Posts by prh99

It's not just Big Tech: The UK's Online Safety Act applies across the board

Unless they have some connection to the UK outside of some users or they have similar laws in their home country they're probably not going to bother. The trend is saying your law applies globally, in practice that's not the case unless you're multinational. The UK government will probably end up having to block them if they don't comply.

They tried to pass a similar law in California with the backing of Baroness Kidron and it got struck down. So Ofcom can sit and spin here when it comes to small forums.

Brit watchdog probes Google's search, ads empire

I switched to Duckduckgo after they rolled out that AI nonsense. It's pretty clear ads not quality results are their focus.

Europe hopes Trump trumps Biden's plan for US to play AI gatekeeper

There is no data sharing agreement, well not one that will survive a challenge. There is no political will in congress or the whitehouse to reform the NSA much less form a court able to review data collected for EU citizens.

Re: No limit for the Netherlands but for EU?

My guess would be restrictions on previously unrestricted countries if they don't pay attention to who they sell to. Other guess it's going to suck being AI startup... well if you want Nvidia, AMD, Intel(I guess) AI chips.

yeah, I meant members too close to China. Probably should have included that.

Re: No limit for the Netherlands but for EU?

They didn't ban the EU, just certain members.

Let me guess which EU members are restricted, the ones with leaders a little too friendly with Putin. Hungary, Slovakia, and Bulgaria.

Edit: Oh yeah, of course China as well.

Microsoft tests 45% M365 price hikes in Asia-Pacific to see how much you enjoy AI

Well I am glad I am not dependent on Microsoft Office for anything. Don't really want Clippy 2.0 and definitely don't want to pay more to have it forced on me. I assume the price hike is coming one way or another.

Apple auto-opts everyone into having their photos analyzed by AI for landmarks

AI just needs to die.

Are you better value for money than AI?

Yes, please commit corporate suicide by replacing talent with over hyped dumb as a brick AI.

Europe signs off on €10.6B IRIS² satellite broadband deal

You could have been doing that before, creating EU jobs with defense contractors. Instead, spent 25 years of decreasing military budgets until Russia's wake up call. EU defense contractors are unwilling to invest without procurement contracts. Of course Merkel just had to jump in bed with Russia for cheap gas

https://www.iiss.org/online-analysis/survival-online/2023/06/the-guns-of-europe-defence-industrial-challenges-in-a-time-of-war/

Yeah, I don't understand relying so much on one nation to swoop in and help either. As for Ukraine, Trump will basically gets his way cause the EU is unprepared and will have a hard time filling the void if he ends support.

Your air fryer might be snitching on you to China

Why on earth would anyone connect an air fryer to the internet or connect it to an App? People really that lazy they can't stand to set the temperature and cooking time on their fryer even though they're standing right there after putting food in? Sad..just sad.

US lawmakers dig into FCC's $900M Starlink snub in wake of Hurricane Helene

Of course he is, Comer would investigate road kill if he though he could turn it into political hackery or benefit one of Trump's lackeys.

US Army drafts AI to combat recruitment shortfall

I understand why they wouldn't want to do cold calls. I spent months after my 18th just abruptly hanging up on them and telling them to f*ck off when they called back. Apparently no, regardless of how harshly expressed, is something they're not prepared to accept.

As for recruiting, not really surprising young people don't want to play solider. They get abused in basic training and spend a couple years defending the interests of a government and its allies that show time and again the contempt with which they regard the average American.

No way? Big Tech's 'lucrative surveillance' of everyone is terrible for privacy, freedom

Congress is too corrupt to do anything about it. Law enforcement loves it cause they get to bypass those peaky warrant requirements. Congress had the chance, but decided to just restrict data brokers from selling to China etc instead.

Europe to force Apple to help rivals connect to iOS, iPadOS

Re: Cunning plan.

I was talking exclusively about OP's hypothetical where the EU comes up with a list of things Apple can't do anything about and fining them. It wouldn't take a terribly long list of 10% fines to cancel that 94 billion out.

