#Best Tech 2017

[neverlandnightingale]

Hey do y'all remember several years ago when we were all freaking out about net neutrality being overturned? Well despite net neutrality's win in 2024, a federal court just overturned it.

For those who aren't aware, net neutrality is the simple principle that companies like Verizon and Comcast should treat all web traffic equally – not pick and choose based on who is willing to pay more or who they like best. Big Tech companies obviously don’t like that – which is why they spent millions lobbying against it over the years.

Now, these megacorporations will be able to seize control back over our Internet. The likely result? Throttled access to streaming services, monopolistic pricing that cuts out competition, and a slower, walled off, and less free Internet for all of us.

And unfortunately, rulings like this will only get more common now that the Supreme Court has overturned the “Chevron deference” – giving judges, rather than qualified public servants, a blank check to toss out protections like net neutrality, environmental safeguards, or food safety standards.

When Trump’s FCC repealed net neutrality back in 2017, they gave big corporations total control over our Internet – putting free and open access at risk.

Internet providers responded by exploiting their newfound power to speed up certain websites, and slow down – or even block – others. They failed to provide crucial Internet infrastructure in rural areas, low-income communities, and communities of color. They even slashed firefighters’ Internet access during severe wildfires.

But over 126,000 people spoke out and we were able to reinstate net neutrality – until now.

The time has come again to take action: please sign this petition from Common Cause so we can reinstate net neutrality.

[amn-group]

What's in my Tech Bag! v6.0

It'' s been a while since I'' ve. And being on the roadway right'now, I figured it ' d be the. Fast shout out, if you'' re not following me on Instagram, obtained a possibility to win an actually. sick set of kicks from Puma. And details on that particular are down below. (positive songs) So, first off the bag, the knapsack. The most fundamental part. of a What'' s in My Bag. This is the Air Tech…

[mostlysignssomeportents]

Ad-tech targeting is an existential threat

I'm on a 20+ city book tour for my new novel PICKS AND SHOVELS. Catch me TORONTO on SUNDAY (Feb 23) at Another Story Books, and in NYC on WEDNESDAY (26 Feb) with JOHN HODGMAN. More tour dates here.

The commercial surveillance industry is almost totally unregulated. Data brokers, ad-tech, and everyone in between – they harvest, store, analyze, sell and rent every intimate, sensitive, potentially compromising fact about your life.

Late last year, I testified at a Consumer Finance Protection Bureau hearing about a proposed new rule to kill off data brokers, who are the lynchpin of the industry:

https://pluralistic.net/2023/08/16/the-second-best-time-is-now/#the-point-of-a-system-is-what-it-does

The other witnesses were fascinating – and chilling, There was a lawyer from the AARP who explained how data-brokers would let you target ads to categories like "seniors with dementia." Then there was someone from the Pentagon, discussing how anyone could do an ad-buy targeting "people enlisted in the armed forces who have gambling problems." Sure, I thought, and you don't even need these explicit categories: if you served an ad to "people 25-40 with Ivy League/Big Ten law or political science degrees within 5 miles of Congress," you could serve an ad with a malicious payload to every Congressional staffer.

Now, that's just the data brokers. The real action is in ad-tech, a sector dominated by two giant companies, Meta and Google. These companies claim that they are better than the unregulated data-broker cowboys at the bottom of the food-chain. They say they're responsible wielders of unregulated monopoly surveillance power. Reader, they are not.

Meta has been repeatedly caught offering ad-targeting like "depressed teenagers" (great for your next incel recruiting drive):

https://www.technologyreview.com/2017/05/01/105987/is-facebook-targeting-ads-at-sad-teens/

And Google? They just keep on getting caught with both hands in the creepy commercial surveillance cookie-jar. Today, Wired's Dell Cameron and Dhruv Mehrotra report on a way to use Google to target people with chronic illnesses, people in financial distress, and national security "decision makers":

https://www.wired.com/story/google-dv360-banned-audience-segments-national-security/

Google doesn't offer these categories itself, they just allow data-brokers to assemble them and offer them for sale via Google. Just as it's possible to generate a target of "Congressional staffers" by using location and education data, it's possible to target people with chronic illnesses based on things like whether they regularly travel to clinics that treat HIV, asthma, chronic pain, etc.

Google claims that this violates their policies, and that they have best-of-breed technical measures to prevent this from happening, but when Wired asked how this data-broker was able to sell these audiences – including people in menopause, or with "chronic pain, fibromyalgia, psoriasis, arthritis, high cholesterol, and hypertension" – Google did not reply.

The data broker in the report also sold access to people based on which medications they took (including Ambien), people who abuse opioids or are recovering from opioid addiction, people with endocrine disorders, and "contractors with access to restricted US defense-related technologies."

It's easy to see how these categories could enable blackmail, spear-phishing, scams, malvertising, and many other crimes that threaten individuals, groups, and the nation as a whole. The US Office of Naval Intelligence has already published details of how "anonymous" people targeted by ads can be identified:

https://www.odni.gov/files/ODNI/documents/assessments/ODNI-Declassified-Report-on-CAI-January2022.pdf

The most amazing part is how the 33,000 targeting segments came to public light: an activist just pretended to be an ad buyer, and the data-broker sent him the whole package, no questions asked. Johnny Ryan is a brilliant Irish privacy activist with the Irish Council for Civil Liberties. He created a fake data analytics website for a company that wasn't registered anywhere, then sent out a sales query to a brokerage (the brokerage isn't identified in the piece, to prevent bad actors from using it to attack targeted categories of people).

Foreign states, including China – a favorite boogeyman of the US national security establishment – can buy Google's data and target users based on Google ad-tech stack. In the past, Chinese spies have used malvertising – serving targeted ads loaded with malware – to attack their adversaries. Chinese firms spend billions every year to target ads to Americans:

https://www.nytimes.com/2024/03/06/business/google-meta-temu-shein.html

Google and Meta have no meaningful checks to prevent anyone from establishing a shell company that buys and targets ads with their services, and the data-brokers that feed into those services are even less well-protected against fraud and other malicious act.

All of this is only possible because Congress has failed to act on privacy since 1988. That's the year that Congress passed the Video Privacy Protection Act, which bans video store clerks from telling the newspapers which VHS cassettes you have at home. That's also the last time Congress passed a federal consumer privacy law:

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

The legislative history of the VPPA is telling: it was passed after a newspaper published the leaked video-rental history of a far-right judge named Robert Bork, whom Reagan hoped to elevate to the Supreme Court. Bork failed his Senate confirmation hearings, but not because of his video rentals (he actually had pretty good taste in movies). Rather, it was because he was a Nixonite criminal and virulent loudmouth racist whose record was strewn with the most disgusting nonsense imaginable).

But the leak of Bork's video-rental history gave Congress the cold grue. His video rental history wasn't embarrassing, but it sure seemed like Congress had some stuff in its video-rental records that they didn't want voters finding out about. They beat all land-speed records in making it a crime to tell anyone what kind of movies they (and we) were watching.

And that was it. For 37 years, Congress has completely failed to pass another consumer privacy law. Which is how we got here – to this moment where you can target ads to suicidal teens, gambling addicted soldiers in Minuteman silos, grannies with Alzheimer's, and every Congressional staffer on the Hill.

