Installed #Vivaldi today (I had been using #Firefox for the past ... 20 years or so?) - First Impressions:

• it is really fast (definitely faster than FF)
• very easy to import bookmarks from Firefox (exported html)
• uBlock and Zotero connector work fine
• adding No AI DuckDuckGo was easy
• noAI :)

Bonus: link to their Mastodon server on the toolbar 😊

Might have problems later but for now I like it! Thanks @Vivaldi 🙌

#Browser #Browsers

[voir ci-dessous pour la traduction fr]
This feels like a time as good as any to share the (French) songs of my dad - Jacques Duvelle - who was a music teacher and a singer - musician - composer.

He released two albums with his group and also led a national event in France at the time of the war in #Bosnia (1994) where he somehow organized for 10 000 children of schools all across France, plus the world-famous singer Barbara Hendrix, to come to Paris and sing "the song of Sarajevo" against the war.

I noticed that you can upload mp3 files here, so I will share the songs in this thread... 🎵 ⤵️

-- Version Française --

Le temps est venu de partager un fil sur les chansons de mon père - Jacques Duvelle - qui était un professeur de musique (au collège) et un chanteur - musicien - compositeur.

Il a sorti deux albums avec son groupe et a aussi organisé un événement national en France au temps de la guerre en #Bosnie (1994) où il a réussi à faire venir 10 000 enfants de tous les collèges de France, avec la chanteuse de renommée mondiale Barbara Hendrix, sur le Champ de Mars à Paris, pour chanter une chanson qu'il avait composée avec les enfants "La Chanson de Sarajevo", contre la guerre.

Apparemment on peut publier des fichiers mp3 ici donc je vais partager ses chansons ci-dessous! 🎵 ⤵️

1/x
#JacquesDuvelle

Album: Musique d'un Film
Song 1: Elle Est Née Au Nord

This song is about me 😊 I was just a baby at the time, and I think it explains why my parents chose my first name - has good musicality and many possible play on words!

I was just talking to @Fragglemuppet about it which is what pushed me to write this thread. I added the French lyrics and my English translation to it. I plan to do that for the upcoming songs when I get a chance!

2/

#JacquesDuvelle

@Fragglemuppet

I found it! Not sure if it will work but I have aded the mp3 to this post.

Not a problem at all, I am actually happy that someone is interested in it :)

It is in French so I wrote down the lyrics and made an English translation in the Alt-Text :)

WTF #Firefox ?? Who told you to change my default search engine? And for some #genAI slop machine when it was originally "NO AI Duck-Duck go"?!? Pretty clear that I DO NOT WANT AI

#Perplexity ? Yes, I am Perplexed that you would decide to impose this on me, I was already on the verge of quitting but I guess this will have to be the last straw.

Is it possible to get one's donations back?

Clearly I am not the only one having this problem:
https://connect.mozilla.org/t5/discussions/try-out-perplexity-ai-search-in-firefox-139/m-p/98352

@Fragglemuppet I should have, let me try to see if I can upload it..

@Fragglemuppet I like it. My dad wrote a (nice) song about it when I was still a baby, so thinking about my name reminds me of the song, my dad (who is dead now), and the reason why my parents chose this name..

@libreoffice that sounds great! 🙏 And I really hope you are not planning to add any "genAI" or "AI bot" or any other kind of AI in it!

Bonus points for @libreoffice which has an account on here! 🙌

"I was elected mayor of Istanbul, but I write this from jail: Turkish democracy is under grave threat"
https://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2025/sep/24/mayor-istanbul-jail-ekrem-imamoglu-turkey-democracy

#Turkey #TurkeyPol

@kaia ... UK is not even in the list 😬

@poemproducer
Here's a more accurate Alt-text: photo of a person holding a sign that says "Russia can stop the war anytime by leaving Ukrainian land!"

"AI Summaries" have infested #ScienceDirect now with their inaccurate but confidently-formulated statements... Fortunately some people are fighting back, like @Iris who emailed them about it:

AI slop and the destruction of knowledge

We should all do the same until they remove these "summaries"!

#GenAI #LLM #Science #Research #Academia @academicchatter

This is not a joke... A press release from the UK government about a meeting of the "national drought group", in order to "save water at home", suggests to:

"Delete old emails and pictures as data centres require vast amounts of water to cool their systems"

... while the government also pushes for full-blown investments in, and adoption of, "genAI" (e.g. here ) with absolutely no mention of the environmental costs.. which are surely orders of magnitude worse than whatever a server uses to store old pictures, and for what?! 🤦🤦🤦

#GenAI #SavingThePlanet

So.. This is what has been happening recently:

• Climate breakdown tripled death toll in Europe’s June heatwave, study finds

• Accelerated glacial melt and monsoon rains trigger deadly floods in Pakistan

• French warned of high-risk summer for wildfires as Marseille blaze contained

-Texas flooding death toll climbs to 119 as search for more people continues

• Thousands meet their MPs to show huge demand for climate action

... and this is what politicians are talking about when they meet 🤦

Wednesday briefing: Can Macron and Starmer solve the small-boats crisis?

#SaveThePlanet

I know that America is currently unwell and knowing it "theoretically" is one thing, having lots of colleagues and friends professionally affected is another, having our server's admin, one of the kindest, most generous people that I know, physically attacked, and their finger broken, by the LAPD, is another altogether.
https://neuromatch.social/@jonny/114656662458145810

I wish @jonny a prompt recovery if that is possible and I am so proud of them for standing up for what is right. I hope more and more people participate in these protests in a non-violent way until the police / army / country finally realizes that it's on the completely wrong track and comes back to reason.

I also feel quite useless from here in the UK but if there is anything that we can do to help, let us know.
#LosAngeles #LosAngelesProtests

#UsPol #NIH #Academia

NIH scientists publish declaration criticizing Trump’s deep cuts in public health research

Some quotes:

"The NIH that I'm working in now is unrecognisable to me. Every day I go into the office and I wonder what ethical boundary I'm going to be asked to violate, what probably illegal actions am I going to be asked to take"

"It's particularly frustrating when we are being sold this lie that this is being done in the name of efficiency. Because when we terminate these studies, when they're 50, 60, 70, 80% complete, we're not saving the 1 or 2 million dollars left at the tail end of the study, we are wasting the 3 or 4 million dollars that have already been invested."

#Musk 's record at DOGE seen from French newspaper #LeMonde - pretty good summary..

Musk's questionable record at DOGE

Some quotes:

"The approach boiled down to indiscriminate cuts in government agencies and civil service staffing, without any prior audit of public utilities. Inexperience and a lack of understanding of government operations led Musk's teams to undermine certain programs in public health, nuclear safety, air regulation, education and tax collection, with no concern for the medium-term, counterproductive effects on the US economy."

"With little room for maneuver, DOGE turned to scapegoats such as the United States Agency for International Development (USAID), which is primarily responsible for humanitarian aid. This populist and cynical decision upended the lives of millions of people around the world in exchange for meager savings on the scale of the US budget, and at the cost of lasting damage to the country's international influence."

"One can only hope that, with Musk, the illusion that a state can be run like a business will be short-lived. With unmet objectives and management that alienated his teams, what CEO would survive such a record?"

@inthehands Yes! Thanks for sharing!
I don't suppose you or anyone else would know if there is a #StandUpForScience in the UK?

@aral @kardinal691 I don't think that's what they said. What's the source for this text?