#new apps 2022 download

[mostlysignssomeportents]

When Facebook came for your battery, feudal security failed

When George Hayward was working as a Facebook data-scientist, his bosses ordered him to run a “negative test,” updating Facebook Messenger to deliberately drain users’ batteries, in order to determine how power-hungry various parts of the apps were. Hayward refused, and Facebook fired him, and he sued:

https://nypost.com/2023/01/28/facebook-fires-worker-who-refused-to-do-negative-testing-awsuit/

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/2023/02/05/battery-vampire/#drained

Hayward balked because he knew that among the 1.3 billion people who use Messenger, some would be placed in harm’s way if Facebook deliberately drained their batteries — physically stranded, unable to communicate with loved ones experiencing emergencies, or locked out of their identification, payment method, and all the other functions filled by mobile phones.

As Hayward told Kathianne Boniello at the New York Post, “Any data scientist worth his or her salt will know, ‘Don’t hurt people…’ I refused to do this test. It turns out if you tell your boss, ‘No, that’s illegal,’ it doesn’t go over very well.”

Negative testing is standard practice at Facebook, and Hayward was given a document called “How to run thoughtful negative tests” regarding which he said, “I have never seen a more horrible document in my career.”

We don’t know much else, because Hayward’s employment contract included a non-negotiable binding arbitration waiver, which means that he surrendered his right to seek legal redress from his former employer. Instead, his claim will be heard by an arbitrator — that is, a fake corporate judge who is paid by Facebook to decide if Facebook was wrong. Even if he finds in Hayward’s favor — something that arbitrators do far less frequently than real judges do — the judgment, and all the information that led up to it, will be confidential, meaning we won’t get to find out more:

https://pluralistic.net/2022/06/12/hot-coffee/#mcgeico

One significant element of this story is that the malicious code was inserted into Facebook’s app. Apps, we’re told, are more secure than real software. Under the “curated computing” model, you forfeit your right to decide what programs run on your devices, and the manufacturer keeps you safe. But in practice, apps are just software, only worse:

https://pluralistic.net/2022/06/23/peek-a-boo/#attack-helicopter-parenting

Apps are part what Bruce Schneier calls “feudal security.” In this model, we defend ourselves against the bandits who roam the internet by moving into a warlord’s fortress. So long as we do what the warlord tells us to do, his hired mercenaries will keep us safe from the bandits:

https://locusmag.com/2021/01/cory-doctorow-neofeudalism-and-the-digital-manor/

But in practice, the mercenaries aren’t all that good at their jobs. They let all kinds of badware into the fortress, like the “pig butchering” apps that snuck into the two major mobile app stores:

https://arstechnica.com/information-technology/2023/02/pig-butchering-scam-apps-sneak-into-apples-app-store-and-google-play/

It’s not merely that the app stores’ masters make mistakes — it’s that when they screw up, we have no recourse. You can’t switch to an app store that pays closer attention, or that lets you install low-level software that monitors and overrides the apps you download.

Indeed, Apple’s Developer Agreement bans apps that violate other services’ terms of service, and they’ve blocked apps like OG App that block Facebook’s surveillance and other enshittification measures, siding with Facebook against Apple device owners who assert the right to control how they interact with the company:

https://pluralistic.net/2022/12/10/e2e/#the-censors-pen

When a company insists that you must be rendered helpless as a condition of protecting you, it sets itself up for ghastly failures. Apple’s decision to prevent every one of its Chinese users from overriding its decisions led inevitably and foreseeably to the Chinese government ordering Apple to spy on those users:

https://pluralistic.net/2022/11/11/foreseeable-consequences/#airdropped

Apple isn’t shy about thwarting Facebook’s business plans, but Apple uses that power selectively — they blocked Facebook from spying on Iphone users (yay!) and Apple covertly spied on its customers in exactly the same way as Facebook, for exactly the same purpose, and lied about it:

https://pluralistic.net/2022/11/14/luxury-surveillance/#liar-liar

The ultimately, irresolvable problem of Feudal Security is that the warlord’s mercenaries will protect you against anyone — except the warlord who pays them. When Apple or Google or Facebook decides to attack its users, the company’s security experts will bend their efforts to preventing those users from defending themselves, turning the fortress into a prison:

https://pluralistic.net/2022/10/20/benevolent-dictators/#felony-contempt-of-business-model

Feudal security leaves us at the mercy of giant corporations �� fallible and just as vulnerable to temptation as any of us. Both binding arbitration and feudal security assume that the benevolent dictator will always be benevolent, and never make a mistake. Time and again, these assumptions are proven to be nonsense.

Image: Anthony Quintano (modified) https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Mark_Zuckerberg_F8_2018_Keynote_%2841118890174%29.jpg

CC BY 2.0: https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/2.0/deed.en

[Image ID: A painting depicting the Roman sacking of Jerusalem. The Roman leader's head has been replaced with Mark Zuckerberg's head. The wall has Apple's 'Think Different' wordmark and an Ios 'low battery' icon.]

Next week (Feb 8-17), I'll be in Australia, touring my book *Chokepoint Capitalism* with my co-author, Rebecca Giblin. We'll be in Brisbane on Feb 8, and then we're doing a remote event for NZ on Feb 9. Next is Melbourne, Sydney and Canberra. I hope to see you!

https://chokepointcapitalism.com/

[sindar-princeling]

LOTR Newsletter 3 Shire Drift - FAQ

Hello everyone!

Just like last year: for those of you who are already familiar with The Lord of the Rings Newsletter, this serves as an announcement that I'm doing it again; and for those who aren't - an introduction to the project :)

What is LOTR Newsletter?

I'm one of the people who subscribed to Dracula Daily in May 2022, and immediately thought, "Hey, I can do this too but with XYZ!" - XYZ being The Lord of the Rings. Because the events of LOTR also have specific dates ascribed to them, we're gonna be reading LOTR as it happened.

When does it take place?

Because of the way the beginning of LOTR is structured (read: because I don't want to leave six-month-long breaks between the first entries), we're gonna start on September 15th - a week before September 22nd, when the main events start to take place. It's also the publishing date of the Silmarillion, but that's just a fun fact for my own enjoyment.

