#Billing Software UK

[gaysheep]

Touching is Good: A Retrospective

My trusty Nintendo 3DS, which has held out since I was gifted it for my 15th birthday, has turned one decade old with my 25th birthday this past November. Given new life with custom firmware and nds-bootstrap via TWiLightMenu, the 3DS is stellar for visiting any past handheld title or console title up to (and somewhat including) the N64. (Quick plug for the CFW/hacking community for the less popular PS Vita, too, which has accomplished some pretty crazy-cool stuff this last year.) I use my 3DS more often than I use my Nintendo Switch most weeks.

The Nintendo DS (minus the three) launched in late 2004. The second display and stylus support were novel tools for developers to experiment with, and the NDS is best remembered for its robust catalogue of RPGs and visual novels. Where it lacked in power, narrative-focused games flourished under its technical limitations.

That being said, while browsing the ROM archives on Vimm's Lair to pick up some titles, I was reminded of what an interesting era the mid-to-late 2000s were for games. While Sony and Microsoft were fighting over the "core gamer" demographic, who had outgrown Nintendo mascots, Nintendo led a series of wildly successful marketing campaigns for its hardware after the light failure of the Gamecube, where the Nintendo DS and then the Wii were targeted at...everyone else.

[Image source. Image description in alt text.]

If you look at ads for the DS and the Wii, you'll see that adults are featured much more prominently than children, especially women and seniors. (This did not go unnoticed, as I found this ancient relic of misogyny while looking for images for this post.) A Nintendo handheld was already an easy sell to parents with small children (though I think it's also notable that ads which do focus on children often prominently feature girls. Munchlax is pretty hot...), but Nintendo's angle for the DS and Wii was that their hardware wasn't just for children. The Wii was a way to get up off the couch and to play board games with grandma. The DS was a great gadget for a working woman to keep in her pocketbook.

This worked. The Wii and DS were two of the best-selling consoles of all time. In particular, the DS's marketing campaign only worked because it came out in the perfect window of time. PDA-phone hybrids had been around since the 90s, and the Blackberry had been kicking around for a few years, but the iPhone wouldn't be introduced until 2007, and the 4G LTE standard wouldn't be released until 2009. While the Blackberry was popular with businesspeople and the PDA was out of style, smartphones were luxury toys for several years; they wouldn't become near-ubiquious until the mid-2010s. I didn't get my own smartphone until probably around the same time I got my 3DS, a full handheld generation later.

Browsing the software library for the Nintendo DS and DSi with that in mind is really interesting. Many titles released for the platform serve the same purposes that would be fulfilled by simple smartphone apps less than a decade later: planners and diaries, fitness trackers, calculators, language learning and SAT prep software, even a guide to the then-most-recent version of the driver's test in the UK. These proliferated with the release of the DSi's virtual store, but they existed even with the base model. You could go to a brick-and-mortar store and buy them on physical cartridges. (You might be wondering, "Why would you bother carrying those around over just buying a Blackberry?" You can't underestimate how expensive the service bills for a smartphone were before companies realized they were the most powerful spyware tool in history.)

There was never a time where every single businesswoman in New York carried a DS Lite, but adults did buy and use them, and a not insignificant portion of the DS's software library is aimed at a casual adult audience. Another niche covered mostly by smartphone games these days—games designed to be picked up and played in short sessions on-the-go, in places like waiting rooms and subway commutes.

Nintendo made crazy bank in the seventh console generation. Publications of the time talked about a console war between Sony, Microsoft, and Nintendo, but the real battle was between the PS3 and the Xbox 360 over the gamer demographic. Nintendo was producing hardware for a niche who would quietly disappear once smartphone sales began ballooning by hundreds of millions per year over the course of the early 2010s.

After the failure of the Wii U, Nintendo's marketing strategy pivoted again, though I doubt they'll ever completely abandon their family-friendly image. Currently beat out only by the PS2 and the DS, the Nintendo Switch may very well climb to a status as the best-selling console of all time before the end of its lifespan, but the "gamer" demographic is much bigger than it was two decades ago at the dawn of the DS. As more and more devices become consolidated into the Swiss army knife the smartphone has become, consoles can only carve out a role as dedicated gaming machines.

I'm not sure we'll ever see anything like the Nintendo DS or the Wii again. I think they're worth looking back on for their uniqueness in that way as much as they are for the more celebrated parts of their libraries.

[justforbooks]

Mike Lynch

British tech entrepreneur who sold his Autonomy software group to Hewlett-Packard and was later cleared after a long-running US fraud case

Mike Lynch, who has died aged 59 in the wreck of his yacht, was sometimes described as “Britain’s Bill Gates”. It was a huge exaggeration, but Lynch could claim two parallels with Gates: he developed world-leading technology (in his case in machine learning or AI) and, unlike so many UK scientists, he learned how to turn it into commercial success.

Such was this success that his company, Autonomy, was valued at $11bn when he sold it to Hewlett-Packard in 2011, but the fall-out from the sale would come to overshadow his technological achievements, and lead to a national debate about the circumstances in which UK citizens may be extradited to the US.

Lynch founded Autonomy with two partners in 1996. Its software enabled a computer to search huge quantities of diverse information, including phone calls, emails and videos, and recognise words. He told the Independent in 1999: “The way our technology works is to look at words and understand the relationships because it has seen a lot of content before. When it sees the word ‘star’ in the context of film, it knows it has nothing to do with the word moon. Because it works from text, it can deal with slang and with different languages.”

Autonomy became a leading company in Cambridge’s Silicon Fen cluster and established a base in San Francisco. “We knew we had to be successful in America. It was a question of ‘Go West young man, go to San Francisco and be ignored.’ They found it hard to believe that anyone from England could have anything powerful.” Lynch found what he called the “cold-hearted schmooze” to secure funding tough.

But Autonomy’s software, enabling computers to identify and match themes and ideas, and sort mammoth amounts of data, was licensed to more than 500 customers, including the US State Department and the BBC. It was listed on Nasdaq in 1998 and on the FTSE 100 in November 2000, although its value of £5.1bn would be halved within a few months in the collapse of the technology boom and accusations of over-promotion. In 2005 it bought a major US rival, Verity, for $500m.

Lynch’s profile rose with it. In 2006 he was appointed OBE for services to enterprise and the following year joined the board of the BBC. In 2011 he became a member of the government’s Council for Science and Technology, and was named the most influential person in UK IT by Computer Weekly. In 2014 he was elected a fellow of the Royal Society.

Though quietly spoken, he had a reputation for toughness, coloured by a liking for James Bond, which led to Autonomy conference rooms being named after Bond villains, and a tank of piranha fish in reception. (Lynch claimed it belonged to one of his business partners.) Challenged about a company culture where people were “a little fanatical”, he replied: “This is not the place for you if you want to work 9 to 5 and don’t love your work.”

Born in Ilford, east London, to Michael, a firefighter, and Dolores, a nurse, and brought up in Chelmsford, Lynch won a scholarship to the independent Bancroft’s school in Woodford Green, before taking a natural sciences degree at Cambridge, where his PhD in artificial neural networks, a form of machine learning, has been widely studied since.

A saxophone player and jazz lover, he set up his first business, Lynett Systems, while still a student, to produce electronic equipment for the music industry. Later he would attribute some loss of hearing to adjusting synthesisers for bands. He quoted his own experience to highlight the difficulties of finding funding for startup businesses in Britain. He finally negotiated a £2,000 loan from one of the managers of Genesis in a Soho bar.

Lynch’s next venture came out of his research. In 1991 he founded Cambridge Neurodynamics, specialising in computer-based fingerprint recognition. Then he established Autonomy.

The pinnacle of his success appeared to come in October 2011 when Autonomy was purchased by Hewlett-Packard for $11bn and Lynch made an estimated $800m. Shortly afterwards he established a new company, Invoke Capital, for investment in tech companies, and he and his wife, Angela Bacares, whom he had married in 2001, invested about £200m in Darktrace, a cybersecurity company.

