pleroma.debian.social

jlines | @jlines@pleroma.debian.social

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jlines jlines
re: Olimex order arrived, safely and quickly 😃
@olimex some people (=Advertising executives) ask 'how can this Fediverse thing survive without Advertising' - but companies which provide a good service should not need to pay someone to say they are great - their customers will do it for them. Being present in places where their customers hang up will allow them to let people know about new things they are doing, with a good chance that they will be informing interested people.

jlines jlines
Olimex order arrived, safely and quickly 😃

My order of two Pioneer Freedombox systems, one for home, and one to lend to friends so they can try it, arrived. The order was put in yesterday, and I am in the UK, and we are in the Christmas period. Excellent service from @olimex and DHL (who don’t have a Fediverse presence.)

Sandra Sandra@idiomdrottning.org

Bookmarking this one:

https://skepticalscience.com/rebutting-33-false-claims-about-solar-wind-ev-introduction.html

john john@social.paladyn.org
@Sandra Good find, and glad I can follow them on the Fediverse @SkepticalScience - people/groups communicating good science need to be on the fediverse, where I hope the people interested in reality will hang out, as well as on platforms like Twitter - the Climate Change Sceptics echo chamber.

jlines jlines
@wouter @auschwitzmuseum Unfortunately when a group of people start to see members of another group not as people but as things then they no longer think of it as a crime. From their point of view this was more like the records a pest control officer would keep, an achievement, not a cause of shame. We should all be wary of the trap of simplifying and dehumanising. All (immigrants/police/jews/arabs/republicans/democrats/blacks/whites/straights/gays....) are evil/good.

jlines jlines
@mike @jdp23 @rwg I see one of the biggest problems with current social media is that the algorithms keep showing readers more of what they like to see, but rather like issues of highly processed foods, it is not always a good thing to be fed only what you like.

jlines jlines

@mike @rwg @jdp23 I see Flipboard and similar as being able to add value as content aggregators, similar to the way the BBC has ‘The Papers‘ articles on its website. Flipboard, by working with publishers, hence filtering out unreliable sources, could give access to a spectrum of views on, say Electric cars.

jlines jlines
@mnot @1br0wn sometimes I am so tempted to tap someone on the shoulder and say 'I am so sorry your piles are painful' or whatever personal thing they are discussing, or comment on a film or restaurant they have mentioned.

jlines jlines
@rwg @jdp23 @mike Very much agree on the running their own servers - while appreciating Flipboard's promotion of the Fediverse. Flipboard, and Facebook, Twitter etc flatten the name space, removing useful clues for the reader about the real source. If something appears on a monolithic site, which appears to be from something like a source you trust, you could easily be misled. The reader is expected to trust the platform, not the source.

jlines jlines
@Paulatics you certainly came across better, I felt slightly sorry for Marc, as it is hard to be the man on the ground stuck with defending an indefensible position. Canada would benefit from looking at the European Union @EUCommission which appears to be demonstrating world leadership in this space.

jlines jlines

@cwebber I have been an XMPP fan for ages, and find it really frustrating that due to networking effects (of the social kind) everyone non technical is hooked on WhatsApp and how good and useful it is (and it is, I use it, but reluctantly), when the concept of Instant Messaging is good and useful. I am very concerned about Who pays for WhatsApp . People assume the WhatsApp fairy.

jlines jlines
re: The problem of proving 'real' identity

I have written more on The Proof of Identity Problem on my blog

jlines jlines
The problem of proving 'real' identity

As the world becomes more digital increasing numbers of organisations want us to “prove” that we are who we claim to be. There is a fundamental problem there, in that, in a digital world, if I give organisation X the proof that I am some particular person, there exists the possibility that someone will use this same information to “prove” to organisation Y that they are me.

jlines jlines

@lcamtuf I was looking for steganographic software within Debian, and came across snowdrop, and although it did not meet my needs I appreciated the diversion into vacuum tubes and banknotes

jlines jlines
@stefano there are many good things about cloud technology, but clouds do not *have* to be remote and run by some external cloud provider. There are also advantages for privacy and security about putting more thought into where data should be, which need not be the same place for all data. Also a more local cache, fetched in advance from a central location would allow things to proceed in the event of a comms issue.

jlines jlines
@jwildeboer @EUCommission I have been following them for some time. Although I am not an EU citizen they often demonstrate understanding of areas such as software freedom and the need for social media platforms which are not controlled by giant commercial entities. I wish more government level entities had the same level of awareness.

jlines jlines
re: Another reason to dislike WhatsApp

@john as well as concerns about Who pays for WhatsApp

jlines jlines
Monitoring for mail delivery problems

After an issue where a large mail provider stopped accepting mail from my default outgoing mail server (detected by my wife, who sends more mail than I do) I decided I had better know if this happens again, and have written it up as Monitoring for email delivery problems in case it is useful to someone else.

jlines jlines
RFC 9518 - Centralization, Decentralization, and Internet Standards

RFC 9518 is another thoughtful document from Mark Nottingham @mnot regarding the balance of Centralization and Decentralization in standards. I would add Network Time to that, were I not writing from Oxford (famous for Oxford Time) and https://xkcd.com/2867

jlines jlines
Federated attacker/trust information
I am pondering the use of ActivityPub for distributing information about bad actors on the internet. Something like a fail2ban action which would publish on securitybot@social.examplle.com a structured message carrying the meaning "192.168.12.7 has just blocked 10.1.99.5 for SSH bad password attempts". It could follow, for example securitybot@social.example.net etc, and so on and decide to add possible attackers to its own blocklists.

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