2024-10-10

the Raccoon Army Rises, pedofiles, dead pilot, lights & storms. illicit Iceland, right wing "moral panic", breaking Google, privacy via spyware, he aint Satoshi, many funny money, Walz twitches

etc

• More than 100 raccoons besiege house of woman who had been feeding them

  trapped in her home near Poulsbo, Washington, and scared as the animals can be aggressive. She called the sheriff’s office, saying the raccoons were around her place day and night after their population “exploded” about six weeks ago.

  • Woman calls 911 as home is surrounded by over 100 raccoons | 9news.com

  "They had never seen that many raccoons in one place. Nobody ever remembers being surrounded by a swarm of raccoons. This was a first."

• there's an insane amount of pedophiles

  This is one of those rare breaches that has concerned me to the extent that I felt it necessary to flag with friends in law enforcement. To quote the person that sent me the breach: "If you grep through it there's an insane amount of pedophiles".

  there's the assertion that people use disposable email addresses for things like this not linked to their real identities. Sometimes, yes. Most times, no. We sent 8k emails today to individuals and domain owners, and these are real addresses the owners are monitoring

  Let me give you an example of both how real email addresses are used and how there is absolutely no question as to the CSAM intent of the prompts. I'll redact both the PII and specific words but the intent will be clear, as is the attribution.

  • Hacked ‘AI Girlfriend’ Data Shows Prompts Describing Child Sexual Abuse

• Pilot dies mid-flight, prompting emergency landing at JFK

  • Pilot dies in middle of flight to Turkey, forcing emergency NYC landing

• 'Severe' geomagnetic storm to slam Earth Thursday, auroras possible in CA and AL

Hurricanes

• Starlink was offered for free to those hit by Hurricane Helene. It is not free

• Is a Category 6 Hurricane Possible?

• Brian Trascher of United Cajun Navy Confirms a Blackhawk Did 'Rotor Wash' a Western NC Resource Site – RedState

• 'Price Gouging' After a Disaster Is Good for the Public

• Is FEMA messing up? An expert weighs in

• How the 'Waffle House Index' Shows the Impact of Hurricane Milton

• Tornado crossing I75 near Miami

• Climate change boosted Helene's deadly rain and wind and scientists say same is likely for Milton | AP News

  Human-caused climate change boosted a devastating Hurricane Helene ‘s rainfall by about 10% and intensified its winds by about 11%, scientists said in a new flash study released just as a strengthening Hurricane Milton threatens the Florida coast less than two weeks later. The warming climate boosted Helene’s wind speeds by about 13 miles per hour (20.92 kilometers per hour), and made the high sea temperatures that fueled the storm 200 to 500 times more likely, World Weather Attribution calculated Wednesday from Europe. Ocean temperatures in the Gulf of Mexico were about 3.6 degrees Fahrenheit (2 degrees Celsius) above average, WWA said.

  • Rapid analysis finds climate change's fingerprint on Hurricane Helene

• Oh great now the storm is possessed NOAA drops scientist's ashes into the eye of Category 5 Milton

• When Cell Service Is Down, You Can Send iPhone Texts via Satellite

• Hurricanes likely a major issue for Florida lawmakers next session

• The water has been sucked out of Tampa Bay by Milton.

• Hurricane Milton live updates: category 3 storm makes landfall in Florida

Horseshit

• Arbitration – Disney Abandoned a Brazen Legal Tactic. Uber Is Doubling Down

• Our son died. Now we can use his sperm to have a grandchild

• CDC reports social media associated with bullying, sadness, and suicide

• Germans decry influence of English as 'idiot's apostrophe' gets approval

• New Report Shows Why Getting a Michelin Star May Not Be a Good Thing

• More women than men have added their DNA to the human gene pool

• Perrier Well Contamination Sparks Scrutiny for Luxe Water Brand

• Wealth distribution in the United States

  Could the richest people liquidate holdings for the value Forbes estimates their worth at? I doubt it. Is it possible that the people figuring up "wealth" for these articles have multiple reasons to exaggerate the totals? Perhaps outweighing their impulses towards scientific and journalistic credibility?

