Woman who planned to sell human toes regurgitated by dogs pleads guilty in Melbourne court
Joanna Kathlyn Kinman, 48, was working at an animal shelter when she found body parts of dogs’ owner who had died of natural causesGuardian staff reporter (The Guardian)
A Tesla protester targeted by Elon Musk speaks out: 'I have to protect myself.'
https://www.npr.org/2025/03/17/nx-s1-5328626/elon-musk-protests-tesla-takedown?utm_source=flipboard&utm_medium=activitypub
Posted into Politics @politics-npr
David Erich's *Murder the Truth: Fear, the First Amendment, and a Secret Campaign to Protect the Powerful* is a brave, furious book about the long-running plan by America's wealthy and corrupt to "open up the libel laws" so they can destroy their critics:
harpercollins.com/products/mur…
--
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:
pluralistic.net/2025/03/17/act…
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Murder the Truth
"Authoritarian governments abroad have long used legal threats and lawsuits against journalists to cover up their disinformation, corruption, and viole...HarperCollins
March Madness is expected to generate $3.1 billion in bets. This expert urges caution
https://www.npr.org/2025/03/14/nx-s1-5327109/legalized-sports-betting-addiction-march-madness?utm_source=flipboard&utm_medium=activitypub
Posted into Sports @sports-npr
🍀 Happy St. Patrick’s Day! 🍀
OpenStreetMap in Ireland has been thriving for years, even hosting our 2nd State of the Map in 2008! Since 2019, OSM Ireland has been a proud Local Chapter of the OpenStreetMap Foundation. Beyond everyday mapping, the Irish OSM community has been actively preserving genealogy, history, and heritage through mapping.
OSM Irl.: openstreetmap.ie
Mapping connecting past & future: blog.openstreetmap.org/2021/01…
@governorkeagan
Do you know who at OSM Ireland could fix the https problem with the ireland site? (You get a security warning when you try and visit it)
Wir suchen für meine Abteilung einen Vertriebsbeauftragten (idealerweise für #Oldenburg )! Wir entwickeln Leittechnik für Stadtwerke - die zentrale Steuersoftware für Strom-, Gas-, Wasser- und Fernwärme-Netzwerke.
Wir verkaufen üblicherweise sehr kundenspezifische Projekte, keine Produkte von der Stange. Kenntnisse über die Strombranche wären hilfreich.
Bei Fragen zu der Stelle könnt Ihr euch bei mir melden!
#GetFediHired #JobAlert #JobSearch #Hiring #SCADA #Energy
kisters.eu/de/job-vacancy/key-…
17 March 1901 | A Polish woman, Genowefa Wojnar, was born.
In #Auschwitz from 12 November 1942.
No. 24435
She was evacuated to Ravensbrück concentration camp and liberated there.
Germany issues warning for transgender & nonbinary people traveling to the U.S.www.advocate.com/news/germany...
Germany issues warning for tra...
Germany warns trans & nonbinary people about travel to U.S.
A German official confirmed the government’s alert to The Advocate.Christopher Wiggins (Advocate.com)
The latest Fountain Pen video is now available for your viewing pleasure.
In this video I am looking at the fountain pens I have inked up in March 2025.
Join me now to see those pens.
#fountainPenReview #fountainPenNetwork #fountainPenGeek #fountainPenCollector #fountainPenAddict #fountainPenLover #fountainPenNerd #fountainpens #fountainpen #penreview #inkedpens #pensinuse #edc #everydaycarry #PIU #currentlyinked #dailywriter #writing
March Fountain Pen Favorites: What’s on My Desk This Month?
The latest Fountain Pen video is now available for your viewing pleasure.In this video I am looking at the fountain pens I have inked up in March 2025.Join m...YouTube
Morning news brief
https://www.npr.org/2025/03/17/nx-s1-5327249/morning-news-brief?utm_source=flipboard&utm_medium=activitypub
Posted into World News @world-news-npr
bbc.com/news/articles/c4g0rxz2…
Poorest children missing more school and further behind after Covid, study says
Those from the lowest income families are now up to 19 months behind peers by the age of 16.Branwen Jeffreys (BBC News)
L: theconversation.com/chewing-gu…
C: news.ycombinator.com/item?id=4…
posted on 2025.03.17 at 02:59:19 (c=0, p=3)
Chewing gum is plastic pollution, not a litter problem
The reality is that chewing gum is just another form of plastic pollution, but it is not treated as such.The Conversation
This is insane.