But just 13 months after the Autonomy sale, HP announced an $8.8bn writedown of the assets “due to serious accounting improprieties, disclosure failures and outright misrepresentations” which it claimed had artificially inflated the company’s value. The authorities investigated, and while the UK Serious Fraud Office found insufficient evidence, in 2018 the US authorities indicted Lynch for fraud. Soon after, Autonomy’s chief financial officer, Sushovan Hussain, was found guilty of fraud and sentenced to five years in prison.

In March 2019 HP followed up with a civil action for fraud in London. Lynch spent days in the witness box as the civil action stretched over nine months. It ended in January 2022 with the judge ruling that HP had substantially succeeded, but that damages would be much less than the $5bn they had claimed.

Meanwhile the US authorities sought Lynch’s extradition on criminal charges of conspiracy and fraud. In spite of representations by senior politicians and accusations that the US authorities were attempting to exercise “extraterritorial jurisdiction”, a district judge ruled in favour of extradition.

An application for judicial review and a further appeal failed, and in May 2023 Lynch was flown to the US to be held under house arrest in San Francisco, with the prospect of a 25-year sentence.

Charged with wire fraud, securities fraud and conspiracy, on 18 March this year Lynch pleaded not guilty, alongside his former vice-president of finance, Stephen Chamberlain. On 6 June, they were found not guilty of all charges. Chamberlain died after being hit by a car on 17 August.

Lynch declared that he wanted to get back to what he loved doing – innovating. But he had little opportunity to do so. He soon embarked on a voyage to celebrate his acquittal, with family, colleagues and business associates. It ended with the sinking of his yacht, Bayesian – named after the 18th-century mathematician, Thomas Bayes, whose work on probability had informed much of his thinking – in a violent storm off the coast of Sicily.

Lynch is survived by his wife and elder daughter, Esme. Their other daughter, Hannah, was also on board the Bayesian.

🔔 Michael Richard Lynch, technology entrepreneur, born 16 June 1965; died 19 August 2024

Daily inspiration. Discover more photos at Just for Books…?

[thessalian]

Thess vs Big Brother

For those of you who aren't aware (because I know a lot of you are USian or at least not being here in the UK, and there's a lot going on right now), there have been some ... issues ... in the UK the last little while. And by "issues", I mean "alt-right riots". Supposedly rallies, but y'know. More are expected over the weekend. I will be staying indoors as much as possible, even though I did have plans to be Out And About at least a little this weekend. A nearby borough already had its bits of violence not all that long ago, and that was severely under-reported. If anyplace else in London is going to have some of that shit (because Whitehall, while it makes a statement, isn't a place where you'll find mosques or businesses run by non-white people the way, say, Clapham or Peckham or most of outer London), it'll be in that borough. Those who are now having to call themselves "anti-racists", since all of the other terms for "not an asshole" have been turned into insults, are planning counter-protests. So ... yeah. Riots.

The reason for this particular blog entry title is what our relatively new PM, Kier Starmer, wants to do about it. What he wants to do is expand the use of live facial recognition technology. Which, because we're not in the EU anymore and we left before the EU laws we had to write into our own human rights record could catch up with the technology, is a highly under-regulated technology. Hell, Starmer suggested this expanded use of facial recognition on the same day that the EU passed a law largely banning the use of facial recognition software.

Please understand that this is talking about shit like checking whether someone's on the Naughty List before they're allowed to so much as board a train, and phrases like, "where there are reasonable grounds to suspect that the individual depicted is about to cause an offense". Emphasis mine, because we already know that five people got arrested and sentenced to years in jail just for talking about a protest on fucking Zoom. Stuff like this could be used to go, say, "Well, this guy was under suspicion of planning a protest, and he wants to go to Liverpool; he shouldn't be allowed to go and cause trouble in Liverpool, so he is not allowed on the train".

Combine live facial recognition technology (which already struggles with identifying Black people) and the various recent bills that allow for much greater stop-and-search powers, and no legal restrictions on how this can be used? It's a fucking human rights nightmare. We've already got voter ID; apparently shit like this amounts to having a national ID scheme. Except instead of some jackboot-wearing asshole asking to see your papers, they'll just point a bodycam at you and let you hope to hell that it doesn't read your face wrong. Or right, honestly. We've thrown "innocent until proven guilty" out the fucking window because they don't even wait until you've done anything.

And this is the response to white supremacist assholes rioting, attacking mosques, and stabbing thirteen people at a dance class. "Let's implement a solution that will most negatively affect the people these white supremacist assholes are actually attacking! YAAAAAAY!"

Fuck this country. Fuck it right in the ear. And fuck Labour. Then again, the Tories would probably have been worse at this point. Though I wonder how the white supremacist assholes would have felt with Rishi Sunak, who is not exactly white, still being Prime Minister. Then again, they'd have preferred Farage, who is not quite encouraging violence this weekend but is saying that it's an inevitability and will only get worse. On Formerly-Twitter. It's the fascist asshole's tacit permission, and we all know it. Especially the people who will use it as such and throw a brick through some poor shopkeeper's window. Or worse.

This place scares me and I can't complain to my mother because she very much believes in "if you've got nothing to hide, you've got nothing to fear" and supports things like banning face coverings and the like Because Terrorism. Then again, she lost so many friends on 9/11 and I sometimes think that got to her in ways she hasn't really tried to explore in, say, therapy. Me? I believe until innocent until proven guilty, and too much of this doesn't really seem to care if you're guilty, and while it's being talked about in the context of alt-right riots, you know that's not how it'll be used long-term.

*whiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiine*

[vavuska]

I thought this one would be just another developer of mobile game that use The Sims 4 contents in its (fake) ads to fraud users by making people belive it is its game, when it has a completely different gameplay.

Unfortunately, Room Makover by FlyBird Casual Games is much more than this.

Room Makover has plenty of false ads. This time I actually tried the game, because the pictures and videos on Google Play were cute and I decided to give it a try.

I was so naive. Happens that the whole page on Google Play is full of fake contents.

It's just one of those mobile games in which you have to match and remove nails. Every time you pass a level, you will rewarded with bills that you can use to unlock part of a building under "makeover". You have just three option for every part of the building or the room to choose between.

There is nothing creative. Not actual building or cluttering rooms or decoring.

As, always, since I'm a curious little bitch, I decided to dig further into this FlyBird Casual Game and... Oh. God. Their site looks even less legit than LUCKY FORTUNE GAMES' one!

It is just a void page. There is nothing here. NOTHING. The only two working section are the privacy and conditions of use, in which they try to convince you that they didn't have any liability for damages or fraud committed.

The privacy one is curious, because mentions this Commissioner's Office in UK and a long list of partners. Both for ads and for data collection, which is hugely uncommon for this kind of games.

Sooooo... In this magical list of apps, I noticed a few tech nightmares, which I will explain briefly here:

Aarki is an AI company that builds advertising solutions to drive mobile revenue growth. Traslated from bullshit: they use AI to generate fake ads and sells it to shady corps.

Blind Ferret is the big deal here! Not only gave you digital marketing solutions, data collection and analytics, but also pays influencers and product placement on social media to promote the game and, hear me out, CREATE fake ads too! It's literally written in their site: "Our Creative Services don’t just make things look pretty. Our team uses data to guide us! How do we make brands shine? By turning the arts into a numbers game with top-performing creative content." This include: Graphic Design, Illustration, 2D Animation, Video Editing and Composition, Copywriting and conceptualizing.

InMobi is a big Corp that does native advertising, which means promoted contents, collabs with influencers, etc.

Ironsource. This one is a fucking cancer. IronSource Ltd. is an Israeli software company that focuses on developing technologies for app monetization and distribution, with its core production focused on the app economy. That would sound harmless, but Samsung use it in its budget and midrange smartphone to install multiple third-party apps during the set-up process. This platform slips bloatware on the pretext of recommended apps, leading to apps clutter and reduction in on-board storage space. The only purpose it exists on Samsung phones is to download games without your consent with no way to remove it (no app installed).

