Webb captures iconic Horsehead Nebula in unprecedented detail
https://www.esa.int/Science_Exploration/Space_Science/Webb/Webb_captures_iconic_Horsehead_Nebula_in_unprecedented_detail

# Webb captures iconic Horsehead Nebula in unprecedented detail

The NASA/ESA/CSA James Webb Space Telescope has captured the sharpest infrared images to date of one of the most distinctive objects in our skies, the Horsehead Nebula. These observations show a part of the iconic nebula in a whole new light, capturing its complexity with unprecedented spatial resolution.

![Webb captures iconic Horsehead Nebula in unprecedented detail](https://www.esa.int/var/esa/storage/images/esa_multimedia/images/2024/04/webb_captures_iconic_horsehead_nebula_in_unprecedented_detail/26010706-1-eng-GB/Webb_captures_iconic_Horsehead_Nebula_in_unprecedented_detail_article.jpg)

Webb’s new images show part of the sky in the constellation Orion (The Hunter), in the western side of the Orion B molecular cloud. Rising from turbulent waves of dust and gas is the Horsehead Nebula, otherwise known as Barnard 33, which resides roughly 1300 light-years away. The nebula formed from a collapsing interstellar cloud of material, and glows because it is illuminated by a nearby hot star. The gas clouds surrounding the Horsehead have already dissipated, but the jutting pillar is made of thick clumps of material that is harder to erode. Astronomers estimate that the Horsehead has about five million years left before it too disintegrates. Webb’s new view focuses on the illuminated edge of the top of the nebula’s distinctive dust and gas structure.

[Zoom into the Horsehead Nebula](https://www.esa.int/ESA_Multimedia/Videos/2024/04/Zoom_into_the_Horsehead_Nebula)

![Horsehead Nebula (NIRCam image)](https://www.esa.int/var/esa/storage/images/esa_multimedia/images/2024/04/horsehead_nebula_nircam_image/26010612-1-eng-GB/Horsehead_Nebula_NIRCam_image_article.jpg)

The Horsehead Nebula is a well-known photon-dominated region, or PDR. In such a region ultraviolet light from young, massive stars creates a mostly neutral, warm area of gas and dust between the fully ionised gas surrounding the massive stars and the clouds in which they are born. This ultraviolet radiation strongly influences the gas chemistry of these regions and acts as the most important source of heat.

![Horsehead Nebula (MIRI image)](https://www.esa.int/var/esa/storage/images/esa_multimedia/images/2024/04/horsehead_nebula_miri_image/26010659-1-eng-GB/Horsehead_Nebula_MIRI_image_article.jpg)

Thanks to Webb’s MIRI and NIRCam instruments, an international team of astronomers have revealed for the first time the small-scale structures of the illuminated edge of the Horsehead. They have also detected a network of striated features extending perpendicular to the PDR front and containing dust particles and ionised gas entrained in the photo-evaporative flow of the nebula. The observations have also allowed astronomers to investigate the effects of dust attenuation and emission, and to better understand the multidimensional shape of the nebula.


A leadership crisis in the Nix community
https://lwn.net/SubscriberLink/970824/0d89c6d83efad1e0/

By **Daroc Alden**
April 29, 2024

On April 21, a group of anonymous authors and non-anonymous signatories published [a lengthy open letter](https://save-nix-together.org/) to the [Nix](https://nixos.org/) community and Nix founder Eelco Dolstra calling for his resignation from the project. They claimed ongoing problems with the project's leadership, primarily focusing on the way his actions have allegedly undermined people nominally empowered to perform various moderation and governance tasks. Since its release, the letter has gained more than 100 signatures.

#### Decision-making authority

The Nix project is governed by the [NixOS Foundation](https://github.com/NixOS/foundation), a non-profit organization that handles the project's finances and legal responsibilities. The foundation itself is headed by a board with five voting members, chaired by Dolstra. There are no term limits, and the board selects its own membership and chair. According to [the board's team page](https://nixos.org/community/teams/foundation-board/), its responsibilities include handling "administrative, legal, and financial tasks", sponsorships and donations, funding for "community events and efforts", and acting as an arbiter in case of conflicts in the community. Notably, the board "is not responsible for technical leadership, decisions, or direction", nor is it expected to handle all decision making. The board is responsible for providing "a framework for teams to self-organize", including a duty to "[h]and out the credentials and permissions required for the teams' work".

The open letter has several related complaints, but the most central one is that they allege Dolstra has repeatedly strong-armed the board and members of other community teams to overrule their decisions:

> For example, after months of discussion on sponsorship policy in the board, with consensus having been formed on a policy that allows community veto of NixCon sponsors, Eelco (and Graham [Christensen], at the same time) appeared at the [open board call over 45 minutes in](https://discourse.nixos.org/t/open-board-call-2024-03-20/41898/), and began re-litigating the issue of whether we need to limit sponsorship to begin with, which had already been agreed upon by everyone but him.

Christensen is Dolstra's co-founder at [Determinate Systems](https://determinate.systems).
The letter lists other examples, such as Dolstra blocking longtime contributors from becoming code reviewers or blocking a build-system change that had made it through the RFC process. The letter concludes that Dolstra is essentially leveraging social power from being the founder of the project to overrule decisions that are nominally supposed to be made collaboratively. In short, Dolstra is acting as "the effective Benevolent Dictator for Life (BDFL)" of the project, even though the NixOS Foundation's charter doesn't grant anyone that authority. The letter says this leads to "a culture of responsibility without authority" that erodes contributors' desire to continue working on the project. It specifically mentions the moderation team as an example of this, saying that its members are "in fear of their authority being undermined directly by Eelco or indirectly through the Foundation".

When asked to comment on the concerns raised in the letter, members of the NixOS moderation team responded:

> Overall we think that the letter describes the situation of the moderation team fairly well. We have been operating in an emergency mode most of the time for over half a year now. Our team retention is at an all time low, and we are barely able to keep up with recruiting new members as old ones quit. Right now the moderation team is down to four people, including two who desire to leave as soon as a replacement is found, not counting another moderator who left last week.
>
> To the extent that the moderation team feels disempowered, this is mostly because of heavy antagonism from some community members or risks of destabilizing the community, and not because of an actual lack of power. Most of that is a reflection of a deeper cultural conflict within the community and not directly related to the foundation board.

Despite slightly disagreeing with the source of the issue, they went on to acknowledge that Dolstra had impeded several attempts to improve the situation, and said that they understood many community members' complaints. The team also called the situation itself "a deep structural and cultural issue involving many people".

Pierre Bourdon, a long-time contributor to Nix, [posted on Mastodon](https://mastodon.delroth.net/@delroth/112310645064859357) about his experience working on NixOS, [stating](https://mastodon.delroth.net/@delroth/112310661634038271) that while he disagrees with the tone and approach of the open letter, the factual statements about Dolstra's leadership match his own experience.

#### Conflicts of interest

The letter also alleges several conflicts of interest, primarily concerning Dolstra's employer, Determinate Systems. [Anduril](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Anduril_Industries), a military contractor that uses NixOS, has repeatedly attempted to become a sponsor of NixCon, which did not go over well with the community, as reflected in the minutes of the board meeting on March 20. The letter says Dolstra pushed strongly for the inclusion of Anduril as a sponsor even after it became clear that many core contributors disagreed. Anduril was eventually dropped as a sponsor for both [NixCon 2023](https://2023.nixcon.org/) and [NixCon 2024](https://2024-na.nixcon.org/) after community pressure.

On April 10, Théophane Hufschmitt, the secretary of the board, shared [an update](https://discourse.nixos.org/t/nixos-foundation-event-sponsorship-policy/43110) on the board's [new sponsorship policy](https://github.com/NixOS/foundation/blob/bb7af14ae242ab87c8312bb4122b2a3cd184462d/policies/sponsorship_policy.md). Hufschmitt expressed the board's apologies for the way the situation was handled, and promised that "we will prioritize transparency, inclusivity, and responsiveness in our decision-making processes".

That same day, Samuel Dionne-Riel [stated](https://twitter.com/samueldr/status/1778259760707448853) that Dolstra had refused to clarify whether he had a relationship with Anduril and asked Christensen, a co-founder of Determinate Systems: "Does DetSys have or had relationships with Anduril?" Christensen [replied](https://twitter.com/grhmc/status/1778386025007460682): "Did you know this category of question is pretty much impossible to answer because NDAs are a thing?"

This isn't the only time Dolstra has appeared to avoid disclosing potential conflicts of interest; the letter alleges that he kept his status as a founder of Determinate Systems secret for some months (a claim Dolstra later denied), and that this is especially worrying in light of some of the technical promises that Determinate Systems makes to customers. The company produces its own installer for Nix that the company promises will provide stable support for some Nix features. The

 letter states: "This is fine, however, it is questionably acceptable to do that while employing *the lead developer of CppNix* [the main Nix implementation] and saying nothing about how this will interact with the team's [decision-making] autonomy." The concerns are not entirely theoretical, either; the main Nix installer has been [broken in various ways](https://github.com/NixOS/nix/issues/10109) since version 2.18 in September 2023.

#### Call to action

The final section of the letter calls for Dolstra's resignation from the board, suggesting that he should also completely disengage from the project for at least six months, to give the rest of the board time to reform the project's governance.

> This document should be seen as the canary in the coal mine for what *many* people have been feeling for years and does not exhaustively cover absolutely all problems in the community, but we hope it is enough to justify action.

The letter ends by suggesting that if Dolstra doesn't resign, the signatories would switch to and support a fork of the project. I contacted several of the signatories to ask whether they'd be willing to provide additional commentary on why they believed a letter like this to be a necessary step. Haydon Welsh responded:

> I signed the letter because it was clear that every other team member was sick and tired of Eelco, and so I saw it only right if that's their only hope to regain enthusiasm for the project. No open-source project should die or be hard-forked because of one person, that destroys a lot of the purpose for being open-source.

Kiara Grouwstra had stronger feelings on the matter:

> While I want a full rotation of members on the NixOS board, as well as changes to its goal and structure so as to better incorporate the community including marginalized perspectives, my friend convinced me the polemic response would not sit well with the moderators, and shared with me the draft open letter about Eelco's role, which I opted to settle for as the lower-hanging fruit right now.

On April 27, Xe Iaso wrote [a blog post](https://xeiaso.net/blog/2024/much-ado-about-nothing/) about xer perspective on the matter, stating that at this point a fork is both inevitable and doomed. Even if the actions called for in the letter do come about, the difficult situation is already having an impact on the Nix community. On April 21, Nixpgs contributor Kamila Borowska [resigned from the project](https://github.com/NixOS/nixpkgs/pull/305826). On April 25, Mario Rodas, who had contributed more than 250 packages, [followed suit](https://github.com/NixOS/nixpkgs/pull/306702). In total, 24 maintainers [have left](https://github.com/NixOS/nixpkgs/issues?q=label%3A%228.has%3A+maintainer+removal%22).

