#microsoft activation deal

[tumblerweeding69]

Microsoft Expects Next-Gen Xbox And PS6 To Launch In 2028, Claims It's Losing The Console War: Report

Microsoft He believes the next generation of gaming consoles should arrive in 2028, court document in ongoing FTC trial over attempted acquisition of Xbox parent activism blizzard revealed. Documents reviewed by IGN detailed what the next Xbox and playstation 6 Will likely be released in 2020, eight years after the current launch. The timeline from 2022 coincides with Sony’s statement that the…

[kn96artworks]

switched from libreoffice to wps because reasons

i'm a bit more used to wps layout (i have it on my phone) but now it won't stop messing up the text formatting when i copy paste text from somewhere else eg ao3 😢 i can only either paste them exactly as how they appear on the webpage or with formatting removed. tried the 'match current format' option and i still lost the formatting

why do microsoft gotta have to be such a bitch

[batboyblog]

Things Biden and the Democrats did, this week #17

May 3-10 2024

Vice President Harris announced 5.5 billion dollars to build affordable housing and address homelessness. The grants will go to 1,200 communities across all 50 states, DC and Puerto Rico. 1.3 billion will go to HUD's HOME program which builds, buys, and rehabs affordable housing for rent or ownership. 3.3 billion is headed to Community Development Block Grants which supports housing as well as homeless services, and expanding economic opportunities. Remaining funds focus on building housing for extremely low- and very low-income households, Housing for people struggling with HIV/AIDS, transitional housing for those with substance-use disorder, and money to support homeless shelters and homeless prevention programs.

At the 3rd meeting of the Los Angeles Declaration group in Guatemala Security of State Blinken announced $578 million in new US aid to Latin America. The Los Angeles Declaration is a partnership between the US and 20 other nations in the Americas to address immigration, combat human trafficking, and support economic development and improved quality of life for people in poor nations in the Americas. The bulk of the aid, over $400 million will go to humanitarian assistance to the Venezuelan people. Inside of Venezuela over 7 million people are in need of humanitarian assistance due to decades of political and economic instability. Over 7 million more have been forced to flee the country and live in poverty across the Americas. The aid will help Venezuelans both inside and outside of Venezuela.

The Department of Energy lead an effort to get the G7 to agree to phase out coal by the early 2030s. The G7 is a collection of the 7 largest Industrial economies on Earth, the US, the UK, Canada, France, Germany, Japan, and Italy. To avoid catastrophic climate change the International Energy Agency believes coal needs to be phased out by 2035. However this has been a sticking point with the G7 since 1/3rd of Japan and 1/4th of Germany's energy comes from Coal. This agreement to phase out represents a major breakthrough and the US plans to press for even wider agreement on the issue at the G20 meeting in November.

President Biden announced a major investment deal in Racine, Wisconsin, site of the failed Trump Foxconn deal. In 2018 then President Trump visited Racine and declared the planned Foxconn plant "the eighth wonder of the world.". However the promised 13,000 jobs never materialized and the Taiwan based Foxconn after bulldozing 100s of homes and farms decided not to build. President Biden inked a deal with Microsoft for the land formally given to Foxconn which will bring 2,000 new jobs to Racine to help replace the 1,000 job losses during Trump's Presidency in the community.

200 tribal governments and the US territories of American Samoa, the Northern Mariana Islands, Guam, and the U.S. Virgin Islands, published climate action plans. The plans were paid for by the Biden Administration as part of a 5 billion dollar Climate Pollution Reduction Grants program. The federal government is supporting all 50 states, territories, DC, and tribal governments to draft climate action plans, which will be used to apply for more than 4 billion dollars in grants to help turn plans into reality

As part of marking Yom HaShoah (Holocaust Remembrance Day), the Biden Administration announced a number of action aimed at combating antisemitism and supporting the Jewish Community. This included $400 million in new funding for the Nonprofit Security Grant Program. The Program has supported Synagogues and Jewish Community Centers with security improvements like bullet proof windows and trainings for staff in how to handle active shooter and hostage situations. The Department of Education issued guidance to all schools districts and federally funded colleges stressing that antisemitism is banned under Title VI of the Civil Rights Act of 1964. These actions come as part of the Biden Administration's National Strategy To Counter Antisemitism, the first ever national strategy addressing the issue by any Administration.

USAID announced $220 million in additional humanitarian aid to Yemen. This new funding will bring US aid to Yemen over the last 10 years to nearly $6 billion. Currently 18 million Yemenis are estimated as needing humanitarian assistance, 9 million of them children, and the UN believes nearly 14 million face imminent risk of famine. The US remains the single largest donor nation to humanitarian relief in Yemen.

The Department of Interior announced nearly $150 million to help communities fight drought. The funds will support 42 projects across 10 western states. This is part of the President's $8.3 billion dollar investment in the nations water infrastructure over the next 5 five years.

[girlactionfigure]

A very powerful message from Hillel Fuld:  I really don’t think you understand the absolute miracles that we witnessed last night here in Israel. In fact, I am sure you don’t. Let’s break this down. Israel has three air defense systems, each one of them a technological wonder and that’s not me saying it. That’s Dr. Gold who basically invented the Iron Dome who told me that. The level and sophistication of the Iron Dome is simply unparalleled. But the Iron Dome only knows how to detonate short range rockets or missiles within a 70 km range, give or take.  Then Israel has the David’s Sling system. That knows how to deal with mid range missiles up to approximately 300 km.  Then we have the Arrow system that literally detonates missiles that can fly outside of the earth’s atmosphere. That has a range of about 2,400 km!! 🤯 Last night, as Iran rained down ballistic missiles on Israel, all three defense systems were activated and implemented to perfection. The chances of all of these incredibly complex systems working in unison as flawlessly as they did last night, are basically non existent. If one thing went wrong, if one of those ballistic missiles hit an apartment building, a shopping center, or an army base, we would now be burying hundreds of Israelis.  And all of that is not even the biggest miracle.  A few hours ago, I got a WhatsApp message from a good friend who is a senior executive at Microsoft and who wasn’t exactly a God fearing Jew. Until yesterday.  Here is what he wrote me.  “If you’re looking for miracles man - last night I started believing. Missiles hit all around me but none of them hit my house or any house, for that matter.” He elaborated some more and shared info about the missiles that he watched land just meters away from very strategic places in Israel, to say the least.  Each one of those defense systems is, in and of itself, pretty miraculous, but what is even more insane is the low casualty numbers from the rockets and missiles that we’re NOT intercepted.  Where did those missiles go? I’ll tell you where. They landed in sand, in water, and in “Empty spaces”.  Have you been to Israel? It’s a microscopic country. What empty spaces? Where are these empty spaces? 🤷‍♂️ How have hundreds of Iranian ballistic missiles all either get detonated by miraculous systems or totally miss their mark and land in empty spaces causing zero casualties and minimal damage?!   How?? Listen, I get it. This thought process begs the question, where was God during the horrible terrorist attack yesterday? Where was He on October 7th? Where was He during the holocaust?  All valid questions that require a very serious nuanced conversation.  But if you know anything about what had to happen last night and throughout this war in general, for such a low number of casualties, you’ll know that what we witnessed last night was the equivalent of God splitting the sea right before our eyes.  Guess what. When God split the sea, there were those who didn’t believe it was a miracle and didn’t jump in. And there are also those who feel the need to explain it naturally. Ok, that’s fine.  You don’t want to call yesterday an act of God? That’s your choice, but like my Microsoft friend, if you look at these events objectively, you’d have a really hard time seeing those hundreds of deadly missiles land in empty spaces and not see the hand of God.  Last night was an incredible display of the collaboration between two of the powers that protect the Jewish people: The IDF and Hashem.  Last night will go down in history right alongside many of Israel’s accomplishments in this war including the beepers and the unprecedented low ratio between combatant and civilian, as a military operation the likes of which the world has never seen. Ever! Last night will be analyzed by military strategists and experts for generations.  Last night, we witnessed history.  Last night we witnessed open miracles.  Last night, we witnessed God in all His glory watching over His children.