Canadian woman applies for a work Visa in the US, but ends up in the immigration system and is put in various jail cells for almost two weeks sleeping on concrete.
Watch the video interview on this page:
ctvnews.ca/vancouver/article/c…
Via.
@Karolina
Canadian woman who was detained in U.S. immigration jails returns to Vancouver
After a dozen days being shuffled between detention centres in the U.S., Jasmine Mooney has made it back to Vancouver.Ian Holliday (CTVNews)
Meta AI presents VGGT, a feed - forward neural network. It can directly infer key 3D scene attributes from one or more images in under a second. These attributes include camera parameters, point maps, depth maps, and 3D point tracks. 🧵1/3
Project: vgg-t.github.io/
VGGT: Visual Geometry Grounded Transformer.
We propose Visual Geometry Grounded Transformer (VGGT), a feed-forward neural network that directly predicts all key 3D scene attributes from single or multiple (up to hundreds) image views within seconds.vgg-t.github.io
Михаил Саакашвили приговорен к четырем с половиной годам тюрьмы за незаконное пересечение границы Грузии
Суд в Грузии признал бывшего президента страны Михаила Саакашвили виновным в незаконном пересечении границы и приговорил к 4,5 года лишения свободы, сообщило Mtavari TV.Meduza
In full solidarity with @SalemSolomon & other VOA staffers put on leave. Salem is a multi-award winning editor/reporter working in Tigrigna, Amharic AND English, serving audiences across Africa & the world. I'm proud to have been mentored by her for years, she's an inspiration, a sister from another mother.
On that wasteland known as X, her post was swarmed with pro-regime trolling & misogynistic hate.
Best indicator of who is happiest with the clampdown on free press: fascist men.
"National Institutes of Health officials have urged scientists to remove all references to mRNA vaccine technology from their grant applications, two researchers said"
Squashing a promising new area of research. For what purpose?
kffhealthnews.org/news/article…
Scientists Say NIH Officials Told Them To Scrub mRNA References on Grants - KFF Health News
Two senior scientists say National Institutes of Health officials advised them to remove references to mRNA vaccines in grant applications, and they fear the Trump administration will abandon a promising field of medical research.KFF Health News
U.S. deports hundreds of Venezuelans to El Salvador
https://www.npr.org/2025/03/17/nx-s1-5329796/u-s-deports-hundreds-of-venezuelans-to-el-salvador?utm_source=flipboard&utm_medium=activitypub
Posted into U.S. News @u-s-news-npr
Lawyer discusses suit against Trump administration over use of Alien Enemies Act
https://www.npr.org/2025/03/17/nx-s1-5329815/lawyer-discusses-suit-against-trump-administration-over-use-of-alien-enemies-act?utm_source=flipboard&utm_medium=activitypub
Posted into U.S. News @u-s-news-npr
More than 50 universities under investigation as part of Trump's anti-DEI crackdown
https://www.npr.org/2025/03/17/nx-s1-5328572/more-than-50-universities-under-investigation-as-part-of-trumps-anti-dei-crackdown?utm_source=flipboard&utm_medium=activitypub
Posted into U.S. News @u-s-news-npr
Four Eyes are Better Than Five: Canada, UK, Australia and NZ Discuss Excluding US From Intelligence Sharing
substack.com/home/post/p-15880…
🇷🇺 / 🇪🇹
Today, Russian state media outlet Sputnik expanded its broadcast presence in Ethiopia, opening an "Africa Hub" in Addis Ababa.
Some of this footage is from the launch ceremony, where Ethiopian parliamentary speaker Agegnehu Teshager, and Valentina Matvienko, Russia's Federation Council speaker were both present.
Sputnik, which already had a presence in Ethiopia, expands at a time when Ethiopian media outlets and civil society orgs face shutdowns, and the arrests of their members.