#### Dolstra's response

On April 26, Dolstra posted [a response](https://determinate.systems/posts/on-community-in-nix/) to the letter. He states that the role of the board is to handle the financial and legal work, not to run the Nix community. He also claims that he has had "very little involvement in Nixpkgs and NixOS in recent years". Dolstra goes on to state: "I am just one member of the five-member Nix team and hold no more formal authority than the others in determining the direction of the team." While this is true, it does not directly refute the letter's claims that Dolstra exceeds the formal authority granted to him.

Dolstra also reiterated his position that NixCon should not refuse Anduril's sponsorship, stating: "It is my opinion that it is not for us, as open source software developers, to decide whose views are valid and whose are not, and to allow or disallow project or conference participation as a result." Dolstra does, however, explicitly refute the claim that his involvement in Determinate Systems was at all secret: "My role, participation, and focus on the good work being done at Determinate Systems have been public knowledge since the company's inception". He goes on to say that the claim that Determinate Systems seeks to have an outsized influence on the community is "patently false".

He ends his response by inviting community members who feel unwelcome in the Nix community to work for Determinate Systems instead:

> I remain committed to creating a community where everyone feels seen, heard, and valued, and I will not let unfounded accusations detract from this important work. I encourage everyone reading this who feels that they have not been heard or feels displaced to join the Determinate Systems community as we continue working to make Nix as easy to use and as impactful as possible.

It is difficult to predict where the Nix community will go from here, and what the eventual fate of any forks will be. For now, Dolstra remains the chair of the board — a position he seems unlikely to give up under pressure from the letter's signatories.


Garry’s Mod faces deluge of Nintendo-related DMCA takedown notices
https://www.engadget.com/garrys-mod-faces-deluge-of-nintendo-related-dmca-takedown-notices-123027589.html

> Facepunch Studios has announced on Steam that it's removing 20 years' worth of Nintendo-related workshop items for its sandbox game Garry's Mod to comply with the Japanese company's demands. Earlier this year, an X user with the name Brewster T. Koopa posted that a group of trolls was filing false DMCA claims against the game to get Nintendo add-ons removed and to get add-on makers to shut down. The perpetrators allegedly used a fake email to impersonate Nintendo's lawyers to send DMCA takedown notices. Facepunch Studios said in its new announcement, that it believes the demands legitimately came from Nintendo and that it has to respect the company's decision and start taking down items related to its IPs. "This is an ongoing process, as we have 20 years of uploads to go through," the developer wrote. "If you want to help us by deleting your Nintendo related uploads and never uploading them again, that would help us a lot."


The Secrets Factory: The Shadowy Firm Pushing the Limits of Business Privacy
https://www.wired.com/story/registered-agents-inc-fake-personas/

Inside a drab one-story office building in Post Falls, Idaho, a little-known American company has built the machinery that enables hundreds of thousands of businesses to operate in near-total secrecy.

The company, Registered Agents Inc., is a one-stop shop for people seeking to incorporate a business in any US state, often in those with advantageous tax policies, while obscuring their identities. According to five former employees of Registered Agents Inc. or its subsidiaries, the company routinely incorporates thousands of businesses on behalf of its customers using fake personas. Former Registered Agents Inc. employees say that the company’s widespread use of personas is an outgrowth of its founder’s obsession with privacy and a desire to push the boundaries of incorporation laws.

The registered agent industry, which incorporates businesses and acts as a point of contact for legal notices, is already effective at masking the identity of who owns a company. Registered agents have many legitimate uses, and states often require that a company have a registered agent. In some instances, however, these services have benefited “oligarchs, criminals, and online scammers,” according to a 2022 investigation by The Washington Post and the International Consortium of Investigative Journalists. Experts say a lack of adequate federal and state regulations of registered agents helps to make the United States a hotbed for money-laundering and other shady business dealings.

In a typical scenario, a registered agent would incorporate a company on behalf of a customer. An employee of the registered agent company would list their name on the incorporation documents, sometimes providing the company’s email address and office as contact information. That process provides business owners one layer of secrecy, preventing anyone who looks at state records from determining the real owner of a company.

Registered Agents Inc., according to the former employees, routinely goes one step further, incorporating companies in the names of fictional personas created by the company’s founder, Dan Keen. It’s unclear what benefit Registered Agents Inc. or its customers receive when a company is incorporated by a fake identity.

Around the country, at least 1,463 companies incorporated by Registered Agents Inc. list a woman named Riley Park as an organizer or agent, according to a WIRED analysis of publicly available incorporation documents. But Riley Park isn’t a real person, the former employees say. She’s one of multiple fake personas used by Registered Agents Inc. Former employees identified at least 10 fake personas used by the company, including David Roberts, Drake Forester, and Morgan Noble.

Using business records made public by OpenCorporates, a website that shares and standardizes information sourced from business registries around the world, WIRED found 36,257 business listing company officers who share names that former employees say are fake. At least 3,735 of these businesses’ incorporation paperwork references Registered Agents Inc., either explicitly in the paperwork or by using an address known to former employees as belonging to Registered Agents Inc.

WIRED’s analysis found that these companies are registered in 20 different states and appear to provide services ranging from law enforcement training to landscaping. Many of these companies with officers using an alleged fake name were registered to addresses known by sources to belong to Registered Agents Inc. For example, six allegedly fake names were listed as officers for 887 of businesses registered to the same address in Sheridan, Wyoming—an office of Registered Agents Inc.

This is likely an undercount. WIRED looked specifically for company records indicating that Registered Agents Inc. incorporated the company alongside at least one of a dozen false names provided by sources. We additionally looked for companies registered by these same false names associated with addresses previously utilized by Registered Agents Inc. for incorporating thousands of other companies. Sources believe the true number is likely much higher.

Registered Agents Inc. declined to fully answer WIRED’s detailed set of questions about its business practices.

“To put it plainly, your assertions in this question set are outdated and patently wrong about Registered Agents Inc.,” the company said in a statement. “Therefore, at this time Registered Agents Inc. will provide no comment as it is apparent that you, Wired and its editors attempt [to] fit a pre-arranged narrative through publishing false facts and other blatant lies.”

Registered Agents Inc. says that it has offices in every state in the US and in Washington, DC, allowing it to offer its customers the ability to register a business anywhere. Many of those offices are small outfits located near state government offices, so its employees can easily submit paperwork. (The Sheridan office is located just a block away from city hall.)

Registered Agents Inc. has expanded beyond incorporation services, building custom software to manage entire businesses. Last year, it acquired Epik, a domain registrar and web hosting company that had previously catered to far-right extremists.

Much of the company’s high-level operations and development take place in the Pacific Northwest, including Spokane, Washington, and Post Falls, Idaho. The company has two major subsidiaries: Two Barrels LLC, which develops software, and Corporate Tools LLC, which enables its customers to manage the filings of multiple businesses.

“Somebody will hire [Registered Agents Inc.] to create an LLC, and then [Registered Agents Inc. will] sign all that paperwork with fake identities and submit it to the Secretary of State,” says Mikhail Slyusarev, who worked as a senior software engineer at the company for more than six years. “There’s no oversight, you're not really answering to anybody, and you’re just making shit up.”

ON JULY 29, 2015, Registered Agents Inc. updated the name listed on its own incorporation documents it had filed with the Wyoming secretary of state. While Keen had previously signed as president and registered agent of the company, the new registered agent for the company was a man named Bill Havre.

Registered Agent Inc.’s website featured a vivid yarn detailing Havre’s life story, according to an archived version of the site from December 2021. Havre grew up on a small ranch in Wyoming and studied medicine at the University of California, Berkeley in the early 1970s, the bio read. But shortly after enrolling in classes, Havre returned home to Wyoming to tend to a family emergency, eventually starting his own businesses in the state.

“After gaining some insight into the nature of starting a business, Mr. Havre was intrigued by the business entity formation process, particularly concerned by what at the time seemed exorbitant fees paid to attorneys to complete and file corporate formation documents,” the website said.

Havre was once listed on Registered Agent Inc.’s website as the company’s president and executive director. Havre has helped register 491 companies with Registered Agents Inc., WIRED found. He’s also an entirely fabricated persona, five former employees say, an invention of Dan Keen.

That 2015 document is the earliest recorded instance of the company using fake names identified by WIRED. Havre’s name was removed from the company’s website in 2022 following inquiries from The Washington Post and the International Consortium of Investigative Journalists.

The Wyoming incorporation paperwork viewed by WIRED includes the full text of the state law against filing a false document, reminding registrants that doing so may be a felony punishable by up to two years in prison and a $2,000 fine. Former employees say that customers of Registered Agents Inc. typically aren’t aware that a fake name is used to sign their company’s incorporation documents.

Provided a copy of the Wyoming incorporation document, experts say using a fake person would likely violate the law. “This does look like it requires a real person to sign—Riley Park would seemingly be in violation,” says Gary Kalman, the executive director of Transparency International US, an anti-corruption group.

Former Registered Agents Inc. employees allege that Keen justified using fake names by saying it was a way to protect employees from being drawn into legal battles and being forced to testify about the company’s customers.

The laws for incorporating companies in America are decided at the state level, allowing a prospective business owner to shop around based on tax advantages, anonymity rules, and other considerations. Many state offices don’t fully investigate filings to determine if the signatories are legitimate, former employees of Registered Agents Inc. say.

“There is no federal requirement, there is no state-level requirement that these registered agents have any code of ethics. There’s no anything,” says Sarah Beth Felix, an expert on financial transparency. “For being essential gatekeepers to legitimize businesses, they’re grossly unregulated.”

Former employees say that the registered agents industry benefits from relaxed incorporation laws in states like Wyoming and Montana, where registering a completely anonymous company is as simple as paying a registered agent service as little as $200. That makes the US an appealing location for illicit financial activity even before the added layer of opacity by a registered agent.

According to two former employees, the company doesn’t screen to see if its customers are real people, or even if their email addresses are legitimate. Former employees say they raised concerns about not knowing the true identity of all of their customers to company leadership, but were dismissed. Experts and former employees said that verifying the identity of its customers is often not required for registered agents.

“You could say your name was Billy Bob and your email was BillyBob123, and we would have created an LLC for you,” the former software developer says.

“Dan takes it almost to an extreme. He tries to maximize what the laws allow in each state,” says Don Evans, who worked in a chief technical officer role at the company. “If people find ways to use his services that are in the gray area, he would turn a cheek to it.”

SINCE 2008, DAN Keen has grown his business from a small company serving customers in the Pacific Northwest to a major national player in what’s known as the corporate formation industry. The company and its competitors offer the ability to incorporate a business in the state of a customer’s choosing and receive mail and legal notices.

Keen started the company after running a tree trimming and landscaping business. Former employees said Keen worked tirelessly to build the business, often sending emails at all hours of the night.

“Dan put in a lot of effort, he worked nonstop,” says Matt MacKenzie, who worked as a legal compliance specialist for more than 11 years and was one of the company’s earliest employees.

When the company was a small upstart, Keen regularly listed his name on the formation documents of the company and its various subsidiaries in states across America. “It wasn't until down the road a couple years later, where he started wanting to use full-on fake names and take his name off all the corporate paperwork for Registered Agents Inc.,” MacKenzie says.

