Mastodon is working on a new “Packs” feature designed to help you quickly find accounts to follow. It’s similar to Bluesky’s Starter Packs, and lets you opt out of appearing in the lists.
Second Wind III Support now only recovers life if the supported skill actually consumes a cooldown use.
Fixed an issue where the Ground Effects for the Flaming, Sleet, and Shocking Map Modifiers did not receive the reduced frequency changes from the 0.3.1 patch. Existing modifiers on Waystones will not be affected by this change.
Fixed a bug where stats that increased the chance of encountering specific content in maps were only increasing the chance relative to other content, and not increasing the amount of content encountered overall.
Fixed a bug where Minion Instability was able to trigger on Spectres that had been removed after weapon swapping.
Fixed a bug where the Infernalist's Altered Flesh Skill did not display stats on the character sheet correctly.
Fixed an issue where Explosive Spear and Storm Lance were thrown at the character's feet when no enemy was targeted while using a controller.
Fixed an issue where characters could get stuck in unwalkable terrain in the final phase of the Vessel of Kulemak fight.
Fixed a bug which allowed you to 'upgrade' Runes, Liquid Emotions and Catalysts in the Essence Stash Tab, which could cause items to be deleted in certain cases.
Fixed an issue where The Pale Angel could not spawn as a Corrupted Nexus boss.
Fixed an issue where the Cruel Hegemony Unique Tablet did not sell to vendors for the correct amount of Gold.
Fixed an issue where some guild microtransactions were not usable on all platforms.
The recently released Rise of the Abyssal Supporter Packs include the Trarthan Executioner and the Justice series, featuring a variety of exclusive microtransactions. We know you always appreciate the work of our artists, so in this post we've gathered some pieces of concept art for these supporter packs created by our art team. Check them out below!
I’ve had two major issues with these guys. While not necessarily worth defederating everyone, I really don’t want to deal with hexbear because:
ALL of their content is political. When they first showed up on my feed, I watched what posts/communities came up and how their users interacted on non hexbear posts. I’ve done my best to remove all politics from my social media. These guys only talked about politics and would go to other communities to turn a normal conversation political.
Everything was extreme and obnoxious. I don’t understand why everyone keeps calling them polite. There was a constant “you’re with us or you’re against us”/“my beliefs are always right” behavior that was really annoying, especially in a public space that wasn’t polarized before they got there. It reminded me of this one girl from middle school who would walk into a room and loudly talk about whatever she wanted until all the other conversations petered out. They’re more than welcome to behave like that in their home, but they can’t go to a public space and expect everyone to cater to their beliefs.
From the admin on a post in Jan 2024. While I do appreciate offering the reasoning on the matter, I'm quite surprised since I checked all banned instances and hexbear seemed like an oddity amongst the mix.
Perhaps it's so long ago that I dont remember the issues.
But to categorise the banned instances we have the likes of: * threads * Lemmynsfw * maga.place
And the odd inclusion of one big instance which to me certainly feels like any average instance. Certainly no worse than lemmy.ml
Ofc its not my instance, I'm just bringing this up for reconsideration. If you don't wanna deal with it thats your decision to make. But it certainly feels unnecessary from the outside. Especially when so many nation based comms here post political content and so do most lemmy instances.
Sincerely, PinkyCoyote/ SnokenKeekaGuard. User and mod on this instance.
US President Donald Trump announced late on Wednesday that Israel and the Palestinian movement Hamas had "both signed off" on the "first phase" of a plan to end the two-year genocidal war on Gaza.
Every major Palestinian political figure part of the resistance will remain jailed as all of this is, as always, on imperialist terms. Even if Hamas will try to bring negotiations to their advantage as much as possible, it will mean no more than minuscule concessions. An "erasure of Palestinian politics", to paraphrase Vijay Prashad. Regardless, "ceasefire", because it really is no more than that when we're speaking of settler colonialism and genocide. The Oslo Accords were always a joke, as history teaches us that you don't "negotiate", or "engage in dialogue" with oppressors; you resist and crush them. Yet watch the "international community" rhetorically invoke the "two state solution" again in 3....
And yet history also teaches us that it is possible for a people to be utterly eradicated or wholly displaced. You must live in order to fight another day. It's a decision any leadership must take very, very seriously.
Qt 6.10 application development framework adds a new Flexbox layout, SearchField control, and major accessibility upgrades for desktop and mobile apps.
I honestly don't like CSS interfaces. They have a way of rendering as-they-load, and it looks unnatural to me for a native app. But even without CSS, Qt has a special way of rendering. It's the main reason why I don't like KDE. I kind of see it rendering things one by one, even if it's in a split second. It bothers me. I much prefer the way things render on pretty much any other toolkit or OS. It's kind of "there" all at once.
That's very interesting. Are you talking about some kind of temporal delay? I'm very curious if it's something that happens on my end too. Would you have some examples?
It's just loads some stuff in a window, and then loads the rest of the stuff a quarter of a second later or so. It happens often when using kde. It just doesn't feel organic to me.
Honestly, that's how the codec game works. Most people or software don't adopt until after the successor is in place. It's more about the software side lagging to adopt though. Nvidia just got AV1 into their hardware processing pipeline in the last 2 years. I think AMD is even more recent than that.
That, and add some patent pools filled with dubious claims of essentiality, sales deals made under the threat of litigation, and ever-present claims of "twice as efficient it's predecessor" with a big asterisk. Fun times.
My problem with AV1 is that so many people I talk to in real life about it think I'm mispronouncing AVI (Audio Video Interleave), the old container format that was popular in the 90s and early 2000s. I tell them it's a video codec and they act all surprised like H.264 and H.265 are the only ones in existence.
Are you sure that's many people? Outside of the few tech savvy people I know, most lay people have no clue what h.264/5 are either. They know mp3 and that just means digital music to them.
Why do we need more codecs? Technical progress is nice but unless the new thing is literally 5x better than the old thing, media codecs are for practical purposes a solved problem by now. Slight improvements aren't worth the churn and patent hazards.
I don't know, but if it is, why take chances with yet another codec? The hazard is less about the developers asserting patents than trolls coming out of the woodwork after the codec is deployed.
AV1 and AV2 are both patent free and nobody will be able to grab them to be a patent troll, that’s the point. Maybe you should start educating yourself a bit on the subject before ranting?
Patent troll = someone pops up claiming av1 or av2 infringes on some obscure patent that they control. That happens all the time. There's no way to guarantee that it won't happen with any codec or really with anything. It is very expensive to defend against even when the claim is bogus.
That happens all the time. There’s no way to guarantee that it won’t happen with any codec or really with anything.
Yes, so there's no reason to hold back on releasing updates, since it could very well happen on AV1.
It is very expensive to defend against even when the claim is bogus.
The principle behind AV1, once again, is to have a modern codec that is out of reach from patent trolls. Those who are part of the AOM consortium, which developed this codec, have all contractually agreed to unconditionally license all patents they hold that are necessary for the implementation of the codec.
And those who are not part of the consortium and who would like to claim patents relating to the AV1 or AV2 codecs would have to face the legal teams of the companies part of said consortium, including Amazon, Alibaba, Adobe, AMD, Cisco, Google, Intel, Microsoft, Mozilla Foundation, ARM, Huawei, Samsung, Tencent, Meta, Nvidia, Apple, Netflix, and other large companies.
The AV1 and AV2 codecs, after perhaps H264, are the most secure codecs available today in terms of patent trolls. Nobody has both the will and the means to attack it.
Yes and no. Hardware = pay google - Proprietary software = pay google or 3rd party - Open source (d@v1d) = free (this is what most people use = VLC Player)
AV2 provides enhanced support for AR/VR applications, split-screen delivery of multiple programs, improved handling of screen content, and an ability to operate over a wider visual quality range.
Please do not start a flame war about cryptocurrencies. Monero is the only cryptocurrency listed because of its privacy.
The very left column is the category for each row, the middle section is the various VPN providers, and the right section is which VPNs are the best in each category.
IVPN has two differing plans, which is why "Standard" and "Pro" are sometimes differentiated.
For accounts, "Generated" means a random identifier is created for you to act as your account, "Required" means you must sign up yourself. Proton VPN allows guest use under specific conditions (e.g. installed from the Google Play Store), but otherwise requires an account.
Switzerland is seen as more private than Sweden. Gibraltar is seen as privacy neutral.
All prices are in United States Dollars. Tax is not included.
Pricing is based on the price combination to achieve the exact time frame. For example, Proton VPN does not have a 3 year plan but you can achieve 3 years by combining a 2 year plan with a 1 year plan.
The availability section is security based. Availability is framed around a GrapheneOS and secureblue setup.
Availability on secureblue is based on the ujust install-vpn command. Security features must be disabled on secureblue in order to use the GUI for IVPN and Mullvad VPN, but not for Proton VPN. Mozilla VPN and NymVPN are available as Flatpaks, which are safer than layering packages.
I wanted to include more categories, such as which programming languages they are written in, connection speed, and security, but that became far too difficult and complex, so I decided to omit those categories.
Takeaways
NymVPN is very very new, but it's off to a strong start. It wins in almost every category. I actually hadn't heard of it until I started this project.
If you want a free VPN, Proton VPN is the only one here that meets that requirement.
If you want to pay week-by-week, IVPN is the only one that allows that.
If you're paying month-by-month on a budget, Mullvad VPN is the cheapest option.
NymVPN is the cheapest plan for anything past 1 month.
If you want to use Accrescent as your main app store, IVPN is the only VPN available there for now.
If you want to pay for a bundle of apps, including a VPN, Proton sells more than just a VPN.
Mozilla VPN is terrible. The only thing it has going for it is a verified Flatpak, but NymVPN also has that so it doesn't even matter.
I'm human. I make mistakes. I made multiple mistakes in my last post, and there may be some here. I've tried my best.
Pricing is sometimes weird. For example, a 1 year plan for Private Internet Access is 37.19€ first year and then auto-renews annually at 46.73€. By the way, they misspelled "annually". AirVPN has a 3 day pricing plan. For the instances when pricing is weird, I did what I felt was best on a case-by-case basis.
Tor is not a VPN, but there are multiple apps that allow you to use it like a VPN. They've released an official Tor VPN app for Android, and there is a verified Flatpak called Carburetor which you can use to use Tor like a VPN on secureblue (Linux). It's not unreasonable to add this to the list.
Some projects use different licenses for different platforms. For example, NordVPN has an open source Linux client. However, to call NordVPN open source would be like calling a meat sandwich vegan because the bread is vegan.
The age of a VPN isn't a good indicator of how secure it is. There could be a trustworthy VPN that's been around for 10 years but uses insecure, outdated code, and a new VPN that's been around for 10 days but uses up-to-date, modern code.
Some VPNs, like Surfshark VPN, operate in multiple countries. Legality may vary.
All of the VPNs claim a "no log" policy, but there's some I trust more than others to actually uphold that.
Tor is special in the port forwarding category, because it depends on what you're using port forwarding for. In some cases, Tor doesn't need port forwarding.
Tor technically doesn't have a WireGuard profile, but you could (probably?) create one.
Takeaways
If you don't mind the speed cost, Tor is a really good option to protect your IP address.
If you're on a budget, NymVPN, Private Internet Access, and Surfshark VPN are generally the cheapest. If you're paying month-by-month, Mullvad VPN still can't be beat.
If you want VPNs that go out of their way to collect as little information as possible, IVPN, Mullvad VPN, and NymVPN don't require any personal information to use. And Tor, of course.
Audited, open-source VPN service with WireGuard, killswitch and tracker blocker. No logs, no false promises. Anonymous signup with 30 day money back guarantee.
I've included it both as a post image and as an embedded image for maximum compatibility (e.g. for RSS readers), so there shouldn't be any problems. I've tested it on multiple browsers on multiple devices just fine.
Edit: It seems lemmy.world is breaking all lemmy.ml images
Proton VPN supports port forwarding. IVPN and Mullvad VPN do not. Mozilla VPN and NymVPN don't explicitly state whether or not they do from what I found, so I'm not sure.
I had the same dilemma after mullvad stopped allowing you to create port forwards. I switched to Proton which works fine but I'm curious what other options are out there. It can be hard to find the details about port forwarding, especially if it only works when using their app and not with openvpn/wireguard which is easier for running containers.
AirVPN lets you open 5 ports and allow p2p. Works with their app and openvpn/wireguard. I've been paying for it couple years now and I'm pretty happy with it
I wouldn't call it useless, for people who just use a vpn for privacy, for all I know the only main use case for port forwarding in a vpn is torrenting linux iso's rather than genuine privacy measures.
I have Pure VPN. It allows port forwarding but isn't on the list. I don't see it talked about much so I don't know how it compares to others, but I've just been using it because I got a great deal for a 5 year plan forever ago.
Pure vpn seams like a pretty generic scammy vpn like surfshark or nordvpn they have there own blog dedicated to why they are the best stating reasons like securing yourself in public wifi, protecting you from scams or getting hacked, protecting you against ddos atacks??? and just advertising vpn's as a jack of all trades privacy toolkit, which they really aren't.
