Posts by Jellied Eel

Re: "a strong desire to reduce refueling costs"

That takes us to the most likely outcome and that is pay-per-mile road pricing.

This has been planned and in progress for years already. It's alledgedly a 'fair' way to pay for travel, and allows for variable tariffs. So to 'ease congestion', you'll be charged more per mile depending on the time of day. This is both good and bad news given the drive to WFH has resulted in less need to move from your desk at home to a desk in the office. Downside is the less miles travelled, the less revenue raised and the UK's already looking at a £30bn+ per year black hole from it's push towards modern milk floats.

It also ignores that there's already per-mile road pricing given fuel duty. The more miles you do, the more you'll need to fill up your car with a lot of tax and a little bit of diesel/petrol.

Either the car will have it embedded (so many have connectivity now pushing metrics it is a joke) or you will need an app.

You already have one or more of those, ie all new cars in the EU (and thus UK) must have 'black boxes' fitted so you can be located if you're in an accident. So the telematics to support road charging is already in new vehicles. It'll also support other behavioural modification like this-

https://notalotofpeopleknowthat.wordpress.com/2023/01/05/cut-motorway-speed-limit-to-64mph-to-drive-net-zero-goals-no-10-told/

The Government should consider cutting motorway speed limits to 64mph to reduce transport emissions and dependence on oil imports, MPs have said...

...The IEA’s plan also included the introduction of car-free Sundays in cities, working from home three days a week and alternating car access to roads depending on licence plate numbers...

...Writing for The Telegraph, below, Philip Dunne, a Tory MP and the chairman of the environmental audit committee, said: “Decisions need to be made now that will secure our energy supplies, resilient enough so that we are never again so vulnerable to the whims of brutal and autocratic regimes.”

Via the Torygraph. Dunne presumably doesn't consider the oddly specific 64mph, banning the Sunday shop, and numberplate lotteries to be neither brutal, nor autocratic. No more freedom of movement. because reasons. Many, if not most new vehicles either require, or strongly encourage you to pair your car to your phone. That way you can be tracked and compliance monitored at all times.

Plus as of last week, all home EV chargers must be 'smart', include telematics and the ability to regulate & restrict charging rates. This 'solves' one of the VED and fuel duty challenges given the charging meter could be given a seperate tariff. Except for people who bypass that by running another 30A extension to their garage. Having your coooker next to the freezer is just more efficient and convenient. But thanks to telematics, TPTB will know exactly where your vehicle is, where it's being charged, and with a bit of correlation, send a fine for tax evasion.

There may be some sort of transition for older vehicles but my feeling is this will be an app-driven GPS tracked solution based on mobile devices or the vehicle itself.

Yup. Now most of the pieces are in place, it's just finding out more ways to fleece the public. The incoming elephant is replacing VED and fuel duties, but those can simply be added to the price per kWh paid for EV charging. With a price-per-mile surcharge. And the idea of 'Individual Carbon Allowances' is already being pushed heavily. Some EV support costs are already added to our electricity bills, but given those are getting sky high already, loading more costs onto general electricity tariffs will be increasingly unpopular and inflationary. But some sucker will have to pay for Dunne's virtue signalling, and it sure as hell isn't going to be him.

Re: Russia's illegal invasion of Ukraine

So who, exactly, is to say that it's illegal, rather than immoral, stupid, unethical, counterproductive, etc?

Therein lies the problem. As others have said, there isn't really any such thing as 'International Law', only Treaties, Agreements and national legislation. A good example of that is probably the US ITAR, and similar legislation is also enacted in many other countries-

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/International_Traffic_in_Arms_Regulations#ITAR_and_information_technology

The ease with which USML items can be exported and retransferred using computer networks and removable media significantly increases the risk of unauthorized retransfer of USML items. As discussed above, carrying a laptop computer which contains USML items overseas is considered a retransfer of those items. Likewise, access to USML items on corporate systems, such as intranets, by foreign persons overseas or in the U.S., is considered a Retransfer of the items. Foreign employees working in the US cannot have access to the same network where ITAR data may be stored, nor may they have access to rooms or facilities where ITAR work is being done.

It is important to note that, in both cases, theoretical access to the USML items overseas or by foreign persons is sufficient to constitute a breach of ITAR. Files on a laptop carried overseas do not need to be opened overseas, and foreign persons do not need to have actual access to USML items on computer networks for a breach to occur.