What do dogs see when they look at a TV screen?
https://www.npr.org/2025/03/17/nx-s1-5323763/what-do-dogs-see-when-they-look-at-a-tv-screen?utm_source=flipboard&utm_medium=activitypub
Posted into Science @science-npr
Peruvian farmer goes head to head with German energy giant in climate test case
https://www.npr.org/2025/03/17/nx-s1-5328711/peruvian-farmer-goes-head-to-head-with-german-energy-giant-in-climate-test-case?utm_source=flipboard&utm_medium=activitypub
Posted into World News @world-news-npr
How nuclear deterrence in Europe may change
https://www.npr.org/2025/03/17/nx-s1-5327224/how-nuclear-deterrence-in-europe-may-change?utm_source=flipboard&utm_medium=activitypub
Posted into World News @world-news-npr
Why are Israel-Hamas ceasefire talks stuck? An explainer on the latest
https://www.npr.org/2025/03/17/nx-s1-5329781/why-are-israel-hamas-ceasefire-talks-stuck-an-explainer-on-the-latest?utm_source=flipboard&utm_medium=activitypub
Posted into World News @world-news-npr
Ukraine-Liveblog: ++ Ukraine hält offenbar weiter Gebiete bei Kursk ++
Das ukrainische Militär hält nach eigenen Angaben auch nach dem Rückzug aus Sudscha weiter Positionen im westrussischen Gebiet Kursk. Russland und die Ukraine melden gegenseitige Drohnenabschüsse. Die Entwicklungen im Liveblog.
➡️ tagesschau.de/newsticker/liveb…
Ukraine-Liveblog: ++ Trump will am Dienstag mit Putin sprechen ++
US-Präsident Trump hat angekündigt, am Dienstag mit Russlands Präsident Putin zu sprechen. Die EU-Außenminister beraten heute über weitere Militärhilfen für die Ukraine.tagesschau.de
Glyn Moody reshared this.
How the music industry has changed in the first quarter of this century
https://www.npr.org/2025/03/17/nx-s1-5252583/how-the-music-industry-has-changed-in-the-first-quarter-of-this-century?utm_source=flipboard&utm_medium=activitypub
Posted into Music @music-npr
Here is a forum discussion about how to simplify borders with Inkscape: hope it helps!
The first game of March Madness is on Tuesday. Get caught up on the brackets
https://www.npr.org/2025/03/17/nx-s1-5327260/the-first-game-of-march-madness-is-on-tuesday-get-caught-up-on-the-brackets?utm_source=flipboard&utm_medium=activitypub
Posted into Sports @sports-npr
School tries to cover huge 65 foot penis on roof that is visible from space
metro.co.uk/2025/02/27/school-…
School tries to cover huge 65 foot penis on roof that is visible from space
The 20m long knob was seemingly painted on top of the Waldorf School in the Kreuzberg district in Berlin.Luke Alsford (Metro)
Here are ways parents can help their teens be smart with screen time
https://www.npr.org/2025/03/17/nx-s1-5326162/here-are-ways-parents-can-help-their-teens-be-smart-with-screen-time?utm_source=flipboard&utm_medium=activitypub
Posted into Health @health-npr
How one influential Irish musician in America celebrates St. Patrick's Day
https://www.npr.org/2025/03/17/nx-s1-5324845/how-one-influential-irish-musician-in-america-celebrates-st-patricks-day?utm_source=flipboard&utm_medium=activitypub
Posted into Arts & Life @arts-life-npr
Deadly weekend storms kill at least 3 dozen people across the southern U.S.