VPN companies that are willing to lie to consumers about what vpn's actually do means they could be lying about other things, like there no logs policy.
I mean I'm using pia, so not much better but I'm broke so I ain't paying for mullvad or anything. I might switch to nymvpn when I get the chance though, it seams pretty good.
Wow, Nym’s payment model past month-to-month looks good. I don’t really need port forwarding, so the advantage I see they have over Mullvad is the decentralized nature of their servers. Mullvad does have multi-hop but it goes through Mullvad owned or rented servers. Does anyone know if Nym really does use servers that aren’t leased/rented by them for decentralization? Otherwise, they are no different from Mullvad and only the payment model is better.
Nym pays users to be a relay as far as I know. There are 5 relays or 2 relays with your preference (depends on the speed and security you want). Maybe they own some servers that I don't know but their encryption techniques are quite advanced. There are articles on their websites that they cannot log anything.
Where is AirVPN? Arguably much better then these VPN providers offering static port forwarding among their features.
Provides configurations built for Wireguard and OpenVPN with each server having unlisted IPs to completely get around VPN blocks.
Owned by a "hacktivst" lawyer in Italy.
Multiple audit along with police attempting to sieze running servers. These are configured to dump there configuration on shutdown and run entirely in ram.
This is a battle tested VPN that has existed since 2010. They allow for completely anonymity using Creptocurrencies payments.
Also would be worth considering RiseUp VPN which is run by an anarchist organization. There's also a new one BuycatVPN which I think is affiliated with the Tech for Palestine project and from an organization that's an official partner with BDS, but I don't know anything else about it.
Why is proton consistently red in the pricing category despite being cheaper than (or on par with) other options like mozilla which is consistently yellow? Am I misreading this as green = good, red = bad?
VPNs and Tor are used for different purposes (sort of).
And common tasks like downloading big-ish files or streaming video should not be done on Tor (it's possible, but I believe it is discouraged), but can be done easily over a VPN.
CEO is a jackass but the product is fantastic and has a great free tier, although P2P/torrenting was removed from the free tier unfortunately I believe
This is great, thanks for sharing! You've got a few useful feedback points, let me add one more: does a provider have an onion address. This allows decoupling of payment from usage. Not a big thing, but good to know.
As long as you can generate a wireguard config that works, for example, on your desktop/main pc with wireguard directly, then Gluetun should have no issue (as far as im aware).
Gluetun specific provider support is usually just there to get setup faster (I think so it can automatically get configs for certain countries, etc).
Does anyone have experience with the Mullvad, NymVPN, or AirVPN clients (if they exist) on Linux? I'm still mad Proton removed support for their Linux client and replaced it with an intern-level gnome-only taskbar applet. Also, do they support generating plain Wireguard configs?
I have experience with airvpn on linux. They have a couple different client options as well as being able to config files for both openvpn and wireguard. All of which I have used and haven't had any notable challenges using.
I really like Mullvad. I can’t speak towards their app though I just export the configurations and import them to my distros networking settings so I can activate it more easily.
Assuming every connection you make is encrypted with TLS (HTTPS) or otherwise encrypted:
If you use encrypted custom DNS, your ISP sees only the IP addresses you connect to. If you use unencrypted DNS or ISP-provided DNS, they see the hostnames plus the IP addresses.
It can prevent man in the middle observation or attack and allow you to avoid a particular type of location tracking.
Another user on an instance I don’t see posts from talked about tls in response to your question about https. It’s important to recognize that the certificate based system for establishing identity when making a tls connection is cooked and has been for twenty years at least. It may have been designed flawed from the start.
Because of that, the combination of dns over https or dns over tls and a vpn you trust allows you to bypass certificate attacks.
With the upcoming restrictions on third-party apps that Google has announced maybe? It'll be easier to get from Play, and may not be available otherwise at all.
I don't think giving into Google seizing more power is the way. People doing that is what enables the corporation to continue and have more control over their lives, including their privacy.
I didn't suggest F-Droid for inclusion though. I merely used its applicable terminology. Still, with Google Play, you trust Google to ensure that the apk is from the actual source, and with F-Droid, that's delegated to F-Droid. I don't see that as being less secure.
I didn’t suggest F-Droid for inclusion though. I merely used its applicable terminology.
My bad, I understand now.
Because it's security focused, it includes app stores that are good for their security (regardless of privacy). Other app stores, such as F-Droid, have security issues that Accrescent and the Google Play Store don't share. This topic has been argued to death countless times before, and I don't want to start a flame war, but do try researching it and see what comes up.
While F-Droid has security issues, the ideological security benefit it provides that Accrescent/Play Store/Obtainium doesn't is the guarantee that the app is open source, and if the developer goes rogue (I.e. Simple Mobile Tools) it gets removed. A lot could be improved though.
server with wg-easy and thus easy to use Web UI (before 2-step auth)
peers
BananiPi 3 F (RISC-V) headless via nmcli
desktop on Debian via NetworkManaged
mobile phone on /e/OS via the WireGuard client (with Ente Auth to login back on server as admin)
... and it was the first time I used WireGuard.
So I'm trying to imply that one shouldn't use commercial VPNs or benefit from their services, solely that setting up your own depending on your abilities and needs might not be as complex as you initially imagine.
PS: I did have experience with OpenVPN before and a running server already with Docker and nginx as reverse proxy.
Attached: 1 image
Shame is a great motivator <1h I have my own self-hosted VPN thanks to :
- wg-easy providing WireGuard server + WebUI,
- WireGuard client on Android reading QRcode config,
- Debian/KDE reading the .
Maybe I misunderstand wireguard, but don't you still need a VPN provider to connect to? If it's just your home server, how would you get any anonymity?
You can host WireGuard on your server, you don't need a VPN provider specifically, you need a server to put WireGuard on though. Depends who you want to be anonymous from, as per usual it's the threat model that defines the solution.
There's plenty of seedbox companies out there, you can get 10Gbps+ connections and they run the torrent client for you so there's no upload happening from your local PC at all.. Many offer VPN capabilities at the same time, but for general browsing I use a VPS with my own wireguard.
Don’t do this if you want to use a VPN to pirate stuff. It’s a fine suggestion for anything else, using a VPS w/self hosted VPN to provide a basic degree of anonymity.
I assume you're talking about creating a VPN into your own personal network? Unless you have family or friends in a different country I fail see how you're circumventing geo restrictions or gain anonymity on the internet.
Wrong assumption, you can install it on any other machine you have root access to, e.g. remote ssh. You can rent a server in another country and put your VPN server if that's your need.
I do not agree with placing switzerland over sweden in that location category
and i think a category should included, that tracks age of vpn or something like that, considering this is nymvpns biggest flaw.. still hard to say how trustworthy it is + their software is less battle tested
(~~and just for someone curiouse, it should be mentioned that nymvpn does use mullvad servers/ has a deal with mullvad~~ sry i mixed that up obscura and mullvad had partnership, not nymvpn)
I do not agree with placing switzerland over sweden in that location category
I'd be happy to hear your elaboration on this. From what I know, Switzerland is seen as the gold standard in terms of privacy.
and i think a category should included, that tracks age of vpn or something like that
The issue is that age doesn't correlate with security. There could be an outdated, insecure VPN that's been around for 10 years, or a modern, secure VPN that's been around for 10 days. If I included it, there would be no "good" or "bad" values. Nevertheless, I will include this in version 2.0.
(and just for someone curiouse, it should be mentioned that nymvpn does use mullvad servers/ has a deal with mullvad)
I knew NymVPN used a small bit of Mullvad VPN's code, but I didn't know they used their servers. Could you link to this?
this is awkward i am sorry it seems like my memory failed me, for one it is was mullvad and obscura that have a deal, not nymvpn..
and then i also thought somehow that vpns are in sweden protected by the constitution, but it appears its more like normal laws. Which appear to be effective tho. But mainly i thought about that recently switzerland was proposing laws like this tuta.com/blog/switzerland-surv… (possible that laws like these get proposed in sweden aswell ofc) which makes it sound like the privacy stands of the goverment is not that strong anymore, but there are probably no effects really at the moment. I think i would rank sweden and switzerland equally i guess, i mean the famouse mullvad example kind of proofs that they are safe i think...
But like my research into the countries is not that deep, so if you really looked into this deeply and switzerland is really better for some reason, than i guess it is like this.
But i still think the age is important, like sure its completly possible that an old vpn suddenly gets infiltrated or idk what really, but since for vpns are mostly trust based, i think that the track record is the best option for this.. and new vpns just dont have that long of a record (personally i would not use like a 1 month old vpn for example, whoever good it sounds)
Why is proton VPN excluded from the winners for open source, license, and based on, despite having the exact same values populated as the other 4 winners?
What about logging policies? Seems like that would be an important category to visit - which providers store logs or don't etc. I've heard of some that use RAM-only logging that allegedly never gets stored on disk.
Best way I know is to observe them being unable to comply with legal demands to supply data when they receive them. From what I've heard Mullvad has passed that test, but I've never tried to follow up and find details.
There is no guarantee unless you could personally audit their facilities and inspect what they did with your account etc. But I would still choose one that states they have a good policy versus one that says nothing on the subject.
I was grumped by not seeing PIA on this break down. I’ve been using it for years and have always had a good experience with it. But I’m not so sure I know their privacy side now that I see this great break down
Edit: just re read the post again and I think PIA isn’t on here cause it’s not open source?
PIA is an American owned company obligated to comply with the Five Eyes Alliance, they’re legally obligated to retain your personal information unless noted otherwise.
Source their privacy policy, which FYi compare their Privacy Policy to another company like Mullvad and notice how theirs reads like a novel compared to Mullvads, that’s an immediate red flag.
Private Internet Access is committed to protecting your privacy. Please read on to understand what data we collect or don't collect, how we collect, store and use the data.
ProtonVPN has started to become blocked on tons of websites. I have to switch servers all the time, to the point I won't be able to keep a VPN connection up like I used to.
I've read Mullvad has worsened as well. There seems to be a general ban on VPN use (there was always some of course)
My last hope: non profits who offer VPN. They keep logs, don't allow torrenting, and require a real name to subscribe. Very few server choices, if any.
I'm... fine with that. I just want privacy. No surveillance. And I trust the non profit. Plus I torrent on a VPS anyway
What I would like to see are local VPNs, with a small enough pool of users on each server to not get flagged. A rotation between servers from time to time. Compliant with the law of course (as long as the law doesn't require total surveillance, evidently). The goal is to hide everyone's activity from the providers and websites (yes, I know, fingerprinting)
But maybe there's some other existing tool/service I'm not aware of?
Does using a VPS truly enhance safety while torrenting? Isn't it still possible for downloads and uploads to be traced back to your identifiable IP address, especially considering that the VPS provider logs your IP and email details?
Exactly this, the commenter above even mentioned they have a VPS already, what's stopping them from (this is just an option) slapping tailscale on there, enabling it as an exit node and being done with it? Would literally take 5 minutes and suddenly your traffic is coming from a datacenter and not your home IP
Both comments are me. Configuring Tailscale (or Headscale?) is on my to-do.
To be clear, connecting to the VPS is not what I use for the anonymizing part, it's the gluetun container that connects to ProtonVPN servers. This way I can still access my VPS with its real IP. Not sure if there was a confusion there.
Simply using my VPS as relay would still attach my browsing to a single IP I'm the sole user of... or not? I do not know how that works.
Thank you for clarifying. Does using a VPN on a VPS offer the same level of privacy as connecting a VPN container to a torrent container from a home connection? I'm curious about the advantages of using a VPS in this context.
No advantages privacy-wise, but it's like a seedbox! I keep the torrent client running. Also I'm on a limited mobile data plan on my router at home, so this helps.
When I found out you could get a free 200GB VPS (look up free tier vps) - and because I had another paid VPS already anyway - I decided to make a seedbox. It's not a ton of storage but it works really well, very happy with it.
Are you sure you can blend in? Depends on the vpn and the laws I guess... If they are able to identify your connection. As far as I know, they all have credentials connected to your account...
It is easier to blend in though if the vpn doesn't log (and before logging is added by feds if possible) or if the person tracking you is not a government and doesnt have that control or is just the service you use, etc.
I looked on the website. This is actually an "early bird" special price that is ~80% discounted. So after a while, it's going to be $162/year and $310/2 years.
I looked on the website. This is actually an “early bird” special price that is ~80% discounted. So after a while, it’s going to be $162/year and $310/2 years.
I don't really pay attention to these "discounts". It is, generally, just a marketing tactic. Plenty of services/websites/shops have the same discount 24/7.
You're right, it is pretty common to do that but there's always the chance they just cancel the discount around renewal. If you have autopay then you probably already committed to the new price before you realized what happened.