USML being the US Munitions List, which already includes software, and that might include 'Open Source' elements. That's lead to some.. Interesting challenges in designing sufficiently secure/airgapped/audited networks that properly segregate ITAR material from non-US nationals. Plus there's also practical aspects, like building/converting a broom cupboard for the US network/sysadmin that adminsters the ITAR bits. Especially as they have to be securely locked up. With sysadmins, that's arguably a GoodThing(tm).

Penalties for breaching ITAR regulations are harsh, as are other national equivalents. But enforcement might be complicated, ie if I broke ITAR, US could charge me, then I'd have to be extradited and face the US justice system. Obviously that gets trickier if the person is a national, or being sheltered by a nation that doesn't have extradition treaties.

It's much the same with challenges like war crimes. There have been attempts to create international courts to prosecute those, but they can be pretty toothless, if nations don't recognise their legitimacy. So someone could be prosecuted and convicted in absentia by an international court, but if they're sheltered, the conviction is largely meaningless.

Re: Weird argument

People made cars. People have killed people with cars by intentionally running over them. The inventors and manufacturers of cars are not culpable for those murders.

That has changed somewhat, and not necessarily for the better. So in the US there have been cases against firearms manufacturers because their products have been improperly used. Sometimes even if that's just been for 'supply', and actual supply has been lawfully sold/transferred via a dealer. Similar principles could (and sometimes have) been applied to other manufacturers, so it's a potentially slippery slope. There's extensive anti-firearm lobbying, less extensive against car manufacturers. But existing legislation seems adequate, even if it's being extended in dubious ways. So the nutjob who drove into the parade a while back is going to be locked up for a very long time. Car manufacturers still have liability if their products are defective, but there's scope creep with mandated tech like vehicle tracking, or breath interlocks.

Re: Keep politics out of open source

What works for hardware doesn't work for software, which is virtual and thus near impossible to trace. All right, the forbidden code appears in the hands of the Bad Guys. What can/will you do?

Hope for leniency? But it's one of those disruptive things we've created along with the Internet, ie the ability to share information. Some of that information might be classified, an official secret, or subject to regulation and legislation. Ignorance has rarely been a good defence. Alongside this, we've introduced 'thought crimes' in the guise of anti-terrorism legislation, where knowing or possessing information that might cause harm could be a serious offence.

So you could potentially end up going to prison for quite some time. Or perhaps you'll get a request to take down whatever you've published. Or an order to do the same, and not attempt to share or publish it anywhere else. Or, if you've knowingly shared forbidden code with a hostile actor, then you could be in a lot of trouble. It's one of those areas where it pays to have some common sense, ie thinking about whether whatever you're about to publish could get abused or misused. But that isn't an exact science, ie you can't just email TPTB and ask for a list of everything that's restricted, just in case.

Re: Keep politics out of open source

So if a contributor to GNU SDR included "not for military use" and the US Coastguard used it - he could have the British courts extradite the US president as CinC to rule on whether the Coastguard counted as military ?

They could try I guess, although it'd probably be easier to make a civil claim for breach of contract. Enforcing that may prove a tad trickier.

Re: Restrictions != F(L)OSS

On one end of the spectrum, you have totalitarianism and on the other it's a free-for-all liberal agenda (is there a word for that?)

I think that's just basic liberalism, but arguably that's been corrupted. So we have 'liberals' who demand X, or else. So increasingly people who view themselves as liberal, are actually acting in a totalitarian or authoritarian manner. I've also heard this-

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Karl_Popper#The_paradox_of_tolerance

Unlimited tolerance must lead to the disappearance of tolerance. If we extend unlimited tolerance even to those who are intolerant, if we are not prepared to defend a tolerant society against the onslaught of the intolerant, then the tolerant will be destroyed, and tolerance with them.

used a lot to justify acting in an authoritarian and intolerant way, presumably by people who never botherered reading past the first sentence.

Re: Restrictions != F(L)OSS

(*) Yes, yes, there are lots of repressive regimes that try hard to mute any concious thought. That said, you will need to disallow extremely basic mathematics to suppress computational concepts and programs from proliferating.

There have been some fascinating examples from history where that's been tried. So WW2 Germany, where it was decided that 'Jewish physics' was verbotten. Which resulted in a number of Jewish physicists and other scientists fleeing Germany, and being welcomed by other nations. Who then got a leg up in quantum physics, so we got the bomb and Germany didn't. And then there was this chappy in Russia-

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Trofim_Lysenko

In 1940, Lysenko became director of the Institute of Genetics within the USSR's Academy of Sciences, and he used his political influence and power to suppress dissenting opinions and discredit, marginalize, and imprison his critics, elevating his anti-Mendelian theories to state-sanctioned doctrine.

