Hyper-V not enabled?
If my knowledge is correct, Windows Sandbox requires Hyper-V to run right? But when I enable Windows Sandbox on the Windows Features window, Hyper-V did not get enabled so I wanted to know what was...Super User
Oh, you're using Sandbox - yea, I could see certain checks failing as the app will be intentionally prevented from accessing certain things to be sandboxed.
Sandbox isn't the same as a VM.
You can run VirtualBox, but it's performance is notably less than VMware, and the latest version of VMware Workstation is free once again.
No reason it shouldn't work.
Whats your VM software, what's the host and (especially) the guest OS?
I've seen this error with an app in Windows, while running it in an admin account, haha. No idea what these app devs are doing to cause these messages.
Keep in mind under Linux, distros today often don't setup the first user as root, but as a limited account (there's a separate root account with it's own password).
Windows and Win Sandbox
I’ve seen this error with an app in Windows, while running it in an admin account, haha. No idea what these app devs are doing to cause these messages.
Oh really? Was the admin account you are referring to outside or inside the VM?
I don't recall if it was in a VM or not, it doesn't really matter. A VM is just a logical system, the OS runs the same as it would on bare hardware (for things like this).
I suspect what I see in Windows is a result of devs designing for an prior version of Windows, and some system call returns differently enough in a newer version. The times I've seen it, the apps work fine, which makes me thing it's a validation that fails.
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DaGeek247 likes this.
I prefer containers...
theres one available called gluetun that can run proton vpn..
then I have a deluge (torrent client) running in another container that specifies gluetun as it's network source.
this way if the VPN drops I don't bleed my actual ip
these containers are pre-built and public so config is fairly minimal
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nope, i've not had any issues with ports, but im using deluge.
the container network management handles most of that nonsense, the vpn is treated as a native internet connection
Yup many people had the same issue which is why someone created a docker container mod for LinuxServer's qbit docker image:
github.com/t-anc/GSP-Qbittoren…
I've been using it for over a year now and it works well.
GitHub - t-anc/GSP-Qbittorent-Gluetun-sync-port-mod: Docker mod for Linuxserver's Qbittorrent image to sync gluetun's forwarded port. Can also work with any qBittorrent image as a standalone container.
Docker mod for Linuxserver's Qbittorrent image to sync gluetun's forwarded port. Can also work with any qBittorrent image as a standalone container. - t-anc/GSP-Qbittorent-Gluetun-sync-port...GitHub
qBittorrent with GlueTUN VPN in Docker on a Synology NAS
In this guide I will take you through the steps to get qBittorrent up and running in Container Manager and a separate VPN container on a Synology NASDr_Frankenstein (DrFrankenstein's Tech Stuff)
I use this container with AirVPN; github.com/haugene/docker-tran…
Port forwarding was incredibly easy to setup with this VPN, and transmission is enough for what I have. As a bonus, this docker container in particular has a shitload of documentation and support tickets behind it, which made troubleshooting a lot easier for me.
GitHub - haugene/docker-transmission-openvpn: Docker container running Transmission torrent client with WebUI over an OpenVPN tunnel
Docker container running Transmission torrent client with WebUI over an OpenVPN tunnel - haugene/docker-transmission-openvpnGitHub
Bare metal = not in a VM
Why are you uploading to email? Can't you just download the torrent in the VM and check it in virustotal there?
Yeah it would be no different from running without a VM. The issue you're having isn't related to it being a VM.
Your popup there looks like it is because the user account you're using doesn't have admin privileges on windows. If this is a fresh install, I have no idea how you've ended up in that situation, as the user account you create on install is admin by default.
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hornface likes this.
should I just not use a VM while torrenting and using a VPN then?
If I don't use a VM, is it possible to torrent with a VPN but surf the net without the vpn concurrently?
A VM is a good way to do it, the only real downside is just the space used by a whole extra OS install.
Most VPN clients will have an option to route only specific applications over the VPN. Just remember to also lock the Bittorrent client to the VPN network interface to prevent leaks if the VPN stops working.
If I don't use a VM, is it possible to torrent with a VPN but surf the net without the vpn concurrently?
This is called split tunneling and not all VPNs offer it as a feature but you can use your own VPN client with a wireguard or openvpn config from your VPN to get the best of both worlds. On Windows, I was running WireSock to accomplish this
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Preferences -> Advanced -> Network Interface
Then select the VPN connection. That's what I do for qbittorrent. Not sure about other programs.
I'm not the only person who thinks Kill switches don't live up to their name
Bind always. Kill switches don't work reliably.
reddit.com/r/torrents/comments…Kill switches can fail. Always bind your client to your vpn adapter.
reddit.com/r/torrents/comments…While using a kill-switch is a good step, it may not provide complete protection. Combine it with binding your VPN network interface to qBittorrent for added privacy and security
reddit.com/r/surfshark/comment…Killswitches aren't perfect. Binding is.
reddit.com/r/surfshark/comment…Yep binding is so much better than killswitch.
reddit.com/r/surfshark/comment…torrenting with kill switch turned on, leaks?
reddit.com/r/ProtonVPN/comment…That's not a killswitch, that's binding your connection. It literally says that right in the screenshot. smh, kids these days. Killswitch is managed by your VPN, totally separate thing, and can still leak your IP at times.
reddit.com/r/Piracy/comments/v…I've had an occurrence even in windows with kill-switch on where the app closed and downloads continued.
reddit.com/r/unRAID/comments/1…Instead of kill switch (which fails a lot on many VPNs) you should bind your VPN to your torrent client.