Nell’arco di pochi giorni, qualche settimana scarsa, le mie giornate sono diventate così tanto credo noiose che iniziano a spuntarmi fuori riflessioni assurde… vorrei stare infinitamente nel lettino a dormire, perché fa freddo e fa buio prima, e tutto ciò fa un pochino male all’anima (soprattutto il freddo, sto ferma e ho freddo, mi muovo […]
trovate di pazzia tra i rifiuti della mia esistenza (dalla mia tastiera esce di tutto)
Nell’arco di pochi giorni, qualche settimana scarsa, le mie giornate sono diventate così tanto credo noiose che iniziano a spuntarmi fuori riflessioni assurde… vorrei stare infinitamente nel lettino a dormire, perché fa freddo e fa buio prima, e tutto ciò fa un pochino male all’anima (soprattutto il freddo, sto ferma e ho freddo, mi muovo in casa e il vento che creo muovendo l’aria mi fa freddo, non ce la posso fare), e le altre cose rimangono difficilmente in primo piano… ma, se questo mi porterà ad andare a dormire prima per stare in coma più a lungo, forse è meglio, tanto non è che ho molto da fare la sera… ben 2 post di recupero per i miei manga li ho scritti, e tanto domani mattina mi piazzo col PC a lezione e programmo come se fossi a casa, e tutto si ripeterà così all’infinito… 😤
Ah ma, attenzione, ho divagato; le riflessioni assurde di questa sera non sono quelle di cui sopra, che tutto sommato non penso si possano nemmeno tanto etichettare come anormali, bensì… che minchia di roba esce dalla tastiera (a membrana, maledetta, mannaggia alla miseria) del PC? No, non è un pensiero che non c’entra assolutamente nulla con tutto il suddetto, perché in effetti usando meno il PC fisso ultimamente — ma in realtà, stando meno alla scrivania in generale, visto che troppi giorni sto fuori — dovrebbe accumularsi meno roba strana, e invece… scuotendola tra ieri sera e poco fa è uscito tutto questo bel tesoretto di roba (almeno, bello per chi apprezza il discarica-core, credo)… 🤢 …Peli minuscoli che mi tiro dalla faccia mentre faccio altro ed evidentemente ogni tanto finiscono anche lì in mezzo, quelli che sembrano pezzetti di unghia forse finiti lì dentro quando le ho sistemate l’ultima volta… e il resto, di colore marrone, a parte qualche microplastica sparsa e appena visibile, credo sia tutta pelle mortache rilascio gradualmente nell’ambiente anziché fare la muta ordinatamente come i serpenti… Va a finire tutto in questa specie di griglia nera di buchi (che non è come un buco nero, purtroppo, perché in quello la roba sparirebbe, invece qui girando o soffiando riesce tutta fuori, e che schifo) e boh, mi fa sembrare un mostro in decomposizione. 🧟♀️
A parte tutto, non ricordo precisamente da quanto non la scuotevo così per pulirla, ma è stato non troppo tempo fa, credo… eppure, si riempie sempre di roba, e io non me ne capacito. Ma ci sarà un fottuto modo per evitare in primo luogo che diventi abitualmente una discarica? A parte i vari frammenti solidi di cheratina che vabbé, a me sembra di fare attenzione a non farli finire lì, ma evidentemente ho problemi di skill…come stramaledizione faccio a non farci finire almeno la pelle morta??? Io non sono Asmongold, le mani e la faccia me le lavo, quindi, veramente, sono esterrefatta! (NON toccate mai la mia tastiera, che sennò vi prendete 10 malattie, di questo ne sono alquanto sicura.) 😾
A hanging blade sign is one of the most effective ways to attract attention and enhance your storefront’s visibility. Positioned perpendicular to your building, it allows customers to spot your business from a distance, even in crowded streets. These signs not only improve brand recognition but also add a professional and stylish touch to your exterior design. Whether you own a café, boutique, or retail shop, a well-designed hanging blade sign helps guide foot traffic, strengthen your brand identity, and create a lasting first impression. It’s a cost-effective marketing tool that keeps working for your business 24/7, ensuring your store never goes unnoticed.
anyone who has to work to earn a living is a prostitute; we're just using our bodies a slightly different way.
this guy is special because he's rich enough to guarantee that he doesn't have to, he just loves doing it; he's not a prostitute, he's just the ruling's class' willing removed.
Gov. Tina Kotek ordered the move, which follows reporting by Oregon Public Broadcasting and ProPublica that highlighted impediments green energy advocates blame for the state’s poor ranking when it comes to the growth of renewables.
The countries of the collective West, covering up the terrorist acts of the Kiev regime and the regular attacks of the Ukrainian army on the Zaporozhye nuclear power station, are becoming "direct accomplices" of the Ukrainian crimes, Maria Zakharova …
yeah, the azov brigade is definitely guilty of ethnic cleansing style pogroms and i'll never cease to be amazed that their activities have been covered up considering that you can find them with simple google searches.
Profitez des vidéos et de la musique que vous aimez, mettez en ligne des contenus originaux, et partagez-les avec vos amis, vos proches et le monde entier.
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I mean, I’m as big a ML fans as you’ll find on Lemmy, but this is a slop machine to build some Altman hype.
A controllable, integrated version as a tool, with augmentations like VACE or SDXLs controlnet would be neat. Thats also great because it’s not so easy for 1 click zero effort automated spam, which is by far Sora's largest market as is.
…And guess what. We have that, it’s neat already, it’s open weights, it's improving, and it’s not so controversial/abused because there’s an actual tiny barrier of entry to using it, like Davinci Resolve vs instagram filters.
The less barriers to entry the better for something like this. Imagine all the people who have always wanted to make movies/tv shows but haven't had the ability to who could use these tools to make pilots/trailer to sell to studios, or even create full series/movies to self-publish.
Trying to put barriers and "controls" in front of it purely because you don't like that it can be used to make "slop" is dumb.
Free and open source CGI software can be run on older computers.
And take years to learn how to use well, compared to literally seconds of using an AI video generation tool. Then there's the actual rendering and iteration, which can now be seconds versus hours/days.
Lazy people who want to feel special will generate AI slop.
People who want to make stuff will be able to make amazing stuff with ease with AI.
You AI haters are all so closed minded, only capable of thinking of the lowest common denominator. Who cares if people make AI "slop" when there will also be visionaries making mind blowing stuff with AI?
Heaven fucking forbid that a person dedicates themself to learning a perfecting a craft. Meanwhile, you sloppers are out here thinking you're gonna take over the entertainment industry with your, "Yo Sora, make me a movie that's like Pulp Fiction crossed with Fight Club with supernatural elements."
Who cares if people make AI “slop” when there will also be visionaries making mind blowing stuff with AI?
Because that's all that it's good for. Every year it's, "Oh this is going to be so much better in 6 months, bro. It'll be able to generate full movies by then, for sure, bro." And every year it does get better, but it's still complete and utter garbage. It's still slop.
And even if it's not slop, LLM tech is basically just a repackaged soulless slurry of existing media. Unless there is a fundamental breakthrough in AI tech, it will always be that. LLMs just work that way. It is a limitation of the technology.
If you can't see that, then you truly don't understand what this tech is.
Heaven fucking forbid that a person dedicates themself to learning a perfecting a craft.
So you think that things should always be difficult and extremely time consuming, taking years to learn, even though new tech comes out that means it doesn't have to be, just because.......why exactly?
The same people that dedicate themselves to learning and perfecting a craft can also use these tools and will be able to do amazing things with them - or they can continue not using them if they want.
Meanwhile, you sloppers are out here thinking you’re gonna take over the entertainment industry with your, “Yo Sora, make me a movie that’s like Pulp Fiction crossed with Fight Club with supernatural elements.”
Ok so again, narrow minded and short sighted. What people can do with this is do their usual movie making process - storyboarding, script writing, etc - but can then literally "film" the scene and chop and change it, iterating and fixing almost instantly. It doesn't just spit out an entire movie - at least yet! You can give it exact words to say, camera angles, filters, etc - it basically allows the would-be director to shoot scenes in real time at any time they want, from any location, regardless of the weather/time/location/etc.
Because that’s all that it’s good for. Every year it’s, “Oh this is going to be so much better in 6 months, bro. It’ll be able to generate full movies by then, for sure, bro.” And every year it does get better, but it’s still complete and utter garbage. It’s still slop.
Dude, the technology has been around for only a few years lol. In that time it has absolutely gotten so much better - Google's video generation is a mind blowing upgrade for example.
LLM tech is basically just a repackaged soulless slurry of existing media.
You don't understand how it works if this is what you think.
If you can’t see that, then you truly don’t understand what this tech is.
That look incredible though. That's the point - now people can make incredible stylized or realistic videos with nothing more than a few words and a few seconds wait.
You're like someone complaining about a technology like raytracing because all you saw was some devs use it to do a few shadows and cut their framerate in half. You can't see the big picture. You can't see that with every medium there is "slop" - there are terrible writers writing books, it's not just all new york times best sellers. There is terrible music, not just grammy winners. AI video generation will have tonnes and tonnes of crap, but it will also have masterpieces.
Filler words makes a piece feel more human. Ironically cutting out human tics in favour of a more sterlised presentation yet criticising AI, how ironic.
It's a bit excessive for my taste as well. Traditionally if you felt the need to cut this much just to make the sentence come out the way you want, you'd just do another take instead of making this many cuts in post. Over-cutting of spacing also makes the pacing a bit too "word-vomit" rather than "polished" imo.
I imagine this is more normalized in stereotypically "zoomer" presentation of video content, but it might also just be this guy (or their editor's) style.
I don't think there is a good reason. It's an interesting ability for a model. I can see the appeal why people are interested in much the same way I can understand why people climb mountains. Wouldn't wanna do it myself but I can see why you like it kind of way. For me this falls into the category of "the general public doesn't need to have access to this." I get mad when I hear people talk about it in terms of what is and isn't allowed in it. "And then I tried to put a light saber in it and that was okay but I couldn't make me into Super Mario." You just created enough heat in a server farm that will kill a polar bear, that needs to be cooled with future drinking water we need to desalinate, and you have huffed some more air in the hyped up bubble economy surrounding so-called AI. All so you can see where the model draws the copyright line? And if you think that I was modest in my hyperbole, you'll probably agree with me when I say in a similar spirit that we as a species deserve to eradicate ourselves off this planet.
The so-called AI peddlers have the same problem as news peddlers online. It's fucking hard to turn users into paying subscribers. And they need to turn a profit at some point. It's the merciless mechanics of capitalism that dumps all these models on an unprepared general public at dumping prices. A drive to increase shareholder value above any other consideration. It's time to change that.
And I'm not opposed to this model existing. Research it, fine tune it, offer it for the actual cost you're running in the background plus a bit of a profit margin. And when it costs $207.40 per month to make these brief videos, I'd be okay with that. It would price out enough users not to undo any of the insufficient climate saving measures we as a species have already implemented.
I didn't know that! Thank you for that tidbit. Also wanna take the time to say I feel I derived more satisfaction learning of the source than I lost from the bummer.
High demand will drive efficiency gains in subsequent generations of technology. It'll be like how processors today use a tiny fraction of the power that processors a decade ago used for the same amount of work. Better instruction sets, architectures and smaller lithography has driven efficient and competitive computing. Similar will happen for AI processors
This is a bit irrelevant but we can't use sea water for cooling instead. And if we're already heating sea water can't we just heat it up more in the end and create a combined desalination server farm.
I think there biggest problem with sea water is dirt, not just the salt. So it's easier to waste drinking water on cooling the chips. The idea of a combination server farm and desalination plant is probably possible. Desalination is expensive though. I remember reading about Singapore's efforts. So this would have to be a big investment with profits pushed far back into a sustainable future. So if you're on the board and have this fiduciary responsibility to increase shareholder value you'll probably throw your hands up and give up at that point. Without governments making wasting drinking water on server cooling expensive, this plan will never even make it to the c-suite.
I have never once asked why something should exist. It’s the human will to make new cool things, and in 5y this model will train on your refrigerator, so you aren’t stopping it. These videos complain about the problems of exponentially increasing technology rather than look towards solutions, like anti capitalist organizing. Like, ok, this destroys copyright and IP: guess what copyright and IP is DUMB CAPITALIST NONSENSE. Let’s overthrow it. These people are complaining about companies selling access to these models under cost: that’s because this can never make a profit! If you don’t need labor, cost goes to 0. This will spur unemployment and harm, which will spur worker participation and class warfare.
And the environmental cost is still lower than meat.
To me all the complaining is the sweet voice of class consciousness.
And the environmental cost is still lower than meat.
Meat, whether you think it's moral or ethical or not, serves a need. People need to eat. People don't need AI slop.
It's kind of like saying, "Well yeah I leave this 50kw diesel generator running 24/7. It's way less environmentally damaging than meat. No, I'm not using the power it generates for any real purpose, but who cares, it's environmentally friendly!"