Where history has arguably been repeating itself, as revealed by some of the Twitter internal dumps.

Re: Keep politics out of open source

And this is enforced by ?

Criminal and civil legislation? See-

https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-england-london-20959319

A retired British businessman who admitted selling weapon parts to Iran has been sentenced to 33 months in prison by a court in the US.

Initial reporting on that case was pretty bad, ie man arrested and threated with extradition because he sold batteries. Seemed a bit harsh, but then with a little digging, the batteries were rather specialised, and the end-user rather problematic. I strongly suspect the same laws would apply if you tried to transfer the Hawk's software, but being digital, harder for TPTB to detect that.

See also-

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=BYVZh5kqaFg

Where Mark Rober attempts a world record egg drop. In which he creates an improvised guided missile, and someone explains why experts probably wouldn't tell him how to improve his design's accuracy. It's a relatively simple physics and control systems engineering problem, but posting detailed designs and code would probably result in a request to take it down. Or else. Again it's one of those things where the genie has long left the bottle. Missiles being lobbed in both directions at the moment were often designed using 1980s or 1990 era hardware, and that's only got smaller, cheaper and faster.

Re: @MachDiamond

I specifically remember Cracking DES:

I still have a copy of that. It's a great book, especially if you're a programmer, otherwise the OCR test pages aren't the most riveting read. But it also covers a lot of the theory and design for creating dedicated hardware. First published in 1998, and hardware had moved on just a tad, so hopefully nobody is still using DES for anything sensitive.

Re: Open source software today is playing a critical role in bad things!

One thing at a time. But the world's gone slightly mad-

https://time.com/6242949/exercise-industry-white-supremacy/

The White Supremacist Origins of Exercise, and 6 Other Surprising Facts About the History of U.S. Physical Fitness

Errm.. right. I never trusted runners, but I also get the feeling the Time article may have been taken slightly out of context. I guess there is some truth in it given the dark times around the 1900's where eugenics was considered a good thing. But I think most people would generally consider exercise to be postive for health. Unless you take it to extremes, but that's extremists for you.

But perhaps it's time for some self-reflection. Time's rebranded it's 'Man of the Yea' to 'Person of the Year', and awarded it to a whole country. Yet time is one of the biggest symbols of oppression and colonialism. Once upon a time, we used to be able to do things in our own time, until a colonial system was imposed on us. Then to further oppress us, alarm clocks were invented so servants could be woken up so their master's breakfasts were ready, and their newspapers and magazines were freshly ironed. It's also fundamentally racist, as recent evens have shown. Why should Australians get to celebrate a happy new year, before the UK does? Everyone should be free to celebrate a new year in their own time.

Re: Restrictions != F(L)OSS

There is no discussion possible. The definition of terms for the license to be a valid open source license are:

Potentially incompatible with national and international law. If a country, like the US, or a trading bloc like the EU decides it's illegal to provide a good or service to another nation, or individual, they have the power to pass legislation and punish violators. Which is kind of back to the days of my old T-shirt with export controlled crypto printed on it. Non-state sanctioned crypto used to be illegal in France. But look how that played out. The genie's well and trully out of the bottle when source code is so easily distributed by so many mechanisms.

In the speech, she opined: "Open source software today is playing a critical role in mass surveillance, anti-immigrant violence, protester suppression, racially biased policing and the development and use of cruel and inhumane weapons."

She's right. Google, Twitter, Apple, Facebook, Palantir etc etc all use, or used OSS to perform those critical roles on a massive scale. The whole Internet pretty much relies on it, and attempting to have one authoritarian regime ban or block another is pretty pointless, especially when heavily sanctioned nations have always found workarounds. Or just develops their own alternatives. That's kind of the problem with attempting to punish a country like China. It has a rather large population that traditionally values society and education more than we do. They've invested massively in STEM education and research, we haven't. Basic population distribution suggests that if you've got 1bn people, they're going to produce more intelligent people than a country with a population of <100m. Especially when in some of those countries, intelligence is racist and a symbol of opression.