[turianhumanclient]

What I know about the situation at Zaum Studio OÜ, developers of Disco Elysium

Perhaps you've heard of the deplorable situation of Disco Elysium's fired leads, of the oust by majority shareholder and CEO, of the lawsuits and rest of the cultural association and 'old guard' still at work there, quiet and held quiet by corporate policy and perhaps embittered by the 'auteur' theory holding parasocial public.

What I am going to share with you is information that is publicly available through Estonian and United Kingdom company registers. I haven't seen any news outlet feature this information yet.

WHAT IS NEW HERE?

Ilmar Kompus, the current CEO who was installed in 2020, had actually been a shareholder all along since Zaum Studio's founding in Estonia.

Kaur Kender, the author in his own right and producer at Zaum, has founded a lot of game development companies in Estonia and United Kingdom, while Zaum worked, published and updated Disco Elysium. These apparently went nowhere, some of them are now defunct. All of them had Ilmar Kompus or some ZAUM subsidiary as shareholders, and some also shared correspondence addresses with ZAUM's UK subsidiaries.

The 'game pitch' that cost Zaum 4,8 million euros and funded Kompus' acquisition of majority share from Linnamäe, the so called Pioneer One, has been previously reported by one gaming news outlet to have come via Anu Reiman's YESSIRNOSIR Limited. I have discovered that Kaur Kender held a game company in UK called Pioneer One Ltd that was active between years 2018-2022, and it had an Estonian artist Kristiina Ago as its secretary. I cannot prove that it was this entity that sold it instead, but it is a glaring coincidence nevertheless.

Kaur Kender and later Ilmar Kompus have founded a succession of ZAUM studios (Zaum London, Zaum UK, Disco Elysium UK and now Zaum Studio Limited) which have held the main development operations in UK. Kurvits and Rostov/Taal hold minority shares in Zaum UK. The later ones are all Ilmar Kompus-held in shares. I suspect this is a method of his to sever the fired leads' means of control to the company's branches in UK.

Both the 'main line' of Zaum's UK companies and Zaum Studio OÜ back in Estonia have loaned money to the tune of millions to Newelysium and Revachol in UK (Note, Revachol OÜ in Estonia is held by ZAUM cultural association members and is not a game studio)

What does it all mean then? I am not certain. I have not practical experience in game dev industry to say whether constantly making side companies or shells is a sign of a healthy leadership.

However looking at all the shell companies made near annually, and how the successive ‘main studios’ have consolidated into Kompus’ hands, I am going to speculate a bit. This has been a long con. Whether there was going to be a product that sold well or not, Kompus, Haavel and Kender were going be the ones collecting the jackpot. There were shell companies being established even as the game was floundering after the estonians’ walkout. All the ‘artists’ had to do was just do the work and not get in the way of money.

But then ZA/UM made an award-winning darling game of the year. TV show adaptation deals. Lead developers like Kurvits and Hindpere standing at the Game Awards Show spotlight. Audience eating up all that and latching onto whatever crumb and morsel might come next.

A clean exit sale out of a modest studio became impossible. Now there were developers in the studio who knew they were worth A LOT and with shareholders’ power both in Zaum Studio OÜ and Zaum UK Ltd to hamper any sale to Tencent, Amazon or Microsoft. Now we reach the part of “toxic misogynist auteurs trying to steal the IP for themselves.” who had to be let go.

Kender's lawsuit around the turn of 2022-2023 and divestiture of his Zaum Studio OÜ shares as result muddles the water for this speculated theory even more as he still holds directorship in a number of shell companies with Kompus back in UK. There is also Dark Maths Studios that he founded this April in UK, so it remains to be seen what he'll do and if its with Kompus and Haavel or alone.

[lemonadedino]

Have a snippet of landoscar enemies to lovers background story from the much ado about nothing au fic below the cut 🫶

I have to prove to myself that I’ve actually worked in it lol

As he walked back to his seat, amid all the polite clapping, he heard him.

“That Piastri guy had the most boring presentation ever, I swear. I was actively falling asleep. And don’t get me started on the slide choice, Carlos! Where was the color? The variety? The fun, engaging design elements? It was just all so bland, mate. Blergh.”

Oscar was pretty sure the curly-haired man currently launching a vitriolic attack on his PowerPoint was named Lando Norris. He vaguely recognized him from his presentation earlier in the day.

Oscar had heard his name floating around the office break room. Supposedly, he was the office prodigy, some sort of comp-sci genius poached straight out of Oxford. Public opinion on Lando seemed to deem him as an intensely likable and cherubic, if slightly hyperactive, team member with a strong work ethic and sharp sense of humor.

Listening to the Brit’s increasingly passionate tirade, Oscar wasn’t so sure about the first part of that descriptor.

Unaware that he now had an audience, Lando kept on ranting to his companion, gesticulating wildly.

“I can’t believe he used Times New Roman, Carlos. Times New Roman! That’s literally the worst possible choice. It means you intentionally didn’t want to use the default font, Arial, but still couldn’t branch out and be more exciting! Oswald is right there!” His voice gradually climbed in volume. “Also! Who actually adds transitions to their slides? That’s some George type shit.”

“Mate, yours wasn’t much better.” The words came spitting out before Oscar even registered that his mouth had opened. Clearly, four hours of sleep had lowered his normal inhibitions surrounding conflict avoidance. Two sets of eyes snapped to look at him, one pair unnervingly reminiscent of watercolor and the other velveteen brown.

Oscar swallowed. Well. There’s no backing out now. He might as well fully commit.

“At least I didn’t use brain-meltingly bright neon colors and an overcrowded SlidesGo template. And a soundtrack? Really, Norris? Where did you even find that?” Oscar was on a roll now. There was something oddly liberating about it. “What are you, a five year old who got access to Microsoft Office for the first time?”

Lando pouted, which in theory should look absolutely ridiculous on a full grown man. It certainly didn’t help him fight the “five year old who got access to Microsoft Office for the first time” allegations. Yet somehow, on Lando, it was adorable. Oscar shut down that train of thought as soon as it sprouted.

Lando pursed his lips, primed to respond, no doubt with another jab at Oscar’s presentation.

“Oscar! Great job, dude!” Logan suddenly hollered from across the room, eagerly waving him over. Oscar had never been more grateful for his best friend. He would definitely be buying him one of those Arnold Palmers that the American so adored from the office café in thanks.Taking the opportunity to escape, Oscar waved back and slipped away.

He heard Carlos chuckle as he left.

“He’s really got you there, Lando. You know, I quite liked his presentation. He’s a good speaker. Very articulate,” the older man said.

“Shut up. That’s my new Sworn Arch-Nemesis you’re talking about.”

“A bit dramatic, don’t you think? What happened to Betty from HR being your Sworn Arch-Nemesis? You were complaining to me about her just yesterday.”

“I’m not being dramatic, Carlos. Can’t you see it? Betty’s been ousted. Oscar Piastri is an infinitely more qualified candidate for the role of my Sworn Arch-Nemesis.” Lando paused. “Plus, I’m pretty sure Betty is nearing her 70s. She talks about her grandchildren all the time. I don’t want to deal with the hassle of finding a replacement after her retirement.”