I don’t think meat is unethical, nor do I think AI is unethical. Both serve a purpose (slop doesn’t serve a purpose but slop exists because we are doing ai research and expansion which very much serves a long term purpose). I’m just trying to put AI water and power use into perspective.
And the environmental cost is still lower than meat.
It's not meat.
It's cars and planes. We know this because we observed a drastic drop in air pollution in both 2008 (following the financial crash) and March 2020 that can be attributed to basically the entire planet no longer commuting and traveling.
That said, LLM's water and carbon footprints are likely going to be far more devastating than meat consumption, not that it'll matter. Everyone is still going to vote Democrat and Republican and things will steadily continue to get worse.
Literally mention meat and the internet goes berserk. Does anyone have any commentary on the remainder of my post?
We still couldn’t reverse climate change with 2020 or 2008 numbers… We are FUCKED. Best not to think too hard about it because thanos could barely solve climate change.
I disagree that LLMs carbon footprint will be more than meat. I think it’ll remain thousands of times less than meat basically forever in fact. That’s basically claiming that GPU servers will outnumber cows and chickens in the future. But whatever.
It's cars and planes. We know this because we observed a drastic drop in air pollution in both 2008 (following the financial crash) and March 2020 that can be attributed to basically the entire planet no longer commuting and traveling.
It's both, and a handful of other industries. The tiny blip of dropped emissions during covid did absolutely fucking nothing to help air pollution and greenhouse gas emissions. It's just feel-good bullshit the media spread around. Travel is a significant portion of ghg emissions, very comparable in impact to meat production.
It's remarkable that demradlibs used to be all "anti-war" during the Bush years but gradually moved so far to the neo-interventionist right wing through Obama that you're cold war level gung ho for NATO and for spreading Russophobia.
In reality there's absolutely nothing out of the ordinary about west aligned nations to have dysfunctional elections or open dictatorships and no amount of screeching about "western values" and corny reddit slogans like PutlerPutlerPutler changes that. Which is US/EU propaganda to the point of censoring "enemy" media but weirdly doesn't bother you amirite.
Firstly, I'm not American. I live in Europe. So fail one. Secondly, I'm a Socialist, so fail two. Fuck liberalism, and screw America, but ultimately, that doesn't mean you have to swallow everything the enemies of American push. Oh, and I'm on Lemmy because I haven't touched Reddit in a while. You're the weirdest leftie that is still actively on an enshittified right-wing hell hole and the projection is real crazy. You cannot demand critical analysis from Americans, and fail in it yourself.
Oh, btw, Russia is capitalist, with many, many billionaires. The proletariat are not reaping the benefits of their exploitation.
I live in a world where you can be anti-captalist and not shilling for Russia.
Let's go back to basics though, if you have a source saying something, you have to ask who said it, and whether they have a motive. Russia Today is the Russian state broadcaster. It's a really dreadful source to use to understand a war Russia are currently in. I'd suggest you'd find a less biased source, but not too many of them are pushing Russian propaganda.
I'm really curious. How do you run polling stations, where you have to advertise to the public where they are, and to come there, and protect yourself from drone and missile strikes? I really want to understand how you can run elections where you're being invaded. Can you help me out here? Any examples?
I get really annoyed with Libtards throwing around terms like "tankies" but you're really kind of walking the ball into your own net (football reference) when you're shilling this hard for Russia.
Examples of countries that have had territory invaded that run elections? I asked for examples because I'd love to see real world examples and not fictional examples from inside someone's head...
If like me, you were wondering how this changed anything since they've been doing this for years, then you will find this part of the article to be relevant:
FTA: Martial law and a general mobilization were first declared in Ukraine in February 2022 and have since been extended numerous times.
I made a post on Showerthoughts saying if you are a guy and you are a virgin at 22 years old, you are fucked because most women in their 20s have sexual experience, so if you are a 22-year-old guy, a woman who’s 23, 24, 25, 26, 27, 28, 29, or 30 wouldn’t want to date you because they have sexual experience already.
However, I could be wrong, so do some women with sexual experience date a virgin? If so, why?
Being a virgin doesn’t matter to the vast majority of people. If a woman finds a person attractive, they’re not gonna care if they’re a virgin. If they do, they’re probably pretty judgmental and not worth the time. I’m now 28, I don’t think I’ve heard anyone mention virginity for at least 6 or 7 years.
L'evento dei Black Carpet Awards ci fa porre una domanda spinosa: celebrare la diversità in un evento a parte è un atto di inclusione o di separazione?
Ecco i punti chiave:
1. Il Paradosso della visibilità: da un lato, eventi dedicati sono fondamentali per dare luce e voce a chi, nel mainstream, fatica a emergere. Creano comunità e modelli di riferimento potenti.
2. Il Rischio della ghettizzazione: dall'altro, un evento "collaterale" rischia di confinare la diversità in una nicchia, implicitamente suggerendo che non sia ancora pronta per il palco principale dell'industria.
3. La meta finale: il vero traguardo non è avere palchi paralleli, ma un cambiamento strutturale. Camera Moda e le istituzioni devono integrare la diversità nel cuore degli eventi ufficiali, rendendola la norma e non l'eccezione.
In sintesi: I Black Carpet Awards sono un sintomo necessario di un'industria in transizione, ma ci ricordano che il viaggio verso l'inclusione è completo solo quando la diversità sarà il palcoscenico stesso.
Many experts are forecasting the end of a key provision of election law — enabling Republicans to shore up their advantage in the House, according to a new report.
Ahead of the court’s Oct. 15 rehearing of Louisiana v. Callais — a case that has major implications for the VRA — two voting rights groups are sounding the alarm, warning that eliminating Section 2, a provision that prohibits racial gerrymandering when it dilutes minority voting power, would let Republicans redraw up to 19 House seats to favor the party and crush minority representation in Congress.
Bye bye free and fair elections by the midterms! And people called me crazy for predicting this.
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i did Primerica out of desperation back in the 90's and they made us sit through presentations and videos like this and i resented it.
watching something like it again 30 years later was enjoyable, but only because it was a pleasant trip through memory lane re-seeing the aesthetics and home decor that i realized were prevalent in upper middle class homes back then when i had to travel to do Primerica.
also: i've had to work at a couple of diners during high-school/college and tandmen cooking has been the status quo atleast since the 80's; it's only high end restaurants/diners who don't do this and it's wild to learn that people are still unaware of it.
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They have gotten money from Bill Gates foundation. Still its a pop sci YouTube and does a good job at it. Some say its spreading misinformation or that context is missing. I don't really see malicious intentions. Expecting more of a pop sci publication is kind of absurd; take a real class and study if you want more.
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While not wrong, this is now quite a bit dated. Kurzgesagt acknowledged being called out for it and addressed it via various channels. One of them here:
I feel like propping up the industry primarily responsible for one of the largest (if not the largest) crises in human history is an appropriate place to draw a line.
They've continually called for switching to renewables though, and put out a bunch of videos on how damaging climate change is and will continue to be...
It's definitely not only that. I and, from what I've seen discussed here and elsewhere online, many other people have stopped watching the channel because of many valid reasons completely unrelated to AI. I haven't watched a single one of their videos for years, something changed in their content and I just lost interest. Then there have been several controversial events throughout the years, both objective bad stuff and subjective things that made many loose interest and faith in their integrity. They definitely became one of the many channels that lost it's way because of how big it got. The animations became too "perfect" in a weird way, they lost their personality and they also got scared of having real opinions so they started doing this "all sides" shit and that's when I tapped out. I've tried to watch new videos from them about once every 6 months or so, but I can't even make it past a minute without completely loosing interest.
I mean, I didn’t watch this video because I lost interest when the channel started getting really dark around 2020. I just needed a laugh during the pandemic. I didn’t need 4 videos in a row about the end of the world, then a few about the end of the universe, followed by a future civil war. It was too much.
In that it's mostly a merch ad hidden behind a clickbait title.
So I guess it's a good test for that sort of "just read the headline" response.
It's been a rough few days and I think I may be coming around. What hope is there to parse AI misinformation if people can't parse a Reddit-like link aggregator?
I may be done with this place at this point. It's just all bad. If not the whole Internet, certainly the whole of social media.
Completely agree, their channel has changed a lot and seems to be producing videos on a conveyor belt now, while before they used to do one video or maximum two a month. Now it seems they produce a video a week, and interesting topics are more hard to come by.
When they said that they're "almost 70 full time people and a lot of freelancers on top" I almost did a spit take. I know there are big channels and operations on YT, but this seems such an unreasonable amount of employees for this type of channel and audience. No wonder it feels oversaturated and overdone, they probably feel the need to put more and more videos to keep their huge team and expences afloat.
Just find a sustainable pace and team size, don't go the corporate way of growth over all.
This whole video felt like an advertisement to me. I’d already seen it twice, was it necessary to crosspost it again? You could at least have waited a couple of weeks before reposting the same content.
Their quality going down is probably what’s killing their channel. Every video is a merch ad, and the occasional shilling for the fossil fuel industry probably doesn’t help any.
These things are to be expected when you get bought by private equity, but let’s not be dishonest and say it’s all AI slop that’s killing them.
They are owned by private equity? It's pretty common these days for the more popular YT channels. Veritasium, Astrum, Fireship, fern., and Hoog are some other examples. Basically, if it's a popular YT channel, it's either owned by PE, in negotiations to be acquired by PE, or pursued by a PE firm in the hopes that they can acquire it. Private equity is accelerating their acquisitions, actually, and they want to control everything that captures the attention of viewers.
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Anyone down voting this should be ashamed of themselves.
Like deeply and personally ashamed.
The type of shame that follows them for the rest their lives, because that's how scummy you'd have to be in order downvote someone shining a light on how private equity is buying out major YouTube channels.
Something that I was entirely unaware of, and appreciate your comment regarding.
I get it. They like the channel, and don't want to think that a channel they love could do something they don't love. Or maybe some of them don't see it as a bad thing in the first place.
Me, I'm the opposite. I want to know who owns the media I consume, because I want to know who might be influencing the things I see. It's always better to have the whole truth, even if that truth hurts. It doesn't mean you can't enjoy the channel still, it just means you're better prepared to understand the context of anything that that channel might say. Even cold hard facts with empirical evidence can be propaganda, depending on how it's presented.
I never made myself out to be virtuous, nor do I care about what you think of me. I'm an asshole, and that's fine because I love me exactly how I am and don't need random strangers on the internet for validation. and I certainly don't care about what you think of them making propaganda videos. I wouldn't even still be in this thread if you guys weren't still throwing a tantrum about somebody calling out your precious favorite YouTube channel for their less-than-stellar quality and tendency to pander to billionaires.
I posted my opinion, you got butthurt over it. that's as far as this conversation is ever going to go, because I don't care about you enough to bother arguing it extensively. now why don't you take your sci-fi antisemitic trope of a username and get out of my mentions.
Bringing this general issue up in a thread about Kurzgesagt, without also providing evidence that Kurzgesagt specifically is actually part of that issue, is at best irrelevant and at worst misleading though
I didn't single out any particular YouTube channel for individual scorn. My comment was in reference to that very well sourced video about private equity buying up / investing many YouTube channels, of which they provided sources for in the description of the video.
Look, I'm sorry you got invested in Youtube channels and now feel betrayed, but that's something everyone else already understood: don't blindly trust anyone or any organisation, they can be bought, and will when it's advantageous to do so.
In the meantime, don't shit on people's work without a good reason, or you're doing the work for those who mean to control you.
It's not a matter of betrayal, it was a video revealing another area of influence in society that is now controlled behind the scenes by private equity.
Whose work was I shitting on? I was shaming people who were down voting that very well sourced and informative video, that documented private equity's quiet takeover of major YouTube channels.
Maybe you should review the comment thread and see if you meant to respond to someone else, because that's the most charitable explanation I can come up with for your responses to me.
I mean, I would probably sell the channel myself. That's a lifechanging amount of money. I would buy some land deep in the backcountry, build a little walled village, and invite my family and friends to come live there. Grow our own food, set up some solar panels and wind turbines, buy up plenty of guns and ammo, and see if we couldn't hunker down and live out the ever more likely downfall of the American economy in relative peace.
So basically you would turn yourself in a mini-me version of Zuckenberg, Musk and Bezos. Given this consideration I would reassess my life priorities if I were you
the priority would be the lives of my friends and family. that is a priority that will not change as long as I draw breath, no matter what anyone thinks.
Well, if the societal structure falls there won't be anything left to provide for your friends and family and you'll be left to eat each other in your compound as will the billionaires using their fortunes to build survival bunkers. If that's the way you wanna go, with the leg of your mother as dinner, be my guest. If you, on the other hand, want to have a positive impact on the whole process helping stop this social decline there are much better ways to use your hypothetical money. It's up to you to decide, greed over cooperation or the other way around?
my family and I grow most of our food, and we're part of the local community garden where the small town we live in also grows food that is shared with everyone.
so out of the two of us, I'm pretty sure it'll be you who is starving.