Re: Cunning plan.

I don't think Apple would stick around long if the EU went that far. They're in the market cause they see opportunity for profit, if that were no longer possible (like getting fined for things they can't do or aren't possible) their share holders would demand a swift exit.

Firefox 130 lands with a yawn, but 131 beta teases a long-awaited feature

They probably could, but most Linux distros have opted to get you on the new version not long after you install it. Personally I run updates when I first boot and occasionally before I shutdown. Especially if it's a kernel or browser update.

Yelp accuses Google of being a local search bully in antitrust lawsuit

Pretty sure Yelp is just garbage, but whatever.

US indicts duo over alleged Swatting spree that targeted elected officials

Swatting wouldn't be such a serious problem if cops weren't more often than not violent thugs who's first instinct is kill. They know swatting is an issue, but do next to nothing mitigate potential harm.

TikTok isn't protected by Section 230 in 10-year-old’s ‘blackout challenge’ death

That's what CPS is for. A 10 year old left to browse TikTok unrestricted and unsupervised. If TikTok is liable for promoting the video the parents should be liable for negligence.

Yet another court inventing a section 230 exception.

The supreme court also said in various cases that it's free speech when a site or service picks what content they will allow...moderation, arguably a form of curation. So by this logic a site is liable if they moderate? A situation 230 was enacted to prevent (undoing the Prodigy decision).

The internet isn't safe kids and parents need to parent not use TikTok etc as a babysitter.

Microsoft resurrects Windows Recall for upcoming preview

Re: > Better find a different OS

It would be a good excuse to get them again for being a monopoly.

Better find a different OS to access all your sensitive accounts and information with cause this is just a catastrophe waiting to happen. Hopefully you can at least turn it off for now.

Game not over: Epic brings Fortnite back to iOS in Europe, using its own app store

I didn't say it was wrong, just that I don't understand how they can stand it.

It's stupid in the sense they didn't have to do it. They could have filed suit and skipped being kicked out of app stores globally for several years. As for lower prices, game studio (especially the triple A ones) are just going to add the additional revenue to their bottom line. Epic has been operating their PC store for several years and as far as I can tell prices aren't any cheaper than Steam etc. Maybe that will be different on mobile, but I won't hold my breath. Competition might encourage lowering the stores take, but there is zero incentive for publishers unless consumer balk at their prices, it's just more money for them.

I will never understand how people can stand to play games like fortnite on a phone. It would have been less had they skipped the stupid publicity stunt.

Chrome Web Store warns end is nigh for uBlock Origin

Re: Its over i tell ya its over :)

I knew about the opt-out ad stuff in 128 (i believe) so that wasn't a surprise. I didn't get the studies opt-in reticked when I updated, but I am use Mint so maybe they intervened? No idea.

Sounds like a good reason to ditch Chrome for Firefox or other browsers that aren't breaking ad blockers for the benefit of Google's ad monopoly.

Linux Mint 22 'Wilma' still the Bedrock choice for moving off Windows

*without

NVidia's open source kernel driver which cuts off some legacy GPUs. Hopefully they get it where you can still use the proprietary ones if you want with kernel panics.

Kaspersky says Uncle Sam snubbed proposal to open up its code for third-party review

Re: Umm, why does he need US Government approval ?

Why would they want to help a Russian software company at all? Especially with the war in Ukraine and Russia targeting western companies etc.

Chinese Gen AI researchers snagged more patents than everyone else combined since 2013

Need to find a new metric

Shocker, an organization devoted to intellectual property laws likes horse racing countries by patents granted in a given field (AI being the field dejour).

Patents as metric for innovations has a lot of problem. For one it's antithetical to the concept and there is little evidence connecting the two, and when companies cease to innovate it's not uncommon to use it's patent portfolio to hold back others or worse sell them patent trolls. Or take Oracle (not exactly innovating on anything except pumping licensees for more money), one of the first thing they did after acquiring Sun was their patents to sue Google over Android and compare that to Tesla in 2015 when Musk basically said their patents were free to use.