Keen is described by former employees as a driven but eccentric businessman who is prone to micromanagement and sudden shifts in mood. Keen dresses modestly, former employees say, wearing shorts and flannel shirts, and is an avid skier and outdoorsman.

Keen often took a passive aggressive approach with his staff, according to six former employees. Two recounted Keen begrudgingly offering health care plans to employees after being told it was required by the Affordable Care Act, allegedly telling his staff they were “whiners and complainers” for asking for it.

Multiple former employees described Keen as “inappropriate,” saying he often made comments about employees' physical appearance. Two former employees described him as making misogynistic statements, which allegedly included making sexual comments about women and frequently questioning their ability to perform their job.

Several former employees questioned the high-security nature of the office, which they say was filled with security cameras and required them to lock their cell phones in boxes. Slyusarev, Registered Agents Inc.’s former senior software engineer, says the phone system, which he says he installed, was capable of surreptitiously recording employee phone calls.

Former employees say that Keen chafed at government regulations and exercised complete control over the company and its operations. Keen has no website or social media profiles and doesn't give interviews about his business.

“He thinks people are out to get him, or out to get the company,” Evans, the former senior employee, claims.

Details about its inner workings, including the ownership and management structure, are concealed from employees, who say they were discouraged from discussing it at the office. And the practice of using fake personas extends even to Registered Agents Inc.’s own workers.

When Don Evans began interviewing at Registered Agents Inc., he recalled first speaking over LinkedIn with Diane Brunner, who identified herself as a recruiter at the company. When he arrived at the office for an interview, he asked to speak with Brunner and was told nobody by that name works at the company.

Jack Stephenson, who claims to be a vice president and client relations director at Registered Agents Inc. on LinkedIn, is another fake persona, employees say. Stephenson frequently comments on the registered agents industry on LinkedIn. He lists a Bachelor of Business Administration from Utah State University on his profile, but an official from the university told WIRED they couldn’t find any records pertaining to Jack Stephenson.


Understanding Bitcoin Privacy with OXT — Part 4
https://archive.ph/Aw6zC

> It is unlikely that users reading this are looking to become “experts” in chain analysis, but a fundamental understanding of the tools and concepts used to attack their privacy will allow them to better protect their privacy. In this section we will introduce the real world implications of sending and receiving transactions on user privacy. From there we will present specific privacy enhancing technologies that can be used to maintain privacy when interacting with bitcoin.


Understanding Bitcoin Privacy with OXT — Part 3
https://archive.ph/suxyq

> Previously, we introduced change detection heuristics for simple spends with 1 input and 2 outputs. We assumed that the transaction included a payment and change output. In reality, a simple spend has many additional interpretations based on the UTXO “ownership model”. The ownership model attempts to assign ownership to the inputs and outputs of a transaction. The complete ownership interpretations for a transaction with 1 input and 2 outputs are shown in Fig 3.1.


Understanding Bitcoin Privacy with OXT — Part 2
https://archive.ph/TDvjy

> Now that we have presented the basic concepts in Part 1, we can move on to the core concepts that underpin chain analysis by expanding our analyses to include “external” transaction data.


Understanding Bitcoin Privacy with OXT — Part 1
https://archive.ph/1xAw7


TagStudio - A file and photo management application and system
https://github.com/CyanVoxel/TagStudio

> TagStudio is a photo & file organization application with an underlying system that focuses on giving freedom and flexibility to the user. No proprietary programs or formats, no sea of sidecar files, and no complete upheaval of your filesystem structure.


For sure


Kraken launches self-custodial mobile wallet called Kraken Wallet
https://www.theblock.co/post/289448/kraken-launches-self-custodial-mobile-wallet-and-releases-its-open-source-code

> The crypto exchange giant Kraken released a self-custodial mobile wallet called Kraken Wallet, and it even published the app's code at launch. Kraken Wallet lets users manage their NFTs, tokens and DeFi positions across Bitcoin, Ethereum, Solana, Optimism, Base, Arbitrum, Polygon and Dogecoin, according to a release from Kraken. Users can also connect to popular decentralized applications and access round-the-clock customer service support. The firm also released Kraken Wallet's code on the developer platform GitHub, stating that third-party review strengthens the wallet's security. The wallet also eschews all but necessary customer data collection in the name of privacy. Kraken holds no sign-in details, email addresses or know-your-customer information, and the firm hides user IP addresses. "Not even internal app performance analytics are collected," the company adds. Kraken notes that Kraken Wallet remains a hot wallet due to Apple iOS CryptoKit not supporting the secp256k1 elliptic curve, which is used to create cryptographic keys and digital signatures on the blockchain networks like Bitcoin. The app must use the internet and use additional software to sign transactions. "This means that the private keys must be exposed — at least during signing — within the memory of the sandboxed app environment. This leaves them more exposed to potential threats than a wallet which uses a secure element to sign transactions," the firm said. "Despite the inability to perform the signing on the secure elements directly, which would offer increased protection, we have committed to providing an open-source mobile crypto wallet that prioritizes security, transparency and user control." Kraken brought in $49.3 billion in spot market volumes in March, according to The Block's Data Dashboard. The firm also launched an institutional custody platform called Kraken Custody on March 20.


Bitcoin Sign Guy sells the Bitcoin sign for over 16 BTC
https://protos.com/bitcoin-sign-guy-sells-the-bitcoin-sign/

> Christian Langalis, colloquially known as the ‘Bitcoin Sign Guy,’ has decided to auction off the piece of paper on which he wrote ‘Buy Bitcoin,’ and held up behind Janet Yellen in 2017 during a House Financial Services Committee.  The former Cato Institute intern, who now works on projects on decentralized personal server platform Urbit, stated, “When Bitcoiners ask me about the sign, I tell them, ‘you’d have done the same in my seat.’” According to a Bloomberg article, Langalis turned down a private five-BTC offer in the hopes that the auction would fetch a higher price. His gamble seems to have paid off, with the sale amounting to 16 BTC — over a million dollars at the time of sale and 220% more than the private offer.  One bidder appeared to briefly misclick a bid, rocketing the price to 100 BTC before they corrected their bid down to 10 BTC. The anonymous winner of the Bitcoin sign went by the username ‘Squirrekkywrath.’  The note is described as being ‘hastily drawn on a yellow legal pad,’ and ‘one of few widely-recognized physical Bitcoin artifacts, given Bitcoin’s virtual nature’ by the auction house. The auction house requires all individuals placing bids to deposit 1% of their bitcoin bid as collateral. Read more: Don’t download your full node Bitcoin software from Bitcoin.org. Additionally, the sign is characterized as ‘Ink Drawing on Legal Pad’ and the auction winner may select a certificate of authenticity in the form of their choosing, including a paper certificate or a bitcoin ordinal. Langalis earned almost 17 bitcoins from a series of replica editions that he sold in 2019. He says he plans to use the bitcoin earned from the auction to work on current cryptocurrency projects.


Is it bad that I recognize most of the avatars?


What if you could explore nostr from a wider perspective #damuslabs

https://cdn.jb55.com/s/f5cf579bb95ded6c.png


stacker.news


Soon to be US dollar


Welcome aboard!

nostr:note1df8d339fg93gm93hxjd9eywwkqgv4m2ptfhumr8cpesj6lvsgw8s5dkshc


Runes....

https://video.nostr.build/72be856014a1b537eaf15f43260ec1b69a7c7366bf39dc459e5c55a1a38e26dd.mp4


Jack Dorsey's Block completes development of 3nm Bitcoin mining chip
https://cryptobriefing.com/block-3nm-bitcoin-chip/

> The announcement follows the prior development and testing of a five-nanometer (5nm) mining chip prototype. The new 3nm chip is designed to deliver high performance, necessary for mining operators to remain competitive in the current and future mining epochs, particularly after the recent fourth halving. For the next stage, Block plans to offer a standalone mining chip, positioning itself as a unique, well-capitalized hardware vendor in the mining industry. The company is in the final stages of a full tapeout of the chip design, collaborating with a leading global semiconductor foundry to finalize the product.  Building on the development of its Bitcoin mining chip, Block is also working on a full mining system. The company aims to leverage its expertise in product and software development, system engineering, supply chain management, and aftermarket support, to build the system. These developments are part of the company’s broader goal to decentralize the supply of mining hardware and the distribution of mining power across the industry.
Jack Dorsey revealed plans to build a Bitcoin mining system in 2021, even before his departure from Twitter’s board of directors in May 2022. At the time, he expected the system to be based on custom silicon and open-source so it could be used worldwide by individuals and businesses.


opt out!


Prices of Bitcoin Runes dip two days after launch
https://archive.is/Nfkr8

> This week was supposed to be the moment that fungible tokens on Bitcoin rocketed to prominence. Although some fungible tokens like the billion-dollar ORDI have gained modest popularity using standards like BRC-20 and STAMPS’ SRC-20, a brand new protocol was supposed to supersede these expensive, slow, and data-intensive standards. On April 20, the day of the Bitcoin halving, Ordinals founder Casey Rodarmor launched his next-generation fungible token protocol, Runes. Hundreds of thousands of wallets minted new Runes, paying all-time high Bitcoin transaction fees. Runes promised to be a more professional, less expensive, faster, and more seamless protocol for launching altcoins on Bitcoin. Rodarmor coded Runes because, in his words, “Fungible tokens are 99.9% scams and memes. However, they don’t appear to be going away any time soon.” In short, Rodarmor launched Runes to bring meme coins to Bitcoin. When the halving occurred late Friday night, many fans of Rodarmor were busy working instead of celebrating. Many speculators wanted to mint a Rune within the first block of Bitcoin’s halving, paying astronomical fees alongside other users bidding for inclusion in that historically important block. All told, Bitcoin speculators paid $2.4 million dollars to miners to store less than 4MB of transaction data within Bitcoin’s 840,000th block. Two days later, many Runes prices have already started cratering. Five of the top eight Runes listed on Unisat have declined over the past 24 hours along with 27 of the top 40 on OKX.


Python - All Algorithms implemented in Python
https://github.com/TheAlgorithms/Python


Congress Live Net Worth Tracker
https://www.quiverquant.com/congress-live-net-worth/

Data on politicians' stock portfolios to calculate live net worth estimates for members of Congress.


Tiny11builder - Scripts to build a trimmed-down Windows 11 image
https://github.com/ntdevlabs/tiny11builder

 > Scripts to build a trimmed-down Windows 11 image - now in PowerShell! Tiny11 builder, now completely overhauled. After more than a year (for which I am so sorry) of no updates, tiny11 builder is now a much more complete and flexible solution - one script fits all. Also, it is a steppingstone for an even more fleshed-out solution. You can now use it on ANY Windows 11 release (not just a specific build), as well as ANY language or architecture. This is made possible thanks to the much-improved scripting capabilities of PowerShell, compared to the older Batch release. Since it is written in PowerShell, make sure to set the execution policy to Unrestricted, so that you could run the script. If you haven't done this before, make sure to run: Set-ExecutionPolicy unrestricted as administrator in PowerShell before running the script, otherwise it would just crash. This is a script created to automate the build of a streamlined Windows 11 image, similar to tiny11. My main goal is to use only Microsoft utilities like DISM, and no utilities from external sources. The only executable included is oscdimg.exe, which is provided in the Windows ADK and it is used to create bootable ISO images. Also included is an unattended answer file, which is used to bypass the Microsoft Account on OOBE and to deploy the image with the /compact flag. It's open-source, so feel free to add or remove anything you want! Feedback is also much appreciated.