https://www.npr.org/2025/03/17/nx-s1-5329794/deadly-weekend-storms-kill-at-least-3-dozen-people-across-the-southern-u-s?utm_source=flipboard&utm_medium=activitypub
Posted into U.S. News @u-s-news-npr
'I think he knew': Mahmoud Khalil's wife on his detention and her search for answers
https://www.npr.org/2025/03/17/nx-s1-5328059/i-think-he-knew-mahmoud-khalils-wife-on-his-detention-and-her-search-for-answers?utm_source=flipboard&utm_medium=activitypub
Posted into U.S. News @u-s-news-npr
Two legal migrants denied reentry into the U.S. after traveling abroad
https://www.npr.org/2025/03/17/nx-s1-5329818/two-legal-migrants-denied-reentry-into-the-u-s-after-traveling-abroad?utm_source=flipboard&utm_medium=activitypub
Posted into U.S. News @u-s-news-npr
The Hollywood Forever Cemetary is running out of room. So it's expanding ... upward
https://www.npr.org/2025/03/17/nx-s1-5237568/the-hollywood-forever-cemetary-is-running-out-of-room-so-its-expanding-upward?utm_source=flipboard&utm_medium=activitypub
Posted into U.S. News @u-s-news-npr
Trump will be talking to Putin Tuesday, and he thinks he can get a lasting peace by drawing lines on a map of Ukraine without Ukraine.
Putin is going to run in circles around the most naive president in US history, and he will use every psychological trick in the book to make Trump believe that it is all Ukraine's fault, that Trump's glorious, beautiful, perfect peace deal won't work.
And as always, Trump will make sure there is no historic record of the conversation.
youtu.be/JFkOCGz9-Y4?si=pUjxWi…
Trump to Speak to Putin in Ukraine Ceasefire Push: What to Watch For
President Donald Trump said he’ll speak with Russian President Vladimir Putin on Tuesday, as the US continues to push for an end to fighting in Russia’s war ...YouTube
Glyn Moody reshared this.
With US pulling out of NATO, Norway will no longer be safe from Russia. I believe they will probably annex Svalbard. Maybe more. Question is when. Maybe Putin will take back the baltic states first.
Land concessions is a really bad idea.
At the very least, any land concessions should come with a NATO membership for Ukraine.
Voice of America gutted as Trump administration puts journalists on indefinite leave
https://www.npr.org/2025/03/17/nx-s1-5329872/voice-of-america-gutted-as-trump-administration-puts-journalists-on-indefinite-leave?utm_source=flipboard&utm_medium=activitypub
Posted into World News @world-news-npr
Analysis: UK emissions fall 3.6% in 2024 as coal use drops to lowest since 1666 - Carbon Brief
UK greenhouse gas emissions fell by 3.6% in 2024 as coal use dropped to the lowest level since 1666, the year of the Great Fire of LondonCarbon Brief Staff (Carbon Brief)
Sam reshared this.
Cory Doctorow
in reply to Cory Doctorow • • •Sensitive content
Enrich is a veteran business reporter at the *New York Times*; he's reported extensively on high finance and sleaze, and has a knack for piercing the Shield of Boredom that protects finance crimes from scrutiny. His 2017 book *The Spider's Web* manages the nearly impossible trick of making the LIBOR-rigging conspiracy - which involved trillions, but in ways that were so baroque that hardly anyone noticed - comprehensible:
memex.craphound.com/2017/09/24…
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The Spider Network, a novelistic account of the mediocre rich men who robbed the world with Libor – Cory Doctorow's MEMEX
memex.craphound.comCory Doctorow
in reply to Cory Doctorow • • •Sensitive content
In taking on the libel-industrial complex - a network of shadowy, thin-skinned, wealthy litigation funders; crank academics; buck-chasing lawyer lickspittle sociopaths; and the most corrupt Supreme Court justice on the bench today - Enrich is wading into dangerous territory. After all, he's reporting on people who've made it their life's mission to financially destroy anyone who has the temerity to report on their misdeeds.
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Cory Doctorow
in reply to Cory Doctorow • • •Sensitive content
As such, Enrich's writing is *extremely* cautious, sometimes comically so, but always intentionally, in a way that highlights the absurd chilling effect his subjects are attempting to induce in all of us.
The book primarily concerns itself with the effort to overturn *Sullivan*, a 1964 Supreme Court case that established protections for media outlets that report on public figures and commit minor factual errors, provided that the errors were neither negligent nor malicious.