Some people think the problem with mass surveillance is a kind of machine-driven, automated mind-control ray. They believe the self-aggrandizing claims of tech bros to have finally perfected the elusive mind-control ray, using big data and machine learning.

But you don't need to accept these outlandish claims – which come from Big Tech's sales literature, wherein they boast to potential advertisers that surveillance ads are devastatingly effective – to understand how and why this is harmful. If you're struggling with opioid addiction and I target an ad to you for a fake cure or rehab center, I haven't brainwashed you – I've just tricked you. We don't have to believe in mind-control to believe that targeted lies can cause unlimited harms.

And those harms are indeed grave. Stein's Law predicts that "anything that can't go on forever eventually stops." Congress's failure on privacy has put us all at risk – including Congress. It's only a matter of time until the commercial surveillance industry is responsible for a massive leak, targeted phishing campaign, or a ghastly national security incident involving Congress. Perhaps then we will get action.

In the meantime, the coalition of people whose problems can be blamed on the failure to update privacy law continues to grow. That coalition includes protesters whose identities were served up to cops, teenagers who were tracked to out-of-state abortion clinics, people of color who were discriminated against in hiring and lending, and anyone who's been harassed with deepfake porn:

https://pluralistic.net/2023/12/06/privacy-first/#but-not-just-privacy

If you'd like an essay-formatted version of this post to read or share, here's a link to it on pluralistic.net, my surveillance-free, ad-free, tracker-free blog:

https://pluralistic.net/2025/02/20/privacy-first-second-third/#malvertising

Image: Cryteria (modified) https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:HAL9000.svg

CC BY 3.0 https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/3.0/deed.en

[probablyasocialecologist]

An increasing number of Silicon Valley investors and Wall Street analysts are starting to ring the alarm bells over the countless billions of dollars being invested in AI, an overconfidence they warn could result in a massive bubble. As the Washington Post reports, investment bankers are singing a dramatically different tune than last year, a period marked by tremendous hype surrounding AI, and are instead starting to become wary of Big Tech's ability to actually turn the tech into a profitable business. "Despite its expensive price tag, the technology is nowhere near where it needs to be in order to be useful," Goldman Sach's most senior stock analyst Jim Covello wrote in a report last month. "Overbuilding things the world doesn’t have use for, or is not ready for, typically ends badly."

[...]

According to Barclays analysts, investors are expected to pour $60 billion a year into developing AI models, enough to develop 12,000 products roughly the size of OpenAI's ChatGPT. But whether the world needs 12,000 ChatGPT chatbots remains dubious at best. "We do expect lots of new services... but probably not 12,000 of them," Barclays analysts wrote in a note, as quoted by the WaPo. "We sense that Wall Street is growing increasingly skeptical." For quite some time now, experts have voiced concerns over a growing AI bubble, comparing it to the dot-com crisis of the late 1990s. "Capital continues to pour into the AI sector with very little attention being paid to company fundamentals," tech stock analyst Richard Windsor wrote in a March research note, "in a sure sign that when the music stops there will not be many chairs available." "This is precisely what happened with the Internet in 1999, autonomous driving in 2017, and now generative AI in 2024," he added.

27 July 2024

[batboyblog]

Hi, idk if you're a Mdni page or not, but I'm really scared. I'm 15f, I live in a mostly red state, I've grown up here, and everyone I know is voting red. I was previously in the middle, I didn't care either way who won. I'm terrified of the election after reading about everything the Republican candidate did and plans to do. I wanna know if there's anything I could do to help prevent Trump from winning the election? I have a younger sister, and I don't want her to have to live in a country where her rights are being stripped from her. I just wanna know how to help. Thank you for reading and feel free to delete if I broke a boundary.

for the record I don't mind anyone sending me an ask, everyone is welcome to interact respectfully.

that out of the way, I remember working for Hillary in the 2016 election (by my math you would have been 7?) and our intern was your age and he was... he was everything he was so dryly sarcastic, smart, unflappable, could do anything, he kept us sane and he saved our asses with his can do (and tech skills) more times than I can count.

So to any teens out there who are not yet old enough to vote and think "oh there's nothing I can do" in 2016 we won a Senate race by 1,000 votes, which 100% was the doors we knocked and the voters we talked to out of our office, a 16 year old intern working his ass off saved Obamacare in 2017, not a word of a lie, you can make a difference as an intern or volunteer

Now, from the tone of what you're saying it sounds like your parents would into that, idk if you're parents are the kind of people who let you explore your own thing, or the kind of people who just wouldn't notice, or if they're the kind who would seriously object to you volunteering for the Democrats or progressive groups.

A lot of people assume because they live in Red States or Blue states they don't matter, but for example there are key Senate races this year in Texas, Montana, Ohio, and Florida (Red) and Maryland (Blue) Alaska is a traditionally red state but its one and only Congressperson is a Democrat who will run a very close race to get re-elected again this year. So where ever you live there is a key race, even if it's local. And lots of chances to call voters or send them postcards in swing states

Any ways everyone check out ways to Volunteer Run for Something also supports younger local candidates so if you live somewhere very red or very blue it can be helpful to find locals running for school board or city Council

now for you personally young person, and everyone else, have real and serious conversations with people in your life about this stuff, I can not TELL you how often I knock on someone's door and we talk politics and they tell me "oh well I'm a Democrat, but everyone around here is really a Republican" but like I just talked to 4 other people who were Democrats in their neighborhood, they just saw one Trump sign and gassed themselves up about it. People are often much more swingable than you think, feel everyone out, if there's an adult in your life thats convincible, work on them find out what they care about and bring them facts, be claim and reasonable and work on them. Each of us doing one on one work with people who know us is WAY! more impactful than any TV ad a campaign can buy.

finally if your parents won't let you volunteer for Dems, reach out to the League of Woman Voters, they're not partisan, so they're not Dems or Republicans, they believe in voting. When I was in High School I organized a voter registration drive in my school at lunch time, thats a great thing to do, call your county/town clerk's office and talk to your school, get a social studies teacher involved they love that shit, young people are much more likely to be Democrats so just registering them is helpful.

best of luck, in the words of Hitchhiker's Guide, Don't Panic.

[atjsgf]

One more thing before I go to bed but I'm actually really tired of this narrative that because Blake Lively is better known that Justin Baldoni, and because she's married to Ryan Reynolds and is best friends with Taylor Swift, she had all the power in that dynamic.

Justin Baldoni was not just the co-star and director for IEWU, he was also a producer, and he co-owns and co-founded Wayfarer, the production company that produced the movie. One of the other producers, Jamie Heath, is also alleged to have sexually harassed Blake. And another producer and co-founder is Steve Sarowitz who is literally a tech mogul multibillionaire. Sarowitz and Heath are directly named in the lawsuit, and in the NYT piece, Sarowitz is shown to have been personally willing to bankroll the smear campaign against Blake.

Justin Baldoni is not some scrappy underdog working class hero who is getting steamrolled by more powerful established names. He is a Hollywood film producer with billionaire backing from a man more wealthy than Blake, Ryan and Taylor combined.

The fact that you hadn't heard of him, and you HAD heard of Blake, Ryan and/or Taylor does not actually change that dynamic much. Many people had not heard of Harvey Weinstein before 2017. Many HAD heard of some of his victims, a list that included huge household names like Angelina Jolie, Cate Blanchett, Lupita Nyong'o, and Madonna. That didn't stop him from preying on them for years, and not just early on in their careers but when they were extremely well-known. Gwyneth Paltrow is like, the nepo baby to end all nepo babies (not a drag just an observation) and was dating Brad Pitt when Weinstein made unwanted sexual advances towards her.

