#clone disk

[mbishiri]

Repair Your PC and Access Your Data with Active@ Data Studio

Active@ Data Studio provides you with a useful set of tools for accessing your data and repairing your PC in the event that Windows fails to start up and you cannot find any other way to access your data.

[thevioletzone]

The lost art of GameCube Disks - Part 3

[vimse]

@clonexocweek | Day 7: Free Space | Pairing: Tech x Silvie

Note: Hello!! This is super late, I’m sorry!! I wanted to join the event as it was happening, but...couldn't, for a lot of reasons. One of those reasons is that I really don't have anything concrete decided for this pairing, just— v i b e s. But I wanted to contribute with something. So here is a playlist.

Below is a holodisc containing a mixtape that Silvie made for Tech: one that would hopefully convey her growing feelings for him, one that she never got the chance to give to him before he and his family left Ord Mantell for good. Why is he holding it in the picture, then? Ah, well, I'd like to think that he somehow discovers it one day far into the future, when they meet again.

Translations and a selection of lyrics below the cut!

Aurebesh to English translation of the second picture:

To Tech I really like you but I’m not good with words, so...here you go Tracklist 1. L&H 2. Freedom 3. Runaway 4. Friend of Mine 5. Heavy with Hoping From Silvie

Lastly, some lyrics of the chosen songs to describe the things she wanted to convey:

Silvie’s Mixtape

L&H - Leska

Love and happiness Something make you do wrong Love and happiness Make you do right

Freedom - Kygo & Zak Abel

You give me something that I can hold on to A little light when I'm down on my knees I was so lost in myself when I found you But in that moment you made me believe

Runaway - Galantis

Think I can fly, think I can fly when I’m with you

Friend Of Mine - Avicii, Vargas & Lagola

My, oh my You must have saved me about a thousand times I wouldn't be the one I am today If you hadn't been a friend of mine

Heavy With Hoping - Madeon

Shut me up Shoot me down before I Break and tell the truth Heavy with hoping Heavy with hoping you love me too

[whosname]

congrats on the interface for IT people that IT people can't understand, disk cloning tool!

[campingwithmonsters]

As a PokePark kid, the Synchro Machine will be my everything. I cannot believe that it’s gonna be a real thing. You mean that I’m actually going to be able to live out my dream and play as a Pokémon once again. Is it true you mean every Pokémon. Tell me it’s true. You mean to tell me I can be Golurk. You mean to tell me I can be Sunflora. You mean to tell me I can be anything. Is it true that you can use any Pokémon.

Oh my god. When mom told me I could be anything… I didn’t know it meant I could become God. I’m putting Arceus in the Synchro Machine and playing God. Nothing can stop me.

[sleepygirltwink]

As a trans woman chemical engineer… I feel this in my soul

*trans woman talking about some sort of industrial machine*

“god i miss my wife”

[sawontheboss4]

Upgrade your PC? Save time with disk cloning! Learn key features, best tools, and step-by-step cloning guide. #DiskCloning #SSDUpgrade #DataBackup #SystemMigration #TechGuide

[techdirectarchive]

Video on how to Clone a VM via Export and Import: Copy Virtual Hard Disk on Hyper-V

Clone a VM via Export and Import: Copy Virtual Hard Disk on Hyper-V

[photo-roulette-wheel]

Clone CD

CloneCD 3.0 (2001)

[flavinbagel]

Was trying to clone my shitty boot drive SSD to an M.2 stick and might've ended up fucking both drives from booting windows somehow whoops.

[lightasthesun]

Comprehensive Lexicon Guide for First-Time SW Fic Readers:

Flimsi/Flimsiplast = Paper

Flimsiwork/Datawork = Paperwork

Stylus = Pen

Datapad = Tablet

Comlink/Comm = Communication Device/Phone

Binders = Handcuffs

Chronometer = Clock

Spectacles = Eyeglasses

Chrono = Watch

Conservator = Refrigerator

Caf = Coffee

Nerfburger = Hamburger

Blue milk = Milk (literally blue)