I think the bigger problem with society is we've both enabled mass surveillance, protestor suppression and restrictions on free speech, and many seem quite content with this. Until perhaps they're on the receiving end of those tools of oppression, but by then it's too late.

Re: Well

...it's a huge task to burrow down to the reactor spaces to get to the tea kettle for major service/refueling.

I think that's a design challenge that's true for pretty much any propulsion on a large ship. I saw a vide where a large ferry needed a diesel engine gearbox replacing, and it was much the same. First cut a large hole through the decks so the gearbox could be lifted out. I guess that's a bigger challenge for warships given you'd also want to protect your propulsion systems well.

Re: Well

Anyway, the question in my mind is whether governments would be OK with delivering highly enriched uranium to loads of commercial premises around the world.

That I think is one of the design challenges. SMRs seem to be derived from existing naval reactors, but would be less constrained by the operating environment. So they use HEU to get the best power density and fuel life into the smallest volume, ie a relatively compact attack submarine like the Astutes. So commercial SMRs may not need to use HEU, or may use alternatives like thorium. But being nuclear reactors, they'd also need to be covered by the usual operator licences and regulation. So the average AlphaGoo DC operator probably wouldn't be allowed to touch them.

Naval reactors like RR's and the French are also designed so they don't need fuelling for the expected life of the submarine. So if an SMR can be delivered fully fueled with a 20yr run time, it wouldn't need to be refuelled at the customer site. That cuts an enormous cost of providing fuel loading/unloading and storage from the site, and can be de-fuelled once the SMR's been removed. There may still be some risk and additional opex for security to prevent nutjobs trying to do stupid things, but we have the Civil Nuclear Constabulary and they're armed.

Personally, I'm not convinced SMRs for 'a' datacenter is a good idea. But consider somewhere like Slough and an RR-sized SMR could probably power their DC's and much of the surrounding area. Which I guess makes the economics more interesting, like who pays for and operates the SMRs. Equinix and their customers would be happy with lower cost/more reliable energy, but probably won't want the cost and regulatory hassle of operating one themselves. So it seems to make more sense for existing energy companies with nuclear experience to do that, eg EDF. The economics just seem to work better as 'muni' energy generators, powering urban areas. Especially if we continue the policy of decarbonisation.

Re: What happens in a war ?

The release of nucleotides hardly bears thinking about.

If you hit their radiology department, that may happen anyway. Nuclear medicine already uses and releases a lot of nucleotides, whether for diagnostics or treatments where radioactive materials are fed or injected into patients. The biggest challenge is still really the social/political one in overcoming decades of anti-nuclear propaganda.

Absolutely nobody is proposing this. You are tilting at windmills. Which is an appropriate irony if nothing else.

I guess you've been sleeping through all the 'Net Zero' nonsense, the constant calls for us to 'invest' more in 'renewables', or just the cost comparison in the article. It isn't a like-for-like comparison because nuclear, either large 500MW units, or SMRs deliver near-constant, base load generation. 'Renewables', such as wind, solar or tidal simply cannot deliver this requirement.

This is the reason why, from today, all home EV chargers must have " the ability to send and receive information and the ability to respond to signals to increase the rate or time at which electricity flows through the charge point.". The UK doesn't generate enough electricity to support datacentre expansion, let alone millions of EVs. Hence 'demand management' so vehicles won't charge (or may discharge) when supply is tight.

I guess it's the fault of our education system that's sold the public on the idea of 'renewables' that they can't see the fundamental connnection between the weather, and our energy supply.

Says man selecting the just current month's data for solar in the depths of winter to represent "the renewables"

Like I said, it's fine if you don't need reliable power. The link also shows YTD, or you could just ponder how you'd run overnight jobs in your solar powered data center.

And what about the decommisioning costs...?

Mostly the reverse of the installation cost. So unhook your SMR, stick it back on a trailer/barge/railway carriage and transport it to the recycling depot. Where it'll mostly spend time cooling off to a point where it can be cut up for scrap. Or bury it and call it good. But LCOE are generall con tricks anyway, and rarely compare like-for-like, eg-

And on the optimistic end of this equation, this would put NuScale's reactors within spitting distance of natural gas and onshore wind at a LCOE of roughly $37/MWh, according to the US Energy Information Agency [PDF]. However, solar fares a bit better at $33/MWh.

