Five years ago, Google’s climate action ambitions were the gold standard for Big Tech. Then, with power demand spikes from AI data centres, in July it scrubbed its sustainability website of its 2030 net zero pledge.
I'm sure there's a lot of discussion about age-verification laws around here right now and for the sake of keeping things on topic I won't really broach the subject here, but it has gotten me thinking that there really isn't much that can be programmatica
I'm sure there's a lot of discussion about age-verification laws around here right now and for the sake of keeping things on topic I won't really broach the subject here, but it has gotten me thinking that there really isn't much that can be programmatically marked as adult content on the fediverse.
I haven't dived too much into researching the subject, it looks like Lemmy lets you set posts as NSFW, but most activity is centered around microblogging and that appears to have coalesced around Mastodon's approach of freeform content warnings. This seems like a disaster in the making if "don't show adult content to minors" becomes something that has to be more strictly enforced; these content warnings can be used for everything from benign spoiler warnings to very obviously signposting sexually explicit fetish content. Computers can't really understand this level of nuance unless you throw something that does natural language processing at it, and that will almost certainly come up with a lot of false positives and wasted energy in the process; I can't imagine this going over well with anyone really.
So, I've been wondering, how difficult would it be to standardize a separate mature-content warning from the content warnings currently in place? This idea has clearly been floated before (see this issue on Mastodon's GitHub and this blog post written by someone who was a minor and directly affected by this issue at the time) but I haven't actually seen any work towards anything beyond paying lip service to the subject. Maybe it could be a boolean toggle, like how the former Cohost did it (on top of content warnings) or something closer to how Bluesky does it where you have a few set moderation labels that you can apply yourself (see below).
We could also consider moving this distinction beyond posts; the Mastodon issue that I linked above also mentioned applying this to users and even entire instances.
There are a few caveats here in that people historically don't really appreciate being hidden/deboosted for posting adult works, and there is the potential for backlash if something gets marked as adult when it really isn't. I'm not entirely sure how this could be addressed beyond leaving this to implementers and maybe leaving some strong advice to be understanding and not shove people in a corner because they draw kink art for example.
I'd definitely appreciate more thoughts on the subject, please let me know what you think.
As adult instances are becoming more popular and their reach through the fediverse grows, content on those instances are making their way into the lives of those who are not wanting to see it or ar...
essentially a Note (or other object ) can have many labels associated with it, and these labels would exist as part of well known vocabularies, such that software can give users better choice over what they see and don't see.
Yes, that does mean software may provide methods of complying with age verification laws may mean certain categories of content are unavailable without some form of age verification (but that's between you, your server software, and you instance administrator as to what that is). Currently there are some tools for instance administrators, particularly of mastodon to completely filter certain content from their servers, making their servers somewhat explicitly child-friendly.
This would also allow for third-party labellers in the future if needed (through annotations), which allow for bluesky style labellers which can catch content not self-labelled.
I want to stress that the goal of content labels is not to moderate the adult content nor queerness from the fediverse, but rather to give creators and consumers of content more control over what they publish and who sees it or what they see.
It is unfortunate and terrible the way that age verification is being rolled out as a means to censorship and authoritarianism, and these laws should be fought in the courts and politically to be repealed or changed. Adults must be able to exist on the internet, not everything is for children.
Issues currently within scope of this workstream are: #1 #4 (issue locked, but where discussion started) #84 There will be future issues for both our recommendation regarding content warnings and a...
Sorprendentemente, appena qualche ora di sonno e qualche ora di scrittura magica un pochino avanti e indietro più tardi, e ho effettivamente trovato una soluzione al problema problemoso delle prestazioni imbarazzanti di Love2D caricato di una tale OOP che non gira affatto bene su una viemmina come quella di Lua… e, anche se come previsto […]
The Department of Justice attempted to do damage control after conservative political activist James O'Keefe released a video of a staffer claiming the government would "redact every Republican" from files about sex offender Jeffrey Epstein.
By Vijay Prashad on September 4, 2025 At eighty, the United Nations is bogged down by structural limitations and political divisions that render it powerless to act decisively – nowhere more clearl…
I have a book in my Kobo library that I want to put in Calibre. When I try to download it on my computer or phone, all that downloads is a URLLink.acsm file. Anyone know what's going on?
There is also a Calibre plugin that's supposed to deal with .ascm files. I've never managed to get it to work personally but maybe someone else will have more luck.
The developer behind Revolution Wind, a large — and nearly complete — wind farm near Massachusetts and Rhode Island, is suing to overturn the Trump administration's stop-work order.
The right-wing think tank behind Project 2025 is now crafting new policy suggestions, including an incentive for married couples to have more children, according to a report.
Following its controversial 900-page blueprint for President Donald Trump’s second term, the Heritage Foundation is now drafting a new position paper that includes calls for a “Manhattan Project to restore the nuclear family,” referring to the program to develop the first nuclear weapons, the Washington Post reported.
The forthcoming paper, titled “We Must Save the American Family,” reportedly urges the government to pour funds into individual families rather than child care programs, like Head Start, according to the Post.
The Heritage Foundation is also urging the president to issue orders that require all proposed policies to “measure their positive or negative impacts on marriage and family.” If a program scores poorly, it should be revamped, according to the Post.
“For family policy to succeed, old orthodoxies must be re-examined and innovative approaches embraced, but more than that, we need to mobilize a nation to meet this moment,” the paper reportedly reads.
What could possibly spook The Heritage Foundation of all groups to make this tiny leftward shift just a few years after their big evil strategy was released? They’re still an evil organization, but they’re that last group I’d expect to say the government needs to spend more money on more people.
Unauthorized TLS certificates were issued for 1.1.1.1 by a Certification Authority without permission from Cloudflare. These rogue certificates have now been revoked. Read our blog to see how this could affect you.
3 out of 4 of the Palestinian detainees from Gaza held without trial as "unlawful combatants" by Israel are civilians, according to data from a classified Israeli military database.
Disclaimer: The article linked is from a single source with a single perspective. Make sure to cross-check information against multiple sources to get a comprehensive view on the situation.
Jessica Montell, director of the Israeli human rights group HaMoked, said Israel's "unlawful combatants" law "has been used to facilitate the forced disappearance of hundreds and even thousands of people."
Three weeks ago, Hamas agreed to a U.S.-Israeli-drafted ceasefire, but its offer was ignored. Now, the movement says it will accept a comprehensive deal in a renewed bid to end the genocide.
Disclaimer: The article linked is from a single source with a single perspective. Make sure to cross-check information against multiple sources to get a comprehensive view on the situation.
"Instead of catching real criminals and terrorists, we are arresting pensioners and disabled people calling for the saving of children's lives," said one Metropolitan Police officer.
"Instead of catching real criminals and terrorists, we are arresting pensioners and disabled people calling for the saving of children's lives," said one Metropolitan Police officer.
As a court in Fort Myers, Florida prepares to address the legal rights of immigrants detained at "Alligator Alcatraz," Homeland Security Secretary Kristi Noem announces a new prison in Louisiana to house arrested migrants. Will the notorious Angola facility perpetuate the abuse and repression seen at Alligator Alcatraz?
VeganPizza69 Ⓥ
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