Hubba chips = French Fries

Sweet roll = Doughnut

Flatcakes = Pancakes

Tabac = Tobacco

HoloNet = World Wide Web

Holovision/HoloTV = Television

Holodrama/Holovids = Movie/Videos

Holocamera/Holocam = Camera

Holomap = three-dimensional map

Holojournal = Newspaper

Holocube = Picture frame

Holotable = Projector

Holoscanner = X-ray machine

Holojournalist = Reporter

Flatholo/Holograph = Photograph

Sonic Damper = Active Noise Cancellation

Refresher/Fresher= Bathroom

Sonic Bath = Bath

Sanisteam/Sonic shower = Waterless Shower

Hydrospanner = Wrench

Hydro Flask = Water Bottle

Power Cell/Energy Cell = Batteries

Authorization Chip = Decryption key

Datatape = Disk

Datastick = Flash drive

(Personal) Com Code = Phone number

Datachip = SD Card

Synthflesh = Synthetic skin

Glowrod = Flashlight

Sparkstick = Match

Slugthrower = Gun

Slug = Bullet

Vibroblade = a blade that can vibrate at high frequencies, increasing its cutting power and penetrating ability (tactical knife)

Rangefinder = Rifle scope

Turbolaser = Cannon

Ion pike/Vibropike = Spear

Electro Staff = Stun baton

Blaster = Pistol/Rifle

Stun Blaster = similar to a Taser

Landspeeder/Airspeeder/Speeder = Car

Turbolift = Elevator

Slideramp = Escalator

Starfighter = Fighter jet

Rotorcraft = Helicopter

Hoverpack/Jetpack= Jet pack

Speeder Bike = Motorcycle

Skylane = Traffic lane

Railspeeder/Hovertrain = Train

Power Chair/Hoverchair= Wheelchair

Windscreen = Windshield

Podracing = Car racing

Dejarik = Chess

Sabacc = Poker and Blackjack combined

Galactic Rebels = Combat simulator

B'shingh = Dungeons and dragons

Jizz = Jazz music

Wailer = Singer (ie. Jizz Wailer)

Cantina = Bar or Pup

Para Sailing = Paragliding

Aurebesh = Alphabet

Credits = Money

Sleeping Pallet = Bedroll

Naming Day = Birthday

Youngling = Child

Galactic Basic Standard/ Basic = English

Medkit/Medpac = First aid kit

Hypo = Syringe

Medic/Healer = Doctor

Medcenter = Hospital

Bactapatch = Bandaid

Nanoweave = Fabric

Transparisteel = Glass

Plastifoam = Packing material

Durasteel = Steel

Plasteel = Plastic

Duracrete = Concrete

Slicer = Hacker (slicing = hacking)

Identikit = Passport

Minder = Therapist

Synthleather = Vinyl

Viewport = Window

Cooling Unit = Air-conditioning

Honeydarter = Bee

Slythmonger = Drugdealer

Spice = Drugs

Stimpill = Caffeine pill

Power Socket = Plug

Cutters = Scissors

Cycle = Day

Standard Cycle = 24h

Standard Week = 5 days

Standard Month = 35 standard days

Standard Year = approx. ten months

Tenday = literally ten days

Cigarras/Smokes = Cigarettes

Click = Kilometer or 'a moment'

Parsec = a unit of distance

Tweezers/Clanker/tin head/tinnie = Droid

Separatist = Seppie

Promise Ring = Wedding Ring

Body Glove = Jumpsuit

Slicksuit = Wet suit

Civvies = Civilian clothing

Carbonite = a metal alloy used to freeze a person in a state of hibernation

Hyperdrive = device that allows a starship to travel faster than lightspeed

Moisture vaporator = device that can extract water from the air, commonly used on tatooine

Glareshades = Sunglasses

Gasser = Gas Oven

Repulsorlift = technology that can create an anti-gravity field and is used for levitating heavy objects