Up until that moment, Oscar had been planning to chase Lando down after the conference, buy him a coffee, and apologize effusively for his outburst. Sure, it had been rude of the Brit, but it didn’t justify Oscar insulting his presentation. He didn’t know why he had reacted so strongly to Lando’s snarky commentary. Truly, Lando’s presentation hadn’t been that bad. He’d seen way worse. Oscar actually thought that the soundtrack was a nice touch.

But if Lando was already dead set on treating him as his Sworn Arch-Nemesis, Oscar didn’t see why two couldn’t play at that game. He had to spice up his workday somehow, after all.

Since then, for the last couple of years, there had been a constant stream of traded barbs and petty jibes, more often than not sent via Microsoft Teams, because Lando transferred to a new division based across the country a year ago.

Oscar would never admit it, but he had started looking forward to opening his inbox every morning, eager to see what creative insult Lando had launched at him. Obviously, he shot one of his own right back.

[dreaminginthedeepsouth]

Why can't other newspapers do this?

* * * *

Don't give permission to others to demotivate or mislead you!

September 18, 2024

Robert B. Hubbell

Remain steadfast, dear readers! I received a dozen(-ish) emails today expressing worry about a report from a respected polling organization claiming that “the presidential race is tightening.” I also received a similar number of emails touting reports from a respected polling firm showing VP Harris expanding her post-debate lead to a number that is “larger than the margin of error.”

Here’s the deal: It doesn’t matter which of the above polling narratives is true. Indeed, both could be correct or both could be wrong. Regardless of what the polls show—good or bad—you should not change anything that you plan to do in the next 50 days. We are stuck in a noisy, volatile information environment that is being actively manipulated by the MAGA disinformation machine and Russia. See Axios, Russia amplifies disinformation campaigns against Harris-Walz campaign, Microsoft warns.

Per Axios,

Russia is now throwing all of its disinformation resources behind operations designed to undermine the Harris-Walz campaign, according to a Microsoft report released Tuesday.

[And] the Justice Department exposed a $10 million scheme earlier this month in which employees of a Russian state media network infiltrated a U.S. company to spread Russian propaganda.

Let’s be clear: You are the target of the disinformation being peddled by the GOP and Russia. Their goal is to demotivate you. Do not give them permission to do so!

So, if you have mistakenly over-invested in the polls, knock it off! (And I mean that in the nicest way possible!) It is completely understandable and perfectly human to seek reassurance from polls. No one wants a repeat of the nasty surprise in 2016. But the bad guys have figured out our need for positive feedback and weaponized it against us. They are con men, and we are the mark.

Instead of looking to the media for reassurance, believe your own eyes and ears. You can see the surge in enthusiasm, you know that the number of volunteers at your grassroots organization has increased, and you have been surprised by people in your life who are planning to vote for the first time or will vote for Kamala Harris after voting for Trump in 2016 or 2020. That information is anecdotal, but it is not filtered or manipulated to mislead you.

Of course, we shouldn’t delude ourselves. We must recognize that remaining in touch with real news is important. The question is, how do we stay current without subjecting ourselves to manipulation?

I attended a Swing Left San Gabriel Valley meeting over the weekend where Jessica Craven and I spoke to the grassroots volunteers. One audience member asked which news sources we trust. Our combined answers included the following:

Heather Cox Richardson | Substack

Jessica Craven | Substack

Simon Rosenberg | Substack

Jay Kuo | Substack

Lucian K. Truscott IV | Substack

Joyce Vance | Substack

Judd Legum | Substack

Lawrence O’Donnell | MSNBC

Josh Marshall | Talking Points Memo

The Guardian (for general news but especially commentary by Rebecca Solnit)

Of course, I read dozens of other sources to prepare this newsletter, but the above are my “go to” sources for fair reporting on the news. On legal matters, I rely on Laurence Tribe, Mark Joseph Stern, Ian Millhiser, and Dahlia Lithwick. I also rely on Aaron Rupar on Twitter (@atrupar) and his Substack, Public Notice, to provide real-time, unvarnished tracking of statements by Trump, which are often sane-washed by major media.

I use the above sources to give me an objective view of the news—which I then employ as a lens when I read other sources. If your favorite source is not listed above, please do not take offense! If you have identified a source you trust, reward them with your support.

It is going to be seven long weeks until Election Day. Don’t allow yourself to be manipulated by the news. Instead, make the news by motivating new and existing voters to show up on Election Day. The antidote to anxiety is action. And there is plenty to do!

Kamala Harris’s measured interview with National Association of Black Journalists

Both Kamala Harris and Donald Trump sat for interviews on Tuesday. The interviews were, as expected, windows into competing versions of America under the respective candidates. Kamala Harris’s responses were measured, thoughtful, and linear. The media is still trying to decipher what Trump said or meant on several topics.

But . . . Kamala Harris received relatively little notice in the media for her interview, despite the drumbeat of demands that she sit for more interviews. The New York Times complained that her answers “often echoed her stump speech”—as if consistency and discipline in messaging is a bad thing. The Times instead gave top billing (in two articles) to Trump’s unpredictable and baseless promises in his appearance in Flint Michigan. Michael Gold of the NYTimes wrote,

[Trump] made grand promises to restore auto-making jobs to the state, the heart of the American auto industry, as he gave long-winded, often meandering responses to only a few questions.

“Meandering” is an understatement. “Incomprehensible” and “bonkers” are more descriptive.

The complete video of Kamala Harris’s interview is here: PBS Newshour, Harris participates in National Association of Black Journalists event in Philadelphia. If you don’t have time to watch the entire 45-minute interview, I recommend watching two answers to get a flavor of how well the VP conducted hereself.

In this segment, she responds to the efforts to incite racial hatred toward Haitian immigrants in Springfield, Ohio. See Springfield: It's a crying shame . . . This answer is notable for many reasons, including the fact that Kamala Harris interrupted the interviewer, stopped herself, apologized, and invited the interviewer to finish her question.

In a second segment worth watching, she answers a more challenging question (in tone and substance) about the war in Gaza and the path to peace: Question on Gaza War.

Trump, on the other hand, gave a series of non-sensical answers in his town hall in Flint, Michigan, any one of which would have resulted in howls from the major media if delivered by Kamala Harris. For example,

When asked about the biggest threat to auto manufacturing jobs in Michigan, Trump responded that the biggest threat to auto jobs was “nuclear weapons.” On the one hand, Trump isn’t wrong; on the other hand, “nuclear weapons” are the biggest threat to everything on earth, so the answer was not specific to the question about auto manufacturing jobs.

When asked how he would decrease the cost of groceries, Trump descended into a rant about windmills. He got there by promising that he would reduce the price of groceries by cutting energy costs by 50% in the first year of his term as president. Of course, presidents have virtually no power to regulate energy prices, which are set by global market conditions. That is the type of answer that the NYTimes described as “meandering” when the correct description was “bonkers.”

Trump said that global warming would be good for Michigan because people in that state would have “more beachfront property.” Trump meant his comment to be a joke, showing that he has no conception of how global warming threatens the United States.

Trump said that the US could become energy self-sufficient because the US has “Bagram” in Alaska, which he claimed “is bigger than Saudi Arabia.” Bagram was a US military airbase in Afghanistan and has no connection to Alaska or oil production.

Most of Trump's other remarks were impossible to follow and often ended by discussing a subject far afield from the question. It was a performance indicative ongoing mental decline. No wonder he is afraid to debate Kamala Harris a second time!

[Robert B. Hubbell Newsletter]

[tonguetyd]

literally annoyed that all coastal states (including my dumb glove shaped state) aren't 90% hydro/wind

i might not be an engineer but i am with you there

*drags soapbox out and jumps on top*

DO YOU KNOW HOW INFURIATING IT IS TO HAVE EVERYONE SAY “ELECTRIFY EVERYTHING” KNOWING FULL GODDAMN WELL THAT THE GRID 1) CANNOT SUPPORT IT AND 2) IS DRASTICALLY NOT BASED ON RENEWABLE ENERGY?!?!?!