Virtually no onshore wind costs $37/MWh, hence our every increasing energy bills. Solar fares no better, other than perhaps being able to cover the roof of a data centre with solar panels. Both suffer from the usual problem of being unrealiable, intermittent or just weather dependent. Se-

https://gridwatch.co.uk/Solar

minimum: 0.001 GW maximum: 3.853 GW average: 0.337 GW

For this month's solar. The 'renewables' scam relies on selective use of data. So unless you want a datacentre that only operates part-time, you need reliable power. You already have a power density challenge given the land area needed to generate say 100MW via wind or solar. Then you may want to add 1GW of batteries so it can run for 10hrs @ 100MW. Except you'll need more than 1GW because charging/discharging takes energy. Or you may decide to add 100MW of gas turbines, but then depending on the cost (not price) of gas, it's usually cheaper to run the DC from gas in the first place because you don't have to worry about the weather.

See Texas again for more info, or the US in general. Their 'renewables' generation dropped like a rock, just as the cold weather hit. Luckily Texas learned from their last near-miss and their gas network didn't shut down when the wind dropped.

Re: Nothing new.

Pistol Shrimps are fascinating, but I doubt they break physics. Also curious now about sonoluminescence. There's a similar effect when a bullet passes through a ballistic gel block. If it has the right combination of velocity and cavity generation, there's a flash of plasma when the gel snaps back. AFAIK that's just a compression effect, and a similar collapsing cavity trigger that isn't sound related.

Re: Blockchain next..

Respectfully, if someone won't trust the BoE to execute a transaction, then they're either insane, or there's some kind of apocalypse going on. Banks almost never screw up transactions, and when they do they fix it. By comparison, I would be a lot more worried about how any bug in my blockchain system, or any undetected malicious action, both of which are things that actually do happen, could result in unrecoverable asset loss.

Agreed. I just used the BoE-Scotland arrangement as an example where a similar arrangement already takes place. And I agree that it's all about trust, so who gets to be involved in the chain(s), and the security/risk management. Other banks and financial institutions are either using it, or looking at it.

I also agree about the implementation, and the cost/benefit in terms of compute resources neeed, and basic energy. I guess for users of existing financial instruments and ledger services, it'd be the cost of using blockchains vs paying 3rd parties to provide ledger services. But there's also the regulatory implications of moving existing instruments to blockchain, or creating new instruments/services backed by them.

Re: Blockchain next..

Or, simply, there is nothing *legal* that a blockchain does that can't be done better without one.

I respectfully disagree. I think the blockchain, or to be more specific, a digital distributed ledger is one of the best things to come out of the crypto bubble. The concept of a distributed and trusted ledger provides security to digital assets. I think it also provides more utility for *legal* transactions because the ledger provides trust and allows transactions to be authenticated, tracked, audited etc.

Going back to one of my favorite museums, the Bank of England exhibits a £1m(?) bank note. Can't remember if that was the face value, but a large and uncirculated note that was used to transfer money to Scotland so they could print an equivalent in Scottish Pounds. Which is one of those oddities and kind of the difference between legal tender and promissory notes. I suspect that's all digitised now, and a digital large 'note' could be backed up by a blockchain. This application's simpler I guess because the transactions are between BoE and the three Scottish banks that are authorised to issue Scottish notes, so their market and trust model is simpler to set up.

...but the rest of us are left with incalculable environmental damage.

Debateable. But I'm kinda curious. There had been a slew of reports about the 'environmental' impact of cryptocarp. Mostly based on the amount of energy consumed. So given many crypto mining operations are busily going titsup.com, is there any noticeable impact on the energy market? If the reports were correct and crypto was consuming X% of electricity generation, then there's a corresponding X% reduction in demand, which should translate to lower energy costs.

Yes, I'm an optimist in assuming those cost reductions will be passed through to consumers. See the UK's annual gas price data for more info.

It's also curious to watch the rise & fall of SBF. From multi-billionaire cryptobro with a luxury penthouse in the Bahamas to being 'broke' and having to move back in with the parents. Also curious how the security on his bail works, and who his 'friends' are that have put up most of the collateral. His parent's house in Cali's value won't come close to covering that, and their holiday home might get seized if it was bought with dirty money.

Re: Borshchevik is in its final testing stages

Peace will happen when Putin Khuylo..

Hello.. ancestor? Haven't we met before?

It's interesting the way terms are bandied about by people who presumably don't know the origins of that insult. Especially given the modern-day context and history of those that coined it.