From September 15th to September 19th, we'll read the prologue, and the fragments preceding Frodo's departure from the Shire. From September 20th, we'll be reading according to the dates in the book until April 8th. Then we'll be reading last parts of the book - which are stretched over a long time - once a week, to once again avoid lengthy breaks in delivery.

The Newsletter will last from September 15th to May 26th.

Where do I go if I want to post/talk about something related to the Newsletter with other readers?

We discuss current (and not only current) entries in the #lotr newsletter tag, and we have a Discord server set by the amazing @k-she-rambles! (I really hope this time I managed to generate a link that never expires...)

How do I subscribe?

Since the original platform I was using (TinyLetter) was shut down halfway through the second year of the newsletter, I had to figure out an alternative way to execute this project.

For the lovely people who joined the last edition of the newsletter, just a short announcement - I weighed all the pros and cons and decided to continue carrying out the newsletter the way I did after TinyLetter shut down.

For the new folks, a lengthier explanation: check out this post if you want to learn the details, but long story short: I can't send the newsletter as e-mails anymore, so instead I decided to provide you with a ready copy of the entire thing. I prepared formatted copies of the whole newsletter - September 15th to May 26th - as an .odt file, as a .pdf file, and most importantly as an .epub file, because I assume most of you are reading on your phones (if you don't already have an .epub reader, I use FBReader, and everything worked fine on my phone). At the beginning you'll find the whole table of contents with hyperlinks, so the navigation inside the document should be easy!

The MEGA folder can be accessed right here, and it's available for everyone!

In the folder linked, you'll also find a calendar file made by @none-ofthisnonsense that you can download on your phone and import into your calendar app so that all days when we read are marked in your calendar!

If you want to receive notifications about when there is an entry to read, you can also follow @is-today-a-lotr-newsletter-day and turn on notifications! This is a blog created solely for notifying you all when we're reading a new fragment of the newsletter, so all notifications you'll get will be about new entries, and nothing more. The notifications are meant to be the equivalent of sending e-mails.

Anything else I should know?

Please don't rat me out to Tolkien Estate/j, and have fun reading!

(And as a PS.: Thank you very much if you join - or join again! Last year was very tumultuous because of all the changes in the format, and I know the new way is not for everyone - but introducing more changes again felt like once more creating new chaos, so I decided to stick to a solution that mostly worked. I hope you understand!)

See you on September 15th!

[hurpdurpburps]

Astoria: Fate's Kiss Is Getting Re-released On 25 July, Here Are Some Things You Should Keep In Mind

Most people don't know it (until now I guess), but I'm the founder of, and have been running the @ls-salvation-squad project since Christmas 2021. I hardly interact with the LS community outside of the project server in a personal capacity as I've largely left the fandom around 6 months before the announcement of the app's closure.

I was pretty late to the game (pun intended), having only learnt about the app in 2020, but managed to be around for 'milestone events' such as the writers' strike and the DMCA rampage on YouTube/tumblr. Thanks to certain friends and technology, I've also had privileged access to a quasi-'insider look' into Voltage's workings (and failings) as a studio, both in real time and through secondhand horror stories of the past.

This culmination of experiences has spurred me to make my first, and last, personal opinion piece regarding LS on tumblr, a corner of the community that I haven't really interacted much with.

While I understand the sheer joy, relief and excitement that comes with revived, legal access to some of the most impressive, unapologetically queer stories to have ever graced the internet, I want to point out the ugly truths that are intertwined with the revival of this troubled app:

Buying the game =/= supporting the creators. Not a cent of your money goes towards them. Even when Voltage USA used to be a thing, barely any of it went towards the employees in general either. The writers were paid 3 cents/word, and producers were working twice as hard but only paid around half of their counterparts in other companies. AFAIK the artists have kept quiet but it would be more of a surprise if they were treated any better than their peers.

Buying the game =/= supporting queer content/community. This might come as a shocker, but homophobia ran rampant within Voltage's management. The best evidence of this can be found in their history of 'peculiar' business or creative decisions - and they've made a fuckton of bad choices. Fun fact; the first queer routes were only made possible via sheer force of will of a particular producer. I'm not at liberty to share the nitty gritty on this public platform as the stories aren't mine, but maybe if you asked some of the former staff nicely, they might give you cryptic hints.

You're gonna be paying them a THIRD time. Many of us have already shelled out hundreds of dollars on heart choices - not once, but twice. Putting the whole version on Steam/Switch had always been a valid option from the beginning of the end, but they chose not to do it. Why? Because users scrambling to make bulk purchases of tickets and hearts to record routes as a last hurrah meant a last, fat cash-in. Not to mention the fact that they're selling the game at US$30 per series, for almost decade-old content, presumably without any new additions. At this point, throwing your hard earned money at them AGAIN is just rewarding scummy management and unscrupulous business models.

Do you really need to? Our team of around 100 archivists worked tirelessly in Q1 of 2022 to provide you high quality recordings of every single route. We've gone so far as to acquire recordings of pre-LS Voltage content such as Queen's Gambit and all of the soundtracks. We've put assets up for download. There are a dozen passionate creators out there who have been updating their Ren'Py recreations so that you can scratch your itch - and all for free!!! What more could you possible want or need that only the greedy bastards at Voltage can give you - apart from seeing your custom MC name on the screen and the absolutely inconsequential choices B & C that our videos didn't cover?

Is this a call for a boycott? I guess not really, or at least I didn't consciously set out to make it like this. Dissuading others from purchasing legal access to media when it's easily available goes against my general principle about responsibly and pragmatically supporting creators. And as one 'em Gays™, I know the preciousness of possessing Queer Stories Written By Queer People.

But I was concerned at what seemed to be a wave of happiness and eagerness at news of the revival, without any mention of the absolute shit show that has led us to this very point. There's a very big part of me that's absolutely pissed at being taken for a ride. News of the revival has been a bittersweet development for us all, especially those who have poured their time, money and energy over the past 2.5 years into salvaging what was thought to be a lost piece of queer media - only to find out that all that effort might only get them a slap to the face in the form of a DMCA from the grave. So yeah, fuck you Voltage.