Mintegral is another fucking tech nightmare. Not only poses serious threats to your privacy and datas, but also uses malicious codes to spy your activity and when you seem intentioned to install a mobile app, Mintegral’s software would then fire off fake clicks on non-existent ads to claim credit for the install and essentially collect a bounty from app publishers who pay ad networks to promote their apps.

Mistplay is one of those "play to earn bucks" that I find very very dangerous. Because YOUR data are their revenue.

Tapjoy does monetization of ads and also surveys, that force users to download one from a long list of games, download it and playing for hours or since it is gained some in-game prize. This surveys are rewarded with credits and user can spend on the mobile game they actually want to play. Tapjoy has a huge market among IMVU users, who need credits to buy piece of clothing and accessories for their avi.

The other apps do mobile app marketing, using data collection that allow shady corps to target more gullable and naive people to scam. Plus they do also monetization surveys to earn money and at the same time forcefully grow the engagement of this shady corps.

Obviously, there is no user support mail listed in their Google Play page, but at least this has a contact mail listed on their website: flybirdgames2022@gmail.com

As always, stay safe and please tell me if you know more about everything above or know the person who create this build first.

Help people to stay safe.

Thank you.

<<< previous Coloring app uses design of The Sims 4 builds without the consent of the creators and other mobile developers steal TS4 speed build contents and claim it's the actual gameplay of their mobile game.

[ukrfeminism]

The “worst nightmares” about artificial intelligence-generated child sexual abuse images are coming true and threaten to overwhelm the internet, a safety watchdog has warned.

The Internet Watch Foundation (IWF) said it had found nearly 3,000 AI-made abuse images that broke UK law.

The UK-based organisation said existing images of real-life abuse victims were being built into AI models, which then produce new depictions of them.

It added that the technology was also being used to create images of celebrities who have been “de-aged” and then depicted as children in sexual abuse scenarios. Other examples of child sexual abuse material (CSAM) included using AI tools to “nudify” pictures of clothed children found online.

The IWF had warned in the summer that evidence of AI-made abuse was starting to emerge but said its latest report had shown an acceleration in use of the technology. Susie Hargreaves, the chief executive of the IWF, said the watchdog’s “worst nightmares have come true”.

“Earlier this year, we warned AI imagery could soon become indistinguishable from real pictures of children suffering sexual abuse, and that we could start to see this imagery proliferating in much greater numbers. We have now passed that point,” she said.

“Chillingly, we are seeing criminals deliberately training their AI on real victims’ images who have already suffered abuse. Children who have been raped in the past are now being incorporated into new scenarios because someone, somewhere, wants to see it.”

The IWF said it had also seen evidence of AI-generated images being sold online.

Its latest findings were based on a month-long investigation into a child abuse forum on the dark web, a section of the internet that can only be accessed with a specialist browser.

It investigated 11,108 images on the forum, with 2,978 of them breaking UK law by depicting child sexual abuse.

AI-generated CSAM is illegal under the Protection of Children Act 1978, which criminalises the taking, distribution and possession of an “indecent photograph or pseudo photograph” of a child. The IWF said the vast majority of the illegal material it had found was in breach of the Protection of Children Act, with more than one in five of those images classified as category A, the most serious kind of content, which can depict rape and sexual torture.

The Coroners and Justice Act 2009 also criminalises non-photographic prohibited images of a child, such as cartoons or drawings.

The IWF fears that a tide of AI-generated CSAM will distract law enforcement agencies from detecting real abuse and helping victims.

“If we don’t get a grip on this threat, this material threatens to overwhelm the internet,” said Hargreaves.

Dan Sexton, the chief technology officer at the IWF, said the image-generating tool Stable Diffusion – a publicly available AI model that can be adjusted to help produce CSAM – was the only AI product being discussed on the forum.

“We have seen discussions around the creation of content using Stable Diffusion, which is openly available software.”

Stability AI, the UK company behind Stable Diffusion, has said it “prohibits any misuse for illegal or immoral purposes across our platforms, and our policies are clear that this includes CSAM”.

The government has said AI-generated CSAM will be covered by the online safety bill, due to become law imminently, and that social media companies would be required to prevent it from appearing on their platforms.

[indiesellersguild]

December 2023 Newsletter – Year in Review

Here is our December Newsletter!

Main event:

As we end 2023, we wanted to take a moment to reflect on our victories for the year. Truly, it has been an incredible ride, with far more success than we could have hoped for.

The rest of the text is under the cut; relevant links are embedded in the text on our website.

Lobbying with the US Senate: We worked with Senator Baldwin’s office to help the COOL Online Act (a bill to crack down on dishonest resellers) pass committee. Read our analysis of the bill here.

Fighting Etsy’s Reserve Payment Policy: Our work, combined with the heroic efforts of UK sellers and the media, pressured Etsy to reduce or lift their devastating payment reserve policy for many sellers. Samantha Vass, a prominent UK seller who spoke out, had her Etsy shop suspended, learn more and support her business here.

Feedback to the FTC: An US Federal Trade Commission lawyer reached out to us for feedback on a new FTC rule against unfair and deceptive business practices around online platform fees. Learn more here.

Presentation to UK Small Business Commissioner: We were able to discuss the issue of online platforms messing with indie sellers’ money in a series of meetings with UK Small Business Commissioner Liz Barclay. Watch a video of the presentation here.

Marketplace Research Project: We had over 1,000 participants in our research survey on what creative indie sellers and their customers want from an online marketplace. Read more about how we will use that data to hold marketplaces accountable here.

In the works:

The first annual ISG virtual convention will be April 13-14, 2024!

We will launch our Marketplace Accreditation Program, unveil our new membership site, and discuss how we can continue to fight the exploitation of creative indie sellers by big tech platforms.

Panels will include:

What to do if you get screwed by a tech platform. – with Katharine from the Electronic Frontier Foundation

Etsy Alternatives: Data and tools to help you find the best marketplaces for your business

How to use your Etsy shop to direct traffic to your own site (without breaking Etsy’s rules) – with Kristi Cassidy, ISG President

Results from our Marketplace Research Project: What do sellers and customers really want from an online marketplace – with Samantha Close, Ph.D.

Interview with Racheal from Mayfli marketplace in the UK

Interview with Jon from goimagine marketplace in the US

Get your ticket now to reserve your spot! Tickets only cost $1 to help cover the costs of the convention.

Share your story!

The FTC is seeking public comment on their proposed “Rule on Unfair or Deceptive Fees”. After our meeting with the FTC, we are excited about the rule because it will also protect creative indie sellers from unfair and deceptive fees from marketplaces. If the rule goes through, we hope to use it to combat Etsy’s forced off-site ads and other unfair practices.

Please take a moment to share your thoughts in a public comment, we want to make sure the perspective of creative indie sellers is represented!

We heard you:

We know that the seller member directory, and members-only parts of the website in general are a bit difficult to navigate. One of our first goals in 2024 is to update our membership with new software and far more features. Stay tuned for information on how to set up your profile on the new site!

What ISG needs right now:

While we’ve managed some amazing things with a very small budget, thanks to our amazing volunteers and open source software, we need more funding for 2024 to continue to grow and advocate on your behalf.

Please consider making a small donation to the Indie Sellers Guild. If half of our members donate just $5, we will raise enough funding for the next 6 months. Or you can buy one of our awesome merch items so you can represent the Guild and show off the work of your fellow artists. The Guild receives $5 from every merch purchase.

Thanks so much for your support!

[mostlysignssomeportents]

This day in history

I'm on tour with my new novel The Bezzle! Catch me TONIGHT in SALT LAKE CITY (Feb 21, Weller Book Works) and TOMORROW in SAN DIEGO (Feb 22, Mysterious Galaxy). After that, it's LA, Seattle, Portland, Phoenix and more!