NetBSD 9.4 Released With Security & Stability Fixes
https://www.phoronix.com/news/NetBSD-9.4-Released

> NetBSD 10.0 debuted last month with a long list of improvements and other enhancements that built up over the past several years. For those not yet taking the leap to this big NetBSD update, NetBSD 9.4 is out today for those relying on the stable NetBSD 9 series. NetBSD 9.4 brings various stability enhancements and security fixes. With NetBSD 9.3 having debuted back in 2022, there's a lot in NetBSD 9.4 in terms of fixes. NetBSD 9.4 also includes some updated hardware support such as Intel 600 and 700 series chipset support in various drivers, AMD Zen 3 and Zen 4 support within the temperature driver and related components, supporting newer CPUs in tprof, and various support additions for different wired/wireless network adapters and other device ASICs. NetBSD 9.4 also ships with an updated X.Org Server due to all the security vulnerabilities found over the past two years, updated OpenSSL, and other package updates. The release announcement strongly recommends that NetBSD 9 users upgrade to NetBSD 9.4 if not going straight away for NetBSD 10.


Windows vulnerability reported by the NSA exploited to install Russian malware
https://arstechnica.com/security/2024/04/kremlin-backed-hackers-exploit-critical-windows-vulnerability-reported-by-the-nsa/

> Kremlin-backed hackers have been exploiting a critical Microsoft vulnerability for four years in attacks that targeted a vast array of organizations with a previously undocumented tool, the software maker disclosed Monday. When Microsoft patched the vulnerability in October 2022—at least two years after it came under attack by the Russian hackers—the company made no mention that it was under active exploitation. As of publication, the company’s advisory still made no mention of the in-the-wild targeting. Windows users frequently prioritize the installation of patches based on whether a vulnerability is likely to be exploited in real-world attacks. Exploiting CVE-2022-38028, as the vulnerability is tracked, allows attackers to gain system privileges, the highest available in Windows, when combined with a separate exploit. Exploiting the flaw, which carries a 7.8 severity rating out of a possible 10, requires low existing privileges and little complexity. It resides in the Windows print spooler, a printer-management component that has harbored previous critical zero-days. Microsoft said at the time that it learned of the vulnerability from the US National Security Agency. On Monday, Microsoft revealed that a hacking group tracked under the name Forest Blizzard has been exploiting CVE-2022-38028 since at least June 2020—and possibly as early as April 2019. The threat group—which is also tracked under names including APT28, Sednit, Sofacy, GRU Unit 26165, and Fancy Bear—has been linked by the US and the UK governments to Unit 26165 of the Main Intelligence Directorate, a Russian military intelligence arm better known as the GRU. Forest Blizzard focuses on intelligence gathering through the hacking of a wide array of organizations, mainly in the US, Europe, and the Middle East. Since as early as April 2019, Forest Blizzard has been exploiting CVE-2022-38028 in attacks that, once system privileges are acquired, use a previously undocumented tool that Microsoft calls GooseEgg. The post-exploitation malware elevates privileges within a compromised system and goes on to provide a simple interface for installing additional pieces of malware that also run with system privileges. This additional malware, which includes credential stealers and tools for moving laterally through a compromised network, can be customized for each target. “While a simple launcher application, GooseEgg is capable of spawning other applications specified at the command line with elevated permissions, allowing threat actors to support any follow-on objectives such as remote code execution, installing a backdoor, and moving laterally through compromised networks,” Microsoft officials wrote. GooseEgg is typically installed using a simple batch script, which is executed following the successful exploitation of CVE-2022-38028 or another vulnerability, such as CVE-2023-23397, which Monday's advisory said has also been exploited by Forest Blizzard. The script is responsible for installing the GooseEgg binary, often named justice.exe or DefragmentSrv.exe, then ensuring that they run each time the infected machine is rebooted.


The Moon brings a wild but precarious fish orgy to California's beaches
https://www.bbc.com/future/article/20240419-californias-beaches-are-home-to-wild-fish-orgies-during-the-grunion-run

> On a Southern Californian beach in the middle of the night, a citizen scientist stood observing thousands of fish having sex. "Unruly thousands, all making noise," they duly jotted down. "Looked like some post-apocalyptic marine Mad Max." This unique mating ritual is known as the grunion run. Unlike most other fish, the small silvery grunions actually spawn onshore, flinging themselves from the ocean onto the sand. In addition, they only spawn during full or new moons – because they need a high tide. Since 2002, the rituals have been observed by "grunion greeters" – citizen scientists who volunteer to observe the fish at 50 California beaches. They report their observations back to Karen Martin, a scientist at Malibu's Pepperdine University, who has been studying grunion for decades. To date, more than 5,000 people have contributed to Martin's project. "We couldn't do it without them," says Martin. "There is no other way for us to get this kind of data. It's pretty remarkable, actually." The fish are near-impossible to count. They are smart enough to avoid nets, and they don't take bait on a hook. "The 'normal' methods for stock assessment do not work for these species," Martin explains. As a result, there's no formal statistic for how many there are – and so they don't have a conservation status either, although Martin says they are certainly under threat and numbers have declined significantly in the past decade according to her research. The fish are only found along the Pacific Coast, primarily between Punta Abreojos in Mexico's Baja California, up to Point Conception, in central California. Scientists believe the fish, which grow to around five inches (13cm) long, have declined in numbers over the past century. Beach erosion, light pollution and development along coastlines are the main threats to the fish, as well as overfishing and habitat destruction.

> The grunion's mating behaviour is unique, to say the least. Females swim as far up as they can and then fling themselves out of the water onto the sand, wiggling their tails to dig a hole, into which they release their eggs. Males follow behind and fertilise the eggs. The eggs remain buried in the sand until the next tide that is high enough to reach the them, usually around 10 days. Then they hatch. This behaviour puts the grunion at risk, though – and not only because they are easy prey when they're spawning on the sand. The beaches the fish use happen to be some of the most popular tourist destinations in California, which are groomed almost daily with heavy machinery, meaning the eggs are often destroyed. "Everything that people do on those beaches is going to impact the environment," Martin says. Although gathering data on the fish has been challenging, there have been some successes with implementing regulations to protect grunion. In 1927, the first regulations to protect grunion were put in place by the California Department of Fish and Wildlife after scientists observed the fish being caught in enormous amounts when they came ashore – people would use nets made from bedsheets to catch grunion en masse. Gear restrictions were introduced during closed season – April until June – meaning locals could only use their bare hands. In the 1940s, marine biologist Boyd Walker observed every grunion run in La Jolla, California, for three years. His dissertation mapped the grunion's range, mating habits, and developed a method to count grunion, now known as the Walker Scale. This is what Martin's grunion greeters use to compile their reports. The scale ranges from W0 meaning "no fish or only a few individuals", to W5 meaning "fish covering the length of the beach, several individuals deep, impossible to see sand between fish". The latter is a rare event, making up only around 1-3% of observations in a year. The citizen scientists assess the number of fish on shore, the duration of the spawning event, and the extent of the shoreline the fish cover. Data gathered from the most popular grunion beaches gathered shows an overall decline in the fish. Martin's study, which she published in 2019 using citizen science data, found from 2002 to 2010 the median average ranking on the Walker scale was W2, indicating 100-500 fish at the peak of a run. From 2010 to 2018 this ranking dropped to a median of W1 – fewer than 100 fish at the peak. Furthermore, a median of W0 – "no run" with little or no spawning – was recorded in both 2014 and 2016. "Despite local concentrations, California grunion are not abundant," says Dianna Porzio, senior environmental scientist at the California Department of Fish and Wildlife. "Although [the grunion greeters] data has limitations, the findings show a decrease in the number of spawning California grunion across much of their southern California range over the past decade."


Good question, I’m not sure it is possible.


Thanks for the zap!


Steam Deck Motion Sensors Being Worked On For Linux's HID-Steam Driver
https://www.phoronix.com/news/Steam-Deck-IMU-For-HID-Driver

> A patch is undergoing work to add Steam Deck IMU support to the HID-Steam kernel driver for supporting the accelerometer and gyroscope sensors of the Steam Deck controller. The patches by independent developer Max Maisel allow for the accelerometer and gyroscope features to be exposed to user-space via a separate evdev node with the HID-Steam driver, the kernel driver supporting the Steam Controller and Steam Deck input functionality. This exposing of the Steam Deck IMU support via separate evdev nodes match the behavior of the Nintendo and PlayStation HID kernel drivers for exposing these motion sensors.


Open Source Community Unites to Build CRA-Compliant Cybersecurity Processes
https://news.apache.org/foundation/entry/open-source-community-unites-to-build-cra-compliant-cybersecurity-processes

> Cybersecurity is a central topic for governments around the world. The European Union’s Cyber Resilience Act (CRA) introduced rules on how software should be developed, tested, audited and supported to ensure more secure software. Because open source software underpins today’s global digital infrastructure, this has a profound impact on many actors in the open source software ecosystem. The Apache Software Foundation, Blender Foundation, OpenSSL Software Foundation, PHP Foundation, Python Software Foundation, Rust Foundation, and Eclipse Foundation are jointly announcing our intention to collaborate on the establishment of common specifications for secure software development based on existing open source best practices. The working group is forming to address the multifaceted challenges of cybersecurity in the open source ecosystem, and to demonstrate our commitment to cooperation with and implementation of the CRA. The group’s initial effort will be to enumerate existing security policies and procedures of the respective open source foundations, and similar documents describing best practices. For years, the foundations and communities have created and maintained industry best practices for secure software development processes. With these best practices as our starting point, we aim to accelerate the development of cohesive cybersecurity processes required for regulatory compliance while offering a neutral environment for hosting technical discussions with the open source community at-large. Neutrality of foundations, vendors, communities, etc. is central to this effort. The new working group will be hosted at the Brussels-based Eclipse Foundation AISBL under the auspices of the Eclipse Foundation Specification Process. The governance of the working group will follow the Eclipse Foundation’s usual member-led model but will be augmented by explicit representation from the open source community to ensure diversity and balance in decision-making. The deliverables will consist of one or more process specifications made available under a liberal specification copyright licence and a royalty-free patent licence.


