On March 14, 2025, a Mozilla root certificate used for add-ons verification will expire, potentially disabling extensions like NoScript or breaking features such as the Security Slider on Tor Browser versions older than 13.5.11 legacy.
13 March 1901 | A German, Hermann Bartel, was born in Siegmanten. A decorator.
In #Auschwitz from 6 December 1941. No. 23760 He perished in the camp on 2 March 1942. One of at least 77 prisoners registered as homosexuals. 43 of them perished.
My theory of the "shitty technology adoption curve" holds that you can predict the future impact of abusive technologies on you by observing the way these are deployed against people who have less social power than you:
If you'd like an essay-formatted version of this thread to read or share, here's a link to it on pluralistic.net, my surveillance-free, ad-free, tracker-free blog:
* Thousands of Records, Including PII, Exposed Online in Healthcare Marketplace Connecting Facilities and Nurses Data Leak websiteplanet.com/news/eshyft-… (h/t Hacker News)
Learn about the critical database vulnerability reported by cybersecurity expert Jeremiah Fowler concerning ESHYFT's extensive network of healthcare professionals and facilities across 29 states.
The Llama King writes "America Online tells the Houston Chronicle's TechBlog that, despite a recent Slashdot posting to the contrary, AOL Instant Messenger's terms of service do not imply that the company has the right to use private IM communication…
My last nationally bestselling novel was "The Bezzle," an ice-cold revenge story of high-tech finance crime starring the forensic accountant Martin Hench.
New York Times bestseller Cory Doctorow's The Bezzle is a high stakes thriller where the lives of the hundreds of thousands of inmates in California’s pris...
My ebooks and audiobooks (from Tor Books, Head of Zeus, McSweeneys, Beacon, Verso and others) are for sale all over the net, but I sell 'em too, and when you buy 'em from me, I earn twice as much and you get books with no DRM and no license "agreements."
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I get to chat with one of my favorite writers about his new book, "Picks and Shovels", as well as what it's like to invent a word that absolutely nails the current zeitgeist with "enshittification".
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Canadians who visit US for more than 30 days will be #fingerprinted - theguardian.com/world/2025/mar… "New requirement hardens enforcement of existing law that hasn’t been applied consistently to Canadians entering the United States" #canada
The image shows an illustration of a stick figure with a patch over his eye kneeling in front of a potted plant. Above the figure is text that begins with "to you, my champion" and ends with "why did I let my party convince me to go here". The text is in a handwritten font and appears to be a blessing or incantation, but with parenthetical asides revealing the speaker's true feelings.
Judge To Trump: No, You Can’t Just Declare ‘Off With Their Heads’ To Political Enemies - techdirt.com/2025/03/13/judge-… "Generally speaking, if a judge says this to you, your client is unlikely to succeed in their case" #trump
Generally speaking, if a judge says this to you, your client is unlikely to succeed in their case: “This may be amusing in ‘Alice in Wonderland’ where the Queen of Hearts yells …
‘Wake-up call’: #Measles cases doubled in Europe last year, say WHO and Unicef - theguardian.com/society/2025/m… "Joint analysis of measles cases reveals Covid pandemic resulted in misinformation and vaccination delays" needs sorting fast
My theory of the "shitty technology adoption curve" holds that you can predict the future impact of abusive technologies on you by observing the way these are deployed against people who have less social power than you:
If you'd like an essay-formatted version of this thread to read or share, here's a link to it on pluralistic.net, my surveillance-free, ad-free, tracker-free blog:
When you have a new, abusive technology, you can't just aim it at rich, powerful people, because when *they* complain, they get results. To successfully deploy that abusive tech, you need to work your way up the privilege gradient, starting with people with *no* power, like prisoners, refugees, and mental patients. This starts the process of normalization, even as it sands down some of the technology's rough edges against their tender bodies.
Once that's done, you can move on to people with more social power - immigrants, blue collar workers, school children. Step by step, you normalize and smooth out the abusive tech, until you can apply it to everyone - even rich and powerful people. Think of the deployment of CCTV, facial recognition, location tracking, and web surveillance.
All this means that blue collar workers are the pioneering early adopters of the bossware that will shortly be tormenting their white-collar colleagues elsewhere in the business. It's as William Gibson prophesied: "The future is here, it's just not evenly distributed" (it's pooled up thick and noxious around the ankles of blue-collar workers, refugees, mental patients, etc).
Nowhere is this rule more salient than in Big Tech firms.
Tech has thoroughly segregated workforces. Delivery drivers, customer service reps, data-labelers, warehouse workers and other "green badge," low-status workers are the testing ground for their employer's own disciplinary technology, which monitors them down to the keystroke, eye-movement, and pee break. Meanwhile, the "blue badge" white-collar coders get stock options, gourmet cafeterias, free massages, day care and complimentary egg-freezing so they can delay fertility. 5/
Companies like Google not only use separate entrance for their different classes of workers - they stagger their shifts so that the elite workers don't even *see* their lower-status counterparts.
