Notices by Mark Kraft (krafttea@mastodon.social)

@skinnylatte Email has become a kind of hot garbage, I find, so I do my best to avoid newsletters and other such non-vital email. Even if a newsletter is good, it's a bit like wrapping it in used chip shop newspaper.

My advice would be to post that content either here, or on a separate Mastodon account, perhaps with a very long character length. The people who appreciate x aspect of yourself would probably like y too.

The situation in Russia is even grimmer.

- The doubling of the money supply is actually taking place in the context of a stagnant economy. ALL the economic growth that Russia reports is basically for arms that are being blown up and burned through in Ukraine.

- Increased money supply only reflects a fraction of this. Russia has used banks to give bad, under-secured loans keeping Russian businesses afloat.

- The Welfare Fund is worse than reported. Most of it can't be spent w/o angering China.

I'm not sure which reporter dragged Trump's fake SecDef Pete Hegseth so thoroughly, but we need more of them...

In many ways, the level of commitment Zelensky got from NATO was a compromise, based on each individual nation's political reality. Germany didn't want to give long-range missiles to Ukraine, for example. But Ukraine did get commitments from Scholz to deliver 4000 long-range attack drones that I mentioned earlier today.
Similarly, Denmark and others are relying on the Danish model, as it is called, of funding Ukrainian long-range drone and missile startups, leading to rapid domestic arms growth.

For those of you looking for good investment opportunities under a Trump-run America, might I suggest South Korean weapons manufacturers...?!

The entire world is basically realizing that you should put your money someplace reliable, where Trump's untrustworthiness can't turn it to s*. 💰

https://koreapro.org/2025/02/us-retreat-on-ukraine-may-push-europe-to-turn-to-south-korea-for-defense-needs/

After seeing Elon's goons raiding and playing games with government servers powering all sorts of agencies, I'm thinking @doctorow may want to contemplate this oligarchic "move fast and break things" destruction of democratic systems, and view the corruption of money in social media as inherently part of the process of a larger, emergent oligarchy. It is basically the enshittification of government. Even if you're a small player with VC funding, you'll want to hitch a ride like a remora fish.

@mastodonmigration The amusing thing is that the main technologist at the Social Web Foundation, who is doing this helped create the ActivityPub protocol and presumably is all excited about the plans for this.

Whereas Christine Lemmer-Webber - @cwebber - is ALSO an ActivityPub Co-author, and wonders why - despite the serious technologists weighing in - nobody's bothered to mention the AT protocol is "quadratic to scale towards decentraliation".

A bridge to nowhere?!

https://mastodon.social/@cwebber@social.coop/113822016427233952

Russia is proactively crippling themselves today, it appears.

Maybe Russian civilians would be safer wearing Ukrainian uniforms...

Sometimes, fighting causes brain damage.

Other times, brain damage causes fighting.
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UFC president Dana White, when asked by reporters what he thought of Bryce Mitchell's pro-Hitler comments, replied:

“We’re disgusted by it. I think he’s literally one of the dumbest human beings. Let’s not forget this is a guy who took a drill through his nut sack then had to reverse it. That’s the level of stupid that we’re talking about here."

I've read numerous scared posts from activists saying that in order to survive in a fascist regime, we need to not fight back so brazenly.

I don't agree. I think there's an awful lot about the US institutionally that will resist such mechanations within a comparatively short four year lifespan, with two of those being after midterm elections.

For the time being, might I suggest owning these Nazi fscks? Or are you going to let teachers and preachers do all your fighting for you?!

It occurs to me that the bot hijinks at X and the accusations of Elon Musk's complicity in changes to the algorithm and rightwing bots on X almost ignore the fact that a similar sounding, yet more AI primitive bot network was discovered on X last year, apparently around the time period when Elon reportedly adopted a new AI for the bots.

I wasn't even aware of this, but it's interesting. The researchers seem to think the source of the rightwing bots was within the US.
https://www.nbcnews.com/tech/internet/republican-bot-campaign-trump-x-twitter-elon-musk-fake-accounts-rcna173692

X whistleblower says Elon ordered the manipulation of the '24 election with AI bots IMPLEMENTED BY X, using Eliza AI software provided by Marc Andreesen, changing the algorithm to boost Trump, ignoring foreign influence campaigns trying to do the same, and using X to create fake news stories they'd rig to go viral.

"We're currently doing the same thing in Germany and other European nations... People don't know what's real anymore, and that's exactly what we wanted."

https://theconcernedbird.substack.com/p/elon-musks-and-xs-role-in-2024-election

@skinnylatte @tea Me, drinking tea, watching tea.

This is at the aquarium?
Any appropriate openings?!

I wouldn't say "wholesale capitulation", but a few very wealthy people with a lot of money is all it takes.

One thing a lot of people don't understand is that Kamala Harris was making the political pilgrimage to the Silicon Valley all the time when she was in S.F. politics, going to their back-patting events, etc.

But ultimately, her base of support was surprisingly thin, even though she grew up, if not in the belly of the beast, then at least in a popular suburb of it.

@cstross Contributing a few words for your scene:

Heretofore
A.K.A.
Fermented.
Undulating.
Singsong.

You're welcome.

You want a younger, strong leader who defends objective reality, against people who are fascists?

Well... here she is.

It's very important as we try to make it to the next election intact, to remember that both Elon and Trump are deeply abusive, and find it amusing to gaslight you, on a sadistic, elitist level.

They've largely gotten away with it all their lives, unfortunately.

So, having ANYONE who straight out defends objective reality... well, that's going to be the real hero going forward.

“Freedom is the *freedom* to say that *two plus two* make four. If that is granted, all else follows.” George Orwell

@dansup i.e.
...how to make me not want to use or promote Pixelfed.

@dansup Hey, Daniel... if it's not already a bit of a de facto standard, you may want to encourage the use of something akin to the whole #introduction tag on Mastodon.

Being able to physically see the diversity of people introducing themselves makes a real difference in encouraging community, the formation of sub-communities, and the ability to find new friends and people to follow.

And yes, this is personal to me. My grandfather nearly died, after the Germans bombed his work in London, at the Postal Service.

The city was home to 8.5 million people, and probably around a quarter evacuated, including all the children. But Hitler wanted to target BOMBING CIVILIANS.

He could've picked military targets. But no. Indiscriminate slaughter was his choice.

And yes, this reflects VERY strongly on my stance regarding my unconditional support for Ukraine. Evil shouldn't stand. 🇺🇦