4/
Cory Doctorow
in reply to Cory Doctorow • • •Sensitive content
Since *Sullivan*, media outlets have held the upper hand when reporting on public figures. While *Sullivan* isn't a license to simply make stuff up about celebrities, politicians and business leaders, it does mean that if a reporter makes a minor misstatement, it's on the subject of the reporting to prove that the error was negligent and/or malicious.
5/
Cory Doctorow
in reply to Cory Doctorow • • •Sensitive content
Before *Sullivan*, most defamation litigation happened in state courts, and southern courts allowed lawmakers and cops to sue newspapers that reported on racial terror campaigns during the civil rights fight. The judgments involved were so large that many media outlets simply gave up on reporting on the intimidation, violence and murder taking place in the Jim Crow south.
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Cory Doctorow
in reply to Cory Doctorow • • •Sensitive content
True to form, Clarence Thomas has led the charge to dismantle a law that was key to the struggle for rights for Black people and other disfavored minorities. In Enrich's telling, Thomas's animus for *Sullivan* started during his confirmation hearings, when Anita Hill described his relentless sexual harassment of the lawyers who worked for him, including Hill.
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Cory Doctorow
in reply to Cory Doctorow • • •Sensitive content
Being the subject of a media firestorm that painted him as a disgusting, cruel sex-pest seems to have inspired Thomas in a decades-long campaign to find a case that would let him tear down *Sullivan*, so that wealthy people could once again intimidate reporters into silence.
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Cory Doctorow
in reply to Cory Doctorow • • •Sensitive content
Of course, Thomas's hatred for *Sullivan* only grew when *Propublica* revealed that he had taken numerous "gifts" from wealthy "friends" who had business before the courts, revelations that will forever make Thomas's name a synonym for corruption.
Ehrich's cast of characters includes a clutch of whiny, ultra-rich axe-grinders, who finance (often in secret) lawsuits that are designed to chip away at *Sullivan*.
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Cory Doctorow
in reply to Cory Doctorow • • •Sensitive content
Some are international looters or corrupt ex-Soviet oligarchs, but others are ideologues, committed to the principle of impunity for the powerful.
He also introduces us to the lawyers who wage these battles.
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Cory Doctorow
in reply to Cory Doctorow • • •Sensitive content
As you might imagine, the kind of lawyer who sits up at night figuring out how to help wealthy, powerful people destroy their critics is often a crank themselves, with "colorful" personal relations that Enrich reports on with meticulous prose, including the many denials and non-denials his subjects sent when he sought comment.
As with his LIBOR book, Enrich does yeoman duty here unpacking complex matters that would be dull in a lesser writer's hands.
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Cory Doctorow
in reply to Cory Doctorow • • •Sensitive content
The litigation strategies devised by *Sullivan*'s enemies are always convoluted and are sometimes clever, much like the litigation strategies used to kill campaign finance limits (*Citizens United*) and abortion rights (*Dobbs*). Indeed, many of the financiers, think-tanks and lawyers behind those plots are also would-be *Sullivan* slayers.
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Cory Doctorow
in reply to Cory Doctorow • • •Sensitive content
The best of these legal gambits are actually rather clever - locating innocent people who've been genuinely wronged by *Sullivan* (as the saying goes, "hard cases make bad law") and then using them to undermine *Sullivan*, without actually helping them in any way. It's positively fiendish.
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Cory Doctorow
in reply to Cory Doctorow • • •Sensitive content
We're in a moment when a lot of powerful people are getting far more powerful, and abusing that power to commit wildly corrupt acts. The only way we'll know about this is if the press can freely report on their misdeeds. *Murder the Truth* is a vital guide to the next *Citizens United*, the next *Dobbs* - a campaign to take away your right to know about the *next* assault on your rights that plutocrats will launch.
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Cory Doctorow
in reply to Cory Doctorow • • •Sensitive content
I'm on a 20+ city book tour for my new novel *Picks and Shovels*.
Catch me in SAN DIEGO on Mar 24:
mystgalaxy.com/32425Doctorow
And in CHICAGO with PETER SAGAL on Apr 2:
exileinbookville.com/events/44…
More tour dates here:
martinhench.com
eof/
Authors on Tap: Cory Doctorow and Peter Sagal
exileinbookville.com