TLDR: You should really save your money for more ethical, indie developers who have the decency to not mock your consumer intelligence. I don't think it's a crime against humanity if you end up buying it after all, but just think about it yeah?

[heavenlycloud]

the veil~ smau

pairing: huh yunjin x fem! reader, aespa 5th member fem! reader x huh yunjin

status: ongoing... ➸ 04/15/2022 // taglist OPEN

synopsis: making friends— that’s all you downloaded this new app for, that’s all the new app is supposed to be for. the original plan goes awry when you meet the girl that seems to be your perfect match.

genre: fluff, angst, crack, social media au, romance, comedy, strangers to lovers, idol au

starring: le sserafim, aespa, minji and hanni (new jeans), itzy, nana (woo-ah!), sieun (stayc), jurin (xg), shotaro (nct), heejin (loona), dosie (purple kiss), yeri (red velvet), felix (skz), gaeul (ive), somi, keeho (p1harmony), lily and haewon (nmixx), remi (cherry bullet), txt, lee chaeyoung (fromis_9), beomhan (fm entertainment), more

warnings: swearing, dirty jokes, lightly implied nsfw

fic notes: this is a work of fiction i made for fun just like my other works. i'm not assuming the sexualities, personalities, platonic/romantic relationships between any and all idols used in this fic. idols born after 2003 will not be frequently written in or directly involved with any romantic relationship/implied nsfw at any time.

author notes: this is my first smau!!! i've been wanting to make one for years and i finally found the motivation and confidence to do it. right now i haven't figured out an update schedule since i'm still in school, but i'll work on finding one if people actually want one. some chapters may be very text heavy opposed to tweets and messages just to contribute to the plot.

‎♡‧₊˚˘͈ᵕ˘͈‎ 彡♡ ༘*.ﾟ .·:¨༺ ʚ♡ɞ༻¨*:·.﹢࿐ ☆

┊┊┊┊°⋆ ꒰♡꒱⋆°

┊┊┊୨♡୧ ₊˚๑ * ⋆

┊ ┊˚εїз⋆ ༄

┊:·.♡☆°

before you begin please read the profiles, how it works, and introduction

profiles: the androids | the angels

how it works: the veil app

0. introduction: i got a match

i. one: hell froze over

ii. two: oh that bitch GAY

iii. three: the face of a cold blooded killer

iv. four: you think im cute? part ii. text + social media posts

v. five: hey bby gorl i want u

[silvermountaingirl]

New episode out about Neil Gaiman allegations. Please listen. Claire's story was previously covered in Am I Broken, but this includes all-new interviews with her, audio of a whole phonecall from 2022 in which Gaiman discussed what she went through and "apologized," his team's responses to the allegations, and a lot of new reporting.

[teetlezhere]

RISE OF THE TMNT: HOMECOMING - STEP-BY-STEP INSTALL GUIDE - UPDATED!

Like promised, I've retraced my steps and the post here is a full guide on how to download and play TMNT homecoming for Android device.

Here below I've compiled a series of steps and useful links in case you might need to play the game:

(Edit: The guide's updated now:)

Step 0: First things first...

First thing first, you'll need an Android device to download and play this game.

UPDATE! - The game now also works on Bluestack!

Second thing you'll need (unless you know chinese) is a picture Translator app.

I've used translation apps that take pictures of the screen and translate it to english and followed the instructions to set up my username and password.

Step 1: Downloading the APK

Unless you live in China, or you can get the game legit in some way I don't know, APK downloading sites might help. However, be careful, for some may be scam sites. Use a VPN to help block unwanted visitors.

I've used this site here to download the APK for the game and seems pretty legit (based on bitdefender, the apk is safe) compared to others I've tried. While the picture is from the beta version in 2022, the update is the most recent from 2023.

If you have another apk downloading site you'd prefer to try download the apk from, try looking up for TMNT Homecoming (it will not show as Rise or ROTTMNT despite being the same characters)...

Or if that fails too, try searching for 忍者龟: 归来 apk if you can't find it in english.

STEP 2: Installation

Once you download the game, install it on your device. Phone might ask for permission due to being considered an unknown APK from an outside source.

STEP 3: Username and Password

If everything has gone smoothly, then it's time for the username and password.

A window will show with MUZHI written on it. Here, you must write your username (top) and your password (bottom). -ps: ignore the writing below. It was my bad 😅-

You shouldn't have any issues with this step as it accepts western keyboard characters.

Just remember to write the ID and PW down somewhere so you won't forget them. Or take a snapshot of it before proceeding.

UPDATE! - It seems there are issues with the western keyboards and won't accept them anymore. So, if this step doesn't work, click the button that says: Quick Registration (the button in red) and proceed to step 4!

Step 4: THE DREADED

A new window opens

It requires that you put a name (top) and ID number (below) in order to play the game.

To bypass this, this helped me:

You can pick any of the codes shown (I used the very first one and it worked like a charm).

Let's use this for example: As you can see, there is a series on numbers first, and chinese characters at the end.

Careful with this step as the name goes on the top bar, and should be only chinese characters.

Like this: 刘剑丽

The ID is only numbers, and they go in the bar below.

Like this: 220283198306236235

It must be like this:

STEP 5: Selecting A Game Name

If you've reached this point, and if you're able to play the game at long last, then CONGRATS! You've made it! But it's not over just quite yet.

The game, eventually, requires that you add a GAME NAME. It can be anything you want it to be, but MIND YOU! THIS IS VERY IMPORTANT!

IT WILL NOT ACCEPT Western Keyboard characters. Only chinese characters!

This is, however, much, much easier to bypass than step 4. Here, you have 2 options:

Option 1: If you want your very own original game name to play, you can go to google translate and simply write down and translate it to chinese.

Example:

Just copy the chinese characters and paste them in the bar. Then proceed.