Heating unit = Heater

Utility Droid = Roomba

Sunbonnet = a Clone trooper helmet

Bad Batcher = a defective Clone Trooper

Banthabrain = birdbrain/ a stupid person

Bantha fodder = waste of space/nonsense

Blast! = word of exclamation

Blasted! = s.o in anger or annoyance

Blaster-brained = dimwitted

Blaster fodder = cannon fodder

Blast off = Piss off

Brainless = Stupid

Bug/Bugger = used to refer to Geonosians

Forceforsaken = godforsaken

Full of Poodoo = full of shit

Poodoo = Shit

Kriff = Fuck

Jedi scum = derogatory term for jedi

Kark = derogatory expletive

Larty = LAAT/i gunship

Laserbrain = insult

Meat droid = derogatory term for Clone Troopers

Redrobes = Palpatines guard

Rookie/Shinie = newly recruited Trooper

Scum = insult to refer to bounty hunters/rebels

Sharpie = Sharp-witted

Sithspawn/Sithspit/Hellspawn! = expletive

Sleemo = Slimeball

Son of a bantha = insult

Wizard! = Cool

Spaced = dead

Hutt-spawn = Bastard

Karabast = exclamation of dismay

Stang = Crap

Buckethead/Bucketbrain = derogatory term for Stormtroopers

Bucket = Helmet

Nat-born = Natural Born

Roger Roger = affirmative/copy that

Droid poppers = EMP grenade

Sitrep = short for situation report

Backwater Planet = any planet that isn't part of the core system

Holocron = device that can project a three-dimensional image of a person/object and is used for communication or entertainment.

Kessel Run = a risky Operation. Commonly used as a metaphor in impossible situations.

Thermal Detonator= device that can create a powerful explosion like a grenade or bomb

Ray Shield/Energy Shield = creates a (protective) barrier

Rebreather = device that allows a person to breathe underwater or in toxic environments

Phrases:

Wild goose chase = wild bantha chase

That's bantha shit = that's bullshit

As slippery as a greased Dug = untrustworthy

Credit for your thoughts = penny for your thoughts

Cut the poodoo = cut the crap

to get your gills in a twist = get upset about something

Holy mother of meteors = holy mother of god

Oh my skies/ Oh my stars = exclamation of surprise

Stars' end! = exclamation of disbelief

What in the blue blazes = exclamation

When Geonosis freezes over/When it snows on tatooine = extremely unlikely

Who pissed in your power supply = who pissed you off

Blast it = damn it

By the maker = exclamation of surprise

Great karking Dragon = expression of disbelief

Lothcat got your tongue = equivalent of 'cat got your tongue?'

Sod it = expression of frustration

[nik0nk1]

Beerus![Name]

Conqueror’s Craving

Humor, Crack, OP![Name], Food-Obsessed [Name], Mark is Traumatized, Guardian of the Globe vs. [Name], Canon Divergence, [Name] Breaks the Plot, Nolan is Confused, Timeline is season two!

Mark Grayson x Reader

Word count: 962 words

•|~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~|•

Mark's first mistake was thinking he even stood a chance.

The sky screamed as the invader arrived in the city.

One moment, the city was bathed in the warm glow of the afternoon sun. The next, a comet-like blur tore through the clouds, slamming into the streets below with a force that shattered windows for miles. The shockwave alone flipped cars like toys and sent civilians scrambling for cover.

Mark had been in the middle of patrol when the call came in.

"High-priority threat inbound—potential Viltrumite. Invincible, do not engage alone!"

He had barely processed the words before the explosion rattled the city. And now, standing in the ruins of a downtown intersection, he saw her.

A woman, young-looking but radiating an overwhelming presence. She stood in the middle of the devastation she’d caused, arms crossed, expression bored. Her Viltrumite uniform was pristine—untouched by the destruction around her.

Mark gulped. He’d fought Viltrumites before. His dad, Thragg’s soldiers—he knew what he was up against.

This woman, though? She didn’t even look interested in a fight.

And that scared him more than anything.

She sighed, rolling her shoulders. “Alright, let’s get this over with. Nolan’s taking way too long.”

Then she moved.

The attack was instant.

A flick of her wrist sent an entire truck careening into a building. A casual kick flipped an armored car as if it weighed nothing. Civilians screamed and ran in every direction, but [Name] wasn’t concerned with them.

The Guardians of the Globe arrived within seconds, launching a coordinated strike. Energy blasts, brute force, everything they had—attacks rained down from every direction.

None of it mattered.