Wow

nostr:note1q7zvtu6jd3dkjuhg4fs6srsj59dkwr4x6224a6u3w6gyg6rc4jrqmlts0y


Concern grows as bird flu spreads further in US cows: 32 herds in 8 states
https://arstechnica.com/science/2024/04/concern-grows-as-bird-flu-spreads-further-in-us-cows-32-herds-in-8-states/

> Researchers around the world are growing more uneasy with the spread of highly pathogenic avian influenza (H5N1) in US dairy cows as the virus continues to make its way into new herds and states. Several experts say the US is not sharing enough information from the federal investigation into the unexpected and growing outbreak, including genetic information from isolated viruses. To date, the US Department of Agriculture has tallied 32 affected herds in eight states: Idaho, Kansas, Michigan, New Mexico, North Carolina, Ohio, South Dakota, and Texas. In some cases, the movement of cattle between herds can explain the spread of the virus. But the USDA has not publicly clarified if all the herds are linked in a single outbreak chain or if there is evidence that the virus has spilled over to cows multiple times. Early infections in Texas were linked to dead wild birds (pigeons, blackbirds, and grackles) found on dairy farms. But the USDA reportedly indicated to Stat News that the infections do not appear to be all linked to the Texas cases. Spread of the virus via cattle movements indicates that there is cow-to-cow transmission occurring, the USDA said. But it's unclear how the virus is spreading between cows. Given that even the most symptomatic cows show few respiratory symptoms, the USDA speculates that the most likely way it is spreading is via contaminated milking equipment. Adding to the uncertainty of the virus's spread, The New York Times on Friday reported that the one herd found infected with H5N1 in North Carolina showed no symptoms of the virus. This raises the possibility that the virus could be silently spreading in unknown numbers of other asymptomatic herds and states. In its most recent FAQ document, the USDA encouraged testing for H5N1 if herds show clinical symptoms, such as lethargy, fever, low milk production, and loose stools. But the Times noted that the agency has begun reimbursing farms for testing asymptomatic cows. Meanwhile, the USDA also reported that it has evidence that H5N1 from dairy farms has spread back into birds in nearby poultry farms, but how this is happening is also unknown.


Krazam OS
https://www.krazam.tv/


Good question.

nostr:note18z7sj98sxj3a8rcwj70kyjgz0ffl23jtardnds0r6gf7dg48kp9qj9rvxu


No one buys books - lessons from the publishing industry
https://www.elysian.press/p/no-one-buys-books

> In 2022, Penguin Random House wanted to buy Simon & Schuster. The two publishing houses made up 37 percent and 11 percent of the market share, according to the filing, and combined they would have condensed the Big Five publishing houses into the Big Four. But the government intervened and brought an antitrust case against Penguin to determine whether that would create a monopoly. The judge ultimately ruled that the merger would create a monopoly and blocked the $2.2 billion purchase. But during the trial, the head of every major publishing house and literary agency got up on the stand to speak about the publishing industry and give numbers, giving us an eye-opening account of the industry from the inside. All of the transcripts from the trial were compiled into a book called The Trial. It took me a year to read, but I’ve finally summarized my findings and pulled out all the compelling highlights. I think I can sum up what I’ve learned like this: The Big Five publishing houses spend most of their money on book advances for big celebrities like Brittany Spears and franchise authors like James Patterson and this is the bulk of their business. They also sell a lot of Bibles, repeat best sellers like Lord of the Rings, and children’s books like The Very Hungry Caterpillar. These two market categories (celebrity books and repeat bestsellers from the backlist) make up the entirety of the publishing industry and even fund their vanity project: publishing all the rest of the books we think about when we think about book publishing (which make no money at all and typically sell less than 1,000 copies).


What We Learned Inside a North Korean Internet Server
https://www.38north.org/2024/04/what-we-learned-inside-a-north-korean-internet-server-how-well-do-you-know-your-partners/

> A misconfigured North Korean Internet cloud server has provided a fascinating glance into the world of North Korean animation outsourcing and how foreign companies might be inadvertently employing North Korean companies on information technology (IT) projects. The incident also underlines how difficult it is for foreign companies to verify their outsourced work is not potentially breaking sanctions and ending up on computers in Pyongyang. The story begins in late 2023 with the discovery of a cloud storage server on a North Korean Internet Protocol (IP) address. The server, which appears no longer in use, had been incorrectly configured, making the daily flow of files into and out of this server viewable by anyone without a password. North Korea employs such servers because the average IT worker inside the country does not have direct access to the Internet. Typically, an organization might have just one or two computers with Internet access; workers need approval to use them and are monitored while they do so. The cloud server in question was discovered by Nick Roy, who runs the NK Internet blog. Together, throughout January this year, we observed files. Each day, a new batch of files would appear that included instructions for animation work and the results of that day’s work. The identity of the person or persons uploading the files could not be determined. Often the files contained editing comments and instructions in Chinese, presumably written by the production company, along with a translation of those instructions into Korean. This suggests a go-between was responsible for relaying information between the production companies and the animators. The identity of the North Korean partner was never revealed in any of the documentation observed, but it is likely the April 26 Animation Studio, also known as SEK Studio. The Pyongyang-based organization is North Korea’s premier animation house, producing series for domestic television broadcasts, including the popular “Squirrel and Hedgehog” series. It has previously worked on several international projects, including some with South Korean companies during the “Sunshine Policy” era in the early 2000s. However, in 2016, the studio was sanctioned by the US Department of Treasury as a North Korean state-owned enterprise. The US government has twice laid additional sanctions on Chinese companies that have worked with the studio or acted as a go-between, once in 2021 and again in 2022. For example, in the communication below, the animator is being asked to improve the shape of the character’s head. Together with researchers from Mandiant, a computer security company owned by Google, access logs for the server were also examined. They revealed several logins from Internet addresses associated with virtual private network (VPN) services, but among those that were not VPN-related was an IP address in Spain and three in China. Two of the Chinese addresses were registered to Liaoning Province, which neighbors North Korea and includes the towns of Dandong, Dalian and Shenyang. All three cities are known to have many North Korean-operated businesses and are main centers for North Korea’s IT workers who live overseas.


Equinox.space: a space survival experience with interactive  gamification
https://equinox.space/

> Crafting an immersive space survival experience that combines interactive storytelling and gamification. We think the Web needs more narrative-driven experiences, where stories unfold via exploration and user interaction. So we embarked on creating our own interactive story about something awesome: space travel! Drawing inspiration from video games, we created a first-person journey to enhance immersion. We ensured the controls were user-friendly, allowing even those unfamiliar with gaming to enjoy it comfortably. Equinox is available for desktop and mobile browsers. Thanks to an interaction mode specifically designed for touch screens, the entire story can be experienced on any phone or tablet with just one finger. Making use of visual & sound effects, voiceovers, along with an evolving soundtrack, we aimed to bring a cinematic quality to the experience. To ensure the experience remains fun and interesting, a series of exploration-driven mechanics and puzzles are introduced, allowing the story to progress in a meaningful way. The entire project, encompassing art direction, asset production, music creation, and writing, was conceived and executed in-house by our team. This initiative reflects our studio’s commitment to crafting immersive, interactive experiences that deeply engage users, serving as a blueprint for how we can bring a client’s vision to life.


HashiCorp: Introducing The Infrastructure Cloud
https://www.hashicorp.com/blog/introducing-the-infrastructure-cloud

> Today HashiCorp is excited to introduce The Infrastructure Cloud to help organizations and their development teams make the most of their cloud investment. Our goal is to help these teams ship code quickly while minimizing cloud costs and security risks. The Infrastructure Cloud isn’t a new product. Instead, it’s a new way for the HashiCorp products to deliver value more quickly via the HashiCorp Cloud Platform (HCP), a unified SaaS platform for infrastructure and security lifecycle management. As part of this announcement, we’re bringing Terraform to HCP, and Terraform Cloud is now HCP Terraform.
The Infrastructure Cloud is the result of more than a decade of experience working with thousands of customers to deeply understand what leads to successful cloud adoption.


Doom-htop: The classic DOOM game over htop, the text-based process viewer
https://github.com/0x0mer/doom-htop

> Ever wondered whether ```htop``` could be used to render the graphics of cult video games? I know I have. In order to quench our curiosity and for your viewing pleasure, I created ```doom-htop```.

> The main doom process forks and creates as many process as there are lines in the ascii converted image, and then creates a shared memory segment with every single one of them. The main process copies each line in the image to the matching process's memory segment, and each child-process copies from its segment and writes over its argv[0]. That's it, really.  Originally I wanted to do it with processes sorted by CPU usage, and create a process that consumes a specific CPU percentage, but that turned out to be pretty hard. Then I though about using linux's nice, but as a user you're only allowed 19 possible values, and I wanted better graphics. Eventually I stumbled upon the idea of using virtual memory allocation, which as I said before, as pretty specific per process. I noticed that even when all the forked processes allocate exactly the same amount of memory, htop shows the frame in the right order. I believe that happens because maybe in case of equality the processes are then sorted by time of creation? This works on my system (and is actually a little better, because that way there is less space in which another process could "get into the frame"), but I wasn't sure how it would work on other people's systems and didn't want to take the chance. This also means that I could have probably just given all the processes a unique nice value, but whatever. Anyways, then I created a simple keylogger that works by opening the keyboard's device. This way the game is always playing in the background regardless of whether htop is open or not, which I think is neat.


Amazon grows to over 750k robots, replacing 100k humans
https://finance.yahoo.com/news/amazon-grows-over-750-000-153000967.html

> Amazon.com Inc. is rapidly advancing its use of robotics, deploying over 750,000 robots to work alongside its employees. The world's second-largest private employer employs 1.5 million people. While that's a lot, it's a decrease of over 100,000 employees from the 1.6 million workers it had in 2021. Meanwhile, the company had 520,000 robots in 2022 and 200,000 robots in 2019. While Amazon is bringing on hundreds of thousands of robots per year, the company is slowly decreasing its employee numbers. The robots, including new models like Sequoia and Digit, are designed to perform repetitive tasks, thereby improving efficiency, safety and delivery speed for Amazon‘s customers. Sequoia, for example, speeds up inventory management and order processing in fulfillment centers, while Digit, a bipedal robot developed in collaboration with Agility Robotics, handles tasks like moving empty tote boxes.


Share with Care: Breaking E2EE in Nextcloud
https://eprint.iacr.org/2024/546

> Nextcloud is a leading cloud storage platform with more than 20 million users.
Nextcloud offers an end-to-end encryption (E2EE) feature that is claimed to be able “to keep extremely sensitive data fully secure even in case of a full server breach”. They also claim that the Nextcloud server “has Zero Knowledge, that is, never has access to any of the data or keys in unencrypted form”. This is achieved by having encryption and decryption operations that are done using file keys that are only available to  Nextcloud clients, with those file keys being protected by a key hierarchy that ultimately relies on long passphrases known exclusively to the users.


Proton picks up Standard Notes to deepen its pro-privacy portfolio
https://techcrunch.com/2024/04/10/proton-standard-notes/

> Switzerland-based Proton, the privacy-focused firm behind end-to-end encrypted (E2EE) webmail ProtonMail and other apps, has acquired Standard Notes, a note-taking app founded back in 2017. It offers the same kind of robust privacy promise to its 300,000+ users by also applying E2EE. In a press release announcing the move, Proton emphasized the pair’s “shared values,” including the use of E2EE; a commitment to open source technology; and how neither has relied upon venture capital to drive growth. E2EE is considered the gold standard of security technology, as service providers don’t hold encryption keys. This means they’re technically unable to decrypt user data, safeguarding users’ content behind a “zero knowledge” architecture. Put another way, you don’t have to trust the service provider not to snoop. By adding Standard Notes to its portfolio of apps, Proton will deepen its reach with an engaged community of pro-privacy users, layering on additional cross-selling opportunities as well as boosting the utility of its app ecosystem. The note-taking app fills an obvious gap in Proton’s current lineup.


