Notices by Anirvan Chatterjee (anirvan@mastodon.social)

“the BBC only showed the documentary in the UK…The complaint tries to get around this by—I shit you not—claiming that because VPN usage is up in Florida, it likely means people are using VPNs in Florida to appear to be in the UK in order to watch BBC streams that are geo-locked”

https://www.techdirt.com/2025/12/18/trump-files-10-billion-defamation-suit-over-bbc-doc-that-never-aired-here-using-vpn-stats-as-evidence/

Just everyday foreign policy things:

“The intimidation included approaching country officials during coffee breaks to warn them they might not be able to transit via the US, or that they and their families could face restrictions on entering the country if they acted against American interests”

https://on.ft.com/47lq3dZ

Just got my hands on one of the new BART sweaters, and they’re really nice

https://www.bart.gov/news/articles/2025/news20251028?rss

"But when it came to poverty, everything was figurative. When the Bible talks about the poor, it was constantly implied that they’re talking about those with weak faith. When the Bible says people should tithe, however, there was no interpretation necessary. They sure as hell better give 10% of their income. Vosburg said that last point was stressed repeatedly, 'over 150 times across 16 separate sermons.'"

https://www.friendlyatheist.com/p/how-megachurches-twist-the-bible

"While sentimental value is impossible to measure, other customers fear they will not be able to recover financially if their goods were destroyed."

https://www.nbcnews.com/business/business-news/ups-delay-customs-tariffs-packages-destroyed-rcna236607

“A North Carolina man has been accused of posing as an ICE agent, threatening to deport an immigrant woman, then kidnapping and raping her; police in New York are searching for a man suspected of posing as an ICE agent, assaulting and trying to rape a woman, before robbing her and fleeing the scene in broad daylight.”

https://www.teenvogue.com/story/men-dressed-as-ice-agents-to-assault-immigrant-women-horrifying-trend

A slice of the #H1B massacre this weekend:

"It was a night of absolute mayhem for the H-1B visa community in the United States…immigration attorneys…spent Friday burning the midnight oil, drafting lawsuits to challenge the executive order as early as Monday morning…mailing lists lit up overnight with urgent alerts, and corporate legal teams were scrambling…making sure no one was traveling or exposed to the sudden $100,000 fee…for their re-entry"

https://americanbazaaronline.com/2025/09/20/lawsuits-against-trumps-100000-h-1b-visa-fee-expected-467850/

"'You’re going to see fear of law enforcement that is going to last generations,' Johnson said. 'And that has the biggest impact on women, because women often are more likely to be victimized, and then more afraid to call for help than men.'"

https://www.latimes.com/california/story/2025-09-20/ice-raids-911-calls

Update: UC Berkeley apparently reported Judith Butler to the Trump administration?!

https://www.berkeleyside.org/2025/09/12/uc-berkeley-shares-names

I’m speechless. UC Berkeley has started handing over names to the Trump administration. We know exactly who’s being targeted.

https://www.dailycal.org/news/campus/uc-berkeley-turns-over-personal-information-of-more-than-150-students-and-staff-to-federal/article_a4aad3e1-bbba-42cc-92d7-a7964d9641c5.html

“Dish Network and Echostar are selling $17 billion in valuable spectrum to Elon Musk, after being repeatedly threatened by Trump’s lackey at the FCC, Brendan Carr”

https://www.techdirt.com/2025/09/10/trumps-fcc-just-used-a-fake-investigation-to-shower-att-and-elon-musk-with-billions-in-valuable-spectrum/

“In public comments on the Alcohol Intake and Health Study, wine and beer vendors and representatives of the alcohol industry urged federal officials to rely only on the competing academies report supporting moderate drinking. They called the alcohol intake study ‘alarming and misguided.’”

https://www.nytimes.com/2025/09/05/health/alcohol-drinking-hhs-report.html

This train story is wild:

“Digging into the code revealed a software trap that would disable trains if they were anywhere near a repair facility that wasn’t run by the manufacturer, Newag. But Newag used a pretty inaccurate way to determine when the trains were in a rival repair shop, which led to some unexpected consequences.”

https://www.ifixit.com/News/112008/polish-train-maker-is-suing-the-hackers-who-exposed-its-anti-repair-tricks

Happy 🇮🇳🇵🇰 independence days!

August 14-15, 1947 meant the liberation of 400 million South Asians from colonial rule.

I found this lovely article about Indian and Pakistani students celebrating that moment together in 1947 at UC Berkeley’s International House.

Source:
"Birth of New Nation Feted By Indian Students at UC"
The Berkeley Gazette, Berkeley, California, Mon, Aug 18, 1947, Page 11

Full text below…

1/5

"But over the following decade, something unusual happened. Five of the children stopped coming to the clinic to collect their drugs, and when the team eventually tracked them down many months later, they appeared to be in perfect health. 'Instead of their viral loads being through the roof, they were undetectable,' says Goulder. 'And normally HIV rebounds within two or three weeks.'"

https://www.wired.com/story/the-first-widespread-cure-for-hiv-could-be-in-children/

"The gutting of The Washington Post is not a separate event from the algorithmic manipulation of X. The defunding of PBS is not disconnected from the weaponization of the Federal Communications Commission (FCC). These are interconnected fronts in a single, undeclared war on the very concept of an informed public."

https://www.thedissident.news/the-oligarchs-coup-against-the-free-press-is-happening-now/

“We are now in territory so uncharted that the framing of the police militarization debate no longer works. Having that discussion requires at least a shared understanding that both police officers and soldiers are obligated to uphold the Constitution and the rule of law.”

https://radleybalko.substack.com/p/the-police-militarization-debate

"On April 24, Elon Musk's $9 billion neurotechnology company falsely self-certified as a 'small disadvantaged business' (SDB) on a federal filing, a designation that qualifies the company for preferential treatment as part of a racial and ethnic diversity initiative."

https://www.muskwatch.com/p/musks-neuralink-falsified-federal

“The US government has been steadily positioning noncitizens at the forefront of a massive genetic surveillance regime for years, collecting DNA almost entirely from immigrants in civil custody, while feeding it into systems built for mostly criminal tracking.”

https://www.wired.com/story/dhs-and-doj-face-new-pressure-over-collecting-childrens-dna/

"The 2024 election is the reason that my wife and I packed up our sunny, perfect home in North Carolina to relocate to southern Germany this year…I had to pursue one simple goal from that day in November forward: ensure my son maintains access to gender-affirming care at this critical time in his development. Anything else was tantamount to state-sponsored abuse."

https://rewirenewsgroup.com/2025/06/26/we-ditched-the-us-for-our-trans-son/