[Name] moved through the chaos effortlessly, dodging, countering, barely paying attention. It was like watching someone halfheartedly swatting at flies.

Rex Splode hurled explosive disks at her. She caught one midair, inspected it with mild curiosity, then crushed it in her palm before it could detonate.

Dupli-Kate tried to surround her with multiple clones, attempting to overwhelm her with sheer numbers. [Name] sighed and blurred forward, wiping out half of them in an instant. The real Kate barely dodged in time.

Shrinking Rae zipped around, landing precise blows at pressure points that should have at least staggered a Viltrumite. [Name] merely blinked, unimpressed, before swatting her out of the air like a bug.

Bulletproof charged next, fists coated in kinetic energy, swinging with all his strength. His punches landed with zero effect. He hesitated for half a second too long.

[Name] grabbed his face and slammed him into the pavement.

She was having fun.

Mark shot forward, fists clenched. He needed to stop this before it got worse.

"HEY!"

[Name] turned, spotting him just as he swung. Their fists collided—except only one of them felt it.

Pain shot up Mark’s arm as if he had just punched solid steel. He barely had time to process that before she retaliated. A brutal uppercut sent him rocketing into the sky. His vision blurred, but his instincts forced him to recover midair.

“Okay—ow.” He shook his head, steeling himself. She was stronger than him. Way stronger. But he couldn’t back down.

He dove, aiming for her blind spot. He struck her side, managing to stagger her. Barely.

[Name] blinked, then grinned.

"Oh, you’re actually putting in effort. Cute."

Before he could react, she grabbed him by the leg and swung him like a ragdoll, slamming him through the pavement.

Pain. Everything hurt.

She wasn’t done.

Mark barely registered being launched again, his body crashing through several buildings before—

CRASH!

A vending machine.

The impact shattered the glass and left him slumped against the broken machine, groaning in pain.

Then, something soft landed in his lap.

A bag of Cheetos.

Open.

Mark barely had the energy to process how absurd that was before a blur of movement was in front of him.

[Name] crouched down, staring intensely.

At the Cheetos.

Mark tensed, expecting another attack—but instead, she sniffed the air.

Paused.

Sniffed again.

Without hesitation, she snatched the bag from his lap and shoved a handful into her mouth.

Mark watched in absolute disbelief as the planetary threat in front of him sat there, chewing.

She froze mid-bite. Her pupils dilated. Her breathing slowed.

The world stood still.

Then she swallowed. Slowly, dramatically.

[Name] stared at the bag. Then at Mark. Then back at the bag.

Mark, still too stunned to function, croaked, “...What?”

[Name] shot to her feet, pointing at him.

"This... THIS is why Nolan hasn’t conquered Earth yet."

Mark’s brain malfunctioned. “...What?!”

She turned toward the ruined skyline, gripping the Cheetos like a sacred artifact.

"The food," she whispered. "Earth’s food is amazing. That’s why he’s keeping this planet. His hording all this"

Mark felt like he was having a stroke. His ribs were broken, his vision was spinning, and now this goddamn lunatic was having an existential crisis over Cheetos?!

“What the hell are you talking about?!”

[Name] ignored him, lost in her own revelation.

She took another dramatic bite. Chewed. Swallowed.

Then, with the confidence of someone declaring war, she turned back to him.

"Alright. Change of plans. This planet is mine now."

Mark stared, horrified. His fight-or-flight instincts were completely fried. “Wait—WHAT?!”

[Name] casually tossed the now-empty bag over her shoulder. "You heard me. Earth’s mine now. Nolan’s been slacking, so I’m taking over. Oh I'm [Name] by the way."

She introduced and then stretched, completely unconcerned about the damage she’d caused. "Man, I was this close to just wiping out the city. Good thing I found this first."

She gestured to the Cheetos dust on her fingers like it was the most important discovery of the century.

Mark just sat there, completely done. His body ached, his brain hurt, and now this woman was claiming his entire planet because she liked its snacks.

"...I'm gonna pass out."

And then he did.

Author's note: HOPE YA ALL LIKE IT FJJDDJDJD

Just request some Mark Grayson x Reader scenario and I'll try to make some djjbddjddjdsjdsj.

