#Fee hike protest

[aching-tummies]

Mm but what about hands squeezing and prodding your whipped cream filled belly making all the cream expand even more. Groaning trying to tell them that it's not helping and you feel as tight as a drum but they won't listen. " it'll help trust me" but every squeeze and prod puts way too much pressure on your tummy only making it expand even more till you feel like your stomach might burst as they come up from behind and wrap both arms around you

Response to 'Whipped Topping; Whipped Tum'.

Thank you for this lovely, response. I was blushing while reading it and the whole time I wrote this response to it. I hope it's to your liking ^^

“Phew.” I let out a sigh as I flop onto the couch.

The dryer is working on the latest load of laundry and the dish-washer is loaded and waiting to be turned on. I usually prefer running the dish-washer right before bed—allowing for last-minute additions of utensils or forgotten lunch containers as well as ensuring that we don't get charged 'peak-hour' water-usage fees.

I've been bustling about around our place since coming home. Today was a day off and I spent the first half of it treating myself to a day out window-shopping and whatever. Refreshed from the long-awaited 'me-time', I came home ready to tackle the household tasks that are just a part of being a responsible person. All work and no play, right? A couple of ours out on the town topped off by feeding my chocolate craving renewed my patience for the daily grind and got me about four hours of productivity around our space. I dusted our window coverings, wiped down the windowsills, collected and systematically completed two different loads of laundry, and loaded our dish-washer��among other things.

Grr...rrrk.

I wince as I feel my belly quaking, hands going over to rest on my unusually bloated belly. That's the sight you walk into upon coming home from work.

“Oohh...” I moan as a foreign hand joins mine, pressing firmly on the crest of my belly in lieu of a normal 'hello, I'm home'. I swat at the offending hand, but that only encourages you to flex your fingers into the taut flesh, squeezing my distended belly in your palm.

GrRrRrlLlbBrrrrrr...rrrBlrrrr.

My stomach growls and gurgles audibly at the stimulation. Your other hand pokes and prods all around my belly, squeezing and pinching like how one would check tire-pressure on a bike tire. The rough treatment only serves to upset whatever is going on in my belly and seems to be hastening whatever reaction is taking place within.

“Oooh...nnngh...b-babe...n-not helping.” I murmur, trying to push your hands off of my distended tummy. “I don't...ooh...d-don't feel good.” I moan passed a cross between an aborted hiccup and what would have been a belch had the hiccup not sucked whatever it was back down. Whatever it was burbles around in my drum-tight belly. “Ooohh...o-oww...p-please stop. N-No more...m-my tummy...oooh...m-my tum...ugh.” I plead.

“Shh. It'll help. It's gotta calm down eventually.” You whisper, hands sliding over my belly and hiking my shirt up over the bloated dome that has replaced my normally flat abdomen.

I can't help the moans as you continue to prod and squeeze my belly. It's a really odd feeling. My stomach feels tight and stretched, but without the heaviness that would go hand-in-hand with eating too much. I haven't swallowed anything in over four hours, and the last thing down my throat was a fancy frappucchino that was about 40% whipped cream.

Ding!

The dryer signifies the end of its cycle and I quickly get to my feet, brushing passed you as I use the task as an excuse to evade your prodding hands. I regret the movement almost instantly as my belly protests the movement. I slide a palm over my belly, eyes widening. It feels...rounder...than it did before. I swear, my camisole feels a bit tighter than it was before you got your hands on it. Is it just my imagination?

Bending over to pull items out of the dryer is agony. My stomach feels ridiculously inflated. Something thick and foamy has taken root in my belly and it's been puffing up, expanding to fill every crevasse in my guts. The image of the foam that comes out of a fire extinguisher comes to mind—reacting with the air to expand and smother the flames. I feel like that's what's going on in my belly—like someone shoved the business-end of a fire extinguisher down my throat and let it rip straight into my tummy.

Discreetly, I try to clench my abdominals—willing myself to belch in hopes that it will relieve some of the pressure in my belly. Try as I might, nothing comes up. Everything from the base of my esophagus to some mid-way of my large intestine feels like it's completely bloated up with foam. There are pinching sensations in my lower belly—twinges that tell me that my intestines are just as bloated up as the rest of me. It would seem that the thick, foamy whipped topping from the earlier frappuccino has taken liberties and invaded every inch of my digestive tract. It's light, but thick enough to prevent any wayward gas pockets from moving about freely.

I groan as I pull myself back into a standing position, lifting the basket full of warm, dry laundry with it.

“Urk!” I swallow back against something thick trying to breach into my esophagus as strong arms snake around my waist and clamp down, constricting my bloated belly as my back is pressed up against your front. I drop the laundry basket, contents spilling onto the hardwood floor.