And prayvtell, where do you find your seedlings and your fertilizer? And the tools to be used to work the fields? That's the problem of people like you, you can't see how intertwined it is our life with the rest of the world and you don't know how much it sucks to be living at a subsistence level. But go off with your fantasy, it does cost anything to dream.
Also, I forgot to ask how would you fare in a draught, a hailstorm or a long winter. But these are impossible conditions in your dreamworld I reckon
And prayvtell, where do you find your seedlings and your fertilizer?
well we use the stuff we grow for seeds, we don't buy into the capitalist propaganda that you can't replant things because It'S iLlEgAl. and compost is free and easy to make. also, I'm planning on getting chickens for fertilizer as well, once I build the infrastructure for them. they are great for dealing with insect pests too!
And the tools to be used to work the fields?
my next-door neighbor is a 40-year old dude that took up blacksmithing after he watched one too many YT videos. he made me a knife for last christmas out of a rusty steel cable.
Also, I forgot to ask how would you fare in a draught, a hailstorm or a long winter
I live in the midwest, we deal with those all the time.
dreamworld
a better world is possible, and it's not a dream. get up off your ass and make it with your friends. don't let legality or naysayers tell you something is impossible, that's capitalist propaganda meant to keep you down.
Yes of course, a utopia is waiting for those who are able to grow a crop using a field inside of an apartment.
Dude, you're projecting a reality which could be applied to a very narrow set of people in modern society and in the western world. Imagining a better future is possible and good, but we need to keep it aligned with the actual realities present at this time. Being a bad crop away from death and surviving in a close anarchist encampment can work in a movie like 38 years later, not in real life
it worked for humanity for thousands of years, you pessimistic doomer. you're going to be a wage slave forever, and die unhappy, because you're obviously too afraid to even consider that life could be at all different to the way it is now. you can't even imagine that solidarity and building mutual aid networks could improve your life. what a sad, depressing, incapable, pitiable thing you are. you've got Stockholm syndrome for the system that's going to murder you.
You speak of solidarity after having decided that a possible life changing sum of money would be used to benefit you and the people you decide are worthy of your benevolence. Let me tell you brother, you need to have a look into a vocabulary as soon as possible. And to what the tech overlords are doing with their money. You'll find to be more similar than you think to Bezos and Zuckerberg
Also,he conditions described in your posts are those we had to endure during the middle ages, when citie and villages were tiny nation states and in constant war with eachother to scrap the poor resources we had available at that time, when serfdom was a common occurrence and when people were lucky to live beyond 40 years of age. Not my best pick if I have to choose a future for the whole of humanity.
Lastly you still haven't time how should people living in cities and urban areas live in this futur of yours. Does your crop grow on asphalt and concrete or do you see the problem your "vision" would bring to a huge prt
You talk about,s solidarity afeter having decided that a life-changing sum of money would be used to benefit you and those you deem worthy of yourself. Please pick up a vocabulary and look at the definition of the words you use. Also look at what Bezos and Zuckerberg are doing with their money and how they're building their compounds and you'll find to be closer to them than to an anarchist.
Humanity already went through the conditions you described in your post: it was during the middle ages, when cities were tiny nation states at constant war with eachother to scrap the poor and few resources available, serfdom was pretty common and people were lucky to live past 40 years of age. Not exactly my first choice when it comes to decide how I would like to live my future life.
Lastly I despise the system we live in as much, if not more, than you. But, differently from you, I'm not used to throwing away the baby with the bath water and I prefer to safeguard those advancements wich are truly helpful to humanity such as vaccines, democracy and human rights to cite some of them.
I almost forgot, you still haven't explained how should people living in cities and urban areas survive in this future of yours. Does your crop grow on asphalt and concrete or do you see the problem your "vision" would bring to a huge part of any population?
Keep on dreaming of a 38 years later were you're the protagonist, I'm sure it will help you and everyone else ;)
You talk about,s solidarity afeter having decided that a life-changing sum of money would be used to benefit you and those you deem worthy of yourself.
anarchism is all about mutual association. so yes, anarchist communities would be made of people who agreed to be a community together. this is basic.
Humanity already went through the conditions you described in your post: it was during the middle ages, when cities were tiny nation states at constant war with eachother to scrap the poor and few resources available, serfdom was pretty common and people were lucky to live past 40 years of age. Not exactly my first choice when it comes to decide how I would like to live my future life.
what a first-world mindset. many places in the world still operate like this, you're just so comfortable in your way of life you don't even think about them. I would encourage you to break out of that mindset, and show a little interest in the wide world around you.
I almost forgot, you still haven’t explained how should people living in cities and urban areas survive in this future of yours. Does your crop grow on asphalt and concrete or do you see the problem your “vision” would bring to a huge part of any population?
yes, crops do grow in the cities. many cities are turning to urban farming in order to feed people. singapore is a leader in this, because they have a very large population with very little area for anything, let alone farming food. with not only private citizen-grown farms, but also the worlds first commercial rooftop farming company. and it's not just rooftops, farms are appearing indoors, sometimes taking up entire floors in some skyscrapers. in cities in china, such as chongqing and shenzhen, urban farms and gardens are very common, and shoved into whatever small areas they can be put into. i've seen them in alleys, dead space between buildings, on rooftops, hanging from the ceiling, and even on top of concrete walls in the form of potted crops.
but it's not just asia, places like new york city are also mandating green spaces on top of some skyscrapers as well. those can take the form of parks, or farms, depending on the preferences of the building owners, as long as they are natural plants. furthermore, many residential apartment buildings in places like new york, chicago, and other american cities are seeing rooftop farms appear. in reality, almost everyone can grow some food for themselves, even if all you have is a single small window sill.
you seem to be very ignorant of the world. I would also encourage you to seek out information on green initiatives, and how people in cities are dealing with the problems they face in an urban landscape. there is no doubt that you are speaking on a topic you are woefully unprepared for.
Keep on dreaming of a 38 years later were you’re the protagonist, I’m sure it will help you and everyone else ;)
if the best you can do to argue against me is bring up a fictional zombie apocalypse in which everyone was infected and died, then perhaps it is time to admit you already lost the argument. we're talking about reality here and what is happening right now all across the world, not your fantasy horror worlds.
anarchism is all about mutual association. so yes, anarchist communities would be made of people who agreed to be a community together. this is basic.
Being considered worthy of living in a space you so kindly have cut out of the external world is not association if you still haven't realised that.
what a first-world mindset. many places in the world still operate like this, you’re just so comfortable in your way of life you don’t even think about them. I would encourage you to break out of that mindset, and show a little interest in the wide world around you.
And still I wouldn't want to live like that. Our goal as a specie should be to elevate those living in hellish scenario like the one I described and that you so eagerly wish for all of us. Maybe this hasn't crossed your mind since you must be very young and fairly able bodied, but not everyone is capable of living in conditions where safe drinking water is unavailable and the best health care is relying on the phase of the moon to ingest the medicine cooked up by a wannabe shaman. It's not about being comfortable, it's about making everything better for everybody, for Christ' sake. You want to see millions of people die while you gloat about your helm and your ditch sorrounding it? Go for it, but at least don't call it "solidarity"; call it for what it is: egoism and main character syndrome.
yes, crops do grow in the cities. many cities are turning to urban farming in order to feed people. singapore is a leader in this, because they have a very large population with very little area for anything, let alone farming food. with not only private citizen-grown farms, but also the worlds first commercial rooftop farming company. and it’s not just rooftops, farms are appearing indoors, sometimes taking up entire floors in some skyscrapers. in cities in china, such as chongqing and shenzhen, urban farms and gardens are very common, and shoved into whatever small areas they can be put into. i’ve seen them in alleys, dead space between buildings, on rooftops, hanging from the ceiling, and even on top of concrete walls in the form of potted crops.
but it’s not just asia, places like new york city are also mandating green spaces on top of some skyscrapers as well. those can take the form of parks, or farms, depending on the preferences of the building owners, as long as they are natural plants. furthermore, many residential apartment buildings in places like new york, chicago, and other american cities are seeing rooftop farms appear. in reality, almost everyone can grow some food for themselves, even if all you have is a single small window sill.
you seem to be very ignorant of the world. I would also encourage you to seek out information on green initiatives, and how people in cities are dealing with the problems they face in an urban landscape. there is no doubt that you are speaking on a topic you are woefully unprepared for.
Good luck feeding a city of millions with the fruits of planted pottery. You're gonna need a lot of pottery. Jesus Christ, a proper lot of pottery.
if the best you can do to argue against me is bring up a fictional zombie apocalypse in which everyone was infected and died, then perhaps it is time to admit you already lost the argument. we’re talking about reality here and what is happening right now all across the world, not your fantasy horror worlds.
If the best you can do is responding to a snarky remark I left at the end of my comment thinking that it was the main point I was trying to make while imagining cities where millions of people live able to support themselves with only a couple of trees and tomato plants and completely misunderstanding the meaning of the anarchist mindset I'm afraid we're not having an argument at all, we are displaying the level of delusion you are willing to let yourself live in. Just like those asking for a civil war do not absolutely understand what they're asking for so do you with your call for an uncontrolled fall of the system.
Being considered worthy of living in a space you so kindly have cut out of the external world is not association if you still haven’t realised that.
that exactly is what mutual association is. I suggest you read the AFAQ, because you very clearly do not know anything about anarchism. the freedom of association requires the freedom to disassociate.
as for the rest of your comment, it takes a real special sort of person to look at examples I gave you of cities literally feeding thousands of people through urban farms and go "nah, I can't conceive of that being true, so it isn't". that's MAGA levels of denial. it doesn't matter your opinion or feelings on the matter. it's a real thing, it's happening now, and it's slowly being scaled upwards. snarky bullshit remarks aren't going to change that.
I will be blocking you now. you're not interested in accepting reality, and so our mutual association is no longer mutual, and I'm taking advantage my freedom to cut closed-minded useless people out of my life. live the rest of your sad little life as a slave to capitalism in whatever depressing, dystopian way seems best to you.
Keep on disassociating from someone who is trying to make you think about the result of your actions, that's exactly how grown up people act and that's gonna make associating so much wider when you'll find yourself alone in your fiery outrage. A perfect example of a pizza cutter kind of anarchist, all edge, no point.
You talk about agricultural projects which feed thousands in cities where MILLIONS of people live. You talk about cooperation but you don't consider those who are unable to cooperate due to age, health conditions or any ithe reason. You talk about changing the system but you offer nonviable alternative other than "break it all down and hope for the best". I'm sorry, I can't be bothered with auch juvenile ideas of revolution, they would only bring death and suffering for too many people to be considered viable. I hope you'll grow up sooner rather than later and realise that we can only hope to improve the situation when we will learn everything about the positives of the current system and how we can keep them while discarding everything else.
As for myself I'll be living in this hellish capitalist system as you will until it won't collapse on itself or until I'll die, it rest to be seen what happens first. But I'll be living in it with the clear objective of improving it without needing to kill hundreds of thousands of people during that process, thank you very much
if you wanna just have boards with rusty nails and maybe a baseball bat for defense when trump takes the mask completely off and his raving followers form pogroms to round up people who aren't loyal to him, then I will say something nice in your memory when the time comes.
oh, sorry, I misunderstood your question. Veritasium and Astrum are science channels, Fireship covers programming. fern. and Hoog do what I guess you could call deep dive videos on all sorts of topics. everything from how the North Korean king travels, to how that giant hotel aquarium broke several years ago. it's pretty random with them.
Astrum makes space stuff videos? I dunno, been a while.
Fireship makes videos about programming. Has series about "(Programming language/Framework) explained in 100 seconds", for example. I think people are complaining that the channel is slipping into AI dudebroery.
Hoog is a history/explainer type channel, I think.
Do you have actual evidence for Kurzgesagt being among PE-owned channels, or are you just extrapolating? Because the video you linked doesn't mention them, and a quick search didn't turn up anything about that.
if most of your money comes from billionaires and you admit to making propaganda videos for them, you're owned by private equity. it doesn't matter how much you or they argue about how that isn't technically true because it's not officially on paper.
Like it or not, words have meaning, and black and white thinking is comfortable, but doesn't help anyone. There is still a massive difference between the gates foundation having a 0.5% stake in Kurzgesagt and them being "owned" by PE, and pretending otherwise just means you're not actually interested in any kind of productive discussion.
When you sell your soul to the devil, it’s gone forever. And I never implied I was interested in “productive discussion”. I said what I said because I’ve seen what evidence there is and have made my own conclusions. I never said I was interested in debating.
No wonder veritasium has felt "off" for me for a good while as well. A few years ago I deliberately stopped watching that channel, seems there was a deeper reason behind my superficial reasons and gut feelings
They seem to use the "shotgun" future in Youtube for titles and Thumbnails. Having the a bunch of different titles and and thumbnails and eventually sticking with the combo that drives the most engagement.
Idk about fossil fuels specifically but they been directly being sponsored by big companies and in return making propoganda for them for a few years now.