The idea that Justin can't have harassed her because he didn't have enough power over her is simply not based in reality, and I find it really telling that people were willing to believe Amber Heard brainwashed Johnny Depp winter soldier style into accepting her "abuse" but NOW suddenly they've all got PhDs in class relations. Alright. (Also male privilege is still real and men still weaponize it and I'm tired of people pretending that's not a thing lol.)

[littlejazzy]

👻 Spooky Shows For Spooky Littles 👻

The season is changing, and with it, Halloween approaches! Here's a list of shows that are thematically appropriate, viewable for free on Archive.Org or free with ads on Tubi! It's organized kinda sorta from shows for the littlest little to things that might be more appropriate for middles - but don't let that stop you from exploring anything that looks interesting!

Super Monsters (2017) [S1] [S2] [S3] [x] [x] [x] [x]

The children of various monsters learn lessons and how to use their monster powers! (The [x]s are various specials that occur after the main series)

Ruby Gloom (2006)

Staring the titular Ruby Gloom, this is a really cute show about her and her slightly spooky friends!

A Pup Named Scooby Doo (1988)

Adapted for a younger audience, Mystery Inc. is similarly aged down in this extremely cartoony and silly animated series!

Sabrina The Animated Series (1999)

Admittedly, Sabrina is pretty cutesy, but she is a witch, so watch as this fact gets her into hijinks and adventures with her friends and talking cat! (Tubi Mirror)

Tutenstein (2003)

A 10 year old mummy is brought back to life after 3,000 years and has to adjust to modern day! Heavy focus on Egyptology and fairly accurate portrayals of Egyptian deities and myths!

Growing Up Creepie (2006)

Adopted and raised by a family of bugs, Creepie is a girl who's entering middle school and learning how to interact with humans! There's a heavy focus on bugs and fun facts about them!

Bump in the Night (1994)

A stop-motion cartoon, Mr. Bumby is a monster that lives under the bed, who at night has adventures with Squishington (a slime monster who used to live in the toilet tank) and Molly Coddle (a ragdoll)! (Tubi Mirror)

The Addams Family (1972)

An animated adaptation based off of the original comics, watch the spooky family and their kooky adventures!

Beetlejuice: The Animated Series (1987)

Follow the adventures of Lydia Deetz and her best friend from the Netherworld, Beetlejuice! (The archive is only for the first season - as of posting this, the full series is available to stream, with ads, on Tubi)

Freaky Stories (1997)

An animated anthology show hosted by two, gross live-action puppets!

Scooby Doo, Where Are You? (1969)

(Only available on Tubi) The original show that started it all, watch Scooby and the gang explore spooky places and solve mysteries!

Making Fiends (2009)

Follow Vendetta as she makes fiends, while Charlotte makes friends!

The Real Ghostbusters (1986)

This show follows the adventures of the Ghostbusters after the events of the original film! Some episodes are silly and cartoony while others can get a bit more intense and serious. The last few seasons are a spin-off show for younger audiences.

Extreme Ghostbusters (1997)

Follow-up to The Real Ghostbusters, this show follows the adventures of a new team of 'busters... in the extreme 90s!

Archie's Weird Mysteries (1999)

Watch Archie and his friends explore the strange and sometimes spooky secrets of Riverdale... but, erm, not like the latest adaption, lol (Tubi Mirror)

The Grim Adventures of Billy and Mandy (2001)

After losing a bet to two children, the Grim Reaper is forced to be friends with them - mayhem ensues! (due to how the files are named, the series is scrambled, but is otherwise all there)

Tales from the Cryptkeeper (1999)

Animated anthology series of kids and teens facing spooky situations! (Tubi Mirror)

Nightmare Ned (1997)

Ned has frequent nightmares based off of what happened to him during the day!

Monster Force (1994)

A group of teenagers from the futuristic year of 2020 fight monsters and creatures using high tech gadgets!

Roswell Conspiracies: Aliens, Myths and Legends (1999)

(Only available on Tubi) Aliens live among us, evolving into what we know to be monsters, myths, and legends - A man named Logan joins the Global Alliance, a shady government organization, to unravel conspiracies and to do good!

GhostWriter (1992)

A live-action show, a team of children gather clues and evidence to solve neighborhood mysteries and crimes... with the help of a ghost who can only communicate with them by altering written text! (due to how the files are named, the first 9 episodes are out of order)

Gravity Falls (2012)

Twins Dipper and Mabel Pines explore the mysteries of the titular town of Gravity Falls! (if you have the space, probably make a copy of this one, lol)

Eerie, Indiana (1991)

Live-action show that follows new teenage resident of Eerie, Indiana, Marshall as he finds out that his new town is, well, eerie!

Goosebumps (1995)

Each episode/two-parter is based off of R.L. Stine's books, this live-action anthology show will give you, well, goosebumps! (as a bonus, here's pdfs and e-pubs of every single book - enjoy!)

Are You Afraid of the Dark? (1992)

The live-action spooky anthology show of all time, this show is perfect for middles ready to get scared! Listen and watch the Midnight Society gather around the campfire to tell spooky tales!

📼 Enjoy your shows! And remember - if you really like something, you should probably back it up! 📼

[mariacallous]

In the end, the return of net neutrality was short-lived: Today, the Sixth Circuit Court of Appeals struck down rules introduced by the Biden administration that would have prevented internet service providers from favoring some apps or websites over others. It’s the conclusion of a decades-long fight for a more equitable internet—and a harbinger of what may await other consumer protections in the years to come.

It’s easy to get lost in the technicalities of net neutrality, but the basic thing the Federal Communications Commission wanted was the power to prevent broadband providers from engaging in bandwidth discrimination, slowing speeds for certain customers or to certain sites. Those protections existed under the Obama administration but were rolled back shortly after Donald Trump took office in 2017. You probably won’t feel much near-term impact; we’re largely back to the status quo, and Spectrum is unlikely to immediately try slowing down YouTube to get you to watch its own cable news channels. But that’s also why the way the Sixth Circuit arrived at its decision may be even more alarming than the ruling itself.

The three-judge panel frequently cited Loper Bright Enterprises v. Raimondo, the recent Supreme Court decision that overturned a legal doctrine known as Chevron deference. Under Chevron, courts were required to defer to regulatory agencies when it came to deciding how relevant laws should be interpreted when their provisions were unclear. Now, courts are free to decide for themselves. And the Sixth Circuit did exactly that.

“Unlike past challenges that the DC Circuit considered under Chevron, we no longer afford deference to the FCC’s reading of the statute,” the ruling reads. “Instead, our task is to determine ‘the best reading of the statute’ in the first instance.”

In other words, the court substituted the subject matter expertise of the FCC with its own.

“It's a sad day for democracy when giant corporations can forum-shop for industry-friendly judges to strike down some of the most popular consumer protection rules in history,” says Evan Greer, director of the digital rights nonprofit Fight for the Future. “The court citing Loper Bright here is an alarming harbinger of industry-friendly rulings to come.”

And not just on issues affecting the broadband industry. The Sixth Circuit showed today how courts might use the end of Chevron deference to shape all sorts of policy, from tech to the environment to health care to pretty much any area where legislative ambiguity reigns.