“Nnngh...b-babe...please~m-my tummy...oooh...t-too much pressure. T-Too tight--” I frantically tap at your arms, squirming in your hold. “Nnngh...n-not here! B-Babe—t-the laundry!” I squeal, trying to squirm and face away from the freshly laundered mess on the floor, lest whatever's bloating up my belly come back up to soil the lot. “Nnngh—y-you're doing the next load!” I hiss at you as your arms tighten around my belly.

My guts grumble angrily—quaking within me. Like a cartoon geyser about to blow. There's just so, so, so much pressure in my tum...and you're squeezing me so, so, so tight that there's no way you don't feel the quaking of my guts.

[loving-n0t-heyting]

Holy fuck they are hawking this bullshit again about high mortgage rates being racist

Borrowing costs for mortgages have more than doubled over the last two years as the Federal Reserve has battled inflation by hiking interest rates, which hit a 22-year high earlier this year. […]

The Financial Services Forum, representing eight of the biggest U.S. banks, said it is spending a seven-figure sum on television advertising blasting the proposal as an added fee on Americans already burdened by inflation.

“The fed has hiked interest rates to reduce inflation, and also as the Evil League of Evil points out, these high interest rates exacerbate the problem of inflation.” Could you try to hide the doublethink a bit harder?

After George Floyd’s murder ignited nationwide protests in the summer of 2020, corporations across the economy committed to projects aimed at battling systemic racism. Mortgage lenders pledged to work with financial regulators to provide credit to more minority borrowers.

“To honour the death of George floyd, we need to use interest rates to hike housing values.” Shameless. Just fucking shameless.

Then again, if she extends the lease on her two-bedroom apartment — where her 11-year-old son is sharing a bedroom with his 22-year-old brother — her rent will increase by $70 a month, to nearly $1,400.

“To hear costs just keep going up is really disheartening,” she said. “Where do they want people to live?”

If the problem this woman is facing is that the rent is too damn high, I think the natural thing to do would be to focus on policies with the ability to make the rent less damn high. But no, increasing homeownership forever at all costs is clearly the only solution, which actually dovetails with instead of flatly contradicting addressing the problem of rentiers being able to extort more money from their tenants bc of their high property values

Sen. Sherrod Brown (D-Ohio), who chairs the Senate Banking Committee, struck an incredulous tone over the industry’s lobbying push as the bank CEOs testified before the panel Wednesday.

“Wall Street banks are actually saying that cracking down on them will, quote, ‘hurt working families.’ Really?” he asked. “You’re going to claim that?”

Love that the obligatory “And now we will give coverage to the other side” section is just sherrod brown saying “Sorry do u expect me to actually swallow this tripe?” Lol

[sourcreammachine]

so the party manifestos won’t be published for a few weeks prolly, but the Labour Party policymaking system means they have an internal “policy platform” agreed by the partisan structure that kinda dictates what goes in the manifesto, and a similar partisan structure has the final say on the manifesto itself. the platform is private and internal, but it’s been “seen and summarised”. so heres a couple of interesting bits:

nationalise the rail; allow greater municipal ownership of bus networks; more ev charging stations and increased ev subsidies

“fundamentally reform our system of energy supply, generation and transmission” via public ownership, but without stating whether or not this includes consumer services or if the private wholesale system will continue

abolish the Lords; votes at 16; NO commitment to abolishing FPTP

“support the recognition of” palestine (note wording, and note the fact this was written before 7 october)

ban conversion therapy including for trans people; “modernise the process of gender recognition to remove indignities for trans people, while upholding the Equality Act, its protected characteristics and its provision for single-sex exemptions” (obviously using terf dogwhistles to get out of meaningfully reforming the law, without clarifying their plans)

sewage monitoring and fines for sewage leaks by water companies – water remains private

“land-use framework” to organise farmland with the goal of biodiversity, close hunting loopholes

intellectual property reform, maybe? they’re very vague about that one

one-month waiting time for mental health services

“reform broken tuition fees system” – NO commitment to abolition and debt forgiveness, only this squirmy line

“robust regulation to protect people from online harms” – basically equivocating to allow any possible passage of a bad internet bill :/

£28B green energy investment; double onshore wind, quadruple offshore wind; reinstate fracking ban and stop new oil/gas; “green energy by 2030”, whatever that means. weirdly fetishistic about hydrogen power