Option 2: If you don't care about what name you use to play, just generate a complete random name by pressing the dice button right next to the name bar. The game will insta-generate a completely random name for you to use.

STEP 6: Have fun!

If you followed each step of the way without too much hassle and managed to get through the apocalypse that is bypassing this, then CONGRATS! YOU'VE FINALLY MADE IT!

I'm so, so proud of you! Now you're free to play this Rise of the tmnt game as much as you want! Keep your translator close just in case, and have plenty of fun with the features this game offers.

If you're looking to send me a friend request, You'll find me as Ninja of Liberation (or 解放忍者 ).

In case there’s issues, DM me and I’ll see to try help and update the guide.

[dagwolf]

Recent viral images of Southwest agents getting yelled at and crying have resurfaced a valuable lesson about the nature of our economic system that’s worth examining this holiday season: the deliberate, built-in ways corporate “customer service” is set up to not only shield those on the top of the ladder—executives, vice presidents, large shareholders—but pit low-wage workers against each other in an inherently antagonistic relationship marked by powerlessness and frustration. It’s a dynamic we discussed in “Episode 118: The Snitch Economy—How Rating Apps and Tipping Pit Working People Against Each Other,” of the Citations Needed podcast I co-host, but I feel ought to be expanded on in light of recent events. Watching video after video, reading tweet after tweet, describing frustrated stranded holiday travelers yelling at Southwest Airlines workers, and hearing, in turn, accounts of airline workers and airport staff breaking down crying, is a good opportunity to talk about how none of this is natural or inevitable. It is a choice, both in corporate policy and government regulation. 

There are three main ways capital pits workers against each other in the relationship we call “customer service”:

1. Snitch economy. As discussed in Citations Needed Ep. 118, we are provided with more and more apps, websites, and customer surveys to effectively do the job of managing for management—free of charge, of course. Under the auspices of “empowering” the consumer, we are told to spy on our low-wage servants and gauge the quality of their servitude with stars, tips, and reviews. Uber, DoorDash, Fiver, Grubhub—a new “gig economy” has emerged that not only misclassifies workers as freelancers to pay them less, but hands over the reins of management to the consumer directly. This necessarily increases the antagonism between working-class consumers and the workers they are snitching on. 

2. Automation. Increasingly, even getting to the bottom rung employee to yell at is difficult. Under the thin pretense of Covid, increased labor power has exploded the use of automated technology that creates a frustrating maze to get a simple problem solved or task accomplished. Don’t go to the register, instead download the app and order. Scan the QR code, don’t wait on hold, go to our website and engage a series of automated prompts and maybe you can solve your problem. More and more consumers are being pushed away from humans onto automated systems we are told will “save us time,” but instead exist solely to save the corporation labor costs. So, by the time the average consumer does finally work their way to seeing a human, they are annoyed, frustrated, and angry at this faceless entity and more willing to take it out on someone making $13 an hour. 

One recent visit to Houston’s George H.W. Bush airport portended our obnoxious “automated” future. To cut down on unionized airport labor, all the restaurants use QR codes and require you to order food and drinks for yourself. Per usual, it’s sold as an exciting new technology that’s somehow good for consumers, but really the basic technology is 30 years old. It’s just a screen—the same ones restaurants have had for decades. The only thing that’s changed is the social conditioning of having you do all your own ordering and menu navigation. The waiter hasn’t been replaced by an iPad, they’ve been replaced by you. Invariably, it’s clunky and annoying and reduces the union jobs that airport construction is said to provide to justify soliciting public dollars. The only winner is a faceless corporation with a Delaware LLC and its shareholders living in a few counties in Connecticut and Texas.

Automation not only annoys and adds labor burdens to the customer, there is also evidence that it is a significant contributor to income inequality. A November 2022 study published in the journal Econometrica looked at the significantly widening income gap between lesser and more educated workers over the past 40 years. It found that ​​“automation accounts for more than half of that increase,” as summarized by MIT News. “This single one variable … explains 50 to 70 percent of the changes or variation between group inequality from 1980 to about 2016,” said MIT economist Daron Acemoglu, co-author of the study. Whether or not, under a different economic system, automation could be a force for good is a debate for another day. But what is clear is that, while both consumers and workers are harmed by this trend, there is a significant want of solidarity between them. 

3. Deliberate understaffing. This is a major culprit in this week’s Southwest Airlines meltdown. In parallel with the increased use of forced automation, cost-cutting corporations, facing increased labor power, are gutting staffing to its bare bones and hoping their corporate competitors doing the same will lead to a shift in consumer’s willingness to put up with substandard service and conditions, and overall bullshit. “We apologize for the wait,” the automated phone prompt tells us. Of course a machine cannot be contrite, so the effect is both surreal and grating: You’re not fucking sorry, you don’t exist. You're a recording. But now, who am I yelling at? 

...

[crystallizsch]

Yuusha is such a cute name omg🥺🥺😭💞💘💞💘💗 How did you come up with and find it??? THIS NAME SUITS YUUSHA VERY GOOD XDD💞💞 HAVE A NICE DAY✨

AJBDJSSJ HI HI OYA THANK YOU SO MUCH AND WHAT A SURPRISE SEEING YOU IN MY INBOX 🥺🥺💖💖💕 I HOPE YOU HAVE A NICE DAY TOO 💕💕💕

so short version answer -> i got her name from this yuusha from a visual novel game app!! i just thought the name was so pretty so i kept it in my back pocket just in case i wanted to use it for one of my ocs, so now here i am with my yuusha!! :DDD

"yuusha" is also a protagonist/MC in the game so i just thought this tidbit from the wiki really fits her!

(longer version answer below because i kind of went on a ramble before deciding to shorten it aahhhhh 😖😖😖)

aahh so i tend to make a lot of OCs so i just keep a list full of names that i find that i think are interesting so i don't have to keep looking up new ones!

when i was looking for names with "yuu" i forgot i wrote down "yuusha" as an idea in my list and i'm so happy i found it again because if i didn't, yuusha would have been yuuki/yuki instead (because i also played obey me back then hfdnsnfd)

also also!! the yuusha which i got her name from is also an isekai protagonist into a fantasy world which is SO ironic (yuusha is their default/"canon" name in the story!)