Don’t get me wrong I love electric cars, I love heat pump systems, I love buildings and homes that can say they are fossil fuel free! Really! I do!

But it means FUCK ALL when you have!!!! Said electricity!!!! Sourced by fossil fuels!!!! I said this in my tags on the other post but New York City! Was operating on *COAL*!!!!! Up until like 5 years ago.

WE ARE SITTING IN THE MIDDLE OF A RIVER.

Not to mention the ocean which like. You ever been to the beach?! You know what there’s a whole hell of a lot of at the beach? Wind!!!!!!!! And yet we have literal campaigns saying “save our oceans! Say no to wind power!”

Idk bruh I feel like the fish are gonna be less happy in a boiling ocean than needing to swim around a giant turbine but. I’m not a fuckin fish so.

NOT TO MENTION (I am fully waving my hands around like a crazy person because this is the main thing that gets me going)

THE ELECTRICAL GRID OF THE UNITED STATES HAS NOT BEEN UPDATED ON LARGE SCALE LEVELS SINCE IT WAS BUILT IN THE 1950s AND 60s.

It is not DESIGNED to handle every building in the city of [random map location] Chicago being off of gas and completely electrified. It’s not!!! The plants cannot handle it as now!

So not only do we not have renewable sources because somebody in Iowa doesn’t want to replace their corn field with a solar field/a rich Long Islander doesn’t want to replace their ocean view with a wind turbine! We also are actively encouraging people to put MORE of a strain on the grid with NO FUCKING SOLUTION TO MEET THAT DEMAND!

I used to deal with this *all* the time in my old job when I was working with smaller building - they ALWAYS needed an electrical upgrade from the street and like. The utility only has so many wires going to that building. And it’s not planning on bringing in more for the most part!

(I am now vibrating with rage) and THEN you have the fuckin AI bros! Who have their data centers in the middle of nowhere because that’s a great place to have a lot of servers that you need right? Yeah sure, you know what those places don’t have? ELECTRICAL INFRASTRUCTURE TO SUPPORT THE STUPID AMOUNT OF POWER AI NEEDS!!!!!!!

Now the obvious solution is that the AI bros of Google and Microsoft and whoever the fuck just use their BILLIONS OF FUCKING DOLLARS IN PROFIT to be good neighbors and upgrade the fucking systems because truly what is the downside to that everybody fucking wins!

But what do I know. I’m just friendly neighborhood engineer.

*hops down from soapbox*

[baelpenrose]

Nihilus Rex 27: Mind Games

Nils and Lash have some nice, healthy communication. Also, more jokes about mind games and preparation to deal with their enemy, rival and possible ally. As a behind the scenes note, yes, Ottendorf, Altendorf, and Altdorf are all real variants of the same type of cipher, and me and @canyouhearthelight arguing about which one was most in character to use was actually part of the gag that just went into this chapter. Sometimes it's fun writing hopelessly OP characters where we just get to nod obliquely at all the shit our nerdy asses have picked up over the years.

You better be careful what you do

I wouldn't wanna be in your shoes

If they ever found you out

You better be careful what you say

It never really added up anyway

I got friends in this town

Miranda Lambert, “White Liar” 

Nils

Class was boring - I mean, it would have been interesting, especially the political debate that came inherent in the macroeconomic discussion of regulation - but frankly with everything else going on and the plans Lash and I were hatching it felt almost beneath notice. Like a waste of time before we got to the real action.

Our weeb friend was a smarmy son of a bitch, I had to give him that, and trying to trace him took work -  one of the other reasons that I was just as happy to use the challenge and draw him to us. If it worked, it let us keep flying under the radar and gave us a layer of plausible deniability, and if worst came to worst it handed us a convenient option for another patsy if he proved less than tractable.  Lash and I would have to be careful in our eventual conversation with him in how we phrased everything to make sure statements could be read to assume that he was pissed that we were taking credit for his ideas to set it up properly, but it could be done with good planning. Recruit if we could, cash out the option to get the Feds off our backs if we couldn’t - because we were going to need to deal with the fibbie at some point either way.

I shared the thought with Lash to get her thoughts, and see if we could begin establishing how we wanted to lay in that contingency. “Hey, so it occurs to me, if we can’t recruit this guy, we may want to have some kind of setup to feed him to the feds when we encounter him, let them think we were just doing some dumb, edgy marketing for our totally-legal activism and the actual ‘economic terrorist’ got pissed at us for trying to take the credit. If we can’t get him on our side, better not to have him in the way, right?” 

She looked thoughtful for a moment - or more accurately, like she was plotting - before asking slowly, “How likely would we be to frame him for some of the shit we’ve done? Even just stuff we did before we met?”

“I’d have to look at his profile a little more closely, but bear in mind that the hack itself doesn’t really match the profile of either of our usual patterns, and nothing we did before that rises to the level where the federal government cares enough to pay attention.” 

“I took money from Microsoft and donated it to charity,” she pointed out. “Repeatedly.  That would definitely land on the news, at least.”

“Right,” I said, taking a breath, trying to steady myself, “and let’s not get into my thefts from social media and various databombings on their harvested userdata, BUT that followed a very different profile than the bank job, which is what we knew drew their attention - they’re looking for the people who’d run the bank job, not people who are little more than thieving horseflies buzzing around the heads of corporate titans and taking a few drops here and there that said corporations never notice enough to report.” It was an unpleasant truth - we’d stolen probably tens of thousands between us, but not all at once, and in increments that the corporations we’d robbed could lose to rounding error. 

“Hey, you said you wanted him fed to the Fed, not to go down for the loans,” she shrugged. “Wire fraud across state lines is still FBI-worthy.  Not to mention that many counts.” Lash started silently ticking off on her fingers before staring at them and nodding. “Yeah, plenty of counts, for sure.”

“Fair. I’m worried they’re looking for the bank robbers and we have someone we can give them as a patsy. So when we meet with him, let’s feel him out and make sure any statements we have are set up so they can be misread as him trying to find out if we’re stealing credit for his work, yeah?” 

“Can do.” She snapped off a sarcastic salute before grabbing my elbow and semi-forcing me to slow down. “Either way, our ‘viral marketing campaign’ is ready to go as soon as you set up the location for the final clue.  So, make sure your sandbox is as secure as possible so we don’t get any bugs in there.”

I nodded. “Yeah. I’ll have it ready in an hour. Want me to order some pizza while I do it?”  I had an extra tab open while I was getting the proxy networks set up and sketching out the ciphers for the clues.

“One meat lovers, one spinach and bacon, coming up,” she agreed, pulling out her phone. “Don’t forget to write down the address for me once it’s ready so I can translate it a couple times and hide it in the last clue.”

“Yeah, babe, I know, we’ve been picking at this for a minute.” I said, softly smiling. I wondered if she knew she talked to me the way her mom talked to her dad. I had almost finished the third cipher we were going to be doing it with. “Think three will be enough, or should we do four? At five it feels obnoxious, but if he wasn’t too paranoid to be hooked with fewer than three, he’d be a piece, not a player.” 

“Forty five minutes until food,” Lash announced before looking up. “I’m going to translate it at least twice - once to hex and once to… I dunno, a sound frequency maybe? So four should be fine on your end for the ciphers.”

“You got it. Altdorf code it is.” 

“Altendorf,” she corrected, scrunching her face at what she thought was a deliberate mistake on my part.