reddit.com/r/ProtonVPN/comment…Bind interface. Kill switch is the wrong way to go.
reddit.com/r/Piracy/comments/1…Kill switch is not reliable and can expose your IP. Please search for "how to bind vpn qBitTorrent" and follow the directions to bind the internet adapter to your vpn. That is the only safe way.
reddit.com/r/Piracy/comments/1…Bind qBit to your VPN. This stops all torrent traffic if your VPN drops it's connection or you forgot to connect. It's more reliable than a Kill Switch.
reddit.com/r/qBittorrent/comme…Kill switches are unreliable, use binding instead
reddit.com/r/torrents/comments…Bruh needs to learn how to bind his VPN & Torrent Client... Y'all, kill switches are NOT good enough.
reddit.com/r/Piracy/comments/1…Bind your connection. Kill switches are functionally useless.
reddit.com/r/torrents/comments…
These are what I could find in the last 15 minutes, hopefully this is enough.
setting the network mode on the application docker to the gluetun service
As long as you do this, you're good
Spare yourself a lot of wasted disk space, Windows stupidity, and RAM by just using any mainline Linux distro (e.g. Ubuntu) instead of Windows for the guest. I don't even mean a headless Linux. You can keep the GUI if you prefer and want. That will still be a small fraction of the ram, compute, and disk space for the VM than a Windows guest.
And a tip for the technique: don't download torrents into the virtual hard drive for the VM. Download into a shared/mounted directory.
Honestly, if you are going the Linux route, you might as well get a headless Linux setup (no GUI, just command line), install qbittorrent-nox and access qbitborrent via the webUI.
You will save a massive amount of RAM, desk space and probably even CPU time.
Don't run your torrent client in a VM, that doesn't actually provide you with any additional security.
Use a Docker container instead. Binhex has torrent+vpn containers that will fetch the random open port number from Proton and pipe it into qBittorrent for you, as well as make sure the port is updated if the VPN drops. The container also acts as a killswitch.
Using a docker container provides you with the exact amount of extra protection as using a VM: zilch.
Only advantage is you can use other people's config easily.
- signed, someone happily using their own VM-based setup
Study: Social media probably can’t be fixed
It's no secret that much of social media has become profoundly dysfunctional. Rather than bringing us together into one utopian public square and fostering a healthy exchange of ideas, these platforms too often create filter bubbles or echo chambers. A small number of high-profile users garner the lion's share of attention and influence, and the algorithms designed to maximize engagement end up merely amplifying outrage and conflict, ensuring the dominance of the loudest and most extreme users—thereby increasing polarization even more.Numerous platform-level intervention strategies have been proposed to combat these issues, but according to a preprint posted to the physics arXiv, none of them are likely to be effective. And it's not the fault of much-hated algorithms, non-chronological feeds, or our human proclivity for seeking out negativity. Rather, the dynamics that give rise to all those negative outcomes are structurally embedded in the very architecture of social media. So we're probably doomed to endless toxic feedback loops unless someone hits upon a brilliant fundamental redesign that manages to change those dynamics.
Co-authors Petter Törnberg and Maik Larooij of the University of Amsterdam wanted to learn more about the mechanisms that give rise to the worst aspects of social media: the partisan echo chambers, the concentration of influence among a small group of elite users (attention inequality), and the amplification of the most extreme divisive voices. So they combined standard agent-based modeling with large language models (LLMs), essentially creating little AI personas to simulate online social media behavior. "What we found is that we didn't need to put any algorithms in, we didn't need to massage the model," Törnberg told Ars. "It just came out of the baseline model, all of these dynamics."
Study: Social media probably can’t be fixed
“The [structural] mechanism producing these problematic outcomes is really robust and hard to resolve.”…Jennifer Ouellette (Ars Technica)
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Uso da Inteligência Artificial na Administração Pública de SC em pauta na ALESC
Está em pauta hoje (13/8), na ALESC – Assembleia Legislativa de Santa Catarina, um Projeto de Lei de autoria do deputado Mário Motta que dispõe sobre “os princípios e diretrizes para o uso da Inteligência Artificial no âmbito da Administração Pública Estadual“, e estabelece outras providências. O texto do PL pode ser acessado aqui (arquivo PDF).
O PL estabelece critérios importantes, como “não discriminação”, “transparência” e “auditabilidade”, mas conta com o seguinte texto no Art. 7°: “O Poder Público facilitará a adoção de sistemas de inteligência artificial na Administração Pública e na prestação de serviços públicos, visando à eficiência e à redução dos custos”. Como seria essa facilitação? Como comentou o amigo e engenheiro de dados Cudo, essa “redução de custos” também é outro ponto que precisa de mais atenção, pois pode até gerar mais custos, além de questões como a necessidade de capacitação dos servidores.
Mas o que mais me chamou a atenção é a necessidade de priorizar (ou até condicionar) o uso de IAs desenvolvidas no Brasil e, de preferência, em código aberto, que é auditável de fato e transparente, já que se trata da utilização de informações estatais. Em tempos de debate sobre a soberania digital, seria um ponto fundamental.
O ideal mesmo seria realizar uma audiência pública com pesquisadores, representantes da academia e organizações do terceiro setor dedicadas ao assunto.
Início - Soberania Digital
Rede para debates, trocas de informações e organização de ações pela Soberania Digital. Sua participação é fundamental para construirmos um futuro digital!Diego (Soberania.digital)
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TheBigRoomXXL
in reply to learnbyexample • • •Assume an AWS profile from SSO with a single command and autocomplete
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