(the game is named "Lovestruck" and it was one of my favorite visual novel games because it has a diverse collection of stories and characters, but it was recently discontinued/shut down in 2022 and you can't download it anymore 😭😭)

AAHH ANYWAYS if you've read this far, thank you so much for liking her name and i'm glad to hear you think that it suits her!! 🥺💖💕💖💕

[mariacallous]

ten years ago, WIRED published a news story about how two little-known, slightly ramshackle encryption apps called RedPhone and TextSecure were merging to form something called Signal. Since that July in 2014, Signal has transformed from a cypherpunk curiosity—created by an anarchist coder, run by a scrappy team working in a single room in San Francisco, spread word-of-mouth by hackers competing for paranoia points—into a full-blown, mainstream, encrypted communications phenomenon. Hundreds of millions of people have now downloaded Signal. (Including Drake: “Cuban girl, her family grind coffee,” he rapped in his 2022 song “Major Distribution.” “Text me on the Signal, don’t call me.”) Billions more use Signal’s encryption protocols integrated into platforms like WhatsApp.

That origin story is, perhaps, a startup cliché. But Signal is, in many ways, the exact opposite of the Silicon Valley model. It’s a nonprofit that has never taken investment, makes its product available for free, has no advertisements, and collects virtually no information on its users—while competing with tech giants and winning. In a world where Elon Musk seems to have proven that practically no privately owned communication forum is immune from a single rich person’s whims, Signal stands as a counterfactual: evidence that venture capitalism and surveillance capitalism—hell, capitalism, period—are not the only paths forward for the future of technology.

Over its past decade, no leader of Signal has embodied that iconoclasm as visibly as Meredith Whittaker. Signal’s president since 2022 is one of the world’s most prominent tech critics: When she worked at Google, she led walkouts to protest its discriminatory practices and spoke out against its military contracts. She cofounded the AI Now Institute to address ethical implications of artificial intelligence and has become a leading voice for the notion that AI and surveillance are inherently intertwined. Since she took on the presidency at the Signal Foundation, she has come to see her central task as working to find a long-term taproot of funding to keep Signal alive for decades to come—with zero compromises or corporate entanglements—so it can serve as a model for an entirely new kind of tech ecosystem.

Whittaker has been based in Paris for the summer, but I met up with her during a quick visit to her home city of New York. In a Brooklyn café, we ended up delving deepest into a subject that, as outspoken as the privacy exec may be, she rarely speaks about: herself, and her strange path from Google manager to Silicon Valley gadfly.

[black-arcana]

WITHIN TEMPTATION's SHARON DEN ADEL Guests On 'Labyrinth' Single From Ukraine's BLIND8

Ukrainian band BLIND8 has released a new song, "Labyrinth", featuring Sharon Den Adel of Dutch symphonic metallers WITHIN TEMPTATION.

This collaboration is a landmark moment for BLIND8, which formed just before the Russian invasion of Ukraine and has become a leading light for rock music in its homeland whenever circumstances allow. They will be joining WITHIN TEMPTATION as the opening act on their "Bleed Out 2024" European tour this autumn, playing arenas across mainland Europe and the U.K.

The song is also being released worldwide via WITHIN TEMPTATION's own record label Force Music Recordings.

Sharon comments: "'Labyrinth' is not just a song; it's a testament to the enduring power of music. And even with Roman, the singer, and Ihor, the bass player, currently having been mobilized and in training for the war, BLIND8 continue to defy the odds, proving that even in the most challenging times, art can shine a light in the darkness."

BLIND8 remain committed and hopeful of spreading their message of solidarity, perseverance and defiance across Europe at the end of this year, playing to their largest audiences yet in huge arenas, when they support WITHIN TEMPTATION. The musicians have said that this song is their testament to the fact that even in the darkest times, music has the power to inspire and unite people.

WITHIN TEMPTATION will embark on a huge arena tour of Europe in the autumn of 2024. Joining them on this tour will be both WITHIN TEMPTATION's recent collaborative artists and longtime friends: singer Tarja Turunen (on select dates),German metalcore band ANNISOKAY, BLIND8, GREEN LIZARD and Ukrainian producer and vocalist Alex Yarmak.

The tour starts in September with two shows in The Netherlands (that sold out within days) and will continue throughout Europe in an array of impressive arenas. A number of dates have already sold out, with tickets running low across Europe.

Last fall, WITHIN TEMPTATION co-sponsored the Ukraine Aid Operations boat fundraiser for the Ukrainian Marines. They donated 6,000 euros for 30 patches, which they packaged with a limited-edition box of their latest album, "Bleed Out"

Four months ago, Den Adel spoke to Metal Musikast about WITHIN TEMPTATION's music video for the band's "A Fool's Parade" single, featuring Ukrainian producer and vocalist Alex Yarmak. Recorded amidst the streets of Kyiv with renowned Ukrainian video director Indy Hait, the clip captures Sharon at important Ukrainian landmarks. Asked what it was like to make a music video in the capital city of a country at war, Den Adel said: "Well, I was never scared to go there, because I was in good hands, to my opinion. We were helped to do this video and to organize everything, what we wanted to do in Kyiv, by the organization called Music Saves Ukraine. And they told us about the app that you had need to have. For instance, if you go into Kiev, which we did by night train from Poland, because there's no commercial flights from Amsterdam to Kyiv anymore. So we had to go by night train from Poland to Kyiv. And they told us to download an air-alerts app because everyone in Ukraine has that, and you can select a region that you are in and any incoming dangerous drones or airplanes, like MiGs, who are carrying a supersonic bomb or anything, they will put that in the app and you know what the danger is and how much time you have to go to a shelter. And there's shelters everywhere, even in the hotel that I was. And we once had to go underneath the metro station, because there was a MiG on their way. And sometimes it has a bomb, sometimes it doesn't. It's sometimes just looking and scouting where they can do something with the next airplane. And this time it wasn't wearing any supersonic bomb, which was good for us because it can wipe out a complete area in a matter of seconds."