@invoncible is the inspo of this one shot lol

[mostlysignssomeportents]

There Were Always Enshittifiers

I'm on a 20+ city book tour for my new novel PICKS AND SHOVELS. Catch me in DC TONIGHT (Mar 4), and in RICHMOND TOMORROW (Mar 5). More tour dates here. Mail-order signed copies from LA's Diesel Books.

My latest Locus column is "There Were Always Enshittifiers." It's a history of personal computing and networked communications that traces the earliest days of the battle for computers as tools of liberation and computers as tools for surveillance, control and extraction:

https://locusmag.com/2025/03/commentary-cory-doctorow-there-were-always-enshittifiers/

The occasion for this piece is the publication of my latest Martin Hench novel, a standalone book set in the early 1980s called "Picks and Shovels":

https://us.macmillan.com/books/9781250865908/picksandshovels

The MacGuffin of Picks and Shovels is a "weird PC" company called Fidelity Computing, owned by a Mormon bishop, a Catholic priest, and an orthodox rabbi. It sounds like the setup for a joke, but the punchline is deadly serious: Fidelity Computing is a pyramid selling cult that preys on the trust and fellowship of faith groups to sell the dreadful Fidelity 3000 PC and its ghastly peripherals.

You see, Fidelity's products are booby-trapped. It's not merely that they ship with programs whose data-files can't be read by apps on any other system – that's just table stakes. Fidelity's got a whole bag of tricks up its sleeve – for example, it deliberately damages a specific sector on every floppy disk it ships. The drivers for its floppy drive initialize any read or write operation by checking to see if that sector can be read. If it can, the computer refuses to recognize the disk. This lets the Reverend Sirs (as Fidelity's owners style themselves) run a racket where they sell these deliberately damaged floppies at a 500% markup, because regular floppies won't work on the systems they lure their parishioners into buying.

Or take the Fidelity printer: it's just a rebadged Oki­data ML-80, the workhorse tractor feed printer that led the market for years. But before Fidelity ships this printer to its customers, they fit it with new tractor feed sprockets whose pins are slightly more widely spaced than the standard 0.5" holes on the paper you can buy in any stationery store. That way, Fidelity can force its customers to buy the custom paper that they exclusively peddle – again, at a massive markup.

Needless to say, printing with these wider sprocket holes causes frequent jams and puts a serious strain on the printer's motors, causing them to burn out at a high rate. That's great news – for Fidelity Computing. It means they get to sell you more overpriced paper so you can reprint the jobs ruined by jams, and they can also sell you their high-priced, exclusive repair services when your printer's motors quit.

Perhaps you're thinking, "OK, but I can just buy a normal Okidata printer and use regular, cheap paper, right?" Sorry, the Reverend Sirs are way ahead of you: they've reversed the pinouts on their printers' serial ports, and a normal printer won't be able to talk to your Fidelity 3000.

If all of this sounds familiar, it's because these are the paleolithic ancestors of today's high-tech lock-in scams, from HP's $10,000/gallon ink to Apple and Google's mobile app stores, which cream a 30% commission off of every dollar collected by an app maker. What's more, these ancient, weird misfeatures have their origins in the true history of computing, which was obsessed with making the elusive, copy-proof floppy disk.

This Quixotic enterprise got started in earnest with Bill Gates' notorious 1976 "open letter to hobbyists" in which the young Gates furiously scolds the community of early computer hackers for its scientific ethic of publishing, sharing and improving the code that they all wrote:

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

Gates had recently cloned the BASIC programming language for the popular Altair computer. For Gates, his act of copying was part of the legitimate progress of technology, while the copying of his colleagues, who duplicated Gates' Altair BASIC, was a shameless act of piracy, destined to destroy the nascent computing industry:

As the majority of hobbyists must be aware, most of you steal your software. Hardware must be paid for, but software is something to share. Who cares if the people who worked on it get paid?

Needless to say, Gates didn't offer a royalty to John Kemeny and Thomas Kurtz, the programmers who'd invented BASIC at Dartmouth College in 1963. For Gates – and his intellectual progeny – the formula was simple: "When I copy you, that's progress. When you copy me, that's piracy." Every pirate wants to be an admiral.