Critics of Chevron argued that Congress too often delegated the work of interpreting policies to unelected bureaucrats working for federal agencies, says John Bergmayer, legal director at the consumer advocacy nonprofit Public Knowledge. “Now we have the alternative: The first panel of judges to hear an issue can set nationwide policy.”

There’s at least one way out of this imbalance of power, Bergmayer says: Congress can pass a bill that explicitly says agencies have the authority to interpret laws. That seems unlikely, though, in a GOP-led legislature that’s wary of—or outright hostile toward—the administrative state.

After all, Congress also could have codified net neutrality as the law of the land rather than leaving it to the FCC. Outgoing FCC chair Jessica Rosenworcel, a Democrat, still hopes that it will. “Consumers across the country have told us again and again that they want an internet that is fast, open, and fair,” Rosenworcel said in a statement. “With this decision it is clear that Congress now needs to heed their call, take up the charge for net neutrality, and put open internet principles in federal law.”

That certainly would have been preferable to forcing net neutrality to ride on a political seesaw for the past two decades, passing in and out of favor depending on who’s in charge. (Former FCC chair Ajit Pai, who rolled back net neutrality rules under Trump, hailed the Sixth Circuit’s opinion as “excellent.”) But unless and until that happens, the regulatory whiplash that takes place when a new party takes power will only fuel the courts’ willingness to take matters into their own hands—especially now that they have a green light from the Supreme Court. “Applying Loper Bright means we can end the FCC’s vacillations,” the Sixth Circuit opinion says.

There’s some good news in all this. In 2018, California passed its own net neutrality law that, after years of legal challenges, fully went into effect in 2021. Because the internet doesn’t stop at state borders, California’s law does offer some degree of protection to everyone in the US. “California’s law is quite good,” says Bergmayer. “It’s just that something nationwide would be better.”

Which means, at least, that some net neutrality protections still exist. They’re not as comprehensive as digital rights advocates hoped for and not as strong as the FCC would have granted, but it’s something. But as courts increasingly invoke Loper Bright, that won’t always be the case. The Sixth Court has shown how easily consumer and environmental safeguards can now be erased in an era when it takes only one court ruling to make them disappear.

[mikeluigi64]

Thoughts and opinion on Switch 2

Before I start, do know I really like tech and generally, I like interesting implemtations of it, so I do have a bias towards handheld consoles in general because they have much more interesting limitations to start with. I'll get all my thoughts, up and down, on the switch 2.

I know the bigger screen does mean more internal area to work with, but how the hell did they manage to keep the thickness nearly identical to the switch 1? Actually impressive, I desperately want to see inside if it is all just because of smaller chip size.

Ok, so where do I properly begin excluding the shock that they pulled off the same thickness? Oh, the screen!

This screen is just a welcome addition overall. 1080p, better brightness and better panel tech that allows for HDR (Microsoft fix your god damn hdr implementation even nintendo has it) while being 120hz and VRR (Nvidia confirmed that it's using their implementation of g-sync via a blog post, here: https://blogs.nvidia.com/blog/nintendo-switch-2-leveled-up-with-nvidia-ai-powered-dlss-and-4k-gaming/). It now matches and slightly exceeds a lot of displays on handhelds now, which funnily enough makes puts it in a similar position as the og switch screen back in 2017, but at least the baseline is much higher so I think this will make the eventual OLED either be more meh, or more better in comparison. It may be closer to the meh side, at least with the first impressions I'm seeing on youtube and seen through my 2013 gaming monitor with clear faded pixels which is it's own issue if I do end up deciding to get a switch 2. Still +$100 I'm calling it. However, the fact it's 120hz natively means that you can now run games at 40fps without screen tearing because it's a clean divisable number of 120, with it looking noticably better then 30fps but not as draining as 60fps or above, which is going to help with more title's battery life. Speaking of Nvidia, let's talk a bit about that blog post.

I do not know how much people like this or not (See recent RTX 40xx and 50xx launches to see how happy people are with Nvidia), but I think they are very much the ideal partners in crime with Nintendo this time around. As long as the Tensor hardware is power efficient enough as they claim, this will just be a boon for handheld gaming times, even if they're stuck at the same 2-6.5 hours as the launch model og switch. It also means it can be updated with time to improve games potentially, so if developers decide to take advantage of it and nvidia/nintendo makes it easy to just update the codebase of a game to get to a never version, we may actually have a case of games becoming more performant and/or better looking with time, assuming they are not running at native 4k already. That's neglecting the processing offloading for stuff like that goofy camera, microphone quality and other stuff

(seriously, if you got a recent enough Nvidia GPU try the Nvidia Broadcast app, it's does basically all the audio/video stuff nintendo showed recently, but now with a focused platform I think this is going to become excellent)

oh ya, it is odd that the stream from friend's framerate is like 12 fps, best guess there is because it uses the on board video encoder and decoded to handle it, and if each is a seperate channel, along with one for background recording/screenshots, plus whatever the games may need for their own dedicated use, I am not too surprised it got the cut on such a slim package. Suck though.

That leads into the dock.

I think the dock is fine. Does the job, has USB ports on the side to connect controllers and charge them (USB 2 tho, so I guess the camera attachement had to go to the top USB C port CORRECTION, I just saw MKBHD's recent switch 2 impression video, it can actually be attached elsewhere maybe. That's interesting, Photo attached below). I think it's as inoffensive as the Switch Oled dock, which does all it needed to do too plus ethernet. It's fine.

I guess while I'm here, let's touch upon the Microsd Express card slot.

Let me preface this by saying, I knew that the standard was compatible with SD cards of prior so I found it odd they didn't make it clear if it could be used to at least get video/screenshots off, but they did!

Talking about the microSD express cards themselves, I may be in the minority here, but I am very very happy to see this get adopted. For those who are not in the know, it's basically much faster flash (that can be made for slightly more then an normal SD card) that runs off of the reader's PCIe Gen 4, allowing up to 2gb/s of read/write. Which is Crazy, and if they're mandating it to be required for games, that means the current 800mb/s read ones on the market right now is what the console will be using and games will finally load up so much faster. And, unlike the original SD cards, higher capacities like a terabyte already exist AND are not insanely more expensive over base sd cards.(I mean $20-25 for 256gb sd cards to $60 for same but microsd express is still a jump, but do you guys remember how fucking much 256gb sd cards costed originally? It was like $150, and I think 256gb storage will get further milage then the original 32gb storage the og switch had. And 1tb already cost $200 for when it comes out with the switch 2. Those prices will drop unless, uh... not within the scope of what I want to talk about)

Since we're on storage, 256gb of UFS storage? Like on phones, that can go multiple gigabytes per second read/write? Hell ya, we bout to get load times not much worse then other modern consoles.

Let's touch upon the joycons now.

I like them, but as more in a sense of improvment over og switch joycons. Which, honestly, that's all they needed to do. The standout weird feature is the mouse on both, but I only see this as a plus. I want more of my PC games on portable systems, and as much as I want the steamdeck too, the switch form factor is still more portable. Just... please let the bigger joysticks be actually good and resistant to stick drift, I do not want to open them up just to replace the sticks with hall effect ones again. As a plus, I can't wait to see what insanity warioware is going to become now.

Oh ya, chat.