Profitez des vidéos et de la musique que vous aimez, mettez en ligne des contenus originaux, et partagez-les avec vos amis, vos proches et le monde entier.
I watch that channel for years and i had no idea. I post his answer over the channels answer. Although that is 3 years old, i wonder what is now happening.
They accepted, and continue to accept a great amount of money from the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation. That foundation owns over $11 billion in investments in the fossil fuel industry, including coal-burning utility companies.
In return, there were quite a few videos that Kurzgesagt admits were funded directly by the Foundation, that exaggerate the positive influence corporations owned by the foundation have had. Videos which the CEO of Kurzgesagt has admitted they probably would not have made if the Foundation had not paid for them.
That’s really embarrassing that we as a community have chosen, of all possible creators, to deride Kurzgesagt for taking money from The Gates Foundation. It’s 0.05% of their holdings. ZERO POINT ZERO FIVE. Which, by the way, is down from 6% in the past after public concern — yes, a whopping 6%. Scourge of the earth, locked out of heaven: The Gates Foundation. Those computer nerds strike again. And we choose to punish a great content contributor for that. Shameful display of purity politics.
Yeah. It seems like a ridiculous accusation to make. Bro couldn't even answer the question about example of shilling so they had to pivot into the crime of taking money from a foundation to produce high quality educational content.
They accepted, and continue to accept a great amount of money from the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation. That foundation owns over $11 billion in investments in the fossil fuel industry, including coal-burning utility companies.
In return, there were quite a few videos that Kurzgesagt admits were funded directly by the Foundation, that exaggerate the positive influence corporations owned by the foundation have had. Videos which the CEO of Kurzgesagt has admitted they probably would not have made if the Foundation had not paid for them.
question answered. if you don't want to accept the CEO of Kurzgesagt word that they would not have made the videos if they hadn't been paid to, then that isn't my problem. I'm not here to convince you, and I don't mind if you don't believe him.
I said what I said to voice my own opinion on their channel, I didn't voice it as an indication that I was interested in debating the matter. I've already come to my own conclusions. read their website and their medium, or search up one of the deep dive videos on it if you're really interested. I'm not going to go too far out of my way to convince anyone, since it doesn't really harm me in any way if you believe me or not.
I also didn't say anywhere that you should stop watching their videos. you should, however, know who owns and funds every bit of media you consume, so that you can use that information to be healthily skeptical of things people are telling you, just as you are with me. I still watch fern., even though they are owned by PE, because their videos are high quality and mostly free of bias. but I keep in the back of my mind that they have corporate overlords that might want me to believe one thing or another.
I did a few searches and while I didn't find that quote from Kurzgesagt's CEO, I did find the contribution listed from a decade ago on the Gates foundation website. $570,000 paid out over four years. They also gave NPR $2,000,000 the next year.
Since I didn't find the CEOs quote you've mentioned, I can only question the context around it. Would those videos not have been made because the Gates foundation specifically tied the funding to those videos being created? Or would they not have been made because Kurzgesagt didn't have the money to do so otherwise?
Regardless, Kurzgesagt is a private company and if they wanted to conceal hidden agendas by corporate contributors, they would just keep quiet - not openly acknowledge that they made content with money given to them by some larger organisation.
If we're going to denounce any group of people that are connected via Bacon's Law to a disastrous corporate industry, the moral high ground will be unachievable for the entirety of our species.
The Hated One did a video some years ago on the matter, if you're curious then search it up because they list all their sources for everything including the quote from the CEO.
I never told anyone to be outraged by it. You just got outraged because I criticized a channel you presumably like. I've literally said several times in this thread alone that I watch channels owned by PE.
I don’t really do online fights anymore. I check in on Lemmy twice a week max for a maybe a few minutes tops. I’d suggest getting involved with your local community as a great way to channel your energy rather than reply 5m after I posted a new comment. Take care ✌🏻
the CEO of Kurzgesagt word that they would not have made the videos if they hadn’t been paid to
This on its own proves nothing bad. Some videos just require a bigger budget to make and can't be made on their otherwise limited budget. Or the topic is just lower priority due to writer interests. If they were forced into covering specific topics then that's a different story, but I haven't seen any evidence that was the case.
Does any of that matter in this situation, anyway? Exaggerating their content in exchange for money already places question on their reliability as an educational content creator.
Hint: the investment of $11 billion refers to investment of Gates Foundation in fossil fuels.
Well, considering these exact words were used:
That foundation owns over $11 billion in investments in the fossil fuel industry, including coal-burning utility companies.
What can I say but duh. If I misunderstood anything, it was the comment I replied to, which was unclear about the "0.05% down from 6%" detail, and seemed to be associating that with the $11 billion figure by context.
But hey, nice deflection, and super cool of you to be that rude about it, too.
yes, there is also some other sponsorships, including some from other bill gates owned groups/corporations. I don't think support from billionaires is necessarily good as long as it's diverse.
I'm trying to think of their 'fossil fuel shilling' video and only videos that come to mind are where they say we're too entrenched in the fossil fuel industry to make a switch to renewable overnight. It's just not realistic.
And other than fuel, there are hundreds, if not thousands, of products made from petroleum. Approximately 85% of petroleum is made into fuel. Rest is used to make things like pharma products, paint, pesticides, polymers etc.
even people who needs to use petrolatum(aka protroleum) comes from it, for thier dry skin, plus it used in many topical medications. topical ointment medication is more potent than the cream forms.
The problem is when the contributors influence what the videos say, in contradiction to data.
Kurzgesagt's video on +2° / +3° / +4° over the global mean isn't going to be so bad video was conspicuous to me, and is in fact, based on fossil-fuel industry rhetoric, rather than climatology estimations (which tell us over +1.5° is going to fuck us, and is).
It's allegedly a documentary, not fiction. It should make sense from beginning to end.
Sounds like you feel the need to defend Kurzgesagt for sentimental reasons, and since they're presenting themselves as a source for accurate information, that just won't do.
They link all their sources. So regardless of where their funding comes from I'd rather have a good source of information instead of a non-existent perfect source.
for context, our buddy null here got banned from c/leftymemes because he just kept spamming "ok tankie" to everyone. what he doesn't know is that I'm banned from .ML and Hexbear, and run an anti-tankie comm, so him saying this to me is very amusing and I'm thinking of adopting him.
It’s important to have a coalition of support and so I won’t single anyone out, hence I used the word “we”. I have to assume others share their opinion about Kurz. But the larger point is that this is classic left infighting and, ironically, it stalls actual progress. Before we can be good at something, we have to be bad at something.
I don't care if it's 80% or 0.8%. if you take money from billionaires to produce specific videos for them as propaganda, then that is shilling for them. there isn't any way you can spin that to make it not true, but I'm sure you'll do your very liberal best.
that's not how i read it at all. no misinformation here.
see, the fact they took money to publish critical misinformation about climate change is not a joke. it should take more than an "i'm sowwy" to fix their reputation.
I'm unsure we are talking about the same comment. The misinformation is the claim the Gates foundation is continuing to fund Kurzgesagt, when that clearly isn't the case. This incorrect information is veiled by beginning the statement with the truth of the 2015 grant.
Insofar as the reputational damage Kurzgesagt has incurred, I'm not sure there's much meat on that bone. Sure, you might believe they have fallen from grace or some such, but as I pointed out in another comment here, we can't just connect everything under the sun and say 'group A is bad because groups B through Y are all next to one another and with group Z doing all those injustices, group A is complicit in those crimes'.
To me, the question of whether Kurzgesagt is a Gates mouthpiece is pretty cut and dry. A few reasons for this, but the most glaring is simply that the money didn't keep coming, and it wasn't much money to begin with. I wouldn't be going out of my way to talk up my employer to clients if my last bonus was a decade ago and didn't even cover my rent for the month I got it.
Secondly, if you take money from billionaires to make propaganda videos for them, then you’re owned by them. You sell your soul to the devil, you can’t undo it later because you get called out for it.
The video gives an elaborate description on their evaluation of "AI" and it's influence on the Internet at large. And then they conclude with "we'll continue like before" directly contradicting the title.
Feels disingenuous. And ironic after they talked about their extensive investments into fact checking.
The channel hat always been disingenuous. It's not the first video they have where they develop a well written essay that has conclusions that make no sense with the information presented. It's the theater of research without any of the substance. The editors just do whatever they want, under the expectations that the writing team will support their preconceived notion.
They're an entertainment channel, not a science communication channel. They have said some awful, totally not fact supported stuff in the past.
Climate change whitewashing for corporations with awful conflicts of interest. Others have posted the links to the videos elsewhere in this comment section.
As far as science channels go, you've got SpaceTime for college students, Veritasium for high schoolers, and Kurzgesagt for newborn infants or maybe a smart dog. It's probably at about the right level if you want to explain science to an Australian Shepherd.
Yea, nah, it absolutely is. They often sneak in bad information and poorly interpreted data to fearmonger (see their nuclear power "educational" videos where they instill fear) and other such things. They're just like some other science channels. Like veritasium, which shilled out for Waymo. Just because the animations are very very nice doesn't mean you shouldn't confirm the information they present, and quite often it's wrong on purpose to butter up the right people. If you don't believe me, that's okay. They're not dangerous like pseudoscience channels. Most things they present are good. I just hate that they mix in BS.
You're using a lot of weasel words and zero sources for someone arguing we should all fact check things.
I'm not even saying your wrong, but your going to have to do a lot more than that to convince me that "they're known for" everything you just said, because that sounds like you have a very specific beef with them that overshadows everything else they've ever done (in your estimation) and your projecting that as a universal truth, when really it's not.
I respect your opinion, but there are certainly far more worse channels than there are better ones, and they're known for being one of the better ones.
That + entertainment over information quality. I'm not here to convince anybody, my goal was to make y'all think twice about just blindly trusting theor videos. They're the Linus Tech Tips of the science channel world.
Right so you say everyone should source all their work but then claim very specific things about the channel and then refuse to provide sources.
Interesting.
But I guess as long as you're not here to try and convince anyone that what you're saying is true it's okay for you to just say anything regardless of validity. That's very political of you, well done.
I literally never said everyone should source all their work. You're reading between the lines. What I said is that SOME science channels sneak in misinformation and shilling in their videos which are otherwise educational and most of the time very accurate.
The video gives an elaborate description on their evaluation of “AI” and it’s influence on the Internet at large. And then they conclude with “we’ll continue like before” directly contradicting the title.
You missed the entire point of the video.
The claims are simple:
in order to make this type of videos, they need to be able to reliable fact check
data on the internet is increasingly polluted by AI slop, making it harder to distinguish fact from slop
for now, they have no choice but to continue while being extra vigilant... but eventually, if things do not change, they will be unable to perform
It's the exact same situation about climate change... we need to act now, most of us will suffer otherwise but for now we continue on living while trying to adjust where we can (recycling, reusing, less/no meat, etc) even if we know that will not be enough long term.
Not the guy you're answering to, but I kind of agree with him, the point is fuzzy and the title is clickbaity. With sucha title I expected they would present numbers and figures.
well, it may be a matter of context and tolerance here but I find the concept they are presenting is axiomatic and as such would not require any further explanation:
They use the internet to research their videos... the internet is getting more and more polluted with false narratives... ergo, it is becoming harder to research for their videos. Without good source, there are no videos.
If I tell you plants need water to exist but each season brings less and less rain year after year... would you say a title such as "drought is killing the plants" clickbaity?
I assumed they don't do their research using random crap on "the internet", but reliable experts, peer reviewed papers and such. No specific claims about topics, funding, time or anything. And again, no numbers, so hard to argue objectively.
I assumed they don’t do their research using random crap on “the internet”, but reliable experts, peer reviewed papers and such
Yes, that is what they claim. But I am sure you have seen how hard it is now to find something even if you know exactly what you are looking for. It's not like there are 2 libraries online for anything you need, right? You start researching about topic A and read that Dr XYZ did a study on this so you look for that study... just to find out Dr XYZ does not and has never existed.
No specific claims about topics, funding, time or anything. And again, no numbers, so hard to argue objectively.
So you want a specific number as to how many bad sources they are now forcing to discard because they turned out to be AI slop?
Those metrics aren't any more trustworthy than their own subjective word anyway. If they wanted to say they took more time then they could delay at their whim anyway. If they said their production costs increased, then again, they could spend the money to fit the narrative. On those particular points objective evidence is so susceptible to being gamed that it isn't really more valuable than their subjective reporting.
Numbers of subscribers/views could be a bit more informative, but then people inclined to disbelieve would claim it's because of any number of other reasons not because of AI slop.
Killing in this case sounds like the content is becoming harder and harder to create, which they lay out the subjective case for, but that wouldn't be exactly something they could use figures to present, since it's so subjective.
The one point they might have been able to show with numbers would be the emergence of AI slop 'infotainment animations' diluting the audience, but that wasn't exactly the biggest point of the video and it might be a bit early to be able to demonstrate statistically credible evidence on that one.
