Notices by Marty Fouts (martyfouts@mastodon.online)

@jwildeboer As a retired member of the NetBSD foundation I strongly suggest that you are being far too simplistic in comparing foundations to coops. There’s nothing inherently superior in the structure of either and either can be well used or equally abused.

As always, it comes down to the individual people involved.

@calmeilles Tell me you don’t understand the extent of the American love affair with guns without telling me.

Every US response to the escalation of violence in the last 100 years has been to arm more people.

This would be no different.

@RickiTarr California has a program that is called CERT (community emergency response team) in my neighborhood. It is a good way to build community.

My city supports block parties. Organize one to meet neighbors. The city also has a number of guidance committees that need volunteers. It’s a good way to get involved.

@RickiTarr Saul Alinsky wrote a good general guide and you have hit the key points.

Here are some suggestions applicable to where I live: Volunteer at the local library. Mine runs literacy programs and tax help and some advocacy. Likewise our Senior Center relies on volunteers. Second Harvest is active here. A neighbor has set up a Little Free Pantry you can donate food to.

https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Rules_for_Radicals

/1

@Suiseiseki @itsfoss The Unix source was never free, although the educational license was cheap. To get it, you had to sign a contract that prohibited you from redistributing it. Such contracts were routine before copyright laws changed to allow software copyright.

@lilithsaintcrow You are welcome. Sorry it is long and rambling.

@lilithsaintcrow The only difference between the grift and someone who genuinely believes in what they are doing is that the grifter doesn’t care if the business succeeds; only that they get their cut. The money they don’t take gets spent in the usual ways: paying salaries, buying equipment, buying services and consumables, et cetera. In this case salaries are a lot of it, as AI developers are highly paid, but much goes to building and operating huge data centers. /2

@lilithsaintcrow It’s a great question and difficult for anyone who is not an insider to answer well; but the nature of the grift is to get a lot of money moving through the economy in the hopes of being able to siphon off enough to make it worthwhile to the grifter. So, AI grifter convinces investors to hand them a lot of money in return for the promise of future profits. Grifter pays themselves from that money and spends the rest to run the company. /1

@countcol Because it causes us to answer rhetorical questions

#pottery #fedihelp I have a lovely soup mug made by a now retired potter. Its mate was the victim of a recent accident. I have had no luck searching online or locally for a replacement. Hopefully you can help me find a potter who makes similar mugs. I don’t expect an exact match, of course, only something with similar features.

I would like to find a potter on the San Francisco peninsula to buy a pair from; but anyone who can ship here would be appreciated.

Details in Alt text.

Please boost

@WarnerCrocker The real waiting starts on November 6: when we begin to find out how many republican election officials will do their job properly and certify the results.

@freemo @SecurityWriter Again, that you don’t know that knowledge is widespread does not mean that it is not. Nor can you defend your claim because you would have to disclose a previously undisclosed project to demonstrate that you are right.

@freemo @SecurityWriter Yes, there is an exception to the rule for applying for jobs that require clearance. But yes, there are rules that prohibit general disclosure. Anyway, even if you have had clearance; that you don’t know that a project has been compromised is only evidence of the limitations of your knowledge and not evidence of lack of compromise.

@freemo @SecurityWriter Tell me you don’t know that people with clearance are prohibited by law from revealing that they have clearance without telling me that.

@stux If the challenge is to undertake the obligation, then it is easy: real estate, super yacht, private jet, business, et cetera. If the task is to complete the transaction and take delivery it might be harder because those tend to either have complex purchasing processes or long lead time for delivery.

OTOH you can buy that much on the stock market in a few days, even using online brokerages.

@kwheaton @GottaLaff The campaign is not on life support. One of the things missing from the post debate discussion is the fact that Biden got a bump in the polls from it. The panicked propaganda is drowning out the good news and everyone who is panicking is acting as a “useful idiot” for the fascists.

@luckytran “Wherever two or more of you are gathered there is Covid. “

#dogsofmastodon Kona Bone Jakone is watching.

@codefolio @dalias @lucasmz @linux_mclinuxface Half right. They are only revoking going forward. (Technically not a revocation but a change of terms.) See the GPL for an example of a license that explicitly states conditions for revoking existing licenses. See the history of the GPL for an example of a revoked license leading to it.

@dalias @codefolio @lucasmz @linux_mclinuxface Yes. That is what I said in parentheses. I have spoken about both what can be done to licenses and what they have done in this exchange and perhaps I could have been clearer about which was which. They have changed the terms of the license going forward. They could legally revoke existing licenses, which is problematic but legal. They have not done that. Clear now?