• Wimbledon abolishes line judges after 147 years

• The funhouse mirror factory: How social media distorts perceptions of norms

celebrity gossip

• Pink Floyd's David Gilmour: the wealthy have siphoned off music industry money

• Mark Zuckerberg wants to stream Civilization on Twitch

• Kim Dotcom Fends Off Arrest Before Conspiracy Theories and Reality Collide

Obit

• Ratan Tata, chairman emeritus of Tata Sons, dies at 86

  • Ratan Tata dies at age 88

Rank Propaganda / Thought Policing / World Disordering

• Turkey blocks instant messaging platform Discord

  • Russia and Turkey Block Discord

  • Russia is banning Discord, an app its military uses

• Some of the Web's Sketchiest Sites Share an Address in Iceland (Archive)

  Withheld for Privacy, a company that is part of a booming and largely unregulated industry in Iceland and elsewhere that allows people who operate online domains to shield their identities. While the practice has become commonplace for website owners seeking to protect themselves from harassment or spam, it has also helped others cover their tracks from prying regulators, law enforcement officials or victims. Withheld for Privacy and other so-called proxy services have turned Iceland into a global hub for illicit activity far out of proportion to the country’s size.

Musk

• Brazil lifts ban on Elon Musk's X after it pays $5m fine

  • X reinstated in Brazil after Musk pays fines, agrees to follow local laws

• The bill comes due for Elon Musk

• Elon Musk seizes @America handle on X to promote Trump

Electric / Self Driving cars

• Bankrupt Fisker says it can't migrate its EVs to a new owner's server

• A crash test reveals EVs aren't stopped by guardrails, compared to gas engines

  • It's OK, tho. They'll just mandate gas cars minimum weight until the equity is restored.

Religion / Tribal / Culture War and Re-Segregation

• How come the Mormon, Republican state of Utah is so queer?

• Cognizant found guilty of discriminating against non-Indian employees

• Transgender Wikipedia Editor Labels Pakistani Grooming Gang Scandal A “Far-Right Moral Panic” - The Publica

  Fury from online users has ensued after a Wikipedia editor changed the entry on Britain’s national grooming gangs scandal to describe it as a “moral panic” that has been “popularized from the Far-right.” The Wikipedia entry in question was related to a national crisis which saw over 1,400 children systemically raped by predators who were primarily of Pakistani origin and Muslim faith. The scandal was first uncovered back in 2010, when it was revealed that men from Pakistan dominated court records for grooming gang abuse, particularly in the South Yorkshire town of Rotherham.

Edumacationalizing / Acedemia Nuts

• San Francisco to Shutter 9% of Public Schools Amid Budget Crisis

• Newsom signs bill to expel six food dyes from California public schools

• Demis Hassabis Wins Nobel Prize in Chemistry

Info Rental / ShowBiz / Advertising

• Google threatened with break-up by US

  • US gov considers historic break-up of Google

  • DOJ indicates it's considering Google breakup following monopoly ruling

  • Google facing US Government attempt to break it up, court filing shows

  • Justice Department calls for sanctions against Google in landmark antitrust case

  • US weighs Google break-up in landmark antitrust case

  • HN comments

  • DOJ's Google breakup remedy puts tech world on notice

• A Vtuber Just Became Twitch's Most-Subscribed Streamer

• Gnome Foundation Announces Cost Cutting Measures Due to Budget Woes

• Wordpress.org login now requires a WPE non-affiliation declaration

  • WordPress contributor banned for asking about new checkbox

• Introducing Permission Slip Plus - Innovation at Consumer Reports

  Permission Slip Plus, an even more powerful way to reduce your digital footprint. Paid subscribers will have access to powerful automation and additional support from our team of data experts. Permission Slip Plus costs $59.99/year, or $4.99 month: a fraction of the cost of most deletion services. As always, your contributions make a difference in helping Consumer Reports advance our mission of a free and fair marketplace for all. We will maintain the free version of Permission Slip to keep the right to privacy accessible for all.

• US DOJ wades into Realtek lawsuit that accuses MediaTek of patent abuse

• Instagram and Threads moderation is out of control

• Internet Archive hacked, data breach impacts 31M users

TechSuck / Geek Bait

• Linus asks maintainers to use active voice, preferably just imperative

• Why the ISO format has to die | Hacker News

AI Will (Save | Destroy) The World

• The human internet is dying. AI images are taking over Google top results

• The Editors Protecting Wikipedia from AI Hoaxes

• Geoffrey Hinton glad one of his students had a hand in ousting Sam Altman

• OpenAI pursues public benefit structure to fend off hostile takeovers

Space / Boomy Zoomers / UFO

• Whistleblower Report Says Pentagon Has UAP Program: Immaculate Constellation

• We're going to the Solar System's most intriguing frontier

Crypto con games

• HBO documentary leak suggests ex-Bitcoin dev Peter Todd is Satoshi

• Satoshi Nakamoto and the Origins of Bitcoin

• HBO Film Suggests Peter Todd Is Satoshi, Former Bitcoin Developer Denies Claim

• 'I'm not Satoshi Nakamoto':Subject of HBO documentary denies he invented Bitcoin

• Bitcoin creator is Peter Todd, HBO film says

• HBO doc Money Electric says Peter Todd is Satoshi Nakamoto, a claim Todd denies