Surprised it took them 2 decades to finally do it, but they seem to have a lot of restraint there still, with extensive parent controls to help metigate any issues, so I'll only give them slightly less shit. Slightly. I'm going to call it though, there is going to be controversy about what eventually will occur over the gamechat. Can't wait!

Switch online services

I mean, it was inevitable. This, with the Wii games that's almost absolutely coming later, is going to be good. I suspect a pricebump is going to occur with the NSO that's going to make it cost almost a full game per year, but at least the retro selection is going to start going from crazy to insane, making it probably worth it. I just hope that the voucher program (shown below) gets expanded to more third parties, because as much as I like nintendo games for $50 a piece with this program, it needs to be way more expansive to make the $20 cost at this time to be online, let alone get the 2 vouchers for $100, worth it. If they do that, and keep on adding new actually fun (looking at you Zelda Notes... what the fuck are you) and nice to have to the service, I think it could become worth it in the near future.

I ALMOST FORGOT ONLINE DOWNLOAD PLAY, seriously that alone may be worth it because with both local and online, it means you do not have to force your friends to buy games they may otherwise never touch outside of playing with you. This is straight up a good, pro-consumer thing if others don't ignore it 24/7. I just hope the streaming quality will not be dogshit ahhaha....

(Shout out to nintendo actuallly using this a part to prevent scalpers, I don't like it much because I didn't pay for NSO on the og switch but at least this is a verifiable way to prevent scalpers. I just wish acconts from the Wii U/3ds era got special treatment :^) )

Since we're getting more into software, shout out to how sad the UI is still.

Nintendo, the literal bare minimun here is not just black and white customizable themes. You haven't done that for a generation. I would have much rather had the UI present from the DSi/Wii to Wii U/3ds era then this bland nothing soup. God. Now, onto the most devicive one, and the one that makes or breaks it for me. The games, and their prices.

Let's get a few things clear, the $90 physical switch 2 game thing (which I had fallen for too) is in europe. If you're a suffering US citizen, the price is $80 for what seems to be big, high budget nintendo games, with everything else being $70, at least from the list of prices I've seen online.

About Game key cards, ya it's just the 'download play' games on the switch, but instead of a piece of paper that's one time, it's a re-usable cartridge that allows multiple downloads on other switches and acts like a physical one otherwise. This, in my opinion, is objectively better, and is not the default option. Other games will be on the Cartidge like og switch, see Cyberpunk 2077 on a 64gb one (seriously how the fuck they did that).

This switch 2 edition is on a case by case basis, so if it is just an fps/resolution bump, it is likely to be free. If it has a bit more, like some added extras and they know people would pay for the fps/resolution, see botw and totk will be $10, and if the content has basically DLC + all of the above, it's $20. Also, lol at welcome tour.

Seeing all of that, I'm iffy. I'm worried that the panic and reactions from everyone will lock the prices for everyone else at $80 since the publishers will take any chance to push prices up further, but if $70 stays I would reluctantly accept it. Unlike some people on the other platforms may say, in the past before $60 standardization, we had other options to play games like with rental stores, actually being around friends, and frequent discounts and bundles to get inventory moving. That does mean nowadays, especially with no sale nintendo, this price is here to stay, and if this is the cost to actually keep games good and not need astronomical sales to make back development costs, so be it. I am just not happy knowing that a lot of publishers will be using machine created/generated stuff each year for that price or $80 and expect no issues with it. The only thing I am very curious about is the capabilities of the switch 2 being somewhere between a PS4 and PS5, but able to handle PS5 ports, potentially making it the best way to play a lot of newer games on the go until valve decides in 2030 to make the steam deck 2.

Now everyone's favorite issues, price. I think it's reasonable, sucks a bit but reasonable. We're now dealing in a world where Nvidia has their focus on AI stuff, and knows that Nintendo wants backward compat + better stuff, so Nvidia likely is changing way more on parts. This world also includes inflation (seriously, $300 in 2017 is now closer to $400, and now there's all the extra nicer stuff slapped on top to justify a next gen). This world also includes ungodly uncertienty because of a a group in the wrong place in the wrong time. Considering all of this, honestly, $450 is fine. It sucks, I know it has pushed a few friends out from buying it w/o someone assisting them in the purchase, but it's fine. It's going to be a great refinement, which is all a sequel console had to be. The thing you have to know, nintendo is doing the thing again with previous controllers being compatible with the current system, so in reality (especially with me and my hall-effect modded controllers) the price to play with others will not be much more. I touched upon this already, but the game prices are iffy for me, and it's absolutely going to prevent me from buying as many games as I had for the og switch, but it's an dampener.

I will need more time to simmer (and see how my finacial situation is going to be), but I am currently leaning to I will try to get it. I'm on the fence, and I have a good chance of flipping to waiting later, or just not getting.

I may add more thoughts as I think them and remember I can use tumblr like this, but I think this is everything I wanted to get out that has been simmering in my head for a bit. Oh ya I almost forgot the most important thing, Homebrew. I love homebrew, it has given me extra life and enjoyment out of my og switch. If there is another launch edition vuln that allows homebrew, I want in.

[justinspoliticalcorner]

Ramon Antonio Vargas at The Guardian:

The Washington Post’s Pulitzer prize-winning editorial cartoonist Ann Telnaes has resigned from her position at the newspaper after its refusal to publish a satirical cartoon depicting the outlet’s owner, Jeff Bezos – along with other media and technology barons – kneeling before Donald Trump as he gears up for his second US presidency. “I have had editorial feedback and productive conversations – and some differences – about cartoons I have submitted for publication, but in all that time I’ve never had a cartoon killed because of who or what I chose to aim my pen at,” Telnaes wrote on Friday in an online post on the Substack platform detailing her decision to quit. “Until now.”

In a statement reported by the New York Times, the Post’s opinions editor, David Shipley, defended the newspaper’s decision against publishing Telnaes’s cartoon, saying he disagreed with her “interpretation of events�� and that “the only bias was against repetition”.

“Not every editorial judgment is a reflection of a malign force,” said Shipley, whose statement added that he had spoken with Telnaes and asked her to reconsider leaving. “My decision was guided by the fact that we had just published a column on the same topic as the cartoon and had already scheduled another column – this one a satire – for publication.” Telnaes’s Substack post from Friday contained a rough draft of her cartoon. Beside Bezos, who founded Amazon before buying the Post, the cartoon portrayed caricatures of Meta founder Mark Zuckerberg, Los Angeles Times owner Patrick Soon-Shiong and Walt Disney Co mascot Mickey Mouse.

“The cartoon … criticizes the billionaire tech and media chief executives who have been doing their best to curry favor with … Trump,” Telnaes said. “While it isn’t uncommon for editorial page editors to object to visual metaphors within a cartoon if it strikes that editor as unclear or isn’t correctly conveying the message intended by the cartoonist, such editorial criticism was not the case regarding this cartoon.

“To be clear, there have been instances where sketches have been rejected or revisions requested, but never because of the point of view inherent in the cartoon’s commentary. That’s a gamechanger … and dangerous for a free press.” Telnaes announced her resignation less than three months after the Post and Bezos faced withering backlash over the outlet’s decision to prevent its editorial team from publishing an endorsement of Kamala Harris in the presidential election of 5 November. Soon-Shiong had also similarly refused to allow the LA Times’ editorial board to publish an endorsement of Harris.