“Nope. Altdorf. Right wing computer nut, probably also a gamer. Altdorf code is a memetic variant on the classic Altendorf book cipher, named for a thing in a game franchise popular with that crowd.” I replied, smirking. Dating a girl who knew as much cryptography as I did was a blast, but it was occasionally fun to flex on each other. Loved it when she caught me out, as she often did, but it was sometimes fun to catch her off too. 

“Freaking nerd,” she half-mumbled, knowing good and well I would hear her. “But if it works, it works.  Provided he figures out all the clues I’m laying out.”

“And then we put all this effort into this to show off for each other for nothing…” I muttered, watching her work over what she did as I finished up selecting a handful of games, books, and comics to cipher off of, with arc numbers for each and internally contained clues within the cipher to hint at what the target should be using for the Altdorf code. Nonsensical to anyone who didn’t understand it, but comprehensible to anyone who did - if you understood the rest of the cyphers it was under, of course. 

“Ew, eyewatering,” she grunted before adjusting something. It must have worked, because she was able to actually look at the screen when she was done. “And now for the clouds…”

“Those clouds look awful.” I said, idly thinking out loud. “Really bloated, data-wise.” 

“That would be because they are compressed audio tracks,” she confirmed. “Which, when unzipped and played, give the hex code.  But yeah, they’re ugly, aren’t they?” The door buzzed and she looked at her phone. “Pizza’s here.”

“Ah.” I stood up and got the pizza, tipping the guy. After he left I turned back to Lash. “So, now we wait. Trap is baited and set with a challenge for a new ally or an enemy we can get rid of quickly. Speaking of the question as to what we do if he is a new ally: thoughts on how we get rid of the fed? She’s poking around the white supremacist scene, and stirring them up harder might lead to more of them poking around if she gets shot.” 

Lash rubbed her face before getting up to get plates. “My first instinct is to lay low and monitor.  Right now, there’s no actual evidence tying us to the situation, so monitoring would be the most conservative and safest call in the immediate future.  And it gives us time to plan something in the event we do need to intervene.”

I nodded as I poured drinks for both of us. “Yeah. Fair point. Give him about two days, then we’ll meet him together. Two options, either he thinks the whole made up names thing is actually bullshit, in which case he’ll want to meet both of the people he’s working with and we can establish a triumvirate, or he thinks it’s for real and is playing like he thinks it's dumb, then he’ll want to meet with the heads of both groups, which means we’ll need you there to rep one of them. What angles we play depends on what angle he hits us with.” I was still thinking about the way we could feel that out while also maintaining the option to sacrifice him and dispose of him to the feds if he wasn’t amicable to a team up, but honestly that was mostly just a matter of careful phrasing. 

“If it comes to that, as long as I am repping the Icono-whatsits, I’m good.”

“No, I thought we’d have the brown, anarchic immigrant’s daughter represent the carefully crafted illusion of the violently traditionalist ones who want to restore ‘traditional values’ because that would totally make the con hold up. Tell you what, when we take it global, and we have to do this in India, THEN we swap roles and you have to play a Hindutava nationalist and pretend to be a Disciple chick. For today, the heel role is mine.” 

She set her plate down with a loud clatter, glaring at me as she stood up. “And on that completely uncalled-for note, I think I need to head home for a few days.  Let me know if he gets in contact, and we’ll go from there.”

I sighed, realizing what I’d done wrong, then felt a surprising flash of irritation - at her, at myself, at the fact that every time we started getting closer I said something obnoxious and that we never just got a few weeks without some shit happening. “You know what? Yeah. I’m sorry. That was unnecessarily rude. If you want to go home, I get it, but please eat first, or at least take some pizza with you. I shouldn’t have been that much of an asshole - I’ve been jittery since the Fed showed up, and I shouldn’t be taking it out on you. Know you can’t pass yourself off as a white supremacist, I mostly wanted to joke around about the fact that as this goes global, we may have to practice swapping roles for other countries. That’s all.” 

Lash took a deep breath and picked up one of the pizza boxes. “I know it will eventually be necessary for me to be the bad guy, but seriously. What part of this,” she waved a hand over herself, stopping to gesture emphatically at her face, “in any way says I won’t just blow our entire ass cover if I try to be a white supremacist? It’s not like I’m shirking work or something.”  The free hand shoved her hair back and she exhaled. “I think we just need a couple days to get actual sleep and calm down.”

“You aren’t shirking work, I know.” I said, trying to take a breath. “I’ve just been…I’ve been constantly trying to figure out every possible angle we can take this from, because I want to keep us out of trouble and keep the feds away, keep this prick away from your family, keep everything under control. I said something sarcastic that I thought was funny because yeah, obviously this,” I gestured at her, “was not going to be playing the white supremacist, this,” I gestured at my own face, “was. And I wasn’t looking forward to it. And it isn’t your fault I’ve been obsessively plotting, I haven’t been telling you all of it, but it’s been all of the babbling about contingencies I’ve been doing since the fed arrived. Because I’ve been afraid. And I shouldn’t have taken it out on you.” True, but I did also want her to see my perspective of how much effort I was putting into this whole thing.  “And if you need me to give you a ride home tonight, I will, but seriously take a pizza. Because it’s too late for you to be walking home.” 

The pizza box in her hand dropped back to the table and she growled in frustration. “UGH! And all the shit with Uber and taxis lately…” She fell back into what had become her seat on the couch. “Fine. But I’m sleeping out here. In clothes, so don’t get any ideas, buster.”

“We didn’t have time to go mattress topper shopping, so you’ll probably sleep better, and I’m insisting on plenty of blankets. And you’re eating your share of pizza.” I shrugged. “And even my Catholic ass won’t feel guilty about you being too damn stubborn to take a ride I’m offering.” 

“No ride. I refuse to owe you,” she spat before biting viciously into a slice of pizza, shoving half of it into her mouth without a trace of grace.

“And thus, couch, blankets, and coping aplenty.” I said, sitting down. “You okay, Lash?”

“I am sleep deprived, stressed about the apartment being ready when my parents are discharged next week despite knowing that Mori has had it ready since the day after she got here, and I’m mad at you for being a jerk.”

“Mori took care of the apartment, you know it, you know you know it. You’re going to sleep better tonight, and I’m sorry for being a dick.” I said, coaxingly. “Things are going to be alright. Let’s eat, brush our teeth, then we can rack out, okay?” 

“Fine,” she muttered, demolishing another slice of pizza.

I wasn’t certain what it said about my life - or life, in general - that “relationship issues” were causing me slightly more confusion and headaches than “FBI investigation” and “rival terrorist” combined. It definitely said something, but I wasn’t entirely certain what. Maybe it was a me problem. Maybe if I wasn’t dating someone who would do terrorism with me I wouldn’t have this problem.

But then it wouldn’t be worth it. 

[thefirstknife]

I'd honestly rather see TFS delayed *further* than see the employees have to crunch, especially crunch for an extended period of time. Or have to rework or cut massive amounts of content. It's the finale of the arc, and is probably going to be a deciding factor for many if they stick with the series or bow out once the arc is finished. I'd really rather they be given enough time especially now to compensate for all the layoffs

Yeah same. I'd gladly wait longer to make sure that the remaining staff isn't overworked and pushed over their limits.

Genuinely devastating for everyone here. People who were laid off put everything into their work, for years. Who knows how many people were ripped out of projects in the middle of development. And then those that remain have to continue, with a lack of people, completely demoralised, but they have to push on because this is the finale of something both the devs worked on for a decade and the players have been looking forward to for a decade. Like, how do you even continue working in these conditions.

And the worst is, they have to. Destiny is the only thing making money for Bungie. They have no other games. Until Marathon comes out and is successful enough, they can't let go of Destiny. So there has to be something going on for Destiny even after TFS, and I just don't know how they'll manage that. I definitely don't want the remaining employees to be put into horrible working conditions to make the only content that finances Bungie.