#15yrsago Parent of gamer asks his son to honor the Geneva Conventions https://memex.craphound.com/2009/02/21/parent-of-gamer-asks-his-son-to-honor-the-geneva-conventions/

#15yrsago UAE plans ban on negative economic reporting https://www.nytimes.com/2009/02/12/world/middleeast/12dubai.html

#15yrsago UK’s top snoop gets finked out by her neighbours https://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2009/feb/22/jacqui-smith-expenses-inquiry

#15yrsago Stimulus bill requires RSS feeds of how the money is spent http://www.aaronsw.com/weblog/rssstimulus

#10yrsago Conservative western bloggers: Ukraine strongman’s pay-for-play useful idiots https://www.buzzfeednews.com/article/rosiegray/exclusive-how-ukraine-wooed-conservative-websites

#10yrsago I am a Ukrainian: powerful, viral video about Euromaidan https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Hvds2AIiWLA

#10yrsago Kansas lawmaker introduces bill to permit teachers to hit children hard enough to bruise https://slate.com/human-interest/2014/02/kansas-spanking-bill-new-legislation-allows-parents-and-teachers-to-hit-kids-harder.html

#10yrsago Canadian court rules on copyright trolls: letters can go ahead, under strict supervision https://www.michaelgeist.ca/2015/03/defending-privacy-doesnt-pay-federal-court-issues-ruling-in-voltage-teksavvy-costs/

#10yrsago Mall cops freak out over steampunk meetup, call the real cops https://www.kpbs.org/news/2014/feb/19/steampunk-carousel-outing-cut-short-security-guard/

#10yrsago Openknit: a Reprap-inspired open source knitting machine http://openknit.org

#5yrsago Beyond “more copyright”: how do we improve artists’ lives and livelihoods through policy? https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0294Y6Lv3Eo

#5yrsago Iowa’s electricity monopolist Midamerican Energy has written a bill to let it “monopolize the sun” https://www.bleedingheartland.com/2019/02/20/new-bill-is-clear-attempt-by-midamerican-to-monopolize-the-sun-in-iowa/

#5yrsago Tucker Carlson thought anti-elite historian would be an easy interview, but ended up telling him “go fuck yourself” https://www.theguardian.com/society/2019/feb/20/historian-who-confronted-davos-billionaires-leaks-tucker-carlson-rant

#5yrsago As sports company abandons support for “smart” basketball, Nike pushes a software update that bricks its self-tying shoes https://mashable.com/article/nike-app-connected-shoe-bricked#duGbFcvYdsqa

#5yrsago The TRUE Fees Act: legislative proposal to force cable/ISP companies to advertise the true cost of their services, inclusive of surcharges https://www.vice.com/en/article/j57ddb/new-bill-would-stop-internet-service-providers-from-screwing-you-with-hidden-fees

#1yrago Matt Ruff's "Destroyer of Worlds" https://pluralistic.net/2023/02/21/the-horror-of-white-magic/#anti-lovecraftian

[chocolateandsilver]

The Restrict Act 2023

About the Restrict Act

There’s a lot of information/misinformation I’ve been seeing about the Restrict Act. I’ve stared at the damn bill for around thirty hours at this point, so I thought I’d give people a summary of what it’s actually doing as well as what it isn’t doing, to help you avoid misinformation.

Buckle in, folks, because this is going to be a long post. I know Tumblr is allergic to nuance, but hopefully you’ll be able to see both the good and the bad in this bill by the time I’m done, and be able to understand what’s actually going on. If you just want to see problems with the act, the last section is devoted to that.

tl;dr good in spirit because of the rising rate of infrastructure cyberattacks, but the letter of the law could use a little work to make sure that the government can't overstep

Why the Restrict Act?

Let’s start with the why. Why does the US government feel like this Act is necessary? The stated purpose is: “To authorize the Secretary of Commerce to review and prohibit certain transactions between persons in the United States and foreign adversaries, and for other purposes.” Which is a bunch of legalese, so I’ll give you some examples of things that are happening in the real world which the government wants more authority to look into.

The author of the bill, Sen. Warner, specifically cited Huawei and Kapersky as companies that were doing Suspicious Things, so we’ll look at those first.

Huawei: Huawei is a telecommunications company. The US, Australia, Canada, Sweden, UK, Lithuania, and Estonia have all taken various actions against Huawei over the last decade or so. In 2012, a malicious software update was installed on Huawei devices in Australia, attacking Australia’s telecommunications network. In 2021, a Washington Post review suggested that Huawei was involved in mass surveillance programs. In 2014, a Huawei engineer was caught hacking a cell phone tower in India

Kapersky: The UK, Lithuania, the Netherlands, the EU, Germany, and Italy have all taken action against Kapersky. This company produces antivirus software, and was accused of working on secret projects with Russia’s Federal Security Service, especially in the wake of Russian interference in the 2016 election. Allegedly, the company used the popular antivirus software to secretly scan for classified documents and other information, and allegedly stole NSA information.

In addition to these two companies, there have been tons of cyberattacks worldwide.

Half of the United States’ fuel supply was compromised due to a hack on Colonial Pipeline, shutting down fuel for some areas in the American southeast for days

A hacking group disrupted Iranian steel factories and even started a fire

Costa Rica had to declare a national emergency after government systems were hit, including systems for exports, pensions, taxes, welfare, and even Covid-19 testing.

A ransomware attack caused a major outage to emergency health services in the UK

The stated purpose of this act is to give the USA some kind of formal process to make decisions when something like this is suspected of happening, and when it’s caused by a “foreign adversary.”

What’s a foreign adversary?

A foreign adversary is a country that has engaged in a “long-term pattern or serious instances of conduct significantly adverse to the national security of the United States or security and safety of United States persons.”

The bill kindly provides us with a list of six countries that fit this description: China(including Hong Kong), Cuba, Iran, Korea, Russia, and Venezuela

The Secretary of Commerce can add/remove countries to this list at any time, as long as Congress is informed within 15 days of the reasoning behind that decision.

Once Congress is informed, Congress can disagree via joint resolution (So both Houses have to vote to disagree with the Secretary of Commerce’s decision). If Congress disagrees, there’s a whole complicated process for getting the label added/removed.

We’ll get into the ethics later, in the Genuine Problems section.

For the rest of this post, I’ll be saying Scary Countries instead of foreign adversaries, so that it’s easier for people to understand.

What is the United States allowed to investigate using this Act?

So first we’re going to define some things, because the Act is very specific about what the United States can investigate.

The bill defines something called a “covered transaction,” which is basically a financial or technological action taken by a Scary Country or on behalf of a Scary Country. For the rest of this post, I’ll be saying Scary Action instead of covered transaction.

The bill also defines something called a “covered holding,” which is essentially any group that is partially or fully owned by a Scary Country, on behalf of a Scary Country, or that falls under a Scary Country’s jurisdiction, even with degrees of separation. The group has to affect either 1+ million Americans or has to have sold 1+ million units of a tech product to Americans. This group is usually a company, but it can be other things, too. For the rest of this post, I’ll be saying Scary & Important Group instead of covered holding.

The Secretary of Commerce is allowed to find/investigate/stop any Scary Action or Scary & Important Group that wants to do one of the following:

sabotage information and communications tech in the US

damage critical infrastructure or the digital economy of the US

interfere with a Federal election

undermine democratic processes

Pose any other unacceptable risk to the USA.

This is a list of Really Bad Things, so from now on I’m going to call it the List of Really Bad Things.

If it’s a Scary & Important Group instead of a Scary Action, the Secretary will refer the information to the President, who will then decide what to do to stop the threat. Otherwise, if it’s just a Scary Action, the Secretary has the authority to stop it.