In March 2022, WITHIN TEMPTATION was one of the artists who took part in a telethon concert in support of Ukraine. "Save Ukraine - #StopWar" united more than 20 countries and bring together more than 50 participants. The marathon was broadcast from Warsaw on the Polish TV channel TVP. In addition, broadcasters from many countries around the world rebroadcasted the marathon on their local channels.The "Bleed Out" album was released last October.

[frangipani-wanderlust]

PSA

For anyone who is setting up/moving into a new Samsung phone, mine started to auto-download the TikTok app and thank goodness I saw it and stopped it before that action completed. TikTok is well-known and documented to be horrendously privacy-invasive and its data-collection is not limited to people who sign up and consent to their policies.

https://www.wired.co.uk/article/tiktok-data-privacy https://www.nytimes.com/2022/08/19/technology/tiktok-browser-tracking.html https://www.theguardian.com/technology/2022/aug/24/tiktok-can-track-users-every-tap-as-they-visit-other-sites-through-ios-app-new-research-shows https://www.mediapost.com/publications/article/392312/tiktok-claims-non-users-consent-to-tracking-on-hul.html https://www.msn.com/en-us/news/technology/tiktok-is-making-users-give-their-iphone-passwords-for-unclear-reasons/ar-AA1m7ahi https://www.msn.com/en-au/news/australia/tiktok-privacy-breach-allegations-under-spotlight/ar-AA1m7mOy

Simply put, even using their website puts your privacy at risk. Downloading their app is simply, bottom line, not safe for anyone who is trying to minimize tracking. We should not have devices set to auto-download it, ever.

[mostlysignssomeportents]

Apple's business model made Chinese oppression inevitable

A month ago, a wave of rare political protests swept China, centered on Beijing, where Premier Xi Jinping was consolidating his already-substantial power by claiming an unprecedented third term:

https://www.cnn.com/2022/10/22/china/china-party-congress-overseas-students-protest-intl-hnk

Protest organizers in China struggle with the serious legal and extrajudicial penalties for anti-government activities, backed by a sophisticated digital surveillance grid that monitors and blocks online communications that might challenge government authority.

Though this digital surveillance network is now primarily supplied and serviced by Chinese tech companies, it can't be separated from western tech companies. The first version of the Chinese digital surveillance grid was built by Cisco:

https://www.eff.org/deeplinks/2016/04/ciscos-latest-attempt-dodge-responsibility-facilitating-human-rights-abuses-export

Tech companies like Yahoo went into China knowing that they'd have to censor the internet, and ultimately turned over their users' data to Chinese authorities, who subsequently arrested and tortured some of those users:

https://www.technewsworld.com/story/yahoo-charged-with-complicity-in-chinese-torture-case-57011.html

Google pulled out of China in 2010, after the Chinese government hacked and arrested Gmail users. But eight years later, Google was secretly working on Project Dragonfly, a censoring, surveilling search product designed for the Chinese market:

https://www.technologyreview.com/2018/12/19/138307/how-google-took-on-china-and-lost/

Apple plays a key ongoing role in Chinese state surveillance and oppression. Like most tech giants, Apple depends on access to low-waged Chinese factory workers with weak labor protections to hold down the wage bill for its manufacturing.

Apple also relies on selling phones and computers and services to the titanic Chinese middle class, a category that's loose enough that estimates of its size range from 350m to 700m - but even the lower figure is larger than the entire US population.

Apple's dual reliance on poor Chinese workers and rich Chinese consumers gives the Chinese state enormous leverage over the company. The Chinese government can order Apple to participate in its digital surveillance and dissent-suppression efforts and threaten the company with the loss of revenues and manufacturing if it balks.

But that's true of any western company that seeks to hold down costs and generate revenues through Chinese manufacturing and Chinese sales. What makes Apple uniquely vulnerable to Chinese state pressure is its business-model choices - choices that, ironically, are touted as a way to keep its users safe.

Apple's Ios platform is "curated." Ipads and Iphones ship locked to Apple's App Stores. Users aren't supposed to be able to install software unless it is delivered via the App Store. Apple describes this as a safety measure, a bulwark against the tricks that hackers and identity thieves use to lure users into installing malicious software.

But Apple also makes billions of dollars through this arrangement. The App Store is a chokepoint, and any software author who wants to sell an app to an Iphone owner can only do so if Apple approves of the transaction.

https://chokepointcapitalism.com/

Apple can arbitrarily withhold this permission, if, say, it has a competing product and doesn't want to have to win out over a new market entrant in a fair fight.

Apple can also burden its competitors: if you want to sell media that competes with Apple Books, Apple Music or Apple Video, the company will charge you 15-30% on each sale, while its own offerings escape this charge.

That means that media stores that competes with Apple's own retail storefronts have to either charge more than Apple, or make less money, or not sell media via an app at all - instead, they have to implement a clunky two-step whereby customers buy their media on the web and they flip back to an app to download it.

Even when an app maker doesn't compete with Apple, Apple can turn it to its advantage: the company simply appropriates 15-30% of ever dollar that changes hands when Iphone owners buy software and media from app makers.

This is "feudal security." In a lawless realm of roving bandits, Apple offers us a high-walled fortress bristling with fierce infosec mercenaries who promise to defend us from the threats outside the walls. In return, Apple uses its control over the gateway to the outside world to extract a tax from everyone who brings us the things we need.

Apple has every incentive to make this fortress as impregnable as possible. From the lowest levels of its chip designs to its lobbying blitzes to criminalize jailbreaking devices, the company is fully committed to ensuring that Ios device owners can't make choices Apple disapproves of.

This is the source of China's extraordinary leverage over Apple. Apple can't afford to leave China, because that would mean losing manufacturing and customers. Because of this, the Chinese state can order Apple to take any measure that Apple is technically capable of delivering.

Because of its business-model choices, Apple has the technical capability to introduce defects in the apps on its customers' devices. It can order every software vendor in the App Store to break their privacy tools so that the Chinese government can spy on those customers.