Also, I doubt that we'll ever know the details of how this happened. Sony must be a big part of this, but I don't want to let Bungie off the hook here. Just to make that clear. People have spoken about poor management at the top (one of the first who said this was A_Dmg) which makes sense given how INSANE it is for Bungie to put themselves into a situation where they have no say and no control over this. Even if the decision for layoffs came straight from Sony, the fact that Bungie has no agency to say no means that the deal some execs willingly signed with Sony was bad. Either they willingly signed a bad deal or they're fully responsible for layoffs. It comes down to the same thing essentially. No matter how bad this is from Sony's part, Bungie entered this contract with them, even after bad experiences with two previous corpos (seen people commenting how they should've stayed with Microsoft or Activision, and like I'm sorry but both of those corpos also had massive layoffs too. There's no difference).

I'm sure we'll know more in the coming months. For now, I'd recommend not to stress too much about something that may or may not happen. If you're unsure about any future content, just don't buy it until we know more. There's no need to preorder, though I'm currently not sure if former/remaining employees have made any comments about how cancelling preorders might affect them. I'm a little wary of advocating for cancelling preorders simply because I'm concerned for how this might affect the remaining workers. I'd definitely hold off from it for now until we know something more, but it's up to anyone. If you're unsure about where this is going, don't rush into any purchase. Emotions are super high right now and everyone is anxious and disappointed. I'd recommend letting things cool down a little first since it's not even been 24 hours.

It would genuinely be absolutely bizarre for Sony or Bungie or both of them to suddenly decide they're pulling the plug on an insanely successful game that makes them money actively. Like purely from a business perspective of a greedy capitalist, there's no sense or logic in all of this being a way to just end the game while it's still making bucks. Especially since they're working on another game that won't be done until (projected) 2025.

And finally, video game industry needs unions, NOW.

[andmaybegayer]

So my hope, eventually, is to have my own purpose-built computer which is an expandable skeleton and will more-or-less never need to be entirely tossed out, only supplanted/upgraded Ship of Theseus style.

However, Microsoft is getting a bit too uppity for my tastes, and I hope to mainly run Linux on that eventual computer.

However, I'm also a gaming man, and I recognize that, in many cases, Linux kinda sucks for games, or, at least, that's what I've heard. Emulation is also a pain I'd rather not deal with (both of Windows and of games themselves), and so, for games that don't support Linux, I'd like to have the option of having Windows on the same machine, so that I can run Linux most of the time, but switch to Windows whenever I wanna play games.

My question is how realistic is that? I know that machines with multiple OS's exist, and you can choose which one you want at boot, but I'm hoping for this to be an extremely fancy computer, connected to a lot of extremely fancy computer peripherals. Would switching OS's without power cycling the machine screw with the other hardware? Is it even possible, or would you need to power cycle it in any case? Is there any way to build this hypothetical computer, or am I asking too much/investing too much effort? Would it be easier/better to just build a really good Windows machine and a really good Linux machine?

So the use case you're talking about is pretty popular among a certain kinds of Tech Nerd, and most of them solve it with iommu GPU Passthrough and a windows VM on Linux. I knew a few people doing this back in like 2018 and while it's a little fidgety it's fairly reliable.

You can't share GPU's the way you can share CPU and Memory. Not on consumer hardware, anyway. So if you want to run a VM with windows with a gaming GPU, it needs its own entire GPU just for that.

The basic layout is this: Build a normal high end system with a lot of extra resources, say, 32+GB of RAM, 10+ CPU cores, a couple terabytes of storage, and two separate GPU's. Run Linux on the system, as your host, and only use one of the GPU's. Create a VM on the host under qemu and hand it 16GB of RAM, 6 cores, a terabyte or two of storage, and use iommu to pass it the other GPU. Now use software like LookingGlass to capture the framebuffer directly off the Windows GPU and forward it to your Linux GPU, so that you can display your windows system inside Linux seamlessly.

Now, you do need two GPU's, so it can get expensive. A lot of people choose to run one higher end GPU for windows and a basic GPU for Linux, but that's up to your use case. You can run two identical GPU's if you wish.

The main place this kind of thing is being tinkered with is the Level1Techs forum, Wendell is a big advocate of GPU virtualization and so has aggregated a lot of information and people with relevance here. He also makes a lot of video stuff on IOMMU.

So I have to have two whole GPU's?

Kind of. There ARE ways to live-reset a running GPU which allows you to do tricks where you can swap a single GPU between the host and the VM without rebooting, but it's extremely dubious and flaky. Virtualized GPU partitioning exists but only on extremely expensive server GPU's aimed at virtualization servers for enterprise so it's well outside of our price range.

If you're interested in single-GPU, there is ongoing work getting it to run on consumer hardware on the Level1Techs forum and he's even running some kind of Hackathon on it, but even the people having success with this have pretty unreliable systems.

https://forum.level1techs.com/t/vfio-passthrough-in-2023-call-to-arms/199671

This setup works fine maybe 25% of the time. I can always start the VM just fine, my linux desktop stays active and any software launched after the VM gets the GPU will render on the iGPU without issues. However I suffer from the reset bug, and 75% of the time shutting down the VM won’t return the GPU to Linux and I have to reboot to fix that.

I'm quite satisfied with this setup.

Is this a good idea

It depends on what you need and how willing you are to switch between the host and VM. A LOT more things run smoothly on Linux these days. Wendell started tinkering with IOMMU back in like 2015, and I started gaming on Linux back in 2016. If you had native software, great! Without that, well, good luck with anything less than five years old.

I played Burnout Paradise and even Subnautica on my 750Ti laptop on plain old Wine, and then DXVK came out in 2018 and the world got flipped turned upside down and I have video of me running Warframe on Linux with that same mediocre system a few weeks before Proton hit the scene and we got flipped turned... right way up? Now with Proton I would say most things run pretty well under a mixture of automatic steam stuff and scripts off lutris and homemade WINEPREFIXes.

That said, if you want everything to Just Work, it's hard to beat a VM. I'm not sure how competitive games run, but for everything else a VM is going to be more reliable than WINE.

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[douchebagbrainwaves]

EVERY FOUNDER SHOULD KNOW ABOUT WAS

But if angel investors become more active and better known, they'll increasingly be able to reach most of the changes will be for the better. You can use that target growth rate. Ditto for PayPal. Are there zero users who really love you, but they know better than to be friends with the people whose discoveries will make them so. A few steps down from the top. Professors have to publish novel results to advance their careers, but there won't be many of them. When we cook one up we're not always 100% sure which kind it is. So the deals take longer, dilute you more, and impose more onerous conditions. They'll just have become a different, more conservative, type of investment. C was written by people who needed it for systems programming. But I could be wrong. What you're really doing when you start to see growth, they claim they were your friend all along, and are aghast at the thought of a 30% success rate at fundraising makes my stomach clench.

Being around bad people would be intolerable. And it's true, the benefit that specific manager could derive from the forces I've described. Jessica Livingston, Robert Morris, Eric Raymond, Guido van Rossum, David Weinberger, and Steven Wolfram for reading drafts of this. But only about 10% of the time we could find at least one good name in a 20 minute office hour slot. Actually what they need to do two things, one of the keys to retaining their monopoly. And so ten years ago, he could teach him some new things; if a psychologist met a colleague from 100 years ago, writing software pretty much meant writing software in C or Perl. Now we needed to stay alive.