But I digress. Both HIMARRS and CAESAR are fine for shelling hotels, assuming you have the ammunition. This conflict has instead shown how lower cost weapons like drones, and consumer satellite dishes have become important in modern warfare. So not suprisingly, counters will be developed, and if that means Starlink's satellites adding to orbital debris, that's politics for you.

Re: Borshchevik is in its final testing stages

Whereas in Russia - is this something that the kleptocrats even have to worry about? The less smart just get pawned by the not so less smart.

Russia does lock up kleptocrats. Whether that's justified is a matter for debate. EU leaders are found with bags of cash and it's BAU. Earlier this morning, the US dropped it's >$1tn Omnibill budget expecting that to get passed today. Pelosi gets a building named after her, US politicians are given less than 24hrs to study 4,000+ pages of bacon slices.

But such is politics.

It's still interesting just how much further 'we' are going to push things. So far, well over $100bn has been given to the country that gave a Biden a no-show job. Starlink's getting a small slice of that pie for providing communications to combatants, threatening the service for it's non-military users. Or providing useful intelligence via it's earth stations. One curious aspect of the 'expansionist' Russia is it didn't seem to have very good satellite surveillance over Ukraine. It's been launching ELINT sattelites fairly steadily over the last few months though, so it'll be interestng to see if those can detect active Starlink terminals. Another option would be weather it has drones that could detect those as well. Bigger risk is if Russia decides to target satellites that are involved in the conflict, and disable or destroy those. If those are commercial, there's probably little recourse for the satellite operators given they're supporting the conflict.

Re: Borshchevik is in its final testing stages

Not totally true. HIMARS or CAESAR cannot be considered as 'old stock'.

And how many of those have we donated? How many are still operational? And perhaps most importantly, how much ammunition can we produce for them?

We don't need another Munich.

I think you mean 'Minsk'. Choose either v1 or v2, both those were ignored and used to buy time for Ukraine to train, arm and prepare to re-occupy their Rhineland.

He is the one responsible for this war, as he is for all the war crimes committed by the Russian army and mercenaries.

Nope. The parties responsilble for committing those crimes are. War crimes are happening on all sides, and the parties responsible should be prosecuted to the full extent of the law by a neutral panel. This, I think could be one of the most productive outcomes. As I've said before, if it's illegal to shell a hospital or apartment building in Kiev, it should be illegal to shell a hospital or apartments in Donetsk.. But that's what the HIMARS wundewaffe is being used for.

It could also extend to tests of other international law, like this-

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Collective_punishment

International law posits that no person may be punished for acts that he or she did not commit. It ensures that the collective punishment of a group of persons for a crime committed by an individual is forbidden...This is one of the fundamental guarantees established by the Geneva Conventions and their protocols. This guarantee is applicable not only to protected persons but to all individuals, no matter what their status, or to what category of persons they belong..."

See also the EU's latest round of sanctions targetting Russian entertainers. Or just the way 'we' in the West condone institutional racisim. It's ok to punish 'orcs' because they're subhumans. And we know what happened the last time a state did that. Or see-

https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-us-canada-64060437

To illustrate the brutality of the war, Mr Zelensky evoked US troops fighting the Nazis during World War Two.

Except this time, we're supporting the Nazis. See also-

https://www.forbes.com/sites/davidaxe/2022/12/16/ukraine-deradicalized-its-extremist-troops-now-they-might-be-preparing-a-counteroffensive/?sh=268e5fd7692d

Complete with screenshots taken from a video where WW2 balkenkreuz and wolfsangle emblems are painted on the sides of 'US' (ok, Dutch) AFVs. Or the number of OUN flags proudly waved, or the 'hero' of Ukraine, Stepan Banderas. See also-

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Strafgesetzbuch_section_86a

Where WW2 era symbols that have reappeared are illegal in Germany. Also Poland, and there were attempts to get the EU to implement a similar ban across the EU republic.

So it's been a very strange conflict. Much like when 'we' supported Al Qaeda during Afghanistan v Russia, we seem unconcerned by the blowback. To get back to the topic, if Starlink is being used by Ukraine's military, then it, along with other commercial satellites become parties to the conflict and legitimate targets. What happens then is anybody's guess, because we're already very close to direct and declared war with Russia.

Worst thing is that following on from the Minsk false peace deal, Russia doesn't exactly trust the West. Can't think why. So instead it'll continue until Ukraine (or the EU) is forced to seek terms. Which is probably not that far off. Bahkmut looks like it's finally about to fall, and the messaging is that it's an insignificant city anway. Which doesn't really explain why Ukraine is sacrificing so much to hold it. That it's a key logistics hub, and one of the last heavily fortified bastions that had been developed since the 2014 coup probably does.