Importantly, almost *none* of these workers - whether low-status or high - are unionized. Tech union density is so thin, it's almost nonexistent.
It's easy to see why elite tech workers wouldn't bother with unionizing: with such fantastic wages and so many perks, why endure the tedium of meetings and memos? But then there's the rest of the workers, who are subjected to endless "electronic whipping" by bossware and who take home wages that look like pocket change when compared to the tech division's compensation. These workers have every reason to unionize, living as they do in the dystopian future of labor.
At Amazon warehouses, workers are injured at three times the rate of warehouse workers at competing firms. They are penalized for "time off task" (like taking a piss break). They are made to stand in long, humiliating body-search lines when they go on- and off-shift, hours every week, without compensation. Variations on this theme play out in other blue-collar sectors of the Amazon empire, like Amazon delivery drivers and Whole Food shelf-stockers.
Those workers have every reason to unionize, and they have done their damndest, but Amazon has defeated worker union drives, again and again. How does Amazon win these battles? Simple: they cheat. They illegally fire union organizers:
They spend millions on anti-union tech, spying on workers and creating "heatmaps" that let them direct their anti-union efforts to specific stores and facilities:
A new investigation by Northwestern University's Teke Wiggin draws on worker interviews and FOIA requests to the NLRB to assemble a first-of-its-kind catalog of Amazon's labor-disciplining, union-busting tactics:
Disciplining labor and busting unions go hand in hand. It's a simple equation: the harder it is for your workers to form a union, the worse you can treat them without facing labor reprisals, because individual workers' options are limited to a) quitting or b) sucking it up, while unionized workers can grieve, sue, and strike.
At the core of Amazon's labor discipline technology is "algorithmic management," which is exactly what it sounds like: replacing middle managers with software that counts your keystrokes, watches your eyeballs, or applies a virtual caliper to some other metric to decide whether you're a good worker or a rotten apple:
Automation theory describes two poles of workplace automation: centaurs (in which workers are assisted by technology) and "reverse-centaurs" (in which workers provide assistance to technology):
Amazon is a reverse-centaurism pioneer. Take the delivery drivers whose every maneuver, eyeball movement, and turn signal is analyzed and inevitably, found wanting, as workers seek to satisfy impossible quotas that can't even be met if you pee in a bottle instead of taking toilet breaks:
Some of these workers are fitted with haptic wristbands that buzz to tell them they're being too slow at picking up an item and dropping it into a box, pushing them to faster, joint-destroying paces that account for Amazon's enduring position as the most worker-maiming warehouse employer in the nation:
In his paper, Wiggin does important work connecting these "electronic whips" to Amazon's arsenal of traditional union-busting weapons, like "captive audience" meetings where workers are forced to sit through hours of anti-union indoctrination. For Wiggin, bossware tools aren't just a stick to beat workers with - they're also a carrot that can be used to diffuse a worker's outrage ahead of a key union vote.
Algorithmic management isn't just software that wrings more work out of workers - it's software that replaces managers. By surveilling workers - both on the job and in social media spaces (like subreddits) where workers gather to talk, Amazon can tune the "electronic whip," reducing quotas and easing the pace of work so that workers view their jobs more favorably and are more receptive to anti-union propaganda.
This is "twiddling" - exploiting the digital flexibility of a system to "twiddle the knobs" governing its business logic, changing everything from prices to wages, search rankings to recommendations, in realtime, for every customer and worker:
If you're an Amazon shopper, you get twiddled all the time, as Amazon replaces the best matches for your searches with paid results. If you buy that first product result, you'll pay an average of 29% more than the best match for your search:
When a nurse is assigned a shift by an "Uber for nurses" app, the app checks whether the worker has overdue credit card bills, which trigger lower wages (on the theory that an indebted worker is a desperate worker):
The important thing about algorithmic slack-cutting is that it's only temporary. The algorithm that reduces your work-load in the runup to a union vote can then dial the pace of work up afterward, by small, random increments that are below the threshold at which they register on the human sensory apparatus. They're not so much boiling the frog as *poaching* it.
Meanwhile, Amazon gets to flood the zone with anti-union messages, including mandatory messages on the app that assigns your shifts - a captive audience meeting in every pocket.
Between social media surveillance and on-the-job surveillance, Amazon has built a powerful training set for algorithms designed to crush workplace democracy. That's how things go for Amazon's warehouse workers and delivery drivers, and the shelf-stockers at Whole Foods.
But of course, the picture is very different for Amazon's techies, who enjoy the industry standard of high wages and lavish perks.