We'll probably never be able to match. I think hiring people is the worst thing a company can do. Hacking is something you do with it. Because they haven't tried to control it too much, Twitter feels to everyone like previous protocols. Nearly all your attachment to it comes from it being attached to you. Why programmers, more than dentists or salesmen or landscapers? So why did they even evolve? For example, the Honeywell thermostats in my house have the most atrocious UI. Barbershops are doing fine in the a department. Imagine the obelisk of startups. And now that I'm an investor, the thought of our startups keeps me up at night. The process inherently tends to produce an unpleasant result, like a student who hasn't prepared for an exam.

To be self-funding—Microsoft for example—but most aren't. You just try to get people to pay you for stuff. Investors' opinions are explicitly tested: startups come to them and they have started to use it? You're better off avoiding these. That's true. A rounds creep inexorably downward. That's nonsense. They're increasingly rare, and they're going to get rarer. The company being sold.

But the way they write software. How much is that extra attention worth? To the popular press, hacker means someone who breaks into computers. The founders can't enrich themselves without also enriching the investors. People don't do hard things gratuitously; no one will work on a harder problem unless it is proportionately or at least to know what an n 2 algorithm is if you want to avoid writing them. In fact many of the people who had them to continue thinking about. Fortunately if this does happen it will take years. And when the Mac appeared, it was obvious that rapid development would be important in this market. Was there a connection?

In a world of small companies, performance is all anyone cares about. It must once have been inhabited by someone fairly eccentric, because a lot of investors hated the idea, but they don't need as much of the innovation is unconscious. You know what a throwaway program is: something you write quickly for some limited task. This may not be easy, because a they may be, but more a way of predicting performance. Civil liberties make countries rich. One thing it means is that at least 20-25% of the code in this program is doing things that you can't be pointed off to the side and hope to succeed. A round.

[head-post]

Largest global IT outage in history did not affect Russia

A global technology outage caused by a software update from US cybersecurity company Crowdstrike caused chaos around the world on Friday, with flights suspended and healthcare, banking and ground transport systems facing major disruptions.

George Kurtz, president and CEO of Crowdstrike, said Friday morning that the company is “actively working with customers affected by a flaw discovered in one content update for Windows hosts” – a glitch that affected Microsoft users around the world. He also added:

“This is not a security incident or cyberattack. The issue has been identified, isolated, and a fix has been deployed. We refer customers to the support portal for the latest updates and will continue to provide complete and continuous updates on our website. We further recommend organisations ensure they’re communicating with CrowdStrike representatives through official channels. Our team is fully mobilised to ensure the security and stability of CrowdStrike customers.”

The Financial Times explained that Crowdstrike is “one of the world’s largest providers of “endpoint” security software, used by companies to monitor for security problems across a huge range of devices, from desktop PCs to checkout payment terminals.”

Troy Hunt, a security consultant, wrote on social media that “this will be the largest IT outage in history.” He also added:

“This is basically what we were all worried about with Y2K, except it’s actually happened this time.”

The impacts of the outage cascaded rapidly. Wired noted that “in the early hours of Friday, companies in Australia running Microsoft’s Windows operating system started reporting devices showing Blue Screens of Death (BSODs).” It continued:

“Shortly after, reports of disruptions started flooding in from around the world, including from the UK, India, Germany, the Netherlands, and the US: TV station Sky News went offline, and US airlines United, Delta, and American Airlines issued a “global ground stop” on all flights.”

The UK has been hit by a glitch

As The New York Times observed, the National Health Service in the United Kingdom “was crippled throughout the morning on Friday, as a number of hospitals and doctors offices lost access to their computer systems.”

Whitehall crisis officials were coordinating the response through the Cobra committee that deals with matters of national emergency or major disruption. Ministers were in touch with their sectors to tackle the fallout from the IT failure, and the transport secretary, Louise Haigh, said she was working “at pace with industry” after trains and flights were affected, The Guardian reported.

In the US, flights were grounded owing to communications problems that appear to be linked to the outage. American Airlines, Delta and United Airlines were among the carriers affected. Berlin airport temporarily halted all flights on Friday, while in Australia, Melbourne airport advised customers it was “experiencing a global technology issue which is impacting check-in procedures for some airlines.”

Global flight cancellations

There had been more than 1,000 flight cancellations worldwide so far due to the IT failure, according to the aviation analysis firm Cirium.

Long lines formed at airports in Asia as airlines lost access to check-in and booking services at a time when many travelers are heading away on summer vacations. News outlets in Australia — where telecommunications were severely affected — were pushed off air for hours. Hospitals and doctor’s offices had problems with their appointment systems, while banks in South Africa and New Zealand reported outages to their payment system or websites and apps.

At Hong Kong’s airport, Yvonne Lee, 24, said she only found out her flight to Phuket in Thailand was postponed to Saturday when she arrived at the airport, saying the way it was handled would “affect the image of Hong Kong’s airport very much.” Her already short five-day trip would now have to be further shortened, she said.

In India, Hong Kong and Thailand, many airlines were forced to manually check in passengers. An airline in Kenya was also reporting disruption.

Some athletes and spectators descending on Paris ahead of the Olympics were delayed as was the arrival of their uniforms and accreditations, but Games organisers said disruptions were limited and didn’t affect ticketing or the torch relay.

In Germany, Berlin-Brandenburg Airport halted flights for several hours due to difficulties in checking in passengers, while landings at Zurich airport were suspended and flights in Hungary, Italy and Turkey disrupted.

The Dutch carrier KLM said it had been “forced to suspend most” of its operations.

Amsterdam’s Schiphol Airport warned that the outage was having a “major impact on flights” to and from the busy European hub. The chaotic morning coincided with one of the busiest days of the year for Schiphol.

Israel said its hospitals and post office operations were disrupted.

In South Africa, at least one major bank said it was experiencing nationwide service disruptions as customers reported they were unable to make payments using their bank cards in stores. The New Zealand banks ASB and Kiwibank said their services were down as well.

Shipping was disrupted too: A major container hub in the Baltic port of Gdansk, Poland, the Baltic Hub, said it was battling problems resulting from the global system outage.

Russia was unaffected by the outage

Meanwhile, Russia was less affected by this outage, mainly due to sanctions, import substitution strategy and technological sovereignty.

The global IT failure of devices running the Windows 10 operating system did not affect the operation of Russian airports and airlines, with flights running as scheduled. There are no problems with the information systems of Russian Railways.

“Rosatom” reported that the systems of the concern “Rosenergoatom” work on “import-independent software,” so there are no problems in operation. The disruption in Microsoft’s work will not affect the operation of Russia’s energy system in any way, the agency said.

Read more HERE

[mlobsters]

supernatural s10e1 black (w. jeremy carver)

this show started airing when i was 25 and i wonder how i would have received it then. anyway, was appreciating that i don't have to wait to find out what the demon!dean fallout will be. ...actually i don't think i'm up for this today. tbc

the sam that dean was expecting while he was in purgatory

so is this a padalecki injury or a sam injury? he (jared) seems pretty accident prone. i'm in a rather dismal mood, might need to push this off to day 3.

all right we're back, third time's a charm! with a worse-than-usual migraine. i think that's part of why i was feeling so irritable and shitty yesterday evening. prodromal situation

.asp made me giggle. first job doing web development stuff, i did asp back in 2000/2001.