Linux 6.9-rc5 Released: The Diffstat "Looks A Bit Wonky" But Not Bad
https://www.phoronix.com/news/Linux-6.9-rc5-Released

> The fifth weekly release candidate of Linux 6.9 is now available as the kernel cycle looks to get wrapped up by mid-May. This week brought yet more Bcachefs fixes and recovery improvements for this experimental copy-on-write file-system that has shown promising capabilities. Linux 6.9-rc5 also lands BHI mitigation fixes and other x86/urgent material that was on my radar. Much of the rest of the work this week is the usual bug/regression fixing churn. The Linux 6.9 kernel features are great and the performance benchmarks I've been carrying out so far are in good shape. Linux 6.9 stable should be out by mid-May depending upon how the rest of the release cycle plays out.


Our Response to Hashicorp's Cease and Desist Letter
https://opentofu.org/blog/our-response-to-hashicorps-cease-and-desist/

> On April 3rd, we received a Cease and Desist letter from HashiCorp regarding our implementation of the "removed" block in OpenTofu, claiming copyright infringement on the part of one of our core developers. We were also made aware of an article posted that same day with the same accusations. We have investigated these claims and are publishing the C&D letter, our response and the source code origin document resulting from our investigation. The OpenTofu team vehemently disagrees with any suggestion that it misappropriated, mis-sourced, or otherwise misused HashiCorp’s BSL code. All such statements have zero basis in facts. HashiCorp has made claims of copyright infringement in a cease & desist letter. These claims are completely unsubstantiated. The code in question can be clearly shown to have been copied from older code under the MPL-2.0 license. HashiCorp seems to have copied the same code itself when they implemented their version of this feature. All of this is easily visible in our detailed SCO analysis, as well as their own comments which indicate this.


Thanks!


All Fritz!Box modems have been hijacked
https://crapts.org/2024/04/21/all-fritz-box-modems-have-been-hijacked/

> Fritz!Box modems are popular modems by the German company AVM. They are tailored to the some-what more experienced users who want to have more control over their network settings and they can often be used to replace the modem from your cable/DSL/fiber ISP. The company has been around for a long time and Fritz!Box devices are generally considered to be reliable and well worth the price. However, since the beginning of 2024 all of the Fritz!Box devices have been hijacked. In short, the DHCP server on these modems hands out leases with the DNS suffix fritz.box, which means that domains in DNS requests are appended with the suffix. Unfortunately, this setting cannot be modified. Normally this doesn't have to be a problem, but since the beginning of this year the fritz.box DNS suffix is an actual registered domain and the owner of this domain is not AVM or anyone affiliated to them. This is a very serious issue. DNS requests on a Fritz!Box home network now get forwarded to an unknown entity, which is a case of DNS hijacking. Not every OS deals with DNS suffices in the same way, but at least Windows applies the suffix for all DNS requests which means every DNS request done by a Windows user is now effectively hijacked. The consequences of this are significant: Fritz!Box users' internet behavior is now sent directly to an unknown party and are now prone to phishing attacks. As far as I know the latter hasn't happened yet, but it's bound to happen at some point if this is not resolved as soon as possible. Besides the security issues, this also has a negative effect on performance when the registered IP address isn't responding to the DNS requests. I myself have experienced Chrome and Slack to be very slow in resolving network requests after starting up my Windows laptop. AVM's response so far has been lacking except for a tweet that fritz.box domain is in the process of being sold.


The sovereign music and V4V community.

nostr:npub1yfg0d955c2jrj2080ew7pa4xrtj7x7s7umt28wh0zurwmxgpyj9shwv6vg - V4V music streaming
nostr:npub1v5ufyh4lkeslgxxcclg8f0hzazhaw7rsrhvfquxzm2fk64c72hps45n0v5 - V4V podcasting
nostr:npub1h8gzew8am6cezuq7cpjgudldra40hgnruqrqlsrqnxnzs5wjtczqztps02 - V4V concert live streaming
nostr:npub1t6njrhtc9q3f5wdrwfrhpypq3kes5mpdx4u4rw9w2pxjanuxcpkqveagv3 - V4V artist ecosystem
nostr:npub1eequz6v23szzyx9utphsh8kg6kll50wte6sfh4vah8gdjtplcz6qg7at9s - V4V related merch, and artist
nostr:npub1stemstrls4f5plqeqkeq43gtjhtycuqd9w25v5r5z5ygaq2n2sjsd6mul5 - V4V content creation
nostr:npub1tvqc82mv8cezhax5r34n4muc2c4pgjz8kaye2smj032nngg52clq0rkrq4 nostr:npub1hqaz3dlyuhfqhktqchawke39l92jj9nt30dsgh2zvd9z7dv3j3gqpkt56s - V4V evangelists, OG pleb podcasters
nostr:npub13ql75nq8rldygpkjke47y893akh5tglqtqzs6cspancaxktthsusvfqcg7 - Podfather, V4V OG
nostr:npub13qrrw2h4z52m7jh0spefrwtysl4psfkfv6j4j672se5hkhvtyw7qu0almy  nostr:npub1a377f258tzafuzdgezwjw4aplg8ze3suyzm40t6j4czcjvwp5vls5d5r4w nostr:npub19r9qrxmckj2vyk5a5ttyt966s5qu06vmzyczuh97wj8wtyluktxqymeukr   nostr:npub1hrctsg2qwu5gsp65gvj29968z460g0th755jq92c8uaz620lewmq6qk525  nostr:npub1fnn2h0tgm2mwnl0kar5ez25wztum2w0q0rrrf326n0ljn999znwsqf4xnx  - V4V artist OGs

Artists:
nostr:npub1gvpstj5zutjsf459tgu4m999hy65yj86fungxdk3fmrw564qs43szucgec nostr:npub1q3wl9ywz9j73ytv8lnzjxkkdz3d9xxq3t43pvve2mzextlh6kskqngg7np nostr:npub14sjqfj7k2l468r7jm0uf9jystqdm9sdy8lcpaypl7chs2cz42pesp439mz nostr:npub1wxgpvehj0uhe22dwq4vhpgx3ew7w6v7etze36x89x6arpcmdzsqslwsvzl nostr:npub1jp9s6r7fpuz0q09w7t9q0j3lmvd97gqzqzgps88gu870gulh24xs9xal58 nostr:npub1e2wk36e9vg8uw40phrrkkhc4tax8a9ken3fjcyy63vmdyz9aee2sk9el27

Producers/supporters:
nostr:npub18gp8p84hjmjh9zejdlyqqcg22sj6x3qra0q2ng4v6cxxg95sav8q0mcg5e nostr:npub1d9a94klcx90k073pmlc606q9gyhtmg4p4h0jrzs0j0s34whjlzxq2sw3fp nostr:npub1papldckxytp2m8met6hyeh37m0cn6e32j03srl6thy4gq3tqrz3srq8t4n nostr:npub1z0rrmak9v5drkr3a20e5pehrwzc5pf392apfl5t9h9qk928nay3s7wxuxf nostr:npub1q3dxlgx6t5nc4swr4mnemu3mwdew5qlwfksy449cmwd9jelnyv6q3kzmcg nostr:npub1rpes5hhk6mxun5ddt5kecxfm8y3xdr0h5jwal32mc6mxafr48hxsaj2et2 nostr:npub1key55ax33gkl50uqemvl4khrtqrhzm7wzpc7fhseutt5ddkcwcrqgxlt3h nostr:npub14kw5ygpl6fyqagh9cnrytyaqyacg46lzkq42vz7hk8txdk49kzxs04j7y0 nostr:npub1unmftuzmkpdjxyj4en8r63cm34uuvjn9hnxqz3nz6fls7l5jzzfqtvd0j2 nostr:npub1q5sah9f3p9kl7uqdeaqskqwmg74ktxx70e0093dzh4lpzcp3t0mqzxky65 nostr:npub1yvscx9vrmpcmwcmydrm8lauqdpngum4ne8xmkgc2d4rcaxrx7tkswdwzdu nostr:npub177fz5zkm87jdmf0we2nz7mm7uc2e7l64uzqrv6rvdrsg8qkrg7yqx0aaq7 nostr:npub1gr65v2hqq83n3vqfh6m65eej65hxlqwyjp0echc9ghvw5p6pvqpse3mmjc nostr:npub1dsfcdwmj4h0hrhllu40ma3gfssjh0tr4elqfk7fac7j6hzqnwwwsy5ywd5 nostr:npub1geauq4eq8547h5ea75lpvg40q2k3syyun6hhwsejglex35s7cc8sd00xm0 nostr:npub1clk6vc9xhjp8q5cws262wuf2eh4zuvwupft03hy4ttqqnm7e0jrq3upup9 nostr:npub1nkpqrac6ljvzl0wcuktc7qcjxpuy9v7g9j8j075c9uxwez64mnfqgvllv6 nostr:npub1yauhh489aefdkzsewe5vj2u68elzxlsln7nn5yxr34e3c22vljdqkn7h9m nostr:npub1xv6axulxcx6mce5mfvfzpsy89r4gee3zuknulm45cqqpmyw7680q5pxea6 nostr:npub1getal6ykt05fsz5nqu4uld09nfj3y3qxmv8crys4aeut53unfvlqr80nfm

Just the tip of the purple iceberg.  Follow them all.

Apologies for anyone I inadvertently omitted.