If companies don't comply, Apple can simply block them from delivering software to Chinese users altogether. An absolutely foreseeable consequence of this product design is that the Chinese state will order Apple to neuter all the privacy tools available to Chinese Ios users, which is exactly what happened:

https://www.reuters.com/article/us-china-apple-vpn/apple-says-it-is-removing-vpn-services-from-china-app-store-idUSKBN1AE0BQ

Apple offers cloud storage to its Ios users. Because Apple can't afford to anger the Chinese state, the Chinese state can order Apple to introduce defects into the encryption on its cloud servers so that Apple customers can be spied on by the Chinese government. That's also exactly what happened:

https://www.nytimes.com/2021/05/17/technology/apple-china-censorship-data.html

Apple's business-model decisions reduce the consequences for betraying its customers. If defects in Apple's cloud product come to light, it can simply order all the other cloud services in the App Store to introduce similar defects, on pain of being kicked out of the store.

Last month's Chinese protests were coordinated in part thanks to a novel technological tactic, one that made use of one of Apple's most innovative technologies: Airdrop. Airdrop is an ad hoc, peer-to-peer file transfer protocol that lets two nearby Ios users exchange files with one another without identifying themselves.

Anti-Xi organizers used Airdrop to exchange forbidden protest literature. Because these files travel directly between Ios devices, they weren't visible to the censors and spies who monitor other digital communications tools in China.

This use of Airdrop is a canonical example of the ways that digital technologies can be part of human rights struggles, giving people new tools that give them leverage over powerful state actors.

Right on schedule, the Chinese government has ordered Apple to break Airdrop so that it can't be used to organize protests, requiring users to opt into receiving files from strangers every ten minutes, rather than letting them set their devices to publicly visible until they are ready to turn it off:

https://www.theguardian.com/world/2022/nov/11/apple-limits-iphone-filesharing-feature-used-by-protesters-in-china

Apple called this a "security update." It updates the security of the Chinese state from democratic accountability.

There's a strain of technology criticism that sees incidents like this as proof that digital tools have no place in human rights struggles, because they will always be turned against their users.

But no one forced Apple to launch its "curated computing" service, nor to design it so that its customers can't override it. Apple built a walled fortress in full knowledge that it might be called upon someday to turn that fortress into a prison.

The feigned outrage of tech companies when the weakenesses in their business-models are exploited by third parties is an obvious and shabby trick to deflect blame. Apple put the gun on the mantelpiece in Act I. It can't expect us to forgive it when Xi Jinping fires the gun in Act III.

Of course, this sin isn't unique to Apple. Google has designed a location-harvesting system that is impossible to opt out of, so that it can accumulate and sell access to a database of every movement of every person.

https://pluralistic.net/2021/06/01/you-are-here/#goog

Having assembled this database, Google doesn't get to act surprised when cops show up with "geofenced reverse warrants" that demand the identity of every participant in a Black Lives Matter protest (or the January 6 riot):

https://www.theverge.com/2022/2/5/22918487/fbi-geofence-seattle-blm-protest-police-guild-attack

Or take the scandal of Adobe customers' files being wrecked by the company's dispute with proprietary color system vendor Pantone. Pantone cancelled Adobe's license to use its technology and wants Adobe customers to spend $21/month to keep Pantone colors.

https://pluralistic.net/2022/10/28/fade-to-black/#trust-the-process

But this doesn't just affect files created after the Adobe/Pantone split. Due to Adobe's subscription-based business model, which requires customers to pay monthly for software as a service (SaaS), Pantone can demand that Adobe break all the existing files its customers have created.

If you created a Photoshop file with some Pantone colors 20 years ago, they are broken now, and forever, unless you start paying Pantone $21/month, because Adobe has altered its cloud software so that all Pantone-colored pixels are rendered in black.

I've been corresponding with an Adobe PR flack doing damage control after the Pantone scandal broke, and as far as I can tell, she wants me to "correct" my article to blame Pantone for this mess, because it has Adobe over a barrel.

But Adobe built that barrel. This hostage situation was a completely forseeable consequence of redesigning its products to treat its users like hostages. Pantone are greedy scum, but so are Adobe - and it was Adobe's greed that exposed its customers to Pantone's greed.

The point isn't that having your Photoshop files corrupted is the same as being kidnapped and tortured by Chinese police. But both Adobe and Apple - and every other tech giant - has decided that the rise of networked computing is an opportunity to exercise ongoing control over their customers. All of these companies knew that this ongoing control could be hijacked by hostile governments or corporations at any time, and they did it anyway.

They have no business acting surprised now. Apple isn't responsible for Chinese state oppression, but it is knowingly, explicitly complicit in it.

[Image ID: A Chinese revolutionary poster depicting a marching army of peasant soldiers. It has been altered so that a man at the front of the column is carrying an Ipad. The image is surmounted by Apple's 'Think Different' wordmark.]

[sindar-princeling]

2 LOTR 2 Newsletter - FAQ

Hi everyone!

For those of you who are already familiar with The Lord of the Rings Newsletter, this serves as an announcement that I'm doing it again; and for those who aren't - an introduction to the project :)

What is LOTR Newsletter?

I'm one of the people who subscribed to Dracula Daily in May 2022, and immediately thought, "Hey, I can do this too but with XYZ!" - XYZ being The Lord of the Rings. Because the events of LOTR also have specific dates ascribed to them, we're gonna be reading LOTR as it happened.

When does it take place?

Because of the way the beginning of LOTR is structured (read: because I don't want to leave six-month-long breaks between the first entries), we're gonna start on September 15th - a week before September 22nd, when the main events start to take place. It's also the publishing date of the Silmarillion, but that's just a fun fact for my own enjoyment.

From September 15th to September 19th, we'll read the prologue, and the fragments preceding Frodo's departure from the Shire. From September 20th, we'll be reading according to the dates until April 8th. Then we'll be reading last parts of the book, which are stretched over a lot of time, once a week, to once again avoid long breaks in delivery.