Also, presuming they are sincere and put in all that effort, they are competing with other sources that have no such discipline and they are able to flood the field and grab eyeballs faster than they could.
Propagating feel-goodism about climate change while taking money from the Bill&Melinda Gates Foundation and saying that eventually climate change will be solved by technology, whitewashing carbon capture technologies and overselling their potential, taking money from Templeton Foundation when making videos about consciousness, using the "Israel fighting Hamas" narrative in a 2025 video regarding wars...
I didn't say they have to like it, that would be silly.
I'm criticising them for making an incorrect statement, being corrected on it, then acting extremely proud of being ignorant of the facts, and committing to not informing themselves.
They have been doing this animation style since 2013.
Why do you think they use AI?
I think your AI senses are broken, you see AI everywhere where there is not. You're like the extreme opposite of AI Tech Bro. Like you have paranoid AI-phobia or something.
I watched this with my son last night. Quite enjoyed it. I find the cadences of the narrator's voice oddly soothing, although ironically it sounds very like an AI voice.
I mean there's been some controversy surrounding a number of their videos. Some were under fire for poor research or demonstrating a singular, not widely-held view on certain topics. And I think for one video they were accused of plagiarism iirc. This was when it was still somewhat early days for the channel, haven't followed them since so not sure what the state is now.
In the video you're literally commenting on they explain how they fact check their videos and how they work with professionals in the field at matter.
You can always complain that something wasn't as good as you personally wanted it to be but that may very well be bias. The people making the accusations may have a bias. All we can do is take the totality of their output and cast judgement on that.
The point was that they haven't always held themselves up to those standards and have sometimes only used professionals espousing a single viewpoint (where multiple exist).
I should mention this isn't bias, iirc the channel did release a video apologizing for some of the issues (though not all), so it wasn't even up to their own standards by their own admission.
Looking things up now, I see that the plagiarism case was slightly different: they had published a video on addiction, which was fairly explosive in its claims. Turns out it was citing basically just one fringe researcher who was also accused of plagiarism. The claims did not seem to hold up to scrutiny.
When another channel doing a series on how pop-sci influencers can sometimes spread misinformed ideas asked some questions to Kurzgesagt, they were immediately a bit apprehensive but agreed to do some interview questions, though with the caveat that they were busy with other things and needed a few weeks before it could take place. Then before the interview took place they suddenly put out their own apology video and took the addiction video down. At no point was it mentioned that another channel prompted this action, it was presented as some kind of inward reflection that they had come to themselves.
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You can't really call it slop just because you disagree with their views and representations of things.
Their stuff is carefully researched and sourced, human crafted and open to critique. Whether they're correct in their assessments or not is of course up for debate, but it's good craftsmanship and they show their work.
Eh, there's a lot of blending of conjecture, opinion and fact all presented as truth, and their handling of mistakes could be better - they've openly said if they consider a mistake to be minor then they don't even issue a correction or update.
I personally think that attitude towards production pushes it towards slop, as for things like entertainment one of the key defining things that separate slop from quality media is passion, but if you don't care about making accurate content then are you any better than just getting AI to write a script?
A huge blocklist of manually curated sites that contain AI generated imagery for uBlock Origin & uBlacklist. - laylavish/uBlockOrigin-HUGE-AI-Blocklist
A huge blocklist of manually curated sites that contain AI generated imagery for uBlock Origin & uBlacklist. - laylavish/uBlockOrigin-HUGE-AI-Blocklist
Then other day I was trying to find out how to get just one AD account not to sync through to Azure without disabling it. And the AI came up with this complicated instruction set that didn't work and was totally made up from nowhere. Now what on earth was the point in doing that?
At one point it told me I had to triple click on something. Because that's totally a thing.
It's so fun when it's so specific about some detail with casual confidence that is based on absolutely nothing at all. I know ultimately it's architecture is more akin to a predictive word generator, but it seems so much better.
Saw a clear demonstration and it is wild that the output is consistent, but at least in the model I saw being run, every word is generated without it having considered what the word after would be or what the general concept it is going for. For a human one has to already know the concept before he/she starts putting words to it, but at least the models I've seen explained with detail, it manages to assemble it word by word without knowing where it is trying to go in advance.
I get the frustration, but it does actually cost money to make content, especially high effort content like this.
Add on top of that the fact that the people involved need to be able to eat, have a home, provide for their families, have a life.
People would complain if they were sponsored by some shitty VPN provider or the like, and also complain about them trying to sell merch. I certainly wouldn't work for free, so I don't see why they should have to.
It's not really that hard to do a couple of key presses to skip ahead, either. It's what I do.
I dont think its AI Slop thats "killing the channel" if that statement is even remotely true its due to more and more of their videos being slop sci low information videos. The target audience must be stoners who want to watch something that is visually appealing and feels educational
terrible animations, and its worst than other "education science channels" the least they could do is use actual footage or pictures of the things hes discussing.
Honestly, it isn't the AI so much as it is the suspension that rules that apply to us should also apply to AI. They are barely legal companies getting away with murder due to the residual power of a corrupt empire in decline.
Much the same as blockchain - it could have been exciting and fun, but it was immediately put to work to exploit people, and in the end that's what the tools effectively were.
Yeah, and if it weren't for the techbro nonsense, it would be tossed onto the pile of mathematical curios that don't have nontrivial uses.
The thing is - we often do find uses for those curiosities years later.
In the mean time, I wouldn't mind if a decentralized video game came along where game assets were decentralized, distributed by bittorrent, and player assets were decentralized and tracked by blockchain.
You'd be surprised how valuable these technologies can be when they're not only being developed to create new financialized services to overcharge people for. Manufacturing and shipping has huge capital and logistic buffers created by information gaps, production shortfalls, fraud, etcetera, and cryptographic ledgers are excellent for ensuring accurate production and inventory information is relayed to clients in realtime. What's more, it has the potential to mediate international transactions without relying on Swift or global banking institutions that are an extension of US authority.
Notice how nothing I said was about fucking NFTs. The western financial system completely lost the plot doing super cocaine and became convinced they could just ask the rest of the world to stay slaves forever. They don't even care about its potential! They want TrumpCoin.
Kurzgesagt is annoyingly techno-solutionist but now that they are a big target of AI slop (their artistic style being heavily copied), they complain. That's good I guess.
If you actually watch the video that's not what they're talking about. They are talking about how it's difficult to fact check information in a world of AI misinformation.
I always find it's easier to know what a video is about if I actually watched the video. It's just this little life hack I've come up with.
Watch the video? Duh. Thanks I watched it, and I know they don’t talk about how AI steals their art style (even though it’s really happening). I just pointed out the irony. The video also says they are usually enthusiastic about new tech but not this time.
I know this channel well enough to have seen countless videos praising fake tech like carbon capture and that’s why I have a problem with them. Am I allowed to have an opinion?
You are allowed to have an opinion but when it's a stupid opinion expect to be ridiculed for it.
Carbon capture is an actual technology it's real and it works. There's not a lot of it about yet but there's also not a lot of fusion reactors yet but they're also real technology.
What is the problem with techno-solutionism? Is it just that under capitalism techno-solutionism often results in corruption? Is the development of lemmy not techno-solutionism (to the enshittification of reddit)?
Tangential, but thats what disgusted me about the Osaka world expo. The theme was sustainability so you had fossil fuel companies presenting wildly impractical "solutions" and art projects. The message was "things are under control, continue sleepwalking into oblivion"
There's nothing helpful about giving up though is there.
And we could stop climate change, it's entirely possible, presumably people don't want to die so they will take action but they probably not going to start to act until climate change becomes more apparent, that's depressing but that's human nature. Humans have a long history of making radical changes at the last minute, e.g the cold war.
We like to go right up to the cliff edge but we tend not to take the final step.
After all even China is cleaning up its act and they're the least likely to be cooperative so if even they're doing something about it there's hope.
“with effort, we can solve climate change, or minimise its effects.”
The issue is not the claim that with effort we maybe can minimise the effects, it's the techno-utopia angle. We will solve this by changing nothing about the underlying economic system driving climate change, but Bill Gates and other smart billionaires will make some fantastic technology that will save us!
We will not solve it, it's way too late for that. Still, every 0.01°C additional warming counts. People not born yet will suffer more from everything we don't do now. So, rolling on our backs and giving up is not helping at all. Going vegan is a easy first step to make a difference. Start blowing up pipelines after that. 😀
Large YouTube channels usually try different titles and thumbnails during the first few hours after upload, so the title OP posted was probably accurate at the time of posting.
La settima puntata di Matrimonio a Prima Vista 15 — in onda su Real Time mercoledì 15 ottobre 2025 in prima serata — riunisce per la prima volta le tre coppie. La reunion accende vecchie ruggini e nuovi equilibri: se Roberta Murano e Luca Merlo proseguono spediti, Dario Del Vecchio e Roberta Bordonaro sembrano arrivati al capolinea. Ma i momenti più duri sono, ancora una volta, quelli tra Melissa Cicciari e Matteo Conca.
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Gallego confronted Johnson, demanding to know why Grijalva's swearing-in had been delayed, and if the delay was connected with the release of the Epstein files.
“This has nothing to do with Epstein," Johnson shot back, adding that Gallego was being "absurd."
Arizona Senate Democrats Mark Kelly and Ruben Gallego clashed with Speaker Mike Johnson in the hallways of the Capitol on Wednesday, over the swearing-in of Rep.-elect Adelita Grijalva.
The IRS is sending mass furlough notices to employees and shuttering most of its operations, now that a government shutdown has extended beyond its initial contingency plan.
The agency posted on its website Wednesday morning that, “due to the lapse in appropriations, most IRS operations are closed.”
The IRS, which is preparing for next year’s filing season, kept all its employees on the job for the first five business days of the shutdown. Its contingency plans, however, didn’t specify what would happen if a lapse in funding extended beyond Oct. 7.
According to the agency, an “IRS-wide furlough” began Wednesday, “for everyone except already-identified excepted and exempt employees.”
It’s not clear which employees will keep working at this point. The IRS hasn’t posted an updated contingency plan yet.
Another edition of LinuxDays took place in Prague last weekend – the country’s largest Linux event drawing more than 1200 attendees and as every yearm we had a Fedora booth there – this time we also representing CentOS.
I was really glad that Tomáš Hrčka helped me staff the booth. I’m focused on the desktop part of Fedora and don’t follow the rest of the project in such detail. As a member […]
that's for sure and especially so that the american gov't is now controlling who can and cannot join the linux kernel developer's group; it's easy to see them expend a tiny bit more energy to add people to the watch list
A group of conservative donors spent hundreds of thousands of dollars to develop a rightwing version of late-night talkshows like the Tonight Show and the Late Show, leaked documents reveal, in a further indication of the right’s ongoing efforts to overhaul American culture.
News of the effort to pump conservative viewpoints into the mainstream comes as entertainment shows and the media at large are under severe threat in the US. In September, Jimmy Kimmel’s late-night show was taken off the air, under pressure from the Trump administration, after Kimmel’s comments after the killing of Charlie Kirk, while Donald Trump has launched multiple lawsuits against TV networks and news organizations.
Four pilot episodes, each of which has been watched by the Guardian, were made of the rightwing chatshow. It was promoted by the Ziklag group, a secretive Christian nationalist organization, which aims to reshape culture to match its version of Christianity. In an email in 2022, Ziklag – which ProPublica reported spent $12m to elect Trump last year – urged its members to stump up money for the project, called the Talk Show With Eric Metaxas.
Republicans have been eager to challenge mail-in ballots, with Donald Trump centering it in his attacks on the electoral process. Mike Bost, a Republican representative from Illinois, filed the suit to argue that the Illinois law allowing ballots to be counted up to two weeks after election day if they are postmarked by the deadline unconstitutionally allows an extension of the election period.
Lower courts threw Bost’s suit out, ruling that the conservative congressman in his fifth term did not suffer an injury and had no standing to sue. The appeal argues that the cost of staffing a campaign past election day is a financial injury giving him sufficient standing to challenge the law.
Mass mobilizations have been a feature of Claudia Sheinbaum’s first year presiding over Mexico, and to finish her first “accountability” tour of Mexico and mark one year of governance, she had her biggest yet. More than 400,000 people came out to watch her speak for nearly an hour on Sunday, October 5, reflecting on her and the party’s achievements in the first year of her term, and the continued “fourth transformation” of Mexico.
In recent weeks, Sheinbaum has visited all 31 states of Mexico, outlining her administration’s current projects, plans and results in each state.
The communication strategy of MORENA, the governing party, is very front-facing, with both Sheinbaum and her predecessor Andrés Manuel López Obrador hosting daily press conferences from Monday to Friday, and then generally traveling to one or two parts of Mexico over the weekend. This has proven extremely effective in countering the narratives from the large press corporations that own and operate the majority of Mexican media outlets, as well as of course maintaining closer communication and accountability with the people of Mexico.