[...] Telnaes won the prestigious Pulitzer for illustrated reporting and commentary in 2001 – coincidentally, while working for the LA Times Syndicate – and was a finalist in the same category for the Post in 2022. She also received the National Cartoonists Society’s Reuben award in 2017, becoming the first woman to win both that prize as well as a Pulitzer.

Pulitzer-winning cartoonist Ann Telnaes resigned from The Washington Post over the paper spiking her cartoon that was very critical of its owner Jeff Bezos in that the cartoon depicting Bezos and other tech and media moguls kneeling in front of a Donald Trump statue. The Post’s refusal to publish this cartoon is more proof that many outlets are obeying in advance to Trump’s attacks on the freedom of the press.

See Also:

The Left Hook: Drawing The Ire of Trump and the Broligarchy: A Cartoonist Resigns to Defend The Free Press

[esperchallenge]

Day 1: Snoozetown, Zhalfir

The Commander

The commander for this first list is Sidar Jabari of Zhalfir, first printed as the face commander of the esper Cavalry Charge precon, released alongside the set March of the Machine. He is the fifth commander to be printed with Eminence, only seen before in the 2017 Commander set. Eminence is powerful because it gives your commander an effect on the game while they're still in the command zone: the only limitation is that all the Eminence abilities work with a single creature type. In Jabari's case, that's knights.

(more under the cut)

Jabari allows you to loot a card once per turn cycle when you attack with a knight. On its own, this isn't that powerful, giving you a small amount of card selection. The true power comes out when Jabari himself hits the battlefield. His last ability lets you reanimate any knight in your graveyard, returning it to the battle for free, as long as Jabari can connect with an opponent. He has flying to help him get through, and first strike allows you to pull shenanigans, since what you reanimate will hit the battlefield before normal damage happens. This means you can bring back a lord effect during first strike damage and pump the rest of your knights when they all connect afterwards.

The obvious way to build Sidar Jabari is knight typal, but you can also go more of a reanimator route, playing cheap knights that let you put your finishers into the graveyard to reanimate in any number of ways. You could also go for an aristocrats strategy: there are multiple knights that have a blood artist-adjacent effect. One last option is to build around the card Nazgûl, as they're knights that scale each other up, and you can run nine of them in the deck. You could even run Conspiracy-type effects and make all your creatures wraiths as well as knights!

The Decklist

Since this is my first decklist in the challenge, I decided to go the obvious route and build a knight typal deck. There will be other chances to go in a more goofy direction. The name of the deck, Snoozetown, Zhalfir, is a reference to the fact that I admittedly went the boring route and also because you're trying to go Knighty Knight lol.

This is a creature heavy deck, with 43 total creatures including the commander. There are a surprisingly high number of lords for the knight type. We have 14 total lord effects in the deck, ranging from pumping power and toughness to giving them abilities like double strike, indestructible, and even horsemanship.

The lands and ramp are from a basic manabase package of lands and rocks that I'll be using in most of my decks, filling it out with basics, unless they call for any additions or changes. For this deck, I've added a Three Tree City to the lands, and an Urza's Incubator to the ramp.

The Standout Cards

Haakon is an absolute house in this deck. He acts as a backup way to get your knights back from the graveyard, if your commander is starting to get prohibitively expensive. He also allows for some of my favorite tech in the game: he specifically allows you to recast knight spells from your graveyard, and you know what are technically knight spells?

That's right: Kindred Changeling cards! We are running two removal spells that count as knights, so you can cast them as many times as you'd like when Haakon is out.

The Council of Four is the one non-knight creature in the deck, but I assure you, it's well worth the inclusion! The best part of this card's text is the word "player" because then you can trigger its effect as well. Even if your opponents are avoiding triggering The Council, you can feel free to cast two spells to make another body, or swing with a knight to loot, triggering the first ability and drawing you an additional card.

The Win Conditions

The first, most obvious way to win is to build up a board of knights and turn them sideways. With enough lords and bodies, you should get through eventually, and cards like Knights' Charge and Moonshaker Cavalry just speed up the process.

If, for some reason, you can't attack, be it a board stall or pillowfort cards, you can just work on building up a decent board, then cast Curry Favor, draining everyone out, or work towards some Syr Konrad or Corpse Knight shenanigans.

Final Thoughts

This was a fun place to start! Typal decks are usually fairly straightforward, but knights have some fun options. All-in-all, I feel good about my first deck in the Challenge.

Talk to you next time, when I go over my Urza, Chief Artificer list!

[ms-boogie-man]

Ahem…

Do not come to me pretending to know the outcome either way of this apparent partnership between Tulsi Gabbard, RFK jr, Elon Musk, and President Donald Trump. There is not one person here on Tumblr who has any more info on this than I, so there is not anyone qualified to badmouth me in this. You can have your hunches and concerns, that is fine… I would like to hear them, but do not get uppity with me about it

Here are some facts:

Elon is a businessman and a wildcard. He is the world's biggest contractor to the US government… and that means bigger than Raytheon, HR Textron, Ameron Global, and all the rest. He did not invent the Tesla automobile… he took a rag-tag group of tech hippies, invested in their ideas, put a corral of organization and logic around what they were doing, and brought the Tesla to fruition. His son was brainwashed into the trans cult and is now lost to him, and that may be part of his bone to pick with globalists. Elon bought Twitter, made it into X and has stood up for free speech ever since. He is also said to be the creator of the overhead network of satellites that will form our internet in the future. He also has shown a huge and often disturbing interest in Artificial Intelligence and chipping people.

Robert F Kennedy Jr is a hardcore liberal who may hold some common goals with conservatives, but he also has some national desires that go against conservatives, i.e., gun laws, as one example. His views on health are important though. While working on the goals he has in common with the Trump admin, RFK jr may be hoping to get a couple of his liberal notions thru on the backside. It will be up to us, We the People, to stop this from happening.

Tulsi Gabbard has always held a soft spot within my heart. Like me, she is very pretty, and too, she talks a good game, and, she seems to have served her country cleanly and well… but… I know that she has been involved with the Clowns In America, and this gives me pause yo. I will never trust anyone fully if they have been thru that rat mill. I do like her apparent commitment and vigor yo

What can I say about Donald Trump? He confuses me at times… then at other times, I feel very sure of his commitment to our republic. Feelings are not what this movement is about yo Either way, unless we are going to put a lot of lives on the line, Trump is our best bet to take back our country as peacefully as possible… and that is a fact yo

I have brought up the following before Did anyone notice this 👇🏼 in January 2017?

Btw, JAG stands for Judge Advocate General

These gentlemen, officers in our military, stood with President Trump for 17 seconds *begins counting on her fingers

Yup! Just as I thought yo! The 17th letter in our alphabet is the letter Q

*interesting

Angie/Maddie🦇❥✝︎🇺🇸

[warningsine]

If it was ever possible to maintain the illusion that good work will attract an audience simply by virtue of its quality, it isn’t now. In 2017, there’s simply too much out there to guarantee that the best series will attract the biggest audiences. It’s a miracle, then, that Halt and Catch Fire, a show originally meant to fill the hole left by Mad Men, has managed to make it to the end of its fourth and final season, which concluded this weekend in the US.