For now.
The tech industry is in the midst of three years' worth of mass layoffs: 260K in 2023, 150k in 2024, tens of thousands this year. None of this is due to a shortfall in profits, mind: Google laid off 12,000 workers just weeks after staging a stock buyback that would have funded their salaries for *27 years*.
Meta just announced a 5% across-the-board headcount cut *and* that it was doubling its executive bonuses.
In other words, tech is firing workers not because it must, but because it *can*. When workers depend on scarcity - instead of unions - as a source of power, they dig their own graves. For well-paid, scarcity-based coders, every new computer science graduate is the enemy, eroding the scarcity that your wages depend on.
Amazon coders get to come to work with pink mohawks, facial piercings, and black t-shirts that say things their bosses don't understand. They get to pee whenever they want to. That's not because Jeff Bezos is sentimentally attached to techies and bears personal animus toward warehouse workers. Jeff Bezos wants to pay his workforce as little as he can.
He treats his tech workers with respect because he's afraid of them, because if they quit, he can't replace them, and without their work, he can't make money.
Once there's an army of unemployed coders who'll take your job, Jeff Bezos doesn't have to fear you anymore. He can fire you and replace you the next day.
Bezos is obviously *incredibly horny* for this. Like most tech bosses, he dreams of a world in which entitled hackers can't call their bosses dumbshits and decline to frog when they shout "jump!" That's why Amazon PR puts so much energy into trumpeting the business's use of AI to replace coders:
AWS CEO Matt Garman told staff to “learn about new technologies” and get closer to customers while predicting most developers wouldn’t be coding within 24 months...
It's not just that they're excited about firing coders and saving money - they're even *more* excited about transforming the job of "Amazon coder," from someone who solves complex technical problems to someone who performs tedious code review on automatically generated code barfed up by a chatbot:
"Code reviewer" is a much less fulfilling job than "programmer." Code reviewers are also easier to replace than programmers. A code reviewer is a reverse-centaur, a servant to the machine. Every time you hear "AI-assisted programmer," you should substitute "programmer-assisted AI."
Programming is even more bossware-ready than working in a warehouse.
The machines coders use are much easier to fit with surveillance technology that monitors their performance - and spies on their communications, looking for dissenting chatter - than a warehouse floor. The only thing that stopped Jeff Bezos from treating his programmers like his warehouse workers is their scarcity. That scarcity is now going away.
Tech workers often feel a sense of duty to their users, a "vocational awe" that drives them to put in long hours to make things their users will enjoy. The labor power of tech workers has long served as a check on the impulse to enshittify those products:
As tech workers' power wanes, they don't just lose the ability to protect themselves from their bosses' greediest, most sadistic urges - they also lose the power to defend all of *us*.
Wiggin's report isn't just a snapshot of Amazon warehouse workers' dystopian present - it's a promise of Amazon tech workers' future. The future is here, in Amazon warehouses, and every day, it's getting closer to Amazon's technical offices.
As a programmer with over 40 years of experience, I believe that AI mainly handles basic setup coding, which many find tedious. I've created code generators for this purpose. While some argue for writing from scratch, they often prefer control over tools and avoiding the mess left by others. In the near term, AI can create a basic app that developers can finish, which suits most I've worked with. However, it will take time for AI to generate complete apps from customer specifications or manage features and bug fixes, which currently occupy most developers. Essentially, AI can be viewed as another language layer. I've transitioned from assembler to C++, then to Java, and recently to JavaScript frameworks like React and Python-related languages.
"We are in the midst of a shift in work and workplace relationships as significant as the Second Industrial Revolution of the late 19th and early 20th centuries. And new policies and protections may be necessary to correct the balance of power."
I have a new book coming out! It's called Blight and it's the sequel to my first book, Cascade. If you hate fascism and like sad gay wizards and eldritch abominations you may very well enjoy it. If you pre-order it, you'll make my day: books2read.com/u/mYVl9P
"Instead of dictating specific solutions, present the problem and desired outcome, and let your team figure out how to solve it." Thomas Limoncelli on how to improve solutions and boost the morale of your engineering team: dl.acm.org/doi/pdf/10.1145/371… #CareerNews
Toxicologists are developing new ways to assess chemical safety without animal testing. In vitro tests, in chemico assays, and in silico methods offer faster, cost-effective alternatives to traditional animal testing. A biomedical engineer explains: buff.ly/syiLnvr 🧪#pharmacology
Thousands of chemicals in industry haven’t been thoroughly tested for their safety and toxicity. Researchers are working to standardize quicker, cheaper and more ethical methods to assess chemicals.
how can we resist, ideas? People are still hanging on X. Media is referring to X. My friends returned to Facebook, after they realised Mastodon or Bluesky wasn't really any alternative.