VERY, VERY little mention of City oversight and reform. City to remain extremely independent, capital to continue flowing

abolish leaseholds; end ‘arcane’ land laws; end no-fault evictions

football regulator; reform gambling laws

end fire-rehire; more regulation for two-tier employee/contractor workplace inequalities; more statutory workers’ rights; ban zerohours with more than 12h/week, “right to a contract”; change the minimum wage quango to account for cost of living, potentially hiking the minimum wage by several pounds

repeal a number of union-busting acts; regulate gig economies to statutorily allow the right to unionise; increase rights for unions to organise and manage themselves

ethics quango to enforce the ministerial code for the first time in its history; ban second jobs for MPs with very limited exceptions for professionals; ban former ministers from lobbying for five years; political finance reforms to restrict financing by shell companies

certain devolutionary powers for english local authorities on request; shrink whitehall, let the civil service go elsewhere

“respect orders”, ASBOs 2; domestic abuse register; misogyny as a hatecrime; ‘protect the right to protest’, explicitly opposing the public order bill without committing to overturn it

but yeah, the starmer leadership may leave some things on the cutting room floor, and the starmer government may act totally different when it doesn’t have the partisan oversight. in the end, we have to wait until the proper manifesto releases to make real judgements, but looking through this list can set the tone of our expectations: third-way, boring and pathetic

[mariacallous]

In Kenya, people took to the streets to protest tax hikes to pay for foreign debt. In Sri Lanka, a takeover of the presidential palace was followed by the election of a new government aiming to renegotiate Sri Lanka’s International Monetary Fund (IMF) loan. In Argentina, there’s been a record increase in poverty and hunger as the government pursues austerity to free up cash and pay off debt to the IMF. These are three of almost 80 countries currently in or at risk of debt distress, and most of them are highly climate-vulnerable. In the context of a simultaneous climate and development crisis, high debt payments are a direct obstacle to countries’ abilities to fund essential public services, tackle climate change, and invest in sustainable development. External shocks such as the U.S. Federal Reserve’s 2022-2023 interest rate hikes, combined with a slow recovery from the COVID-19 crisis, have exacerbated debt burdens around the world. And one global institution is absolutely crucial to making debt relief viable in the short term: the IMF.

Atop the international monetary hierarchy, the IMF is the head of the creditors’ cartel. Not only is it a gatekeeper for other supranational lenders; it also functions as a seal of approval for countries to gain access to capital markets. Created to rebalance countries’ balance-of-payments crises, it can even issue a type of international money called Special Drawing Rights (SDRs). Without counting this, it has a trillion dollars of lending power, plus a quarter-trillion-dollars’ worth of gold reserves. In recent years, though, the IMF has diverged from its obligation to support countries in need. Though it has increasingly relied on fees from its more distressed borrowers, over the last 12 months it made a record-breaking $6.8 billion in earnings.

As the fund’s yearly fall meetings are about to begin on Oct. 21, we propose five quick fixes for the IMF, all of which require minimal paperwork and will help get effective relief and climate funds to developing countries. Despite important strides over the last few years, the IMF is still stuck in old ways of austerity and conditionality. The institution is out of sync with the climate emergency and needs to change.

1. Immediate debt relief through the elimination of surcharges

Just as with hidden fees charged by credit cards, dozens of countries have due to surcharges paid the IMF much higher interest rates than those advertised. The institution’s own historical precedents show that bold moves, such as removing these fees, are possible. After prolonged pressure from economists, policymakers and civil society groups, the Fund recently reformed the policy to lower the fees—but didn’t go far enough. Had the IMF board scrapped surcharges, the developing world would have seen up to $13 billion in additional relief over the next decade. Highly indebted countries will continue to face an unnecessary burden and obstacle to development.

The Fund argues these surcharges are a disincentive for large and prolonged borrowing. Some rich countries’ board members opposed full elimination of the policy because they claimed the income derived from these extra fees could pay for concessional rates for loans mainly issued to low-income African and small island states. Beyond the fact that, decades ago, rich countries committed to subsidizing these loans’ low interest rates, the IMF does not need the extra income to fund this subsidy. Boasting a trillion dollars of lending capacity, the powerful IMF can cover this subsidy by freeing up cash from its retained earnings as well as conducting a partial accounting revaluation of its gold reserves. In short, the IMF is solvent enough to forego surcharge income and provide full relief from surcharges to its debt-distressed members before the next review.

2. A new issuance of SDRs

The IMF has a special unit attached to it called the Special Drawing Rights Department. It has its own balance sheet, and with the mandate from its members, it can issue and allocate international currency. American legislation allows the U.S. Treasury to vote at the IMF for an expedited issuance worth up to $650 billion. This issuance would not cost the United States—or any government, for that matter—a single penny. It is a zero-tax, deficit-free, debt-free, and conditionality-free way to support countries in distress without the lengthy political delays of budget appropriations.