Sheinbaum has faced significant challenges in her first year, most notably due to relations with the administration of US President Donald Trump, with problems ranging from tariff threats even to members of his administration suggesting unilateral military intervention against Mexico. While Trump has threatened Mexico with tariffs at every turn, Sheinbaum’s firm but open stance has proved effective in negotiations with Trump and today the country has managed to achieve important exceptions to the aggressive tariff regime.
Sheinbaum arrives at one year in charge with historic levels of approval, depending on the poll you choose your approval rate is somewhere between 72% and 79%. While other countries around the world aren’t as comprehensive in approval polls as Mexico, this likely makes Sheinbaum the most popular leader in the world.
So, how did she get to that level of popularity and what are her challenges in maintaining or growing it? Here are some of the points mentioned by Sheinbaum in her speech and the highlights from her first year governing Mexico.
Reiterating economic achievements
Sheinbaum began by reiterating some of the economic achievements, both that MORENA has accomplished since 2018, and some of the present moment.Between 2018 and 2014, 13.5 million Mexican, Mexico is now the second least unequal country in the Americas, behind only Canada, and the income gap between the richest and poorest was reduced from 27 to 14 times over.Annual inflation has settled at 3.7% percent, unemployment is at 2.7%, a record level of foreign direct investment was reached and annual economic growth is expected at 1.2%.
Sheinbaum’s initiatives from her first 12 months.
Sheinbaum created three new social programs. One is Salud Casa por Casa, a door-to-door free healthcare system for the elderly, where healthcare professionals come into their home for regular check ups. Another is Pensión Mujeres Bienestar, which gives women their pension from 60 years of age, rather than 65, to recognize unpaid work in the home. The final is Beca “Rita Cetina”, which is a universal scholarship for all secondary students in public schools, this is a payment every two months of 1900 pesos (USD 103) to cover schooling costs.The constitutional recognition of several rights, such as the right for women to live lives free from violence, the right of access to the internet, the right of access to housing, the right to social programs and more.Mexico has served more than 86,000 deported Mexicans who have been deported from the US in special comprehensive care centers, under a program called ‘Mexico embraces you”. This includes registering them into Mexicans social security systems to assist them with access to housing, employment and transportation to their area of origin, as well as food and shelter in the meantime.Sheinbaum said the “4T is bringing back the trains”, with many rail projects underway, after they were previously privatized in the late 90s. These make up more than 3000kms of railway across the country, including two trains from Mexico City, to Pacucha and Queretaro respectively, and further expansion of the Interoceanic train, which is a key part of Mexico’s attempt to create an alternative trade corridor to the Panama Canal.Sheinbaum emphasized the administration’s goal to “promote equality and the recognition and just development of women in Mexico.” The current government has created The Secretariat for Women as an official government ministry, opened a national support line for women, has opened the first 678 free centers for women that focus on comprehensive care for women, but the administration is aiming to build 2,500 in total. The government is also aiming to build 1,000 early education and childcare centers, which will provide free childcare to children from 40 to 1,000 days old.Sheinbaum has also made access to water a key feature of her first year in charge. About four billion cubic meters of water have been de-privatized, a new agricultural irrigation technology program is being developed across 13 states, and there are 20 new strategic drinking water and sanitation projects.The Sheinbaum administration will build 1.7 million homes, 400,000 of those for Mexicans without social security, and the rest with accessible loan offers for those who earn less than two minimum wages.Another key feature of her first year in charge has been more scientific investment and projects, with funding for scientific research projects increasing by 193%. These include the production of an electric car, a project for Mexico to make its own semiconductors, the production of observation satellites and more.
Security
A challenge moving forward for Sheinbaum will be continuing to manage the security situations, although her early strategies have proved effective.
52% of Mexicans rank insecurity and drug trafficking as the most important issue affecting the country, and 63% of Mexicans living in urban areas consider it unsafe to live in their city. This figure rose from the previous year, but in fairness, levels were historically low before.
Sheinbaum and Omar Garcia Harfuch, her secretary of security, have taken a different approach to security than AMLO had. Sheinbaum and Garcia Harfuch also worked together when Sheinbaum was the mayor of Mexico City, and homicides dropped 50% in the six years they worked together.
The results have been swift, with Sheinbaum reporting a 32% reduction in homicides over her first year. Between September 2024 and July 2025, there was an average of 64.9 homicides per day. While these numbers are stark, it is a marked improvement from the 98.5 per day that Mexico was experiencing in 2018, when MORENA first came to power.
In 2007, before Felipe Calderon’s aggressive, US-backed security strategy, Mexico was experiencing 24.3 daily homicides.
Mexico also recently managed to get the United States to sign an agreement to attempt to limit the inflow of weapons from the US into Mexico. This is a huge point for Mexican security as even the US itself has recognized that 74% of weapons used by organized crime groups in Mexico arrive illegally from the United States.
However, Mexican political commentator and editor of Mexico Decoded, Viri Rios makes the point that this agreement focuses only on increased border surveillance and inspection, and misses the core problem of dangerous weapons being too easily acquired and severely unregulated in the US.
In theory, the US agreeing to this new policy will give them more accountability for the guns that continue to arrive in Mexico.
Early results are extremely promising, but Sheinbaum’s grapple with security and US relations will be critical moving forward.
Tallis Boerne Marcusis an Australian journalist currently based in Mexico City.
probably the best politician that this world has ever seen and i was surprised at how much american propaganda that i had unknowingly swallowed over the decades about mexican politics until i forced myself to learn about her.
the people of the united states could learn A LOT about mexico because it too was ruled by a two-party duopoly for almost century; just like the united states is right now; but the mexicans have managed to vote 3rd party and it's making their lives better meanwhile the americans can't get past the culture wars that keep the democrat-republican duopoly in charge.
you're behind the times; publications like the guardian and the new york times have labeled her efforts to overhaul the legal system to remove the united states' control over it as "authoritarian" almost a year ago.
Assuming good faith, I guess this is about the hypocrisy of everyone acting extremely morally righteous when it comes to the sexual exploitation of animals and then tolerating, accepting and celebrating all other forms of exploitation of animals. I really hope it is not going the other way around.
In dairy, cattle are sexually exploited. Cows must be preggers to give milk, so they wank a bull to get his semen, then a farmer will inject that semen into a cow while holding her cervix with his hand up her arse. Then when she gives birth, the calf will either become a milker like her mum, or become veal if he's a boy.
But we don't talk about that. It's only wrong if you stick your peepee into a cow.
Not true at all, they've been able to make cows produce milk with artificial hormones for decades now, which is also why veal isn't as widely available as it used to be
To be fair, I read it correctly the first time and didn't occur to me that it could be interpreted in any other way until I went into the comment section.
There's not a single news story on google news landing page or the front page of reddit. I don't think anyone who isn't directly impacted really gives a shit.
For as long as 55-year-old Hopi Chairman Tim Nuvangyaoma has been alive, high-voltage power lines have cut across Hopi lands in northeast Arizona, carrying vast amounts of power long distances throughout the Southwest.
But residents of the Hopi Reservation have never been connected to that grid. Instead, tribal members have relied on a single power line that runs roughly 30 miles east and west across high desert punctuated by three distinctive mesas, home to 12 distinct villages, including some of the oldest inhabited communities in the United States.
Those who live more than a mile away from that line — nearly 3,000 people — have no access to electricity. Families need to rely on generators to power everything from refrigerators to medical devices.
The rest of the reservation is connected to the grid, but the power is unreliable and outages can sometimes last days.
"If you have a power surge or any kind of power outage, you're definitely going to lose that power to that equipment that somebody's life might be reliant on," Nuvangyaoma says.
The tribe thought those days without reliable electricity were about to change.
Nicole Kidman amplia la sua già ricca filmografia televisiva con Discretion, nuova serie Paramount+ prodotta da A24 e ispirata a un’idea originale della scrittrice Chandler Baker. Accanto a lei, nel cast e in produzione, ci sarà Elle Fanning. Un progetto che conferma la centralità dell’attrice australiana sul piccolo schermo dopo titoli come Big Little Lies, Nine Perfect Strangers e The Perfect Couple.
Shortly after flour disappeared from the market in November 2023, it began to circulate again in the sacks originally intended for distribution by UNRWA. This sudden appearance was the result of an act of mass looting by crowds of hungry people, which we only heard about afterward: they had stormed the UNRWA warehouses, some breaking down the doors while others scaled the walls, and emptied them of their supplies—not only flour, but also tinned sardines, corn oil, milk powder, and dried lentils and chickpeas—in a matter of minutes. Apparently, they’d even taken wooden desks, shelves, and the agency’s archives—all of which could be used as firewood. I bought a sack of looted UNRWA flour for more than four times the usual price and made my way home as if bearing priceless treasure. My wife Ula and her sisters were jubilant, and we were all seized by a dark joy amid the wasteland of fear and grief that grows vaster and more desolate by the day as the war continues to escalate. We felt momentarily comfortable and safe; we could bake our own bread now, instead of waiting under the hot sun for hours in the uncertain hope of finding some at the bakery. But another problem stood in our path: to turn the thin rounds of dough into bread we needed an oven, and all we had in the apartment was a gas canister that barely sufficed to cook our regular meals. We would have to find some other way.
Mud ovens, which are what rural Gazan families have always used for cooking and baking, are dotted across the green patches that lie between the apartment blocks in Hamad City. The women they belong to are generous and volunteer their help when other families turn up needing to bake something, only asking them to bring enough paper and cardboard for fuel. But we didn’t have any paper or cardboard in the house—only my books.
Ula looked at me timidly. “Let’s use one or two for now, and when the war’s over you can replace them,” she said, as gently as she could. “The kids need food more than they need to be read to.” The ugliness of it was devastating. In all the years I’d spent amassing my modest library, it had never occurred to me that I might one day have to weigh a book against a piece of bread for my children. I was stunned by the cruelty of the choice, paralyzed by the question it raised: How had things gotten this bad, this fast?
Ultimo appuntamento per Lezioni di Mafie: Nicola Gratteri, Procuratore Capo di Napoli, torna mercoledì 8 ottobre 2025 in prima serata su La7 con “Camorra Social Club”, un viaggio che parte dai vicoli di Napoli e arriva fino al carcere minorile di Nisida. Al suo fianco Antonio Nicaso e Paolo Di Giannantonio per illuminare come la criminalità organizzata campana si sia evoluta nell’era digitale, sfruttando social network e nuove tecnologie per promuoversi, reclutare e cercare consenso.
Ultima puntata di Lezioni di Mafie, anticipazioni 8 ottobre 2025: “Camorra Social Club”. Gratteri con Nicaso e Di Giannantonio analizza camorra e social.
This isn't news, nor is it politics. But given networks' actual competition these days, tech seemed a safe home to share.
To: Bari Weiss
RE: Good luck, babe!
I honestly cannot believe you’ve willingly decided to go into the worst kind of job that exists: management at a dying company.
Managing sucks! It sucks even when you like the people you’re managing and it’s a low-stress position! And I’m sure I don’t have to tell you: running CBS News is not a low-stress position. You are going to get blamed by everyone above you for decisions that are made by people below you, and you are going to get blamed by people below you for the decisions that are made by people above you. You’re also going to get blamed for your own decisions, just for kicks. You have elected to take a job where the primary purpose is for you to eat shit and own the death of broadcast TV news, a thing that is going to die no matter what you do. Nice work!
This is the glass cliff to end all glass cliffs. You’re Marissa Mayer at Yahoo without the Googler street cred. You’re Nancy Dubuc at Vice without the string of hit TV shows. You’re Linda Yaccarino at Twitter without the advertiser relationships. You have been hired as a sop to a Trump administration that is actively hostile to the actual free press, and you will be made to oversee wave after wave of layoffs until you quit or get fired and the entire news division is shut down in a final spasm of cost-cutting after the next inescapable media merger.
This is a pretty brutal assessment of the state of the media ecosystem.
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The song "Ween el Malayeen," in English "Where are the Millions" was written by the Libyan poet Ali alKilani during the First Intifada (~1987 - 1993). He wanted it to be in classical Arabic with well-known words that could be understood all across West Asia and North Africa. It was aimed at the leaders of these nations to condemn and question their silence on the Palesinian cause. Their silence, as we all know, has only gotten worse since then due to continued Western imperialism, Zionist divide-and-rule tactics, and US regime change operations.
Omar alJaffori, the composer and melodist, intended for the song to be performed by three singers from different West Asian and North African countries, symbolizing borderless unity and solidarity.
These are the three female singers we see here:
Sawsan Hamami from Tunisia, Julia Boutros from Lebanon, of a Christian background, and Amal Arafa from Syria
The song itself references verses from the Qur'an, specifically Surah Al-Fil (The Elephant). The verses recount the story of Abrahah's Abyssinian army attacking Makkah to destroy the Ka'bah using war elephants, but flocks of birds carrying stones of baked clay came and defeated the invaders.
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adhocfungus
in reply to dual_sport_dork 🐧🗡️ • • •Pot of Greed