Re: Borshchevik is in its final testing stages

... because the whole system is based on corruption.

Unlike the EU, US, UK etc etc. Money makes the world go around and it goes much faster when there's a few wars on. The West gets to dump old stock to Ukraine, and replace it with the latest kit.. eventually. Ukraine's already got a New York, next it could have a New Slough. After all, that was built around a post-WW2 scrap & recycling yard. Meanwhile, politicans and pals get richer, everyone else gets poorer, and a lot of people on both sides of the conflict get dead & maimed.

With so much money sloshing around though, it's no real suprise the West isn't interested in peace.

Re: works mostly...

These days, the trick is to use something like a 4 port MIDI->USB adapter.

Hmm.. Recommendations for a good adaptor?

I still have my trusty old Korg Triton Studio sitting in the corner, and would be fun to get that back up and running. Downside is I'm not sure what state it's in wrt software for the MOSS board and PCM modules. I think Korg has the software for download, but then it'd be getting it across to the keyboard when I don't think I've got a working PC with a 3.5" drive any more.

Re: What a douche. This is total cover for him.

Hey, for $5 million a year,

I'll bid myself at $4.20m. Bigger concern would be payroll budget. Fundamentally it's mostly an SMS simulator kludged onto a UI, so the basic app doesn't seem that complicated in comparision to other software and systems development. A bigger budget would probably be needed for legal and lobbying to ensure 17. U.S.C§ 512 protections stay intact, especially after all the censoring. But that would also need proper funding, ie a 'content moderation' team that focuses on whether content is lawful, rather than unpopular.

Re: Confused.com

The biggest advantage of Musk running Twitter into the ground is that it makes him too busy to do more damage to SpaceX and Tesla.

That's the problem with Musk. Great ambition, great showmanship, but often a failure to deliver. Tesla's investors seem to be getting a bit nervous about the antics, and Tesla's share price. Plus they've finally 'delivered' the CyberSemi, but haven't delivered some fundamental metrics. Like how much it can haul. Thunderf00t's done another video questioning some of the benefits. Initial presentations claimed significant cost savings over diesel semis, but reality has intervened and due to higher electricity prices, the economics don't look great.

But Musk is spreading himself too thin with all his ventures. Don't forget he has other companies, like Neuralink, currently under investigation for animal welfare concerns. This poll is also a bit of showmanship. When he was buying Twitter, he said he'd appoint a CEO, so stepping down isn't exactly news, and he must have had candidates in mind for the position. I'm guessing someone's accepted, so now he can get some PR for 'listening to the will of the people'.

Or just analyse the voting patterns and maybe stomp on some more bots.

Re: No, no, no!

I dunno, I think an Inquisitor would be fun, although probably a bit too close to a Witcher character. No point making him Emperor because he's just a corpse in a bottle.

Re: The Emperor is a rotting corpse!

They've turned the cameras on to themselves and going to produce documentaries

They're only doing this to get the IP to produce their own servitors. Ring Mk3 will contain the brains of warehouse union workers.

But after seeing the way IP like Bored of the Rings, Rings of Power, Altered Carbon etc were butchered in the name of wokeness, I'm dubious. Then again, The Boys pretty much worked. Included a strong female lead. See also-

https://www.vice.com/en/article/bvmjgv/joe-biden-supporters-embrace-dark-brandon

I thought the writing in that show was clever because it perhaps subverted expectations, ie you could view Homelander as either a Trunp or a Biden caricature, and some not so subtle digs at Hollywoke's sexualisation of women and minority characters. Fascism has never really been about left or right, it's about the dangers of authoritarianism and control.

But GW is a little possessive of it's IP compared to the Tolkien Estate, who just want cash. So maybe it'll end up being appropriately grimdark and dystopian, or maybe Amazon will try crowbarring in it's messaging and it'll be another clusterfunk. It's a deep vein to tap, and potential for lots of spin-offs. The Sisters of Silence have plenty of opportunities for strong female leads, just not much in the way of dialogue.

What an odd statement. If someone punches you, that's bad. If you punch back, that's considered less bad in every legal and moral code I can think of except yours, apparently.