The main use for foreign exchange is to pay for international transactions, primarily imports of goods and services. While 41 rich countries and China would get two-thirds of SDRs and generally would not use them, over 150 developing countries would get around $200 billion worth of SDRs, and most of them would certainly use them to pay for imports. This would boost international trade and stimulate U.S. exports. A recent study shows that hundreds of thousands of export-related jobs in the United States can be preserved or created from an SDR issuance of this magnitude.

Together with this issuance, the United Nations can decide that all UN agencies’ statistics, reports, and accounting are denominated in XDR—the international standard symbol for the SDR, the currency of the IMF, which is, let’s not forget, a UN institution. This will promote the use of SDRs and will incentivize countries to donate them for climate purposes.

3. Invest the IMF’s portfolios in African and Latin American green bonds

The IMF has unused cash on hand for about $405 billion. It has an additional $42 billion invested in the stock market, mainly in rich countries’ blue chip stocks, corporate bonds, and sovereigns. Why not have the IMF increase its portfolio and invest it in top-rated green bonds issued by regional development banks such as the African Development Bank and the Development Bank of Latin America? The usual argument is that the IMF has to follow legacy risk models biased in favor of rich-country markets, but this is shortsighted as it is a globally systemic institution—it doesn’t have to follow markets; it has to make them. This is an opportunity for unused cash at the IMF to instead be put to productive use through climate-oriented, real-life projects.

4. Fix the IMF’s new climate fund

The IMF’s managing director, Kristalina Georgieva, is an environmental economist. She was successful in creating a trust fund at the IMF that is the closest thing to an IMF climate fund: the Resilience and Sustainability Trust. However, old habits die hard, and its framework was problematic from the start. While its 20-year loans are at lower rates than the conventional 10-year IMF loans, they are full of counterproductive conditionalities linked to regular austerity-filled IMF programs and are arbitrarily capped at $1.3 billion per country. The IMF can quickly fix this by tweaking its inertial habits: scrapping the harmful conditionality, delinking it from conventional IMF loans, and removing the arbitrary cap.

5. Fast-track congressional approval for a quota increase

The U.S. government hosts the IMF in Washington and with veto power it is the most important voice at the IMF. The role of the United States is crucial in getting these quick fixes underway. For this next fix, congressional approval will be required.

The IMF’s solvency depends on its members’ quotas, its yearly profits and borrowing agreements with rich countries. The IMF had approved a quota-funding round from its members in 2010, but it was concluded only in 2016—mainly because of a slow U.S. Congress that resisted a small change in voting power. Voting power is defined according to a formula that largely rewards economic size. Per the latest round approved in 2023, the distribution of voting power will remain the same, but countries are required to proportionally increase their quotas to the IMF. In order to comply with the latest round, it is estimated that rich countries will provide around $225 billion, but mostly in their own currencies. Meanwhile, developing countries will have to seek $25 billion in U.S. dollars, with the difference in local currency promises. U.S. congressional approval for the new funding round should be accelerated.

However, for a subsequent round, it is imperative that the IMF opens a discussion on the formula. Economic power shouldn’t go unchecked by climate responsibilities but should include a climate variable that can interact with economic size. We propose including countries’ historic greenhouse gas emissions in the denominator of that formula.

Out of all these measures, only the increase in quotas requires congressional approval. Everything else can be done quickly and for free, with the voting power and influence of the U.S. Treasury representative at the IMF. It is preferable for the United States to lead these reforms, which will realign the fund with its foundational principles and purpose—especially in the context of the climate emergency and a necessary green transition.

[nullnvoid911]

"Anarchopanda", the unofficial mascot of the Quebec student strikes, greets riot police at the start of a student protest against tuition fee hikes in Montreal, Canada.

Ryan Remiorz, February 26, 2013

[thetransitgirl]

An update on my Redbubble store

In protest of Redbubble’s new absurd account fees, I’m going to be shutting down all orders from my Redbubble store on April 30th.

For context, Redbubble has added a new “account fee” to all standard accounts. What that means in practice is that they’re gonna be taking up to 50 percent of artists’ monthly earnings on the site. They’re justifying this by saying that artists can always set their prices as high or as low as they want above the manufacturing fee, but this means artists have to dramatically hike prices in order to make the same margins, which obviously lowers the number of sales. So ultimately, Redbubble’s doing this as a way to raise their prices while letting the artists take the blame.

If you want to order prints/mugs/shirts/anything of any of my maps before this new awful policy goes into effect, this is the last chance. Here’s the link:

[msfbgraves]

Well, the Netflix password sharing ban has reached the Netherlands. Quick survey says that there are several workarounds, but my mom is not tech savvy enough for that level of trickery, so I'll advise her to change her subscription to only one screen.

Count that as two near instances of screaming rage at corporations in two days.

And no, that's not about being unable to live without Netflix. It's the relentless trickle of shittery they keep pulling.