Active Server Pages (ASP) is Microsoft's first server-side scripting language and engine for dynamic web pages. It was first released in December 1996, before being superseded in January 2002 by ASP.NET.

okay, drama

CASTIEL I can help. SAM Cas...we tried that. CASTIEL Sam...you can't blame what that demon did to your shoulder on me; you were out of... SAM I'm not, I'm not blaming anything on you. What happened, happened, and...you need to be worrying about yourself. I really shouldn't have bothered you.

cas has got the heavenly tuberculosis now too. if tumblr's search wasn't broken i'd link to my post where i think i called the... trials that? maybe

SAM Good. I'm alright. I'm just...tired, you know. Be better when we get him back...after...after I kick his butt. CASTIEL I miss him.

this is where you say "me too", sam. also

CASTIEL Well then, who wrote the note? If there's any chance...any chance at all that Dean is still... SAM Still...even remotely Dean?

and then he just hangs up? i laughed. were you raised in a barn, sam??? (i mean.) say goodbye :p

oh no. nonono. i cannot deal with dean singing badly. i really dislike this tonal whiplash that seems more common in these later seasons. big serious feelings then straight into ha ha bad singing, witty banter with the lady and crowley, extremely cheesy western standoff music and acting over foosball.

is this what crowley wants to do with dean? replace sam? definitely isn't going to be beating the simp charges if that is actually the case. please be slightly more complicated in motivation, crowley, i know you have it in you

is demon!dean's voice even lower?

she reminds me of a mix between samantha smith (mary winchester) and katie cassidy (og ruby, my fave). maybe this is the same problem i have with blond guys. all occupy the same spot in the brain

funny how parting his hair makes him look so different. it's a good look on him with it ruffled up

sam of course has a new haircut, not my favorite. kind of a weird bob in the back

i know they're committed to the classic car bit, but that yacht cas is driving must get like 5mpg. lol this site where you can report actual usage, only 2 people with similar models - one person getting around 8mpg, other 10

laughed out loud. handy they put the little hashtag viva abaddon on their message to have sam conveniently stumble upon

CROWLEY Moose. Took you long enough. Your brother and I were beginning to wonder if you'd hit another dog. You know?

ooh burn

SAM I don't know how you did this, what kind of... Black-magic stunt you pulled, but hear me --I will save my brother or die trying. CROWLEY You know what tickles me about all this? It's what's really eating you up. You don't care that he's a demon. Heck, you've been a demon. We've all been demons. No, it's that he's with me and he's having the time of his life. You can't stand the fact that he's mine.

um, ok

SAM He's not your pet. CROWLEY My pet? He's my best friend, my partner in crime. They'll write songs about us, graphic novels. “The Misadventures of Growley and Squirrel." Dean Winchester completes me, and that's what makes you lose your chickens.

tough but fair

boop boop tracking

oh nic, you thought the heavenly politics plotline was done, sweet summer child

DEAN Okay, see, the deal was we howl at the moon -- no time stamp, no expiration date. CROWLEY We've howled. We've bayed. We've done extraordinary things to triplets, all of which have been massively entertaining. I will treasure our Flickr albums forever.

porn of dean with crowley and triplets, okay. that's... a lot

CROWLEY Think of it --the king of hell, Dean Winchester by his side. Together we rule. Together we create the perfect hell. And all of this that's bloomed between us never ends. We're not ending the party. We're just moving the party. Out with the club circuit, in with the stadium tour.

all right so he's tolerating dean's hot demon summer earthly antics but really just wants dean to be his knight in hell

DEAN He traced the call. CROWLEY My bad. I guess he'll be here by morning -- the latest. DEAN You sold me out. Well, that's just lovely. CROWLEY I don't know what's going on with you. I truly don't. But I've had just about enough of it. Sold you out? Try “doing you a favor.” everything I've done for you for the past six months -- the mark, the First Blade, midwifing you back to life, offering you a seat by my side -- has been a favor, a gift, whether you see it or you don't. Take the night. Decide. You know where to find me.

midwifing mhmm.

i'm vaguely aware of some stuff that happens between sam and demon!dean but i don't know the timeline per usual. though i did sneak a look at something so i know when it ends episode-wise

feel like we (i) need a comparison chart of soulless vs moc!demonization

more karaoke? please. 😩 this little drama with the woman from the roadhouse, i guess they're trying to show facets of how he's different and how he's not? like there must be part of him still in there if he suggests they go somewhere together?

and sam's kidnapped, okay. insert me complaining about too much shit happening. there's some little guitar riffs in this scene that remind me of twilight, hard. i thought it was in the scene where edward comes racing in to save bella from getting assaulted with his fancy volvo moves, but wasn't. not worth trying to dig up i'm sure

DEAN No, you listen to me. There's no trade. There's no meet-up. There's no nothing -- except the 100% guarantee that, somewhere down the road, I will find you, and I will kill you. COLE Well, that'll be a cold comfort to your dead brother. DEAN I told him to let me go. So whatever jam he's in now, that is his problem. COLE Yeah, well, I'll be sure to pass that on to him as I'm slitting his throat. DEAN Yeah, you do that, 'cause he knows me. And he knows damn sure that if I am one thing, I am a man of my word.

i dunno. i can see how this should be fun, in theory. i am not feeling it and it feels like a pacing plus the couldn't-care-less angel stuff being wedged in issue. and/or i'm extra weary of inter(intra)brother stress

almost prolonged this to 4 days because i can't shut up and it's late

[scarletanpan]

…

That remote-connection-required GitHub program for my school work had me tweaking so hard i. Impulse bought a laptop yesterday. I have been trying to get one for a few years for school bc my tower is so old and struggles and it’d be nice to be able to take my computer anywhere else so I’m not at home 24/7 bc that’s been killing me for years so like. Had to dig into my savings but it’s still a cheap laptop I just needed it to have decent functionality and after being completely unable to get into it without connecting my Microsoft account I then spent hours uninstalling useless programs and turning off all the dumb sponsors and notifications and random ui features that look atrocious bc I forgot windows 11 existed I was still on 10.

This shit fucking sucks so bad every ten seconds Microsoft is begging u to give them every ounce of your information like it’s not even funny. It’s v easy to click into connecting everything u own to ur computer and like i really don’t care if it’s useful go ahead, but like I’m not tryna do all that. Like can I not just. Use the computer?? Maybe without the system constantly saying how much worse my experience is without one. Like no offense I doubt there’s regulations bc no one would think to fucking do it but it should not be legal to require users to sign up to a service to access their own fucking computer they bought. It literally says if u want to use a local account u can, but after u sign in. So now even tho I’ve tried to delete every trace of my email and removed the original account microsoft edge prompts me with it for sign-in when I open it and no option to delete. So they still have my info even tho I didn’t want to give it to them

And ofc they’re a tech company they need data from users to function but if u don’t glance in the settings there’s a lot of extra ones, to the point that I had to take a break from reading them. Like there’s that fucking many and the ui does way too much back and forth that makes it genuinely exhausting to navigate which is. Interesting

The part that frustrates me the most is that there are now so many random buttons and links on the sidebar every single program in order to redirect to some other microsoft-related features that I can barely tell what I’m navigating sometimes. Everything looks the fucking same, I’m trapped in a fucking soft-edge minimalist window nightmare and it makes me nauseous i think

Might be the only one who feels this way but spending a few hundreds dollars on a brand new computer and then logging in to see the desktop covered with every single possible program (or phone app) u might ever want or need transmuted into this bare, technically functional microsoft void that’s still somehow missing most basic features any active user would need and also can’t be uninstalled w/o settings windows 10 and 11 intentionally removed makes me want to crumble into a ball and die maybe. It’s not hard to add it back but. Just baffling how manipulative the design of the entire system is like. This computer hates my fucking guts for not using its features

Oh and the github shit didn’t work either. Just got to watch it rebuild faster. One of the tech guys on my support case told me the move to github was a v sudden deployment they were rushed into and has lead to tons of issues like this. Which of course, I assumed bc it was Not like this last semester but wow. Love to see tech companies fucking over their workers and the quality of their platform for a deal. Like why is tech annoying and depressing and fucking me in so many ways this isn’t good for my future which I hoped would be tech-centered. It will be anyway I just know I’m gonna be mad abt the stupid fucking ways ppl run their businesses the whole time