Geek Stuff category archive
The New Gilded Age, It’s All about the Algorithm Dept. 0
At the San Francisco Chronicle, Amos Toh describes how exploitation of workers is baked into the snaring economy. He starts by recounting the experience of one person who drives for Lyft, but doesn’t stop there. A nugget:
(snip)
Algorithms that dispatch jobs to gig workers and manage how they are paid can be gamified in ways that compromise their livelihoods and well-being.
Exploitation is exploitation, be it empowered by whip or by algorithm.
Geeking Out 0
I do loves me my wallpaper collection.
Once, a long time ago, I visited that site.
Oh, by the way, that’s Mageia v. 8 with the Fluxbox window manager. Xclock is in the upper right, GKrellM in the lower right.
No Place To Hide from the Dragnet 0
The EFF reports on a California court’s decision to disallow evidence from a “geofence” warrant.* The report also discusses Google’s procedure for responding to such warrants and notes that this is one of several rulings questioning such warrants.
Here’s one bit from the article; follow the link to read the rest.
Me, I keep “location services” turned off on my phone unless I have a positive need, which is almost never, because I know how to read a map. Remember maps?
________________________
*Briefly, a geofence warrant is issued to the corporate surveillance state–all those companies that track the location of our phones or other devices so they can “improve your online experience”–to find out who was in the vicinity of a crime. The police then go through the list to pick out and pursue possible suspects.
Facebook Frolics 0
There is a larger moral here, larger than that Facebook is a ginormous kludge.
- Don’t log into third party sites using your Google, Facebook, or other password.
- Create a unique password for every site.
If you are worried about keeping track of all those passwords, use KeepassXC. It’s local, meaning the data remains on your computer, not in the cloud on somebody else’s computer; the databases are portable, meaning that, if you update the database on one machine, you just have to copy the updated database to your other machines; and, if you are an Android user, it’s compatible with KeepassDroid.
I’ve used it through several iterations (it started as KeepassX, which is no longer maintained) for nearly a decade now; it’s the bee’s knees and the cat’s meow.
The Disinformation Superhighway, Fatted Pig Dept. 0
Cezary Podkul offers guidelines to avoid falling prey to an on-line “Pig Butchering” con. Here’s the opening of his article; follow the link for a detailed analysis of how the scam is worked:
“Pig butchering,” as the technique is known — the phrase alludes to the practice of fattening a hog before slaughter — originated in China, then went global during the pandemic.
Via the Progressive Populist.
(Broken link fixed.)
The Crypto Con Artists 0
Beware of the shills. For example (much more at the link):
(snip(
“The federal securities laws are clear that any celebrity or other individual who promotes a crypto asset security must disclose the nature, source, and amount of compensation they received in exchange for the promotion,” Gurbir Grewal, director of the SEC’s division of enforcement, said in a prepared statement.
Geeking Out 0
Visiting LQ in a VirtualBox VM of Slackware –Current with the Blackbox window manager on Mageia v. 8 with the Fluxbox window manager.
As an aside, Fluxbox is based on Blackbox, but, in my opinion, more versatile. Fluxbox has been my preferred GUI for years.
Geeking Out 0
Yet another screenshot of Mageia v. 8 (I’ve come to really like Mageia) with Fluxbox (which I’ve like for a long, long time). Again, the wallpaper is from my collection.
Geeking Out 0
Listening to The Mill Mystery with VLC on Ubuntu MATE under the Fluxbox window manager. The wallpaper is from my collection.
No Place To Hide 0
Some good news from Bruce Schneir.
Personally, I keep the GPS (Google calls it “location services” turned off on my Android devices unless I have a positive need for it, which is almost never. That means trackers can know my general location, sure, but they don’t know whether I’m in the drug store or the hardware store.
In Translation . . . . 0
. . . which is why, when we needed a new stove and dishwasher earlier this year, I told the salesman, “I don’t want any ‘smart’ appliances. Google doesn’t need to know when I turn on a burner . . . .”
Afterthought:
Yes, they both decided to fail on the same week, but they had served us well for many years.
(Broken link fixed.)
A Pile Up On the Disinformation Superhighway
0
SFGate’s Katie Dowd details the destruction.
Geeking Out 0
VirtualBox virtual machine of Slackware –Current with the Plasma Desktop on Mageia v. 8 with the Fluxbox window manager.