If the Secretary finds out that something Scary is going on and that it falls under the List of Really Bad Things, the Secretary is REQUIRED to publish information in a DECLASSIFIED form about why they thought there was a threat and what was done to stop it, as long as none of the information is already classified. (This is a good thing!)

Process

First, the Secretary is given authority to find and investigate Scary Actions and Scary & Important Groups. The Secretary is also allowed to delegate this to Federal officials. Something key here is that the bill says that Federal officials can only have investigative powers that are “conferred upon them by any other Federal law.” They don’t get any extra powers. Anyone who tells you otherwise is panicking too hard to properly read the bill.

So what happens if, in the course of investigation, the Secretary finds out that a Scary Action or Scary & Important Group is trying to do a Really Bad Thing? Simple. The Attorney General will bring the case to an “appropriate district court.” The max fine for a civil penalty for an individual here is $250,000. For a criminal penalty for an individual, the max fine is $1 million and/or 20 years in prison, as well as giving up any of the things they used to do Really Bad Stuff with.

If someone is found guilty, they can appeal that decision, but only to the District of Columbia Circuit. Note that this is only for appeals! Otherwise, everything will be through the normal federal district courts.

If the appeal fails, too, the US will file all of the information that they used to make any big decisions with the court, and will give the defendant all of the information that is not classified, so that the defendant can ask for a full review.

Once the United States has stopped a Scary Action or a Scary & Important Group from doing Really Bad Things, it’s illegal to go around/against any of the actions that US has taken to do that.

Specifically, the bill says that “no person may cause or aid, abet, counsel, command, induce, procure, permit, or approve the doing of any act prohibited by, or the omission of any act required by any regulation, order, direction, mitigation measure, prohibition, or other authorization or directive issued under, this Act.”

Yes, this is legitimately scary. We’ll get into the ethics later, in the Genuine Problems section.

Myths

The bill gives the USA power to ban VPNs!

No. Unless the VPN company is trying to do one of the Really Bad Things under the instruction of a Scary Country or is suspected of doing one of the Really Bad Things, the VPN company will be fine.

The bill gives the USA power to investigate way more than they could before!

No. “In conducting investigations described in paragraph (1), designated officers or employees of Federal agencies described that paragraph may, to the extent necessary or appropriate to enforce this Act, exercise such authority as is conferred upon them by any other Federal law, subject to policies and procedures approved by the Attorney General” (emphasis mine).

Important here is “exercise such authority as is conferred upon them by any other Federal law” — this act is not giving them additional leeway. Really, the USA is making use of the lack of privacy that’s already baked into law in order to investigate.

If TikTok is banned and I use a VPN to access it, I could go to jail for 20 years!

Possible but severely unlikely, at least according to this law. Let’s go through some scenarios:

Scenario 1: The USA takes TikTok to court. In the decision, the USA says the TikTok app is no longer allowed to be on any app store. In this case, using a VPN to access TikTok would still be allowed, since the ban is for TikTok’s actions, not US citizens’ actions.

Scenario 2: The USA takes TikTok to court. In the decision, the USA says that TikTok is required to have some kind of filter banning US IP addresses. In this case, using a VPN to access TikTok would still be allowed, since the ban is for TikTok’s actions, not US citizens’ actions.

Scenario 3: The USA enacts a law forbidding citizens from accessing TikTok. This is unlikely, since the USA would have to have an entirely separate non-court procedure to do this, which is only kind of in the scope of the law. I guess it’s possible, but it’s skating on thin ice. In this case, using a VPN to access TikTok would be a crime. 4. If you’re charged, you have to go to the DC Circuit Court and not any of the other courts!

Actually, you’d first be charged under an ordinary district court in your state. If you decide to appeal, however, then you have to appeal to DC.

Genuine Problems

Adding a Scary Country to the list seems really easy. There’s nothing to stop the government from adding every single country to the list and then investigating every single action. Granted, it’s highly unlikely that this would happen, simply because then the amount of information would be difficult to go through, but it’s possible.

In the list of Really Bad Things, there’s an additional list item saying “otherwise poses an undue or unacceptable risk to the national security of the United States or the safety of United States persons.” Who determines that?

The definition of a Scary Action is ridiculously broad. It covers any financial or technology-related action. That could refer to a lot of different things.

While the bill is clearly intended only to prosecute people doing Really Bad Things, the wording is kind of vague in some places, and could be used to prosecute others, too.

Specifically, I’m thinking about this clause:

“no person may cause or aid, abet, counsel, command, induce, procure, permit, or approve the doing of any act prohibited by, or the omission of any act required by any regulation, order, direction, mitigation measure, prohibition, or other authorization or directive issued under, this Act”

Yeah this could definitely be used for overreach. It’s far too broad. If there was an infrastructure attack on the USA that affected the police dept, and an ACAB armchair activist tweeted “haha karma” would that count as grounds for prosecution? I have a genuine problem with this clause. The loopholes here are ridiculously large.

Overall, it seems as though this bill is aimed at large companies rather than citizens, but there are definitely loopholes for the government to exploit.

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[alianoralacanta]

Also, it is likely to cost more money to digitise the project than to retain the analogue documents, given how many of them must exist. If it's a million documents (very plausible, considering that the time period under discussion is 165 years and that every year, 1 kilometre of shelving is required at the National Archives to preserve the documents generated). Each year of storage under the current system only adds £27,273 to the storage bill. This is less than the salary of a single IT specialist (in any but the most junior of positions), let alone the cost of continually replacing hardware, software and re-digitisation. To put this into perspective, getting a copy of an already-digitised document from the National Archives in colour is 20 p - despite a law that only allows the National Archives to charge the cost of storing and provisioning that copy. Thus, even if ignoring the one-off cost of digitising the content in the first place, it would only take 136,364 documents to exist per year, for it to be cheaper to preserve only the analogue documents than to preserve only the digital ones. Everyone must have at least 2 affected documents over the course of their lifetime (birth and death). Some will have many more. If we estimate that the average person will have 3 documents relating to this decision*, and that the average British person lives to 75 (only just true now, and definitely optimistic for the 1850s when the collection began), a population of 3,498,101 would suffice to economically justify a preference for analogue rather than digital preservation (assuming economy is the goal, given that no part of the proposed argument suggests removing anything from the archive altogether). * - Among other items, wills, marriages, divorces and individual pieces of evidence relating to probate cases are classed as separate documents. There will be more than a few "Probate Georges", who generated 100+ documents each in their lives, skewing the average document count upwards and making up for the infants who died before they could get married or have independent means to argue over in a probate court. The UK has not been estimated to have had a population below 3,498,101 since the Wars of the Roses in the 15th Century. The wars ended in 1485, which is 373 years before the record collection under discussion began. Even the primary argument advanced in favour of the UK government's idea does not work.

I find it interesting that a key component of the argument - how many documents are involved - was not advanced. Even as an estimate. This leaves me wondering if the UK Government also suspects that the economic argument may not be as well-founded as is being suggested. HTMCS has also received criticism for how much slower it is than the previous system, contrary to the UK Government's assertions, as well as reducing the quality of decisions because it is more difficult to forensically examine documents. A system that is not universally considered fit for purpose for current purposes probably isn't universally fit for purpose for archival either. The current system, where the documents are digitised according to demand (and charged such that the cost of digitisation is paid for on the first occasion in most circumstances - the charge can be waived occasionally) is much better from an economic standpoint, let alone an archival one.

You're a reasonably informed person on the internet. You've experienced things like no longer being able to get files off an old storage device, media you've downloaded suddenly going poof, sites and forums with troves full of people's thoughts and ideas vanishing forever. You've heard of cybercrime. You've read articles about lost media. You have at least a basic understanding that digital data is vulnerable, is what I'm saying. I'm guessing that you're also aware that history is, you know... important? And that it's an ongoing study, requiring ... data about how people live? And that it's not just about stanning celebrities that happen to be dead? Congratulations, you are significantly better-informed than the British government! So they're currently like "Oh hai can we destroy all these historical documents pls? To save money? Because we'll digitise them first so it's fine! That'll be easy, cheap and reliable -- right? These wills from the 1850s will totally be fine for another 170 years as a PNG or whatever, yeah? We didn't need to do an impact assesment about this because it's clearly win-win! We'd keep the physical wills of Famous People™ though because Famous People™ actually matter, unlike you plebs. We don't think there are any equalities implications about this, either! Also the only examples of Famous People™ we can think of are all white and rich, only one is a woman and she got famous because of the guy she married. Kisses!"