Forgetting:
nostr:npub16tnq9ruem6evwmywhu69xxl0qk802f03vf8hftvkuvw0n7mmz83stxcvw5 the king of all weapons and nostr hype
nostr:npub1nyjvepdyl8hpx9qe09fjcvluk025jm5dh2rnvk6jwcfexem5ykcq9e39ch for sheer wit and determination, staying committed to learning btc/Nostr and being active in her endeavor 😘🐦🔥
nostr:npub1jzuma368395gu523y4vk4d34p0lxgctk436hggn4qcuj93075qgqtn3vm0 for nostr uncle problem solver
nostr:npub17x7htjej3hgcqwqj86u9yvpcunhw6nz4zclzph2zfnlwe4v0yp8qrxvgap for designing
nostr:npub1el3mgvtdjpfntdkwq446pmprpdv85v6rs85zh7dq9gvy7tgx37xs2kl27r cuz if I don’t post her even tho you did I’m dead
nostr:npub1jk9h2jsa8hjmtm9qlcca942473gnyhuynz5rmgve0dlu6hpeazxqc3lqz7 because he gives me hope for the younger gen and his memes
nostr:npub148ut8u4vr8xqd4gefhg6eyc5636p5zthw3zfse2njfkezegczers59ty0w for pure heart and class, PV
nostr:npub1v67clmf4jrezn8hsz28434nc0y5fu65e5esws04djnl2kasxl5tskjmjjk for real life real
nostr:npub1qny3tkh0acurzla8x3zy4nhrjz5zd8l9sy9jys09umwng00manysew95gx for orange leader whiskey tango foxtrot
nostr:npub1clk6vc9xhjp8q5cws262wuf2eh4zuvwupft03hy4ttqqnm7e0jrq3upup9 for wisdom and reserve
nostr:npub147whqsr5vsj86x0ays70r0hgreklre3ey97uvcmxhum65skst56s30selt for curation yakkihonne
nostr:npub18mszc492kns4m58vepn4xfa36z9xwra5ufrw4e78gcefk2a20z8qktr3sc for Nashville culture mining and wisdom
nostr:npub1hqaz3dlyuhfqhktqchawke39l92jj9nt30dsgh2zvd9z7dv3j3gqpkt56s for Dos Equis class and wisdom
nostr:npub1utx00neqgqln72j22kej3ux7803c2k986henvvha4thuwfkper4s7r50e8 for proof of work
nostr:npub1txh7f5wew26f56mps7l2gavgj0c9dnjj946a25ta7amgc6eqku6qwmwx64 for straight business
nostr:npub1ysxnqpymj6tq9cvqc6xfsughar0vkynxtyxqjaud5e5hq88cvf2qehzld9 for sincere education
nostr:npub1yx6pjypd4r7qh2gysjhvjd9l2km6hnm4amdnjyjw3467fy05rf0qfp7kza for persistence and code
nostr:npub1r8u6lw8c2h67s66magtqu78vtpckfzcsmmdsg06gqm723njsunfs8kfjwl for down to earth chick pov
nostr:npub1xswmtflr4yclfyy4mq4y4nynnnu2vu5nk8jp0875khq9gnz0cthsc0p4xw for big handed proof of work
nostr:npub12r0yjt8723ey2r035qtklhmdj90f0j6an7xnan8005jl7z5gw80qat9qrx for how the hell did you bag Noshole
nostr:npub1ppjkfvk0ek3g584gp7qp9d3znwdznadchet7q2aez9r27620n9zs45xvx2 cuz monero is acceptable Jenny
nostr:npub1z4m7gkva6yxgvdyclc7zp0vz4ta0s2d9jh8g83w03tp5vdf3kzdsxana6p to pop a fuckin bottle
nostr:npub1xv6axulxcx6mce5mfvfzpsy89r4gee3zuknulm45cqqpmyw7680q5pxea6 for insta wingman
nostr:npub1jrcfyw8n298jf83txvlxzx0w7jtfwqs0j4ha0dnn9ns33hgm209sqejdcc for insta wingwoman
nostr:npub1jlrs53pkdfjnts29kveljul2sm0actt6n8dxrrzqcersttvcuv3qdjynqn for stash sake and code
nostr:npub17swrr0ll933wv4djnzfkeg2g9qxp59237pzf67mvkfj4qr265skqxpumsd for proof of engineering and mining
nostr:npub1rpes5hhk6mxun5ddt5kecxfm8y3xdr0h5jwal32mc6mxafr48hxsaj2et2 for chill ass btc chick
nostr:npub1y67n93njx27lzmg9ua37ce7csvq4awvl6ynfqffzfssvdn7mq9vqlhq62h for classy news
nostr:npub1tvqc82mv8cezhax5r34n4muc2c4pgjz8kaye2smj032nngg52clq0rkrq4 to lead the charge
nostr:npub1wpl2u4cvuj6c9xwg40gvgj0gaf0pctpr5zg0rkyzfkw47f9trlgq8c7wnt to chill and vibe
nostr:npub1cf3zeytdnwgwzz5pk2ax0vvmmlzad03xcft4d50ejrfhsh8pxcdsefx7gk to proof of steak and btc vibe
nostr:npub1ve8qwrlztemdmnh62jffcr0y9m9dpqgqjdg8ufx7gc3qw5wdk74qyv9ka6 Matteo to link up
nostr:npub18ams6ewn5aj2n3wt2qawzglx9mr4nzksxhvrdc4gzrecw7n5tvjqctp424 to gather the plebs and brotherly signal
nostr:npub1rxysxnjkhrmqd3ey73dp9n5y5yvyzcs64acc9g0k2epcpwwyya4spvhnp8 for being that video guy with crazy education
nostr:npub1s33sw6y2p8kpz2t8avz5feu2n6yvfr6swykrnm2frletd7spnt5qew252p for all the hard work and text educating plebs
nostr:npub1tkmhdul84898eu3t94rfu7jypyhngwan5fwzc5tz52f36nrfdutsa9pcur because Troy is the fucking man, son
nostr:npub1xtscya34g58tk0z605fvr788k263gsu6cy9x0mhnm87echrgufzsevkk5s because thank satoshi for Damus for real
nostr:npub1h50pnxqw9jg7dhr906fvy4mze2yzawf895jhnc3p7qmljdugm6gsrurqev for holding it down on the Damus crew
nostr:npub1zafcms4xya5ap9zr7xxr0jlrtrattwlesytn2s42030lzu0dwlzqpd26k5 for the serious proof of work and code
nostr:npub1ejxswthae3nkljavznmv66p9ahp4wmj4adux525htmsrff4qym9sz2t3tv for the multi cultural courage to explore the US and our degenerate ways
nostr:npub1jv3tmy30yrr0ek0fzdz5wfanh0pdp947fqgewyz44qndmg75ev9sz7lakg for keeping it black as fuck and intelligent as fuck. We see no bounds my brother
nostr:npub1xd5apfmrpzfpr7w9l7uezm2fn8ztrdhvrtj3tlrmvvv8l6czqatshccdx5 for smearing makeup on my bitcoin Miami shirt first day at nostrville
nostr:npub10us6l7kvn340s2mw4jhluj0jlpt3zthnqftk8xewy80d64lpj96qa7xew6 because Kat on that real MF doom tip
nostr:npub1aeh2zw4elewy5682lxc6xnlqzjnxksq303gwu2npfaxd49vmde6qcq4nwx for the quick spin up chat and his passion to implement tech on his own terms
nostr:npub12gu8c6uee3p243gez6cgk76362admlqe72aq3kp2fppjsjwmm7eqj9fle6 for that peace of mind that if you live right, things will be right in the end
nostr:npub1mu9wmykl7qx5llk69axd3rvk0hzhdd25jsqtj2hmnzjpn2sxum6s8jjj0t because I’m not tryna get shot when I see a UFO and argue about it with him
nostr:npub1g3827ewz6d23rlgdhkaslc78gyule52ymcqdyt2hsxdwtlw8dt5q7dfpvg for supplying the fucking meat, and other shit btw
nostr:npub16cay92zxv6wmqryxemwygcdmqhnr5r300dre6yawdy58p64lkg8qvss4mx for the ranch, the signal, and his ancient ass “I told you fuckers” swag
nostr:npub1d020nktlkel7q09xq4d5zy53w5jx0lgynhtxkg7ggf5kryajet2sxw4uh2 for the boats and the wallets we lost
nostr:npub12z8jsett3k6rv9fa2guau5p540qr2xuvjzkr8e432mglafjt99sqkw9zmx for keeping it onyx, showing because she’s free as fuck so hold that (let go of ur penis)
nostr:npub1atn7mlwt08erz4ap47gef92xfey65a4z9ed9vec53u5kc9v94pusl6h4x3 because it’s Rod. Park or stfu
nostr:npub1fjqqy4a93z5zsjwsfxqhc2764kvykfdyttvldkkkdera8dr78vhsmmleku for the codes and really good notes
nostr:npub180z8ywyfg56sk78unedkn6p0d68clchwzj2nhq2309sw8gywldcsne5tax for being “the cool chick” because she is, the cool chick
nostr:npub1lhezms58jx4yer60y3wzldc83fdez3j4rc4ue3edhz5qv3wxfsgqhhw94n because he’s a real dude, not afraid to be one either
nostr:npub1djh0dle9f4txy8qyn59zkd68n8r8c9d8zupz8csxn7t98340q52svdt7xs for the Twitter spaces and the signal
nostr:npub1hte85nxymfyez0nlmmxf287nh9cujfuetxhk9vptwcdqg0pn8pxqxasw3d for his amazing voice, his ASICS and his forklift skills
nostr:npub1q6jhxmf4aj0zu4zygvmxcjy20mz5zmrv56lfm50v02jcdxvnk9nsjajw9v for rando posts
nostr:npub1gcxzte5zlkncx26j68ez60fzkvtkm9e0vrwdcvsjakxf9mu9qewqlfnj5z for always updating
nostr:npub12262qa4uhw7u8gdwlgmntqtv7aye8vdcmvszkqwgs0zchel6mz7s6cgrkj for coding genius
nostr:npub1qzagxs8v9jv3ruapcgrs50d9kczczmwn5lmqg8ws0lgczws22z4snghh3h for always hitting my notes
nostr:npub1ewe0qgak4gykym236t6w4x06jyuw4q8v040lmn5lamude434yqcsz7uqlw for the sick cookin
nostr:npub1papldckxytp2m8met6hyeh37m0cn6e32j03srl6thy4gq3tqrz3srq8t4n for god audio

So many others that I couldn’t easily at link.

Pattern, B squared, Josh at btc park ur a fucking boss, M Mickey with the animations. Nym with the art… so many people.

All these plebs I know, I’ve met mostly.
You people give me hope for the human race. Freedomtech is the way

I love you all dearly, and thank you for being a part of MY bitcoin and nostr journey.

Love and respect-
🔱 nostr:note172ufcex3njdl4u53vs32w6c7yex8009my9ndkzewcg6p8fp43u9q0fxqzq


Great response!


I agree with you there


Pretty close!


Why Everything is Becoming a Game
https://www.gurwinder.blog/p/why-everything-is-becoming-a-game

For years, some of the world’s sharpest minds have been quietly turning your life into a series of games. Not merely to amuse you, but because they realized that the easiest way to make you do what they want is to make it fun. To escape their control, you must understand the creeping phenomenon of gamification, and how it makes you act against your own interests.

This is a story that encompasses a couple who replaced their real baby with a fake one, a statistician whose obsessions cost the US the Vietnam War, the apparent absence of extraterrestrial life, and the biggest FBI investigation of the 20th century. But it begins with a mild-mannered psychologist who studied pigeons at Harvard in the Thirties.

B. F. Skinner believed environment determines behavior, and a person could therefore be controlled simply by controlling their environment. He began testing this theory, known as behaviorism, on pigeons. For his experiments, he developed the “Skinner box”, a birdcage with a food dispenser controlled by a button.

Skinner’s goal was to make the pigeons peck the button as many times as possible. From his experiments, he made three discoveries. First, the pigeons pecked most when doing so yielded immediate, rather than delayed, rewards. Second, the pigeons pecked most when it rewarded them randomly, rather than every time. Skinner’s third discovery occurred when he noticed the pigeons continued to peck the button long after the food dispenser was empty, provided they could hear it click. He realized the pigeons had become conditioned to associate the click with the food, and now valued the click as a reward in itself.