A tech drama that takes place entirely between the first iteration of Microsoft Word in 1983 and Windows 95, Halt and Catch Fire kept its focus squarely on the haze of an emerging field, without any of the fist-pumping moments that might have come from a show focusing on the rise of Google or Facebook. The characters never achieved lasting success or transformation, perpetually stymied by the major players in a nascent and clunking industry. Instead, they faced an endless, thankless series of intractable workplace decisions about integrity, product quality and business logistics.

These seemingly pedestrian moments dominate the show’s central relationship between Donna Clark (Kerry Bishé) and Cameron Howe (Mackenzie Davis), two women who attempt to found a tech company and spend the next few years discovering what they’re willing to sacrifice in the effort. Eventually, it’s impossible for people this committed to their work to separate their personal values and their professional ones, and while that conflict might sound cliche, in the hands of Halt and Catch Fire’s cast, it’s enthralling.

Over the course of the series, the characters’ business interests range from building personal computers at Dell competitor Cardiff Electric to videogames, web-based chat, and e-commerce at Cameron and Donna’s startup Mutiny to antivirus software at MacMillan Utility to, finally, early search engines at Comet and Rover. (All of these companies are fictional and, with the exception of Cardiff, are founded by the characters themselves.) Halt and Catch Fire’s cast is full of classic Silicon Valley résumé – they’re perpetually successful enough to keep working, and to live more or less comfortably while pursuing other ventures, but they never quite strike it big, whether that’s because of conflicts between the partners, technological limitation, or, most often, the presence of an enormous corporation capable of choking the market.

Every major character on the series contains multitudes. Donna is a hard-assed businesswoman, but she’s also a practically minded, savvy person who wants to do her best to create a thriving company with an innovative product. Cameron’s myopia is frustrating, but it’s part of why she’s such a successful coder. Steve Jobs-style visionary Joe MacMillan (Lee Pace) is also, to varying degrees, a charlatan, and tinkering softie Gordon Clark (Scoot McNairy) becomes irritable when he has to leave his comfort zone.

Those relationships contained a staggering number of stories. In just the fourth season alone, Halt and Catch Fire handled a teen coming-out story, the fallout from a divorce, a marriage, several mid-life crises, and a sudden, heart-rending death. But none of these stories are the defining features of the characters; they’re simply facets of their lives. Where another drama might end with the consummation of a romantic pairing, or the strengthening of a family, Halt and Catch Fire ends with Donna having an idea, and pitching it to Cameron. We don’t hear the idea, but that’s not important – the point is beginning the cycle anew.

In this respect, it’s similar to the Mad Men finale – but where Mad Men is ambivalent, at best, toward the bolt of inspiration that leads Don Draper to create the “I’d like to buy the world a Coke” ad, Halt and Catch Fire maintains a single commitment: ideas are what we have. That’s why the show could never have become a smash hit, why it got renewed by the skin of its teeth, and why it’s highly unlikely it will ever be brought back by an ambitious investor. With so many self-consciously explosive series vying for your attention, Halt and Catch Fire played a different game. It kept itself contained, forcing the audience to match its subdued, mesmerizing rhythm. Eventually, the audience and the characters learned the same lesson: sometimes, it’s worth putting in the work.

[sugudoe]

hii i wanted to ask for a match make whistle as i love ur works and ideas sm!!!!?! 🪷

I’m 5’5 and a smidge chubby but I carry it curvy (am not keen though) (5’6 on a good day)

I’m quite a sarcastic person and make jokes quite a bit

I’ve been told that I am very kind despite my constant whining ( i try not to b a party pooper but need constant reassurance)

I love to bake! (Brownies is a personal fave recipe)

My mbti is infj (although I’m more of an ambivert depending on the situation. e.g. if there’s a rlly big crowd i will have to link arms with someone it’s an anxious habit. notoriously)

Love languages are 120% physical touch like i crave neck kisses n cuddles(who doesn’t) and i also like acts of service!

I like to spend time in to putting my makeup on and looking pretty- though I despise clothes shopping (head gets all fuzzy!)

I also have a fascination with reading!! Oh- and rollercoasters!!!

tysm whistle if you come to do this❤️❤️ you’re amazing keep up ur work bc i look forward to engaging and reading it!!!!

hii my angel, hope u like it! 🤍

✶ 𝐩𝐚𝐢𝐫𝐢𝐧𝐠: okkotsu yuta

Out of all your classmates and close friends, the first years of Jujutsu Tech, 2017 class, you are the most interesting one for Okkotsu Yuta — let’s recap that there is a boy who only speaks in ingredients and a literal panda that talks and fights.

Maybe, he finds you the most amusing because when Gojo Satoru introduced him to class, you were the only one that stayed with your weapons and powers down, in fact, you jumped in front of Yuta to save him from your classmates. Rika would never admit, but she did liked you that day.

Yuta is, very notable for anyone, the most introvert and awkward person anyone had ever met, and a part of you tried to take care of him. Is a heavy power he has, a curse, but you are there when the weight feels too much.

It’s not only all about Yuta, all your needs are answered with the same intensity you devote to him! And Rika, although creepy sometimes, learns to give you space. Yuta has to threaten her, something that took you by surprise, he was always so gentle.

Your relationship starts merely days before the attack Geto planned, and he knew who you were from the start — trembling ideas in his mind, should he or should he not try to go for Okkotsu’s most prized thing? He did, in the end, you got badly hurt.

Through your blurry vision, drenched in blood, you saw Rika and your boyfriend fighting, and you tried to get up, but ended up falling to the ground, to slumber and defeat.

The feeling of fingertips tracing figures in your arms, and whispers of begging is what wake you up, in the hospital bed. He is all over you in an instant, after a small “Yuta..?”, his head goes straight to your neck, desperately devoting kisses to your beating vein, serving as a reminder that you are well.

Yuta takes his boyfriend and personal nurse duties to a charming extent, Rika doesn’t dare come and complain, you’re already hurt enough.

The boy makes sure all your needs are taken while you recover, he buys your groceries for your dorm, he sleeps with you instead of your teddy bears, and he makes your meals — even desert, you teach him while sitting on the small sofa how to make your perfect brownies, and the first tries he accidentally made cake, but practice makes perfection, and soon, you will be long healed and both making brownies for your friends to taste and say which one is the best.

Yuta does not like public spaces as much as the next person, but he goes wherever you want — a fair, a museum, anywhere and he follows. And if you feel like drowning in a bit of fear, you don’t even have to move first, he is already giving you his arm to hold. Yuta actually prefers to hug you.

In his arms, is a fact everyone can see, that’s your both safe space. A safe harbor.

──── ✎ ° ⋆ FUN FACTS.

◛ ₊· in your second year, your relationship sadly turns into a distance relationship one. fear not, call him at any time and he will pick up (even during a mission).

◛ ₊· he is kinda scared of roller coasters, but your insistence and his needs to make you happy always wins. he will scream though.

◛ ₊· you always picks him up from the airport, any moment with him in japan is mostly spend with you, in the safe space of your room, eating brownies and watching movies.

◛ ₊· he takes a while to understand your sarcasm, but he still laughs at your jokes. he is down bad.

[beardedmrbean]

Salt Lake City — Utah on Wednesday became the first state to pass legislation requiring app stores to verify users' ages and get parental consent for minors to download apps to their devices.

The bill headed to the desk of Gov. Spencer Cox has pitted Meta, which operates Facebook and Instagram, against app store giants Apple and Google over who should be responsible for verifying ages. Similar bills have been introduced in at least eight other states in the latest fight over children's online safety. The proposals targeting app stores follow legal fights over laws requiring social media platforms to verify the ages of users.