My bank raising its fees just because, and I would have switched but I am on this family arrangement so I can't.

My bank app deciding my phone is too old for it.

Another price hike in the supermarket.

The fees for my building's upkeep have been raised by €5 a month for shits and giggles.

A tax hike of €2 a month for my car and don't get me started on paying more than €2 for a litre of petrol.

An insurance price hike and I can't switch because of a misunderstanding with the building upkeep company. Seriously it's the only way of beating constant price hikes, constantly switching.

The ticket prices for the train have been raised.

On and on it goes. And my main problem is that this could easily all be outlawed. But it isn't. Because higher prices on everything also means more tax revenue, as that is a percentage of the total, not a flat fee.

The Netherlands have already protest voted the Nazis in, and the party that calls itself "New Social Contract" means by that, that the whole country should function like the Dutch Bible Belt: with strong solidarity among neighbours instead of state intervention and also trans people are evil. If the government does not try to further the wellbeing of all its citizens, against exploitative corporations, who tf is it for? Like, I know who it's for, it insanely favours capital, but shouldn't there at least be a pretense of something else?

I find it fascinating that government always goes "This is fine" until there are physical mobs outside of their gates. They don't do anything an hour before.

I don't really understand why they keep pushing people to the brink of that. Whom does it help? Nobody. Every revolution simply ushers in a new elite, only that first, a lot of people die - some rich, most poor. The poor mostly stay poor. I'm not saying don't riot, because the revolutions, if survived, often cause a minor uptick for the starving, but not half as well as a government that ensures a high standard of living for everyone.

And make no mistake. They're literally having people starve. Because they can. Either on no food, or on food that is so substandard it causes disease.

It only took 40 years.

Why are they so stupid? People may not understand nft's, or substandard loans swaps, or whatever they come up with next to cheat pension funds, but they do understand being able to afford heating your house, being able to afford to keep a roof over your head, or "I can't afford dinner."

But what do I know. I simply studied humanities.

[burnwater13]

Grogu wondered what his dad thought about all of their adventures. The places they’d been. The things they had done there. A lot of it had been dangerous and painful. Some of it had been so boring it made Grogu sleepy just to think about it. But some of their adventures had turned out just to be fun. 

There was that time that they were on Naboo and met the Gungans and Grogu was able to visit some folks in one of the underwater cities. Grogu had a great time there. His dad on the other hand discovered that Naboo was home to womp rat ant. It wasn’t as big as a womp rat, but when they bit you, you had to hit them as hard as you might hit a womp rat and from the reports he’d been given by their Gungan guide, his dad had used a lot of colorful language. Grogu wondered how many times Din Djarin had said ‘Womp Rat!’, versus ‘Dank Farrik’. Grogu figured that armor didn’t really cover all of him.

Then there was the time they went to Concordia and Grogu met the few Mandalorians who were left who remembered Din Djarin from when he was a boy. They had all asked him if he was still a chatter box and did he still play tricks on his friends and had he finally learned to go to the privy before they left on hike? Din had answered ‘no, no, yes’, but Grogu knew that he should have said ‘no, no, NO’. His dad made sure he had extra fire stacks to eat so he didn’t explain all of his giggling to Din’s old school teachers.

Grogu had asked if they could go to Degobah so he could see the little house that Master Yoda had lived in. He was hopeful that the Jedi Master had found the swampy planet to a good place to live. He understood that it was absolutely swarming with frogs. His dad had said he’d think about it, given how Grogu had behaved the last time they went someplace with a lot of frogs. Grogu had protested that it wasn’t his fault that they went back to Sorgan during the annual frogs and krill festival. He hadn’t intended to eat so many of the critters that he turned blue for a day. He was just lucky that happened.

Grogu was also looking forward to the next time they visited Ossus because he wanted to check on R2-D2 and the building droids and to see if Luke had improved the menu at the school. He had left Luke a note when R2 helped him find Din once the summer session of Jedi Sleep Away Camp was complete advising him that rations were not good, did not need to be part of every meal, and lacked the nutritive qualities that younglings and padawans needed for a well balanced diet. He’d told them they tasted bad. Grogu was sure that Luke would understand what he meant from that.

Din Djarin had mentioned that they might be making a trip to Mandalore to see how the rebuilding was going. He knew that Grogu had learned a lot about being a Mandalorian Bounty Hunter and he’d improved his skills at navigation and planning enough, that taking him back to learn more about Mandalorian daily life and the rules to smash-ball could be added to his educational plan for excellence. 