This led him to propose two kinds of reward: primary and conditioned reinforcers. A primary reinforcer is something we’re born to desire. A conditioned reinforcer is something we learn to desire, due to its association with a primary reinforcer. Skinner found that conditioned reinforcers were generally more effective in shaping behavior, because while our biological need for the primary reinforcer is easily satiable, our abstract desire for the conditioned reinforcer isn’t. The pigeons would stop seeking food once their bellies were full, but they’d take far longer to get tired of hearing the food dispenser click.

Skinner’s three key insights — immediate rewards work better than delayed, unpredictable rewards work better than fixed, and conditioned rewards work better than primary — were found to also apply to humans, and in the 20th Century would be used by businesses to shape consumer behavior. From Frequent Flyer loyalty points to mystery toys in McDonalds Happy Meals, purchases were turned into games, spurring consumers to purchase more.

Some people began to consider whether games could be used to make people do other things. In the Seventies, the American management consultant Charles Coonradt wondered why people work harder at games they pay to play than at work they’re paid to do. Like Skinner, Coonradt saw that a defining feature of compelling games was immediate rewards. Most of the feedback loops in employment — from salary payments to annual performance appraisals — were torturously long. So Coonradt proposed shortening them by introducing daily targets, points systems, and leaderboards. These conditioned reinforcers would transform work from a series of monthly slogs into daily status games, in which employees competed to fulfil the company’s goals.

In the 21st century, advances in technology made it easy to add game mechanics to almost any activity, and a new term — “gamification” — became a buzzword in Silicon Valley. By 2008, business consultants were giving presentations about leveraging fun to shape behavior, while futurists gave TED Talks speculating on the social implications of a gamified world. Underpinning every speech was a single, momentous question: if gamification could make people buy more stuff and work more hours, what else could it be used to make people do?

The tone was generally utopian, because back then gamification seemed to be mostly a force for good. In 2007, for instance, the online word quiz FreeRice gamified famine relief: for every correct answer, 10 grains of rice were given to the UN World Food Programme. Within six months it had already given away over 20 billion grains of rice. Meanwhile, the SaaS company, Opower, had gamified going green. It turned eco-friendliness into a contest, showing each person how much energy they were using compared with their neighbors, and displaying a leaderboard of the top 10 least wasteful. The app has since saved over $3 billion worth of energy. And then there was Foldit, a game developed by University of Washington biochemists who’d struggled for 15 years to discern the structure of an Aids virus protein. They reasoned that, if they turned the search into a game, someone might do what they couldn’t. It took gamers just 10 days.

Even established corporations saw gamification’s potential. In 2008, Volkswagen debuted a campaign called “The Fun Theory”, based on the idea that “fun is the easiest way to change people’s behavior for the better”. Piano stairs were installed at a Stockholm rail station to encourage people to use them instead of the escalator, leading to a 66% increase in stair use. Volkswagen also tried to gamify gamification itself, creating a contest for good game ideas. The winning idea was a “speedcam lottery”, where people who kept to the speed limit would be entered into a prize draw, funded by speeding fines.

It all seemed so simple: if we could only create the right games, we could make humanity fitter, greener, kinder, smarter. We could repopulate forests and even cure cancers simply by making it fun.

Unfortunately, that didn’t happen. Instead, gamification took a less wholesome route.

We humans are harder to manipulate than pigeons, but we can be manipulated in many more ways, because we have a wider spectrum of needs. Pigeons don’t care much about respect, but for us it’s a primary reinforcer, to such an extent that we can be made to desire arbitrary sounds that become associated with it, like praise and applause.

Respect is so important to humans that it’s a key reason we evolved to play games. Will Storr, in his book The Status Game, charted the rise of game-playing in different cultures, and found that games have historically functioned to organize societies into hierarchies of competence, with score acting as a conditioned reinforcer of status. In other words, all games descend from status games. The association between score and status has grown so strong in our minds that, like pigeons pecking the button long after the food dispenser has stopped dispensing, we’ll chase scores long after everyone else has stopped watching.

And so, when Facebook added “likes” in 2009, they quickly became a proxy for status, and a score to compete for. People now had a social stake in posting content. Hitting “send” became like activating a slot machine, initiating an excitingly uncertain outcome; the post might go completely unnoticed, or it might hit the jackpot and go viral, awarding the coveted prizes of respect and fame.

Other social media platforms followed, leveraging Skinner’s three laws to maximize button-pecking. They offered immediate reinforcement in the form of instant responses, conditioned reinforcement in the form of “likes” and “followers”, and unpredictable reinforcement that varied with each post and each refresh of the page. These features turned social media into the world’s most addictive status game. And thus, just as pigeons were made to chase clicks, so eventually were we.

But this was just the beginning. Many in the managerial class saw the success of social media and wondered how they could use gamification for their own ends. The Chinese Communist Party was among the first to apply the principles of social media to the real world. In several towns and cities, it began trialing social credit schemes that assign citizens a level of “clout” based on how well they behave. In some areas, such as Rongcheng and Hangzhou, there are public signs that display leaderboards of the highest scoring citizens. The lowest scoring citizens may be punished with credit blacklists or throttled internet speeds.

Meanwhile, in the West, gamification is used to make people obey corporations. Employers like Amazon and Disneyland use electronic tracking to keep score of employees’ work rates, often displaying them for all to see. Those who place high on the leaderboards can win prizes like virtual pets; those who fall below the minimum rate may be financially penalized.

Game features are even more pervasive in the digital world. In little over a year, the Chinese shopping app Temu has exploded in popularity thanks to its “play to pay” model: as users browse deals they’re presented with puzzles to solve, roulette wheels to spin, and challenges to complete, which reward them with credit and special offers. Unsurprisingly, users are now spending double the amount of time on Temu than on Amazon.

Gamification has also transformed dating apps. Zoosk works like a typical role-playing game, where you gradually accumulate “experience points”, which unlock new abilities, such as animated virtual gifts to send to prospective dates. Meanwhile, on Tinder you can purchase various “level-ups” — Boosts, Super Likes, and Rewinds — that increase your chances of winning and compel you to keep playing to get your money’s worth. And if you have no luck on dating apps, there are always AI girlfriends to play with: apps like iGirl and Replika award users points for their commitment, which can be used to “level up” their virtual lovers into a version that is more intimate.

These are only a few examples. Virtually every kind of app, from audiobook apps to taxicab apps to stock trading apps, now employs game mechanics like points, badges, levels, streaks, progress bars, and leaderboards. Their ubiquity attests to their success in hooking people.

Gamification once promised to create a better society, but it’s now used mainly to addict people to apps. The gamifiers, like Skinner’s pigeons, prioritized immediate rewards over delayed ones, so they gamified for the next financial quarter and not for the future of civilization.

So where does this all lead? What is the endgame?


Earth Online: non-stop satellite monitoring platform
https://nimbo.earth/products/earth-online/

> A free web platform to explore satellite images of the Earth without clouds, updated every month


2008-2012: 50 bitcoin per block = ~US$650.00 at the top
2012-2016: 25 bitcoin per block = ~US$11,000 at the top
2016-2020: 12.5 bitcoin per block = ~US$250,000 at the top
2020-2024: 6.25 bitcoin per block = ~US$465,000 at the top

Any guesses on what this epoch will be?


You know it’s still sort of shocking how few people grasp the programmable part of programmable money. Bitcoin is infinitely upgradeable. There are no gatekeepers, no rules, no constraints on what can and will become. For example, hardware wallets weren’t even a thing when I first came around. I kept a paper wallet in my safe and reused that address. Point is, you buy Bitcoin not necessarily for what it is today but knowing its broader market appeal will inevitably increase as development doesn’t relent on open source permissionless protocols.  Just another one of bitcoins cheat codes


Meme coins on bitcoin? I’m guessing that’s not going to be popular around here.

nostr:note1saz8rn4c9fu6jen6477pklhm3su59glq67740h3py5wvzzlx8nfsxvg73a


If I was to give anyone advice. I’d say be radically honest with yourself and with others. Lying is easy in the moment, but leads to a worse life.


I can't recall for sure, but I don't think I've ever reposted any of my posts.  Once I get something off my chest I'm satisfied.  I don't really care about reach I guess, nor do I want to come off as annoying, repetitive, or pushy.  I've stopped following people who repost a lot.


Beautiful!


My Journey into Personal Computer Software Development in 1983
https://farrs.substack.com/p/my-journey-into-personal-computer

In 1983, Personal Computers were quite the up and coming thing. You could buy your own for a few thousand dollars. Though they were mostly considered toys by many East Coast programmers (more expensive "workstations" were the rage), there had already been some interesting and promising applications developed for it.

I thought (along with a lot of other people) that these were definitely the thing of the future. I was considering a new job, so I decided to take a bit of a risk, and look for work writing Personal Computer Software.

I was able to get an interview at one of the top Personal Computer software development companies of the area. The company was called "Software Arts". It was the company of the creators of "VisiCalc", the original spreadsheet.

During the interview process, I actually met the creators of VisiCalc. People had scared me about one of them, Bob Frankston, as someone difficult to talk to, and quick to temper. But when I met him, I actually found a genuine pleasant programmer-type. His problem was that he didn't really internalize that he was one of the company bosses, and felt that he was just a super-cool programmer. As such, if he felt like yelling at you - it would be perfectly normal because, of course, if he was wrong - you would yell right back and tell him to stfu! The only problem was, as the company founder and chief programmer or something - nobody was actually going to yell back at him. But they would grumble a lot later on, thereby giving him a bad and undeserved reputation.


tldr pages - Collaborative cheatsheets for console commands
https://github.com/tldr-pages/tldr

![image](https://m.stacker.news/27489)

The tldr-pages project is a collection of community-maintained help pages for command-line tools, that aims to be a simpler, more approachable complement to traditional man pages.

Maybe you're new to the command-line world? Perhaps you're just a little rusty or can't always recall the arguments for commands like `lsof`, or `tar`?

It certainly doesn't help that, in the past, the first option explained in `man tar` was:


Consider the concept of 'progress' in human society and individual lives. When we talk about progress, what exactly do we mean? Is it solely about technological advancement, economic growth, or societal development? Or does progress include broader aspects such as personal fulfillment, moral advancement, and environmental sustainability? Is progress always desirable, or are there instances where the pursuit of progress leads to unintended consequences or ethical dilemmas?

How do we define the concept of "progress," and is it always desirable?


Tick tock next block #840065 https://i.nostr.build/O4lnj.jpg


New epoch still same ol’ Deater 😂
I fuckin love Bitcoin https://i.nostr.build/aQ5Yy.jpg  nostr:note16vk8ql9yzgtl3fg3vez8wq7rj3hk40asmeyrhkcfgn9d2a9nef7qg34m93


Click - Python package for creating beautiful command line interfaces
https://click.palletsprojects.com/en/8.1.x/

![image](https://m.stacker.news/27455)

> Click is a Python package for creating beautiful command line interfaces in a composable way with as little code as necessary. It’s the “Command Line Interface Creation Kit”. It’s highly configurable but comes with sensible defaults out of the box. It aims to make the process of writing command line tools quick and fun while also preventing any frustration caused by the inability to implement an intended CLI API. Features: arbitrary nesting of commands, automatic help page generation, supports lazy loading of subcommands at runtime.