• comment:

  The documentary named Peter Todd as Satoshi literally based on them both having the same favorite pizza topping (pineapple and jalepeno)

Economicon / Business / Finance

• Cassie LaBelle: "eBay completely destroyed my life"

  • HN comments

• The Yearlong Wait to Transfer Bonds Out of TreasuryDirect

• America Risks Running Out of Tickers for Single-Stock ETFs

• The Battle over Robots at U.S. Ports Is On

Gubmint / Poilitcks / Law Making

• Burton Malkiel: How the US should reform taxes

• A "corporate money Death Star" is looming over the 2024 election

Harris / Democrats

• Probe into whether Democrats use ActBlue platform to cheat at fundraising expands to 19 states | Just The News

  A sprawling investigation into the online fundraising platform ActBlue has expanded into 19 states, as attorneys general across the country press the company on its security practices and whether Democrats might be using the platform to cheat on election donations.

• Kamala Harris Has Raised $1 Billion Since Entering Presidential Race - The New York Times

  No presidential candidate is believed to have ever raised so much money so fast. The campaign has stopped trumpeting its fund-raising totals to keep Democrats from becoming complacent.

  Vice President Kamala Harris has raised more than $1 billion in less than three months as a presidential candidate, according to three people with knowledge of her fund-raising haul, a remarkable sum of money that has remade the race against former President Donald J. Trump. The $1 billion haul, which encompasses money raised for her campaign and affiliated party committees, including the Democratic National Committee, is being spent on a wave of television and digital advertising and an expansive operation of offices and staff in the seven battleground states and beyond. The historic sum does not include money donated to allied super PACs.

  The campaign has yet to announce how much it raised in September, partly of out of concern that bragging about the gush of donations could diminish donor interest in the race’s final weeks, people briefed on the strategy said. The Harris campaign also remains concerned about the ability of billionaire-funded Republican super PACs to impact the race.

  The $1 billion threshold is more than Mr. Trump has announced raising in all of 2024. He has raised around $853 million this calendar year in concert with the party, according to a tally of his campaign’s public statements.

• Kamala Harris Wanted To Ban The Gun She Now Claims To Own

• Tim Walz does live World of Warcraft Twitch stream

Trump / Right / Jan6

• From Hawaii to Florida, Tracing Ryan Routh’s Path to Attempted Trump Assassination | The Epoch Times

• Trump Pledges to End 'Double Taxation' of Americans Abroad

Law Breaking / Police / Internal Security

• Afghan National Arrested for Plotting an Election Day Terrorist Attack in the Name of ISIS

  • a mobile device that visited the man’s home many, many times, also visited Senator Lankford’s office on 3 occasions.

• 69K Bitcoins Headed for the US Treasury–While Agent Who Seized Them Is in Jail

• Two minors charged with gang assault in attack on former New York Governor David Paterson, his stepson, in Manhattan

External Security / Militaria / Diplomania

• Pentagon awards Anduril $250M contract to counter drone attacks

World

• Post Office senior executive suspended over allegations of destroying evidence

• Right at the end of summer, hmmm... Large French ski resort to close as snow shortage leaves it struggling

Israel

• Escalating Tensions: Hezbollah Strikes Israeli Forces on the Lebanese Border

Health / Medicine

• Regardless of age, quitting cigarette smoking will add years to your life

• AHA calls for declaration of national emergency over IV bag shortages

  • It would help if people stopped using them for dehydration. You can drink water.

  • Doctors forced to give patients Gatorade as makeshift treatment due to IV lack

• Life spans are growing but health spans are shrinking. What that means for money

Pox / COVID / BioTerror AgitProp

• Covid-19 may increase the risk of heart attacks, strokes and deaths for 3 years

Environment / Climate / Green Propaganda

• Eric Schmidt: Build more AI datacenters, we won't 'hit climate goals anyway'

• Microbial marvels: Study finds 'untapped biodiversity' in the bathroom

• 'A huge loss': is it the end for the ship that helped understand life on Earth?

• We are on the brink of an irreversible climate disaster

• Teacher Hannah Willow crowned as Glasgow's first tree-hugging champion

• Climate change makes hurricanes more destructive

• The Environmental Costs of Our Fish Sticks

• Pitting good versus bad fungi on sweet corn: A delicate dance

• Green hydrogen far pricier than projected

• For ranchers in Costa Rica, jaguars and pumas become unexpected allies

• Washington's 'Forgotten Giant' Volcano Stirs: Surge in Quakes Prompts Monitoring

• (Sep 2024) Corn sweat is real, and it's made heat in the Midwest even more uncomfortable