Err, nope. It just demonstrates the moral bankruptcy and lack of objectivity at the Bbc, and other swathes of the liberal media. It can't report objectively because it's too dangerous to send war reporters to war zones. It's also the lack of objectivity that leads to thinking like yours. You've really bought into the doublethink from the original Minitruth. So you justify self-defence. You hit me, I hit you back. In your mind, this is lawful. Anyone who's ever watched a cartoon knows that can also lead to an escalation. Or just Donetsk International Airport turning into a pile of rubble. Or 14,000 dead Ukrainians who objected to the Kiev regime.

According to your legal and moral code though, Donbass is entitled to punch back? Or, according to your legal and moral code, lesser war crimes are less bad, if used as retaliation. Reality to most critical and objective thinkers is they're not, they're both war crimes. But this is a conflict about retaliation and escalation. It started because of 8+ years of aggression against people who self-identify as Ukrainian-Russian.

But the article also points out there are laws-

Ahmad Abouammo, 45, was in August convicted by a jury of acting as an unlawful foreign agent, and committing conspiracy, wire fraud, international money laundering, and falsification of records in a federal investigation.

And doxing Saudi dissidents. Twitter suppressed the news of another alleged unlawful foreign agent that took money from Ukraine and China. The media was fine when 'free speech' of 'Extreme MAGA Republicans' was being suppressed, but went ballistic when the 'liberal' media was given a few time-outs. Again the risks of doing this are all pointed out pretty clearly in George Orwell's famous guide book.

Again the lack of critical thinking and objectivity is quite stunning. So I get the usual ad homs and strawmen. But nobody sees the hypocrisy in Musk's actions? If real-time tracking of Musk's jets is bad, why does Musk use real-time tracking of his customer's vehicles and phones? Why did the EU mandate fitting 'black boxes' to all new vehicles sold in the EU? Surely this is just as dangerous, if Tesla, Apple, AlphaGoo etc could have employees selling (or giving) that data to assorted nutjobs across the political spectrum who could (and do) use that data to do harm?

It's a rancid propaganda channel, like...

.. the Bbc? Still no mention about the heavy shelling of civilian districts in Donetsk. But that's one of those 'free press' and 'disinformation' issues. With a 'free press', people should be able to read news and make up their own minds. With propaganda and official disinformation, that's obviously undesireable. In a free and democratic society, people should be free to read both sides of a story, and draw their own conclusions.

Liberal media doesn't rant about press freedoms when the NYP or other journalists get banned, yet immediately started frothing at the mouth when their own were given a time-out. Doxing and stalking had long been against Twitter's ToS, or some national laws, but the policy was applied inconsistently. Andy Ngo pointed out how Antifa tweeted a call to arms to firebomb Tesla dealers, and they'd long used Twitter to dox, plot insurrection or just carry out violent attacks.

But the journalists also missed a rather important point. If real, or near-real time tracking is such a danger, why does Tesla know where all it's cars are, have been, or are going? Why does Apple or Google? Will this new found concern for safety lead to tech companies doing less tracking, and doing less intrusive surveillance? If Musk is so concerned, why not disable that feature in his vehicles? Especially when he knows Twitter insiders had been supplementing their income by flogging blue check marks, and other user's personal information.

There is no law in the US against a social media company complying with cooperating with the government of any country where that companies product is accessed, nor is the company required to be open, or even honest, about such cooperation.

Depends just how 'co-operative' they are. Both government and regulated businesses are meant to play by the letter, and spirit of the law. Then again, governments have a bad habit of blurring the lines. So LEO access to private data in order to investigate serious crimes vs people's rights to privacy and data protection.

Then there's this kinda stuff-

https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-us-canada-63996061

Twitter condemned by UN and EU over reporters’ ban

Reporters for the New York Times, CNN and the Washington Post were among those locked out of their accounts.

...Melissa Fleming, the UN's under secretary general for global communications, said she was "deeply disturbed" by reports that journalists were being "arbitrarily" suspended from Twitter.

"Media freedom is not a toy," she said. "A free press is the cornerstone of democratic societies and a key tool in the fight against harmful disinformation."

NY Post got TwatBanned, and crickets. EU bans RT and Sputnik, and crickets. A free press is now one that's controlled by Minitruth, and only officially sanctioned disnformation is permitted. Objectivity is no longer permitted in the new 'free press'. That's very apparent in the war reporting, eg the Bbc makes big about the latest attacks on Kiev and Kherson, yet is strangely silent about Ukrainian attacks on the centre of Donetsk.