For would-be ex-pirate admirals, Gates's ideology was seductive. There was just one fly in the ointment: computers operate by copying. The only way a computer can run a program is to copy it into memory – just as the only way your phone can stream a video is to download it to its RAM ("streaming" is a consensus hallucination – every stream is a download, and it has to be, because the internet is a data-transmission network, not a cunning system of tubes and mirrors that can make a picture appear on your screen without transmitting the file that contains that image).

Gripped by this enshittificatory impulse, the computer industry threw itself headfirst into the project of creating copy-proof data, a project about as practical as making water that's not wet. That weird gimmick where Fidelity floppy disks were deliberately damaged at the factory so the OS could distinguish between its expensive disks and the generic ones you bought at the office supply place? It's a lightly fictionalized version of the copy-protection system deployed by Visicalc, a move that was later publicly repudiated by Visicalc co-founder Dan Bricklin, who lamented that it confounded his efforts to preserve his software on modern systems and recover the millions of data-files that Visicalc users created:

http://www.bricklin.com/robfuture.htm

The copy-protection industry ran on equal parts secrecy and overblown sales claims about its products' efficacy. As a result, much of the story of this doomed effort is lost to history. But back in 2017, a redditor called Vadermeer unearthed a key trove of documents from this era, in a Goodwill Outlet store in Seattle:

https://www.reddit.com/r/VintageApple/comments/5vjsow/found_internal_apple_memos_about_copy_protection/

Vaderrmeer find was a Apple Computer binder from 1979, documenting the company's doomed "Software Security from Apple's Friends and Enemies" (SSAFE) project, an effort to make a copy-proof floppy:

https://archive.org/details/AppleSSAFEProject

The SSAFE files are an incredible read. They consist of Apple's best engineers beavering away for days, cooking up a new copy-proof floppy, which they would then hand over to Apple co-founder and legendary hardware wizard Steve Wozniak. Wozniak would then promptly destroy the copy-protection system, usually in a matter of minutes or hours. Wozniak, of course, got the seed capital for Apple by defeating AT&T's security measures, building a "blue box" that let its user make toll-free calls and peddling it around the dorms at Berkeley:

https://512pixels.net/2018/03/woz-blue-box/

Woz has stated that without blue boxes, there would never have been an Apple. Today, Apple leads the charge to restrict how you use your devices, confining you to using its official app store so it can skim a 30% vig off every dollar you spend, and corralling you into using its expensive repair depots, who love to declare your device dead and force you to buy a new one. Every pirate wants to be an admiral!

https://www.vice.com/en/article/tim-cook-to-investors-people-bought-fewer-new-iphones-because-they-repaired-their-old-ones/

Revisiting the early PC years for Picks and Shovels isn't just an excuse to bust out some PC nostalgiacore set-dressing. Picks and Shovels isn't just a face-paced crime thriller: it's a reflection on the enshittificatory impulses that were present at the birth of the modern tech industry.

But there is a nostalgic streak in Picks and Shovels, of course, represented by the other weird PC company in the tale. Computing Freedom is a scrappy PC startup founded by three women who came up as sales managers for Fidelity, before their pangs of conscience caused them to repent of their sins in luring their co-religionists into the Reverend Sirs' trap.

These women – an orthodox lesbian whose family disowned her, a nun who left her order after discovering the liberation theology movement, and a Mormon woman who has quit the church over its opposition to the Equal Rights Amendment – have set about the wozniackian project of reverse-engineering every piece of Fidelity hardware and software, to make compatible products that set Fidelity's caged victims free.

They're making floppies that work with Fidelity drives, and drives that work with Fidelity's floppies. Printers that work with Fidelity computers, and adapters so Fidelity printers will work with other PCs (as well as resprocketing kits to retrofit those printers for standard paper). They're making file converters that allow Fidelity owners to read their data in Visicalc or Lotus 1-2-3, and vice-versa.