Who knows how many of these patents will be useful going forward.

Julian Assange to go free in guilty plea deal with US

Re: Bait and switch

In theory the federal judge could reject the plea deal and sentence him to something up to the maximum. Though that judge is going to piss off a lot of people by doing so, including the DOJ. Biden would then have to pardon him or commute the sentence to what he has already served.

Australian billionaire wins right to sue Facebook in the US over scam ads

"If Forrest can show the law does not apply outside the US, Big Tech's advertising operations will have quite a challenge to consider."

It doesn't apply outside the U.S, but it does apply in U.S courts where he has now file a lawsuit. If his argument is that U.S courts should claim jurisdiction over the actions of U.S headquartered multinationals outside the U.S but not apply U.S law, he's going to have a hard time.

Even then Section 230 maybe irrelevant depending on how the ads were generated.

EU attempt to sneak through new encryption-eroding law slammed by Signal, politicians

The road to hell is paved with good intentions (though I doubt theirs are all good).

Chinese electric car brands zapped by price surge as EU cranks tariffs

Re: Because the last thing we want is the Chinese government subsidising the green transition.

Cheap Chinese EVs aren't going to save the planet, especially since China is burning more coal than ever. EVs are part of it but not the only one.

Re: Because the last thing we want is the Chinese government subsidising the green transition.

You can do a green transition fast if you don't care about anything else. Should we just let China use cheap (possibly free) labor and state subsidies to under cut everyone else for EV's etc. You really want to shed those jobs and be beholden to CCP?

Defiant Microsoft pushes ahead with controversial Recall – tho as an opt-in

Give it a couple years, it will be a live feed

of everything you do and see on your Windows computer, straight to Microsoft's datacenters.

New York Times source code leaks online via 4chan

An anonymous 4chan poster was responsible for the "Gigaleak" leaks from Nintendo, so could very well be.

Windows 11 tries to escape Windows 10's shadow with AI muscle

That's funny, it's the AI stuff I am trying to avoid....Along with all the ads and data collection.

Was there no one at Microsoft who looked at Recall and said: This really, really sucks

Even if the screenshots etc stay local, at least for now, I would not be surprised if it was still generating data Microsoft can use for it's AI or ad targeting etc.

Even if people did say it sucks, I doubt the higher ups would listen. Surveillance capitalism is the name of the game now.

The end is nigh for Windows 10 21H2

If 11 was just 10 with some interface tweaks and ridiculous hardware requirements I could probably begrudgingly use it until I got use to it. The account requirement, connecting to ad networks right out of the box, more ads in the UI, and Microsoft cracking down on customization tools like the ones Stardock sells have really put me off.

I am happy with Mint and don't see myself going back.

Palantir's CEO calls 'woke' a 'central risk to Palantir, America and the world'

Woke just means something conservatives don't like.

They don't like a lot of things, like basic human rights, free speech, and especially anyone who isn't a straight white male Christian.

Microsoft really does not want Windows 11 running on ancient PCs

Re: Alternative

You can certainly use it as a PC with a dock.

That's not true for every game, and a substantial and growing list of games run just fine.

Re: Alternative

SKSE isn't perfect with proton and takes a little messing around but it does work. I don't know what you think is special about hooking an executable, but SKSE is inserting its self into the process memory for Skyrim through DLL injection. Wine and Proton basically use a re-implementation of the Window API etc for Linux along with various other trickery to make it seem like Windows to the application.

Re: Alternative

I don't know about business software (some claim Office 365 can be made to work under Linux but never tried myself) but Wine and Proton are very good for gaming on Linux.

US Chamber of Commerce to sue FTC for banning noncompetes in most jobs

They already are illegal in California, home to several of the world's most valuable companies. Elsewhere fast food workers are under noncompete contracts. It sounds like the case of businesses needing these is limited and frequently abused. It's not like they have zero recourse if a former employee does share trade secrets etc.