Grogu knew that Din had been contacted by Axe Woves and they were planning to start up an annual ‘Winner takes All’ Sabacc tournament to support the foundlings. He agreed that the tournament was a good idea, but he was concerned with the entry fee being the story of how you got your favorite scar. Grogu didn’t have any scars and the Mandalorian absolutely wouldn’t let him get a tattoo, which was like a scar only prettier. Grogu knew that Din just didn’t want to have to compete against someone who had an almost magical way of getting an Idiot’s Array anytime he needed one.

Until then, they were going to take a short trip to Trask to visit the Frog lady and her husband and her children. Grogu was happy about that. He was sure that Tad was much taller than he had been the last time they were on Trask. They were all going to visit the new ‘Sea-quarium’, although his dad said they didn’t need to see the new ‘mamacore’ exhibit. He’d seen enough of that critter the first time they went to Trask. 

Grogu didn’t agree. He really hadn’t gotten a good look at the critter for obvious reasons and he thought his was being just a touch overly dramatic. But then, Grogu had managed to stay pretty dry during that whole event and the Mandalorian was still complaining that he had sand in his armor because of that adventure. Grogu had offered to remove it with the Force, but the last time he did that sort of thing, Din Djarin had only managed to keep his helmet and first layer on. Grogu knew that eventually his dad would be able to laugh about that. As soon as Grogu found that one boot liner that got misplaced. Sometimes Din just didn’t know how to find the fun in things.

[mostlysignssomeportents]

This day in history

#20yrsago RIAA suing college kids for maintaining file-sharing networks https://web.archive.org/web/20030405092843/http://www.riaa.com/PR_story.cfm?id=629

#20yrsago Floppy-disc-a-gami Starship Enterprise https://www.asciipr0n.com/archive/0013/bonnie/craft/

#15yrsago University prof says students can’t sell notes from his classes because it violates his copyright https://www.wired.com/2008/04/prof-sues-note/

#10yrsago Montreal police arrest young woman for instagramming photo of anti-police mural https://www.cbc.ca/news/canada/montreal/instagram-anti-police-pic-sharing-tied-to-montreal-arrest-1.1372383

#10yrsago Paying patent trolls off makes you complicit in the next round of extortion https://www.joelonsoftware.com/2013/04/02/the-patent-protection-racket/

#10yrsago What walled gardens do to the health of the Web, and what to do about it https://www.hyperorg.com/blogger/2013/04/02/berkman-anil-dash-on-the-web-we-lost/

#5yrsago Scammy phone company Centurylink: “No one can sue us because we don’t have any customers” https://arstechnica.com/tech-policy/2018/04/centurylink-fights-billing-fraud-lawsuit-by-claiming-that-it-has-no-customers/

#5yrsago Facebook: Actually, looks like Cambridge Analytica got 87 million user records https://about.fb.com/news/2018/04/restricting-data-access/

#5yrsago Federal court will allow the ACLU to keep suing for the right to violate terms of service for legitimate purposes https://www.axios.com/2018/04/03/suit-to-let-researchers-break-website-rules-wins-a-round-1522766474

#5yrsago The .cm typosquatters accidentally exposed their logs, revealing the incredible scale of typojacking https://krebsonsecurity.com/2018/04/dot-cm-typosquatting-sites-visited-12m-times-so-far-in-2018/

#5yrsago For a mere $105,000, John McAfee will tweet about your cryptocurrency https://www.marketwatch.com/story/john-mcafee-charges-105000-per-tweet-to-promote-your-ico-2018-04-03

#5yrsago Parkland student activists drive American right berzerk, supercharge attack on public education https://theintercept.com/2018/04/04/parkland-florida-shooting-survivor-activists/

#5yrsago 100,000 Americans wrote to Trump’s Park Service to protest national park service-fee hike, and the Park Service actually listened https://web.archive.org/web/20180404000503/https://grist.org/briefly/trump-admin-asked-for-public-comment-on-the-70-park-fee-the-people-responded/

#5yrsago Ifixit flunks Apple’s new educational Ipad as nearly un-repairable https://www.ifixit.com/Teardown/iPad+6+Teardown/105416

#5yrsago Zuckerberg: Facebook will not stop spying on Americans to comply with EU privacy law https://www.reuters.com/article/us-facebook-ceo-privacy-exclusive/exclusive-facebook-ceo-stops-short-of-extending-european-privacy-globally-idUSKCN1HA2M1

#5yrsago Kickstarting a public radio-backed revival of Gothamist, a beloved site killed by an evil, union-hating Trumpist billionaire https://www.kickstarter.com/projects/675760894/bring-back-gothamist

#1yrago The Best Defense Against Rubber-Hose Cryptanalysis https://pluralistic.net/2022/04/04/attackers-advantage/#anti-oligarchic

[allthecanadianpolitics]

Former premier Jean Charest is speaking out against tuition hikes for out-of-province students at Quebec universities to defend his hometown school of Bishop’s University.