The Newsletter will last from September 15th to May 26th.

Where do I go if I want to post/talk about something related to the Newsletter with other readers?

We discuss current (and not only current) entries in the #lotr newsletter tag, and we have a Discord server set by the amazing @k-she-rambles!

How do I subscribe?

Since the original platform I was using (TinyLetter) was shut down halfway through the second year of the newsletter, I had to figure out an alternative way to execute this project. Check out this post to learn more and grab your own copy of the newsletter! In the folder linked in the post, you'll also find a calendar file made by @none-ofthisnonsense that you can download on your phone and import into your calendar app so that all days when we read are marked in your calendar!

If you want to receive notifications about when there is an entry to read, you can also follow @is-today-a-lotr-newsletter-day and turn on notifications! This is a blog created solely for notifying you all when we're reading a new fragment of the newsletter, so all notifications you'll get will be about new entries, and nothing more.

Anything else I should know?

Please don't rat me out to Tolkien Estate/j, and have fun reading!

See you on September 15th!

PS. Thank you to everyone who asked if I'll be organising the Newsletter again, and showed support and excitement over participating again. It means the world to me 💕💕

[cheritzteam]

[The Ssum] A Closer Look at <The Ssum : Forbidden Lab>’s v1.1.0 Update

Hello, dear lab participant!

We’ve prepared for you new relationships, an even more efficient subscription model, and a variety of events!

Spend your year’s end with The Ssum v1.1.0 Update♡

===

> Your new special ssum-one “Harry”

The Lab’s search for your destined one has borne its fruits and we have discovered a new match, Harry🐴(CV. Lim Juwan)!

(Rumors say that lab participants who’ve matched with him by the 14th of December, KST will get a chance to win The Ssum Matching Event…!)

For existing lab participants who are curious about your new match, go to [Profile].

Tapping the button next to your current match’s profile picture will let you check your other match.

Worried that you’ll lose ties with your previous match? Don’t worry about a thing!

When you change your current match, your previous match will stay frozen in time. If you return to the same time slot as where you have left, you won’t miss a single memory with your special ssum-one.

For new lab participants, we’ve revised the study environment so you’ll be able to choose between your two matches with the help of PIU-PIU at the start of the game. You’ll be able to change your match from Day 2 onwards, so choose your first one wisely!

> In-game Seasonal Content

Spend your special days with your special ssum-one every year🎉

Starting with Harry’s birthday that’s coming up soon, you’ll be able to enjoy Seasonal Content and Events in The Ssum app.

Seasonal Content will be unlocked depending on the timezone registered in your account, so you’ll be able to enjoy them without having to calculate the time.

Additionally, don’t miss out on events on Cheritz's social media!

*Seasonal Content celebrating lab participants’ birthdays will be unlocked from the 1st of January, 2023 onwards.

> New subscription model “PIU-PIU Plus”

For those of you who had felt that our existing subscription models(Aurora and Rainbow) were a bit too much for you, we’ve added a new efficiency-centric subscription model, after long hours of deep research!✏

PIU-PIU Plus offers :

Unlimited image downloads📸

100% success rate for I Can See Your Voice💬

40 Secondary Batteries per day🔋

Neutralizing of Ad Antennas (+Free Emotion Energy charging)📡

Free rental of Typing Expert License⌨

Enjoy a more comfortable study experience for the low price of $7.99 monthly($0.27/day)!

> Twitter Retweet Event: Share news on our update!

We’re holding an event on Cheritz’s official Twitter(@Cheritz_DL)!

Retweet the tweet on our update to get a chance to win app store gift cards📢

How to participate

Follow Cheritz’s official Twitter(@Cheritz_DL) ☑

Retweet the tweet on the update 🔁

Event period: 30/11/2022 ~ 13/12/2022 (KST)

Follow Cheritz’s other social media as well! Check out The Ssum’s official Instagram where we present you videos of your special ssum-one every week!

> ~Spreading The Ssum~ Raffle Event

~Spreading The Ssum~ Raffle Event is back!

To celebrate the matching of our new special ssum-one, our event will be focused on Harry this time!

Post your thoughts and opinions on Harry with the hashtag #TheSsum_Harry on your social media, and submit the link through the in-game event page.

7 lucky lab participants will win the following prize:

PIU-PIU’s Love Bundle💌, which will help you enjoy The Ssum even more

100 Aurora Batteries✨, that Harry’s PIU-PIU worked hard to gather

Lab participants who had already participated in the event before the update will be provided with 5 Aurora Batteries once more for this occasion.

Make sure you enter your link before the event ends!

Event period: 30/11/2022 ~ 30/12/2022 (KST)

===

We hope you’re all as excited as we are!

Please look forward to the future of <The Ssum : Forbidden Lab> for more to come!

-Cheritz-

[anarchotahdigism]

im scrolling through your blog and just saw your post on the signal app, gonna tell my family that they should switch to this; i don't download messenger apps (because i don't trust their security) and so im mostly limited to saving their numbers but this changes EVERYTHING, so thank you so so much bestie

Signal is the one app I broadly trust because so many cybersecurity professionals endorse it When Zuckerberg bought Whatsapp, it was a HUGE deal because hundreds of millions of Asians used to communicate safely with families throughout the diaspora and back home. So it was a titanic effort to get people's families with varying degrees of tech literacy to switch to a new and much safer app, especially when Whatsapp had so many functions that Signal still lacks, but Signal was and is so much safer. My policy is that if I won't say it in a post, I won't say it in a DM. Anything more personal or revealing is said on Signal or not at all. However, Signal is only as good as its user settings. To be maximally safe, set chats to autodelete (you can set this per contact and change it), disable screenshots as necessary, and be wise about what you say and to whom. In 2022 (I think) some people caught charges in PNW for leaked Signal screenshots that demonstrated them planning and committing radical acts. The cops got ahold of the phones, and one of which had screenshots and no PIN. That was enough to get at least two people sentenced iirc. No security measure is perfect but Signal is good enough, and the more people who use it while being informed about security culture, the safer we all are and will be.