21 March 2014. West Village, NYC. This improbably tight hallway, in a West Village walk-up, is similar to one seen in the Coen Brothers' "Inside Llewyn Davis". I like that you have to share a doormat with your neighbor.
Captured with a small mirrorless camera and 50mm lens.
This hallway reminded me of a sight gag in the Coens' "Inside Llewyn Davis". I like that the two neighbors have to share a doormat.
The starkly bare hallway and contrasting tones between the walls and the doors and floor make this as much a study in abstract shapes as it is about urban living.
Small NYC brownstones such as the one shown here were generally either built from the start as multi-family tenements, or were built as single-family homes and later subdivided into apartments. In the former case, the layout into individual units was part of the original design and generally fairly sane. In the latter case, landlords often tried to squeeze every square inch of rentable space out of the existing layout, at the expense of things like hallways.
The first place I lived in NYC was originally designed to be 6 floors x 2 relatively spacious apts. when I lived there, it had been divided into 4 600 sq/ft apts per floor.
At USC there used to be a design contest at the Architecture school for putting the maximum number of living spaces into the smallest number of square feet. Each 'unit' had to support two adults, cooking, bathing, a bathroom, and a place to sleep.
One of the students called it 'smooshed camping' which sort of stuck with me.
As tech advances, the law mutates. In some cases (Riley, Carpenter) we get more protections. In other cases, we get fewer protections. This case dates back to 2022. Christopher Poller was a suspect…
On a lighter #electronics note, this is the bestest solder sucker that I have ever used and I love it dearly. About the only thing I'd change I'd make would be to make the body longer (not necessarily the piston volume) to make it a bit better-fitting for my clumsy hands.
The main upside of this one is that it is all-metal, so the button lock doesn't wear out in like 50 uses, unlike the standard variety of these.
Prelinger Archives is in the final year of a three-year grant for mass-digitization of its film collection funded by Filecoin Foundation for the Decentralized Web. Since the start of the […]\n
T-Mobile users woke up this morning to an unwanted surprise: a text from the carrier with news about a $5-per-month rate hike. pcmag.com/news/t-mobile-sorry-…
Price increases start rolling out on April 2. 'We are updating the prices on some of our older phone plans in response to rising costs,' T-Mobile says.
OpenAI urges Trump: Either settle AI copyright debate or lose AI race to China National security hinges on unfettered access to AI training data, OpenAI says. arstechnica.com/tech-policy/20…
Today's Low Quality Ad is for Kiehl's Avocado Eye Treatment. I am a lotiontarian, meaning I only consume nutrients through lotions and creams. My skin looks better than ever. The only downside is that I am always hungry and doctors say this will certainly kill me. amazon.com/dp/B008KMZ8FC?ref=t…
I've recently started to infuse my own lotions. I have become very popular with the neighborhood dogs since I started mixing lotion with peanut butter.
As a New York City subway rider, I am constantly exposed to public health posters. More often than not these feature a photo of a wholesome-looking teen whose sober expression is meant to convey hindsight regret at having taken up drugs, dropped out …
@donaldball Indeed. I would even argue that if they want to argue that it •doesn’t• fail the “impact on potential market” test, that’s an admission that their entire product pitch is BS. Either AI can replace the humans who do this work or it can’t; you can’t have that cake and eat it too.
Can't be repeated enough: "Elon Musk is not engaged in an “efficiency drive”. He is not trying to save money. He is trying to cripple the state and destroy the public sector, since oligarchs of his ilk think these are by nature a waste of money and that their functions should be privatized. Media should report it as such." ft.com/content/6d938875-d9c8-4… #Musk #DOGE #Trump #government #politics #USA
I think you give Elon too much credit. His motives aren't some broader organized movement by oligarchs to eliminate and privatize. His motives are self serving. He is seeking simply to eliminate the arms of the US government that were restraining his business pursuits or investigating him. It's individual and selfish. The rest of the oligarchs are happy to let him go and profit in his wake.
You can argue if bash is a good programming language or not, but you can’t argue that it is a programming language. However, there are a few oddities about it that make it different from most…
Are you a fan of bugs? Especially identifying bugs with a low-cost, power-efficient and lightweight design meant to help field biologists deploy it in various environments, including the depths of the jungle? The Digital Naturalism Lab Mothbox talk at #OHS2025 will be a dream for you! Catch Brianna Johns, Hubert Szczygieł, Andy & Kitty Quitmeyer on Day 1 with their talk and get your tickets today: 2025.oshwa.org/attend/
draeath
in reply to The Tor Project • • •I don't understand why these are built-in. They should be something a user or administrator could manage without requiring a new build :/
(I realize this is really Firefox's problem to fix, though)
divergency
in reply to The Tor Project • • •