Charest, whose plans to raise tuition fees at universities in 2012 led to massive student protests and ultimately to his downfall as leader of the province, spoke out to CJAD’s Andrew Carter against the move by the Quebec government to nearly double tuition fees for students from other provinces.

Full article

Tagging: @politicsofcanada

[ejesgistnews]

Governor Dapo Abiodun of Ogun State has revealed three significant initiatives aimed at reducing the high cost of food items in the state. This announcement follows a meeting with key market leaders, including the Iyaloja General, Chief (Mrs.) Yemisi Abass, on Thursday, September 12. The move comes as Nigeria grapples with surging food prices due to the recent hike in fuel costs.   Gateway Trading Company Revamp The first strategy involves revamping the Gateway Trading Company to implement a price control mechanism. Through bulk purchasing and strategic selling in major zones, the government aims to make essential food items more affordable. This approach is expected to drive down costs across the state. APC Governor, Dapo Abiodun, Orders Refund of N10,000 Employment Fee Amidst Public Outrage Suspension of Market Levies In a bid to ease financial pressure on traders, Governor Abiodun also announced the suspension of all market levies, except for necessary development and environmental fees. A market enforcement task force will be established to ensure compliance and prevent illegal levies or intimidation of traders.   Low-Interest Loans and Grants for Traders To further support traders, the state government will offer low-interest loans and grants. Additionally, efforts will be made to improve market waste management systems to foster a more conducive business environment.   Governor Abiodun's statement emphasized, “Our rebranded Gateway Trading Company will begin bulk purchasing and selling in key zones to lower prices.”   These measures come in the wake of ten days of nationwide protests sparked by the increasing cost of living, exacerbated by the fuel price hike.   New Minimum Wage Pledge In a related development, Governor Abiodun also reaffirmed his commitment to implementing the new minimum wage, positioning Ogun State as a forerunner in adopting the policy. During a meeting with workers’ representatives on September 11, the governor discussed his administration’s efforts to mitigate the effects of fuel subsidy removal on the populace.

[hicginewsagency]

Students at Kyambogo University Protest 50% Tuition Hike.

Kyambogo University Guild President, Mbaziira John, led his colleagues in a protest against online lectures. Courtesy image. Kyambogo University, Kampala – Students at Kyambogo University are staging protests against a recent decision to increase tuition fees by 50% for two specific schools: the School of Management and Entrepreneurship and the School of Built Environment. This fee hike does not…

[xtruss]

Tourists Engulf Montenegro’s Adriatic Gem – In Pictures

Kotor, A UNESCO World Heritage Site (Town in Montenegro), is Struggling to Cope with a Rise in Visitors Clogging Its Narrow Streets and Raising Environmental Concerns. Stevo Vasiljević/Reuters. Additional Reporting by Aleksandar Vasovic

— Monday 12 August 2024 | The Guardian USA

Cruise Ships Navigate the Bay of Kotor. Each Can Carry a Huge Number of Passengers.

Tourists gather at Gurdić Gate in Kotor’s old town. Visitors arrive each day from hundreds of boats, yachts and cruise ships that dock in the harbour, leading some to call for a hike in the €1 fee to enter Kotor charged to people from cruise ships

While tourism contributes to about a quarter of Montenegro’s economic output, Kotor’s 23,000 inhabitants are feeling the strain. ‘Traffic jams are huge,’ said Doris Dajkovic, who works in a souvenir shop

Kotor featured in the 2006 James Bond film Casino Royale

A series of protests against excessive tourism has erupted this year in European destinations including Venice, Barcelona and Santorini

Cruise ships ferrying thousands of visitors navigate the Bay of Kotor. The number of annual arrivals has risen steadily over the past decade, with about 500 cruise ships expected this year. Last Wednesday, four ships carrying about 5,000 tourists each moored in the town

Local people say too many visitors drive up housing costs – pricing residents out of the market – and cause congestion and other environmental problems

‘Our neighbours’ lives are becoming increasingly difficult during the tourist season,’ said Jovan Ristić, the director of the local tourist organisation, who backs an increase in the cruise ship visitor fee. ‘All similar tourist destinations are working on reducing or selecting passenger ships and seriously collecting excursion fees,’ he added

In neighbouring Croatia, the Unesco-listed resort of Dubrovnik introduced a ‘Respect the city’ plan in 2017, capping the number of cruise visitors to 4,000 at any given time

The rise in mass tourism is also taking a toll on Kotor’s marine environment. Milica Mandić, a scientific adviser at Montenegro’s Institute of Marine Biology, said: ‘Such a number of cruisers requires a study to determine the maximum environmental load’

[qualitytvng]