Meta and other social media companies support putting the onus on app stores to verify ages amid criticism that they don't do enough to make their products safe for children - or verify that no kids under 13 use them.

"Parents want a one-stop shop to verify their child's age and grant permission for them to download apps in a privacy-preserving way. The app store is the best place for it," Meta, X and Snap Inc. said in a joint statement Wednesday. "We applaud Utah for putting parents in charge with its landmark legislation and urge Congress to follow suit."

The app stores say app developers are better equipped to handle age verification and other safety measures. Requiring app stores to confirm ages will make it so all users have to hand over sensitive identifying information, such as a driver's license, passport, credit card or Social Security number, even if they don't want to use an age-restricted app, Apple said.

"Because many kids in the U.S. don't have government-issued IDs, parents in the U.S. will have to provide even more sensitive documentation just to allow their child to access apps meant for children. That's not in the interest of user safety or privacy," the company said in its most recent online safety report.

Apple considers age a matter of privacy and lets users decide whether to disclose it. The company gives parents the option to set age-appropriate parameters for app downloads. The Google Play Store does the same.

Apple and Google are among a litany of tech companies that help support the Chamber of Progress, a tech policy group that lobbied Utah lawmakers to reject the bill. Last year, Apple helped kill a similar bill in Louisiana that would have required app stores to help enforce age restrictions.

Kouri Marshall, a spokesperson for the Chamber of Progress, called the measure "a tremendous encroachment of individual privacy" that he said places a heavy burden on app stores to ensure online safety.

Republican Sen. Todd Weiler, the bill's sponsor, argued it's "a lot easier to target two app stores than it is to target 10,000 (app) developers."

Under the bill, app stores would be required to request age information when someone creates an account. If a minor tries to open one, the bill directs the app store to link it to their parent's account and may request a form of ID to confirm their identity. Weiler said a credit card could be used as an age verification tool in most cases.

If a child tries to download an app that allows in-app purchases or requires them to agree to terms and conditions, the parent will first have to approve.

Melissa McKay, a Utah mother, is among those who pushed for the legislation. She said she started asking questions about device safety after her nephew in 2017 was exposed to "really harmful content on another student's device at school." Inaccurate age ratings on apps and faulty parental controls are "at the root of online harm," McKay said.

The eight other states considering proposals would similarly place responsibility on app stores to verify ages and seek parental permissions. A legislative committee advanced Alabama's bill last week.

Lawsuits have delayed implementation of state laws regulating social media apps and websites. A federal judge in 2024 temporarily blocked Utah's first-in-the-nation law requiring social media companies to check the ages of all users and place restrictions on accounts belonging to minors.

If Cox signs the Utah bill into law, most provisions would take effect May 7. The governor's office didn't respond to emails seeking comment Wednesday. Cox, a Republican, supported the state law currently on hold that requires age verification on social media.

[inkmemes]

halt and catch fire  (  2014-2017  )  s01e01 sentence  starters ↪  taken  from  amc's tech drama.  alter  as  you  see  fit  ♡

“oh... glad you could join us.”

“something funny?”

“i don't think you really know what that is.”

“what's your name?”

“do you need a quarter?”

“are you afraid to give me a straight answer?”

“hey, can we get two more?”

“what is this anyway, some kind of job interview?”

“you still haven't answered my question.”

“this doesn't mean you get the job.”

“you mean we're not in love?”

“ain't no jail cell can hold me.”

“look, i had one too many drinks. it got away from me.”

“you still have a job?”

“what i know is that you need to be at work in four hours.”

“you're drunk, so the best thing you could do right now is to shut up.”

“you sound pretty sure about that.”

“i couldn't agree with you more.”

“maybe i'm a guy who's done doing business like that.”

“it ain't sexy, but it sure as hell makes us some serious money.”

“and what is this? what am i looking at?”

“well, we're married.”

“we'll take my car, it's closer.”

“i don't think there is such a thing.”

“well, they had me fooled.”

“what a fearful way to do business.”

“you've made just enough safe choices to stay alive, but not enough to matter.”

“you can be more. you want to be more, don't you?”

“the window of opportunity is closing. this is your chance.”

“this is about you finally having the confidence to walk out on the ledge and know that you're not going to fall.”

“i'm not going to apologize for caring about your business, even if the people who work for you don't.”

“i'll think about it.”

“look, it's better than a flat-out no.”

“are you gonna fix it?”

“i don't care who broke it.”

“you want to take a look and see what's wrong with that?”

“okay, [name], do you want to maybe get me the salt? maybe you could reach into the cabinet about seven inches from your head, take out the salt and put it in my hand so i can finish cooking this. do you think you could at least get me the salt?”

“i'm not in the mood, all right?”

“why don't you go blow-dry your hair some more or something?”

“don't you realize what you wrote?”

“if you see him around, i wanna meet that guy.”

“what are you doing? why are you doing this?”

“we're headed out the door to a movie.”

“he wanted to know if you thought about what he said.”

“oh, yeah? what kind of ideas?”

“we spoke on the phone earlier.”

“what? why? what would be the point?”

“wow, you're serious.”

“look, that's a terrible idea.”

“i'm sorry, but you missed it.”

“are you out of your mind?”

“how are you gonna force their hand?”

“do you have a family, [name]?”

“could you please acknowledge how crazy that is?”

“he's just keyed up about something.”

“[name], we can't do this again. you know we can't.”

“it's just literally a mistake that we can't afford to make again.”

“do you have any idea how expensive this thing was?”

“i faked a fever, so... let's turn this thing inside out.”

“the good news is there's a way around that, sort of.”

“i am a little rusty at this.”

“wait, wait, wait, what am i doing here?”

“how are you getting this from that?”

“you found a needle in a haystack.”

“we still have a lot to do.”

“i-i thought you weren't gonna be back till monday.”

“would you please tell me that you didn't buy all this?”

“why would you lie to me?”

“no, i did not lie to you.”

“this right here, this is what i want to do with my life!”

“well, it's not enough. okay? i'm sorry, it's not enough.”

“come on, [name], don't be like that.”

“i'm sorry, but i think you'll wanna take this.”

“i guess i can say it's good to know he's alive.”

“i wish i could've warned you, but now it might be too late.”

“we've got a problem.”

“i told them.”

“[name], look at me. i'm not like you, okay?”

“oh, go to hell, [name].”

“there is no "we," [name].”

“i figured you needed a break.”

“look, i've been awful. i'm sorry.”

“whatever it is you're dreaming of, build it. i know you can make it great.”

“you son of a bitch.”

“now, why didn't you tell me about this yesterday?”

“i admire your tenacity, but i draw the line at you claiming that you did me a favor.”

“don't screw this up.”

“later, spooky bitch.”

“you know i screwed him, right?”

“let's be adult about this.”

“you love talking down to me, don't you?”

“who are you again?”

“you need me, otherwise you wouldn't be here.”

“i wanted to see what i was so wrong about the first time.”

“i'm sorry you feel bad for hurting my feelings, but don't worry, you didn't.”

“it wasn't supposed to be personal.”

“this is too important to get wrong.”

“i don't need you.”

“how much money would you give me?”

“i'm never... i'm never gonna forget that.”

“holy shit.”

“what are you trying to prove with all this?”