In other words, they're engaged in "adversarial interoperability" – hacking their own fire-exits into the burning building that Fidelity has locked its customers inside of:

https://www.eff.org/deeplinks/2019/10/adversarial-interoperability

This was normal, back then! There were so many cool, interoperable products and services around then, from the Bell and Howell "Black Apple" clones:

https://forum.vcfed.org/index.php?threads%2Fbell-howell-apple-ii.64651%2F

to the amazing copy-protection cracking disks that traveled from hand to hand, so the people who shelled out for expensive software delivered on fragile floppies could make backups against the inevitable day that the disks stopped working:

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

Those were wild times, when engineers pitted their wits against one another in the spirit of Steve Wozniack and SSAFE. That era came to a close – but not because someone finally figured out how to make data that you couldn't copy. Rather, it ended because an unholy coalition of entertainment and tech industry lobbyists convinced Congress to pass the Digital Millennium Copyright Act in 1998, which made it a felony to "bypass an access control":

https://www.eff.org/deeplinks/2016/07/section-1201-dmca-cannot-pass-constitutional-scrutiny

That's right: at the first hint of competition, the self-described libertarians who insisted that computers would make governments obsolete went running to the government, demanding a state-backed monopoly that would put their rivals in prison for daring to interfere with their business model. Plus ça change: today, their intellectual descendants are demanding that the US government bail out their "anti-state," "independent" cryptocurrency:

https://www.citationneeded.news/issue-78/

In truth, the politics of tech has always contained a faction of "anti-government" millionaires and billionaires who – more than anything – wanted to wield the power of the state, not abolish it. This was true in the mainframe days, when companies like IBM made billions on cushy defense contracts, and it's true today, when the self-described "Technoking" of Tesla has inserted himself into government in order to steer tens of billions' worth of no-bid contracts to his Beltway Bandit companies:

https://www.reuters.com/world/us/lawmakers-question-musk-influence-over-verizon-faa-contract-2025-02-28/

The American state has always had a cozy relationship with its tech sector, seeing it as a way to project American soft power into every corner of the globe. But Big Tech isn't the only – or the most important – US tech export. Far more important is the invisible web of IP laws that ban reverse-engineering, modding, independent repair, and other activities that defend American tech exports from competitors in its trading partners.

Countries that trade with the US were arm-twisted into enacting laws like the DMCA as a condition of free trade with the USA. These laws were wildly unpopular, and had to be crammed through other countries' legislatures:

https://pluralistic.net/2024/11/15/radical-extremists/#sex-pest

That's why Europeans who are appalled by Musk's Nazi salute have to confine their protests to being loudly angry at him, selling off their Teslas, and shining lights on Tesla factories:

https://www.malaymail.com/news/money/2025/01/24/heil-tesla-activists-protest-with-light-projection-on-germany-plant-after-musks-nazi-salute-video/164398

Musk is so attention-hungry that all this is as apt to please him as anger him. You know what would really hurt Musk? Jailbreaking every Tesla in Europe so that all its subscription features – which represent the highest-margin line-item on Tesla's balance-sheet – could be unlocked by any local mechanic for €25. That would really kick Musk in the dongle.

The only problem is that in 2001, the US Trade Rep got the EU to pass the EU Copyright Directive, whose Article 6 bans that kind of reverse-engineering. The European Parliament passed that law because doing so guaranteed tariff-free access for EU goods exported to US markets.

Enter Trump, promising a 25% tariff on European exports.

The EU could retaliate here by imposing tit-for-tat tariffs on US exports to the EU, which would make everything Europeans buy from America 25% more expensive. This is a very weird way to punish the USA.

On the other hand, not that Trump has announced that the terms of US free trade deals are optional (for the US, at least), there's no reason not to delete Article 6 of the EUCD, and all the other laws that prevent European companies from jailbreaking iPhones and making their own App Stores (minus Apple's 30% commission), as well as ad-blockers for Facebook and Instagram's apps (which would zero out EU revenue for Meta), and, of course, jailbreaking tools for Xboxes, Teslas, and every make and model of every American car, so European companies could offer service, parts, apps, and add-ons for them.

When Jeff Bezos launched Amazon, his war-cry was "your margin is my opportunity." US tech companies have built up insane margins based on the IP provisions required in the free trade treaties it signed with the rest of the world.