GLOBAL RIGHTS URGES IMMEDIATE RESCIND OF PLANNED EXPULSION OVER UI PEACEFUL PROTEST 

Global Rights, a prominent non-governmental organization, has urgently called on the University of Ibadan (UI) to rescind its planned expulsion of three students involved in a peaceful protest against a sudden tuition fee hike. The protest, which took place on May 13, 2024, during the inauguration of the Student Union government, was a response to the fee increase announced by the university’s…

[inspirationjyoti]

There was this one girl- Amayara, who loved books a lot. Books were stress buster for her, as she used to read them wholeheartedly. Understanding and resolving tough topics, bringing a clarity out of complicated book language was a kind of fun for her. She was too much career oriented until one day when she starting getting stress out of that career oriented mind. She was stressed that her planning was not working, things were not going according to her plans and there was no way to get a desirable and stable career for her. This really made her pissed off. Inspite of hard work, nothing worked at all. The one, who was inspiration for others, started finding her inspiration to live a happy life ahead.

Then one fine day, when she found a path away from this stress, she immediately took that road and just wanted that career-oriented thinking to let go. She wanted to move away from that stress for always, as fast as possible. In so much hurry, that she didn't even gave it a second thought. A feeling of relief filled her heart and made her happy.

Years later, after becoming busy in her second life, which she could not imagine in past (without books and career), some memories striked around her. Before the books turned into stress for her, they used to be her stress buster. How could she forget that time. It was like, that her negativity around books has dissolved and positivity is what that remained. Now she started thinking of how this life can keep her close to her love. After brainstorming, she conclude that there is no way time can rewind and take her to the past, even after a very strong desire.

Isn't it?

Even if we want to run away from our home, our responsibilities, our boundations, our relationships, just to get a life of our own choice, is it possible that the life we will get will completely be of our own choice?

Can we design our life, may be something called 'life designing'??

Amayara also thought that she would leave everything owned by her, be it money, home, relationships, luxuries, all boundations, and would go for her love towards books.

"This path is not worth my journey any more", she thought.

But was that for real ?

Obviously everyone will miss her after she was gone. Slowly all would be habitual of her absence, although there would be a void in their lives.

But will she be able to survive alone? Seriously???

Even after she leaves all these relationships and boundations behind, she had to make new friends, new family and this will definitely create new set of boundations for her.

Humans have always evolved to live in a society, where there is a set of some "good" and "bad" things. We have not learnt to live alone. We may feel like we don't need anyone, but we really do. Sometimes we may say "leave me alone", but next hour we need someone to pour our heart out.

Then what is the solution??

My current opinion (subjecting to change with time) is that escaping from a situation is actually not the solution to that situation. Life might be really really harsh, but there is always a way.

I watched an episode of a TV serial where one poor boy protested extensively against the fees hike in college. He went on a hunger strike with some of his friends but the administration didn't roll the hike in fees. He then decided to leave the college and told hmthis to one of his uncle who was paying his admission fee. He said a great thing. He said-

"All this definition of loyalty, honesty, good things or bad things might fail when you face the real world. Sometimes honest people suffer badly. But this doesn't mean you shouldn't be honest anyone. If you will leave the college, no one would really care and this will prove you to be a failure.

अगर सिस्टम पसंद नहीं है, तो सिस्टम से भागो मत I सिस्टम में रहो, और उसे बदल दो I

This line hits really hard!!

Thinking all this, Amayara started finding another way that could connect her to books other than escaping.

[hardynwa]

Imo undergraduates protest high tuition, extortion, intimidation

Students of tertiary institutions in Imo State have taken to the streets to protest the high cost of living, high fees, poor education, poor infrastructure, poor facilities, extortion and intimidation in their various institutions. The students urged the Federal and State Governments to stop frequent hikes in their tuition fees as well as undue extortion through handouts as well as textbooks. They appealed to the government to provide conducive learning environments and install medical equipment and facilities such as electricity and boreholes, among others, for improved quality education and moral values. The protesters made up of students from the Federal University of Technology Owerri, FUTO, Imo State University Owerri, IMSU, Alvan Ikoku Federal University of Education Owerri, Federal Polytechnic Nekede Owerri and Imo State University of Agriculture and Environmental Sciences, UAES, Umuagwo, Ohaji. They also decried the high cost of living, school fees and student accommodation as well as the hardship in Imo State, which they said is occasioned by the government’s bad economic policy, poor infrastructure and unemployment. They urged the government to make people-oriented policies to alleviate suffering, hunger and poverty faced by students. Vice President, National Association of Nigerian Students, NANS, Valentine Nzubechi, who addressed the protesters, reassured that the Federal and State governments would adhere to their plights and requests to enhance quality education. Read the full article