Yes, this is the same Government that's like "Oh no removing a statue of slave trader is erasing history :(" You have, however, until 23 February 2024 to politely inquire of them what the fuck they are smoking. And they will have to publish a summary of the responses they receive. And it will look kind of bad if the feedback is well-argued, informative and overwhelmingly negative and they go ahead and do it anyway. I currently edit documents including responses to consultations like (but significantly less insane) than this one. Responses do actually matter. I would particularly encourage British people/people based in the UK to do this, but as far as I can see it doesn't say you have to be either. If you are, say, a historian or an archivist, or someone who specialises in digital data do say so and draw on your expertise in your answers. This isn't a question of filling out a form. You have to manually compose an email answering the 12 questions in the consultation paper at the link above. I'll put my own answers under the fold. Note -- I never know if I'm being too rude in these sorts of things. You probably shouldn't be ruder than I have been.

Please do not copy and paste any of this: that would defeat the purpose. This isn't a petition, they need to see a range of individual responses. But it may give you a jumping-off point.

Question 1: Should the current law providing for the inspection of wills be preserved?

Yes. Our ability to understand our shared past is a fundamental aspect of our heritage. It is not possible for any authority to know in advance what future insights they are supporting or impeding by their treatment of material evidence. Safeguarding the historical record for future generations should be considered an extremely important duty.

Question 2: Are there any reforms you would suggest to the current law enabling wills to be inspected?

No.

Question 3: Are there any reasons why the High Court should store original paper will documents on a permanent basis, as opposed to just retaining a digitised copy of that material?

Yes. I am amazed that the recent cyber attack on the British Library, which has effectively paralysed it completely, not been sufficient to answer this question for you.  I also refer you to the fate of the Domesday Project. Digital storage is useful and can help more people access information; however, it is also inherently fragile. Malice, accident, or eventual inevitable obsolescence not merely might occur, but absolutely should be expected. It is ludicrously naive and reflects a truly unpardonable ignorance to assume that information preserved only in digital form is somehow inviolable and safe, or that a physical document once digitised, never need be digitised again..At absolute minimum, it should be understood as certain that at least some of any digital-only archive will eventually be permanently lost. It is not remotely implausible that all of it would be. Preserving the physical documents provides a crucial failsafe. It also allows any errors in reproduction -- also inevitable-- to be, eventually, seen and corrected. Note that maintaining, upgrading and replacing digital infrastructure is not free, easy or reliable. Over the long term, risks to the data concerned can only accumulate.

"Unlike the methods for preserving analog documents that have been honed over millennia, there is no deep precedence to look to regarding the management of digital records. As such, the processing, long-term storage, and distribution potential of archival digital data are highly unresolved issues. [..] the more digital data is migrated, translated, and re-compressed into new formats, the more room there is for information to be lost, be it at the microbit-level of preservation. Any failure to contend with the instability of digital storage mediums, hardware obsolescence, and software obsolescence thus meets a terminal end—the definitive loss of information. The common belief that digital data is safe so long as it is backed up according to the 3-2-1 rule (3 copies on 2 different formats with 1 copy saved off site) belies the fact that it is fundamentally unclear how long digital information can or will remain intact. What is certain is that its unique vulnerabilities do become more pertinent with age."  -- James Boyda, On Loss in the 21st Century: Digital Decay and the Archive, Introduction.

Question 4: Do you agree that after a certain time original paper documents (from 1858 onwards) may be destroyed (other than for famous individuals)? Are there any alternatives, involving the public or private sector, you can suggest to their being destroyed?

Absolutely not. And I would have hoped we were past the "great man" theory of history. Firstly, you do not know which figures will still be considered "famous" in the future and which currently obscure individuals may deserve and eventually receive greater attention. I note that of the three figures you mention here as notable enough to have their wills preserved, all are white, the majority are male (the one woman having achieved fame through marriage) and all were wealthy at the time of their death. Any such approach will certainly cull evidence of the lives of women, people of colour and the poor from the historical record, and send a clear message about whose lives you consider worth remembering.

Secondly, the famous and successsful are only a small part of our history. Understanding the realities that shaped our past and continue to mould our present requires evidence of the lives of so-called "ordinary people"!

Did you even speak to any historians before coming up with this idea?

Entrusting the documents to the private sector would be similarly disastrous. What happens when a private company goes bust or decides that preserving this material is no longer profitable? What reasonable person, confronted with our crumbling privatised water infrastructure, would willingly consign any part of our heritage to a similar fate?

Question 5: Do you agree that there is equivalence between paper and digital copies of wills so that the ECA 2000 can be used?

No. And it raises serious questions about the skill and knowledge base within HMCTS and the government that the very basic concepts of data loss and the digital dark age appear to be unknown to you. I also refer you to the Domesday Project.

Question 6: Are there any other matters directly related to the retention of digital or paper wills that are not covered by the proposed exercise of the powers in the ECA 2000 that you consider are necessary?

Destroying the physical documents will always be an unforgivable dereliction of legal and moral duty.

Question 7: If the Government pursues preserving permanently only a digital copy of a will document, should it seek to reform the primary legislation by introducing a Bill or do so under the ECA 2000?

Destroying the physical documents will always be an unforgivable dereliction of legal and moral duty.

Question 8: If the Government moves to digital only copies of original will documents, what do you think the retention period for the original paper wills should be? Please give reasons and state what you believe the minimum retention period should be and whether you consider the Government’s suggestion of 25 years to be reasonable.

There is no good version of this plan. The physical documents should be preserved.

Question 9: Do you agree with the principle that wills of famous people should be preserved in the original paper form for historic interest?

This question betrays deep ignorance of what "historic interest" actually is. The study of history is not simply glorified celebrity gossip. If anything, the physical wills of currently famous people could be considered more expendable as it is likely that their contents are so widely diffused as to be relatively "safe", whereas the wills of so-called "ordinary people" will, especially in aggregate, provide insights that have not yet been explored.

Question 10: Do you have any initial suggestions on the criteria which should be adopted for identifying famous/historic figures whose original paper will document should be preserved permanently?

Abandon this entire lamentable plan. As previously discussed, you do not and cannot know who will be considered "famous" in the future, and fame is a profoundly flawed criterion of historical significance.

Question 11: Do you agree that the Probate Registries should only permanently retain wills and codicils from the documents submitted in support of a probate application? Please explain, if setting out the case for retention of any other documents.

No, all the documents should be preserved indefinitely.

Question 12: Do you agree that we have correctly identified the range and extent of the equalities impacts under each of these proposals set out in this consultation? Please give reasons and supply evidence of further equalities impacts as appropriate.

No. You appear to have neglected equalities impacts entirely. As discussed, in your drive to prioritise "famous people", your plan will certainly prioritise the white, wealthy and mostly the male, as your "Charles Dickens, Charles Darwin and Princess Diana" examples amply indicate. This plan will create a two-tier system where evidence of the lives of the privileged is carefully preserved while information regarding people of colour, women, the working class and other disadvantaged groups is disproportionately abandoned to digital decay and eventual loss. Current and future historians from, or specialising in the history of minority groups will be especially impoverished by this.  