It's time to delete those IP provisions and throw open domestic competition that attacks the margins that created the fortunes of oligarchs who sat behind Trump on the inauguration dais. It's time to bring back the indomitable hacker spirit that the Bill Gateses of the world have been trying to extinguish since the days of the "open letter to hobbyists." The tech sector built a 10 foot high wall around its business, then the US government convinced the rest of the world to ban four-metre ladders. Lift the ban, unleash the ladders, free the world!

In the same way that futuristic sf is really about the present, Picks and Shovels, an sf novel set in the 1980s, is really about this moment.

I'm on tour with the book now – if you're reading this today (Mar 4) and you're in DC, come see me tonight with Matt Stoller at 6:30PM at the Cleveland Park Library:

https://www.loyaltybookstores.com/picksnshovels

And if you're in Richmond, VA, come down to Fountain Bookshop and catch me with Lee Vinsel tomorrow (Mar 5) at 7:30PM:

https://fountainbookstore.com/events/1795820250305

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

https://pluralistic.net/2025/03/04/object-permanence/#picks-and-shovels

[englishotomegames]

Virche Evermore -EpiC: Lycoris- (終遠のヴィルシュ -EpiC:lycoris-)

Release dates (Nintendo Switch) Japanese: September 7th, 2023 English: November 7th, 2024

"The small country of Arpéchéle is surrounded by the sea and filled with black flowers known as Lycoris Noirges. Every island resident is cursed to die at the age of 23.

Many years of research have led to the creation of a 'memory download' system, allowing the body to die while memories live on in a clone known as a 'Reliver'.

The original story of Virche Evermore -ErroR: Salvation- followed a girl known as 'Death' who brought an early end to any person she was involved with. With the assistance of others, she was able to discover the truth behind some of the dark workings on the island.

This fan disk allows you to explore five unique, all-new tales."

This is the fandisc for Virche Evermore: ErroR:salvation! You can buy the physical version here, or the digital version here.

[starbeltconstellation]

If you just think about the fact that, in Anakin’s mind, Rex is a tier below R2-D2 in terms of his care level… I think you’ll realize just how bad the implications of that really are. 😬😬😬

Unfortunately the stark fact is that Anakin objectively did treat the clones worse than other jedi did. That he was pretty good with them for three years might make him better than Krell but I doubt other jedi would have been prepared to override their free will entirely to force them to kill little kids. You can’t just… ignore that when looking at his relationship with the clones.

At the end of the day he cared about the clones the same way he cared about the jedi. He cared about Rex the same way he cared about Ahsoka and Obi Wan. He cared, just not enough not to betray them and kill them. He valued their lives, but not as much as he valued his needs.

[stealthetrees]

Fox somehow found Palpatine’s secret sith lair on Coruscant and broke in to steal all the secret info he stored there only to be caught in the act. Palpatine was pissed and electrocuted him then left him for dead. He shows up at the Guard HQ half dead and holding a data disk. He’s unconscious for three days. During that time the Fives fiasco happens but the Corrie’s follow protocol and now they have another extra ARC trooper. Dogma is exited to have a familiar face around.

Thorn mentions it to Fox, but the details of what went down are unimportant compared to the huge operation they’re trying to get up and running to start rescuing POWs. Because the only people that care about clones are clones (except the Jedi but the chancellor would never let them do something that would give them the upper hand against him).

It’s been a very long week and Fox has not slept once. He’s taking a team to break into a rich persons house to steal their bank info to fund their new operations when he bumps into CC-1010s old batchmates. Who don’t know Fletcher is dead and Fox has stolen his identity.

They’re pissed at him for killing a brother, cussing him out and telling him he’s not one of them, ecetra. The moment is very serious until someone tells Fox he should kill himself, not in those exact words but the message gets across.

Dead silence.

“Your office would be a good private spot”

Muffled snorts and giggles. “Maybe cut your wrists open”

One of them looses it and doubles over laughing. “Maybe don’t sit in the doorway or someone could slip on the blood.”

Fox is the only one holding it together, physically shaking in the effort. All the Corrie’s are laughing so hard. One in the back says something about identity fraud and Fox breaks, laughing so hard he falls over.

Fletchers batch mates are confused and more than a little scared.