[swldx]

BBC 0509 30 Nov 2024

9410Khz 0457 30 NOV 2024 - BBC (UNITED KINGDOM) in ENGLISH from ASCENSION ISLAND. SINPO = 45333. English, s/on @0458z with Bowbells int. fb ID, pips and Newsroom preview. @0501z World News anchored by Chris Berrow. § Rebel forces in Syria have taken control of "half" of the country's second-largest city, Aleppo, according to the UK-based monitoring group Syrian Observatory for Human Rights (SOHR). SOHR said 277 people - including more than 20 civilians - have been killed since the offensive started on Wednesday. The offensive is the largest against the Syrian government in years and the first time rebels fighting the forces of President Bashar al-Assad have reached Aleppo since being forced out by the army in 2016. Aleppo's airport and all roads leading into the city have been closed, military sources told Reuters news agency. § Thousands of protesters have returned to the streets of Tbilisi, Georgia to protest against the government's decision to suspend accession talks with the European Union. On Friday demonstrators were seen shouting "traitors" and holding photographs of journalists who they say were beaten by police in the previous night's protests. For the second night running, police deployed tear gas and made heavy use of water cannon against the demonstrators. The European Parliament also urged sanctions against Georgia's prime minister and other high-level officials including the billionaire founder of the governing "Georgian Dream" party Bidzina Ivanishvili. § President Volodymyr Zelensky has suggested that the parts of Ukraine under his control should be taken "under the Nato umbrella" to try and stop the "hot phase" of the war. Zelensky said he would accept membership, but only if Nato membership was offered to the whole of Ukraine, within its internationally recognised borders, first. Ukraine could then attempt to negotiate the return of territory currently under Russian control "in a diplomatic way", he said. But the suggestion is highly theoretical. As Zelensky pointed out, no-one has yet made such an offer. § Prime Minister Justin Trudeau is in Florida to meet Donald Trump as Canada seeks to head off the president-elect's threat to impose a 25% tariff on Canadian goods. The Florida visit is the latest move by Canada as it seeks to avoid the hefty tariffs, which could have wide-reaching economic impacts. It remains unclear whether the incoming Trump administration will actually move ahead with the threatened tariffs, as analysts note that the president-elect has been known to use such threats in the past as a negotiating tactic to achieve his goals. § An explosion on Friday evening damaged a canal in northern Kosovo supplying water to two coal-fired power plants that generate nearly all of the country's electricity, Prime Minister Albin Kurti said, blaming what he called "a terrorist act" by neighbouring Serbia. § After five hours of debate in the House of Commons on Friday, the vote concluded with 330 MPs supporting the bill and 275 opposing it. Under the proposed bill, individuals aged 18 or older in England and Wales, diagnosed with a terminal illness expected to result in death within six months, would be eligible to request assistance to end their own life. They must demonstrate the mental capacity to make an informed, voluntary decision. § An exit poll in the Republic of Ireland suggests that Sinn Féin has 21.1% of first preference votes with Fine Gael having 21%, making the result of the general election too close to call. § A coalition of Canada's biggest news outlets is suing OpenAI, the maker of artificial intelligence chatbot ChatGPT, alleging the company is illegally using news articles to train its software. @0506z “The Newsroom” begins. 100' (30m) of Kev-Flex wire feeding "Magic Wand" antenna hanging in backyard tree w/MFJ-1020C active antenna (used as a preamplifier/preselector), JRC NRD-535D, 125kW, beamAz 27°, bearing 103°. Received at Plymouth, MN, United States, 9763KM from transmitter at Ascension Island. Local time: 2257.

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We're a global specialist across sectors such as infrastructure, technology, resources and energy innovations Lake Macquarie. Our people share their ideas, analysis and capabilities.

Allambi Care and Lake Macquarie Council have partnered up to power-up their operations using solar panels. They're one of a number of local organisations joining Council in the Cities Power Partnership, which has more than 170 members.

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The rollout of smart meters gives customers real-time access to their energy data, empowering them to make choices and changes that reduce their electricity consumption and bills. This is an essential enabler of more efficient energy networks, helping the UK meet its carbon targets2.

Smart meters are connected to a national communications network from the outset, making them compatible with all energy suppliers from day one. However, many early-generation meters were installed with the energy supplier’s own communication systems, which means customers will lose some smart functionality if they switch provider.

Deployment constitutes a significant component of the overall cost of a smart transformation program. A dedicated deployment operations capability is essential to define a clear and appropriate deployment strategy that aligns to the achievement of strategic objectives. This enables the identification and rectification of bottlenecks, continuous improvement through customer feedback and the implementation of innovative solutions to improve deployment efficiency. Ultimately, this leads to the delivery of quality outcomes for the program.

3. Energy Efficiency

Energy innovations drive global sustainability goals, including reducing greenhouse gas emissions and enabling the transition to renewable and sustainable energy. Leading forms of green energy innovation include advancements in solar photovoltaic technology, improved battery storage capabilities and smart grids.

A local not for profit community organisation has joined forces with Lake Macquarie City Council and Pingala, a member-owned solar cooperative, to bring the Hunter region’s first community-funded renewable energy project to life. The Allambi Care solar project allows the community to fund a solar system at the organisation’s Charlestown headquarters, with returns of 5 to 8 per cent p.a.

The community-funded project will help Allambi Care save on electricity costs and reduce its environmental footprint by generating its own clean energy through a rooftop solar panel installation in Lake Macquarie and Newcastle. The system will be connected to Ausgrid’s electricity network and provide an onsite, renewable energy source that will be used to offset the City’s remaining carbon emissions from other sources.

4. Energy Storage

The cost of solar and energy storage is falling fast. In China, the world’s biggest power market, there are plans to double ESS capacity over the next five years.

Lake Macquarie City Council is an early adopter of onsite generation with 15 of its buildings now having solar power installed. This enables the business to save on electricity costs and reduce its impact on the environment.

In partnership with Allambi Care, the City is launching its first community-funded renewable energy project – Pingala. It invites local community members to invest in solar power for Allambi Care and receive a return on their investment of between 5 and 8 per cent a year.

Eku Energy, a Macquarie Asset Management portfolio company, develops, builds and actively manages energy storage assets to enable reliable, clean electricity supplies. The team uses a combination of local partnerships and a data-driven understanding of global financial and energy markets to find the right investment solutions for its projects.

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Address Verification API

In today’s digital and globalized world, businesses across industries are increasingly reliant on accurate customer data to provide high-quality service and support. One essential component of this data is address information. Whether for shipping goods, billing, or managing customer records, having precise address data is critical. Errors in address data can lead to undelivered packages, additional costs, poor customer experience, and lost business opportunities. To combat these issues, many organizations are turning to Address Verification APIs—tools designed to validate, standardize, and correct address data in real-time.

This article will cover the basics of an Address Verification API, how it works, why it’s essential for modern businesses, and the key benefits and best practices for implementing it.

1. What is an Address Verification API?

An Address Verification API is a software tool that integrates with other applications to validate, verify, and correct address information in real-time or batch processes. These APIs check addresses against official postal databases, such as those provided by the United States Postal Service (USPS), Royal Mail in the UK, Canada Post, and other postal authorities worldwide. By doing so, they ensure that addresses entered by users are complete, accurate, and deliverable.

Address Verification APIs can perform several functions:

Standardizing addresses: Formatting addresses to comply with local postal standards.

Correcting errors: Fixing typos, missing components, or incorrect zip codes.

Geocoding: Assigning latitude and longitude coordinates to an address for mapping and analysis.

Batch processing: Verifying large address datasets in one go.

By integrating these capabilities, Address Verification APIs help companies maintain clean and accurate address data, reducing errors and improving service efficiency.

2. How Does an Address Verification API Work?

An Address Verification API functions as a bridge between a business’s application (like a CRM, checkout form, or shipping platform) and official postal databases. Here’s a general process of how it works:

Data Entry: A customer or user enters an address into an online form or database.

Request to API: The entered address is sent as a request to the Address Verification API, which processes the data in real-time.

Data Matching: The API compares the provided address against authoritative postal data. This may involve matching street names, zip codes, city names, and more.

Validation and Correction: The API identifies errors or omissions in the address data and either suggests corrections or applies them automatically.

Response: The corrected, standardized address is returned to the original application and updated in the system.

In some cases, the API can display suggestions in real-time (as the user types), providing autofill options for faster and more accurate data entry.

3. Why is Address Verification Important?

Accurate address data is essential for several reasons:

Delivery Accuracy: Address errors can lead to missed or delayed deliveries, which frustrates customers and increases costs.

Reduced Shipping Costs: Accurate addresses help avoid additional fees associated with redelivery or address correction by courier services.

Improved Customer Experience: Verified addresses reduce delivery issues, creating a seamless experience for customers and enhancing satisfaction.

Compliance and Regulatory Requirements: Many industries are required to maintain accurate customer records, and address verification helps ensure compliance with data accuracy regulations.

Fraud Prevention: Address verification helps identify potential fraud by verifying the legitimacy of an address, especially in e-commerce.

4. Benefits of Using an Address Verification API

Address Verification APIs bring numerous advantages to businesses that rely on accurate address data for their operations. Here are some key benefits:

a. Enhanced Data Accuracy

Address Verification APIs validate data at the point of entry, reducing the chance of human error and ensuring accurate records. This ensures that packages reach the correct locations, improving delivery success rates and customer satisfaction.

b. Cost Savings

Incorrect addresses can lead to redelivery fees, return-to-sender costs, and wasted time. By verifying addresses upfront, businesses can avoid these additional expenses and streamline their logistics and shipping processes.

c. Faster Data Entry

Many Address Verification APIs offer autofill or suggestion features, allowing users to select from verified options as they type. This speeds up the data entry process, reduces errors, and improves the user experience during checkout or form submission.

d. International Reach

Global Address Verification APIs can verify addresses across multiple countries and regions, making it easier for businesses to expand internationally. They standardize addresses according to each country’s postal guidelines, ensuring that international shipments are formatted correctly and reach their destinations without issues.

e. Fraud Detection

Address Verification APIs help detect potential fraud by ensuring that the provided address is real and deliverable. In e-commerce, this is particularly useful in preventing fraudulent transactions associated with fake or undeliverable addresses.

f. Data Consistency and Compliance

Maintaining consistent and compliant address data across different platforms and departments is crucial for data quality. Address Verification APIs ensure that all address data is standardized and compliant with postal regulations, reducing discrepancies in the system.

5. Best Practices for Implementing an Address Verification API

To maximize the effectiveness of an Address Verification API, businesses should follow certain best practices:

a. Choose the Right API Provider

Select a provider that offers comprehensive coverage, particularly if you need global address verification. Providers like Google Maps, SmartyStreets, and PostGrid offer reliable address verification services with varying features. Evaluate the API’s data sources, accuracy, and frequency of updates before integrating.

b. Integrate in Real-Time for User-Friendly Data Entry

Real-time verification offers a seamless user experience. Implementing real-time suggestions and corrections can help users enter valid addresses at the point of entry, minimizing errors and enhancing efficiency.

c. Use Autofill and Suggestions

Enable autofill or suggestion features to help users select their address as they type. This not only improves accuracy but also speeds up the checkout or data entry process.

d. Batch Processing for Large Datasets

If you have large datasets that need to be verified periodically, use batch processing capabilities of the API. This allows you to clean and standardize thousands of addresses at once, ensuring consistent data quality.

e. Prioritize Security and Compliance

Ensure that the API provider adheres to data protection regulations, such as GDPR, to protect customer information. Use encrypted connections (e.g., HTTPS) for all API requests and responses to safeguard address data from unauthorized access.

f. Leverage Geocoding for Advanced Applications

If your business requires location-based services, consider using an API that includes geocoding, which assigns latitude and longitude coordinates to addresses. Geocoded data can be useful for analytics, logistics planning, and enhancing delivery precision.

6. Popular Use Cases for Address Verification APIs

Address Verification APIs are versatile tools that can benefit various industries and use cases:

E-commerce: E-commerce companies rely on accurate addresses for efficient order fulfillment. Address verification helps reduce delivery errors and costs.

Logistics and Shipping: Shipping companies use Address Verification APIs to ensure accurate delivery, prevent missed deliveries, and reduce costs related to address correction.

Financial Services: Banks and financial institutions use address verification to validate customer records, meet compliance requirements, and prevent fraud.

Healthcare: Address verification helps healthcare providers maintain accurate patient records and ensure the proper delivery of health-related materials, like prescriptions.

Government Services: Government agencies use address verification to validate citizen records, ensuring accurate delivery of notices, documents, and other services.

7. Address Verification API vs. Traditional Address Verification Software

Compared to traditional address verification software, an API-based approach is more flexible, scalable, and cost-effective:

Scalability: APIs can handle high volumes of requests, making them suitable for businesses with large data requirements.

Ease of Integration: APIs are easy to integrate with existing systems, allowing businesses to verify addresses across different applications seamlessly.

Real-Time Processing: Unlike software that may require manual updates, APIs operate in real-time, ensuring that all addresses are verified with the latest postal data.

Conclusion

An Address Verification API is an invaluable tool for businesses that depend on accurate and reliable address data. By verifying, standardizing, and correcting addresses in real-time, these APIs enhance data quality, reduce costs, improve customer satisfaction, and streamline logistics. Integrating an Address Verification API into your application ensures that every address in your system is accurate, deliverable, and compliant with postal standards.

Whether you operate in e-commerce, logistics, healthcare, or financial services, leveraging an Address Verification API can optimize operations, prevent errors, and ultimately contribute to better customer experiences and operational efficiency. With the right Address Verification API and best practices in place, businesses can build a robust, scalable address verification process that meets the demands of modern, data-driven industries.

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The Benefits of Using Software for Self-Assessment Tax Filing

Why Professional Help is Still Essential?

In recent years, the use of software for self-assessment tax filing has gained popularity among UK taxpayers. These tools promise convenience, speed, and accuracy, making them a viable option for many. However, while tax software can simplify the filing process, it’s still crucial to seek professional help to ensure your Self-Assessment Tax Filing is completed correctly and maximizes your eligible tax relief.

1. Streamlining the Filing Process

One of the main advantages of using software for self-assessment tax filing is the ease it provides in organizing and submitting your tax return. Many platforms are designed to guide users through the process with step-by-step instructions, helping ensure that all necessary information is included. This reduces the likelihood of errors that could lead to fines or additional scrutiny from HMRC. However, even with the best software, you may overlook crucial details without professional oversight.

2. Increased Accuracy

Tax software helps by calculating your tax liability based on the data you input, minimizing the risk of miscalculations. The software can also flag common mistakes, such as incorrectly entered figures or missed fields. While this increases the accuracy of your tax filing, having a tax professional review your return can ensure that complex issues—like income from multiple sources or specialized tax relief claims—are handled properly. An expert can offer additional insight and correct any nuances the software might miss.

3. Maximizing Tax Relief

While software can guide you in claiming certain allowances, it may not be as comprehensive in identifying all the reliefs you’re entitled to claim. A tax professional will have a more in-depth understanding of the UK tax system and can help you uncover all possible deductions, ensuring that your tax bill is minimized. This is particularly important for self-employed individuals, property owners, and those with multiple income streams who may have more complex tax situations.

4. Ensuring Compliance

Tax software ensures that your tax return is submitted in the correct format and on time. However, compliance with ever-changing tax laws and HMRC regulations is an area where professional help is invaluable. Accountants and tax experts stay up-to-date with changes in tax legislation, ensuring that your self-assessment tax filing complies with the latest rules. This can help you avoid costly penalties and ensure peace of mind.

Conclusion

While software for self-assessment tax filing can simplify the process, it is still important to consult with a professional to ensure accuracy, compliance, and maximized tax relief. Visit tax-self-assessment.co.uk today to get expert help with your self-assessment filing needs.