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Today's Topics:
1. Blocking Access To Politically Embarrassing Content
(Stephen Loosley)
2. digiDirect customer data missDirect (Stephen Loosley)
3. Ruby on Rails devs happy to go their own way (Stephen Loosley)
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Message: 1
Date: Tue, 01 Oct 2024 16:10:47 +0930
From: Stephen Loosley <[email protected]>
To: "link" <[email protected]>
Subject: [LINK] Blocking Access To Politically Embarrassing Content
Message-ID: <[email protected]>
Content-Type: text/plain; charset="UTF-8"
Big Tech?s Promise Never To Block Access To Politically Embarrassing Content
Apparently Only Applies To Democrats
[Snip: "And thus, we see the real takeaway: embarrassing stuff about
Republicans must be suppressed, because it?s doxxing or hacking or foreign
interference. However, embarrassing stuff about Democrats must be shared,
because any attempt to block it is election interference."]
By Mike Masnick Mon, Sep 30th 2024 09:28am -
https://www.techdirt.com/2024/09/30/big-techs-promise-never-to-block-access-to-politically-embarrassing-content-apparently-only-applies-to-democrats/
It probably will not shock you to find out that big tech?s promises to never
again suppress embarrassing leaked content about a political figure came with a
catch. Apparently, it only applies when that political figure is a Democrat. If
it?s a Republican, then of course the content will be suppressed, and the GOP
officials who demanded that big tech never ever again suppress such content
will look the other way.
A week and a half ago, the Senate Intelligence Committee held a hearing about
the threat of foreign intelligence efforts to interfere with US elections.
Senator Tom Cotton, who believes in using the US military to suppress American
protests, used the opportunity to berate Meta and Google for supposedly (but
not really) ?suppressing? the Hunter Biden laptop story:
In that session ? which I feel the need to remind you was just held on
September 18th ? both Nick Clegg from Meta and Kent Walker from Google were
made to promise that they would never, ever engage in anything like the
suppression of the Hunter Biden laptop story (Walker noted that Google had
taken no effort to do so when that happened in the first place).
Clegg explicitly said that a similar demotion ?would not take place today.?
Take a guess where this is going?
Exactly one week and one day after that hearing, Ken Klippenstein released the
Trump campaign internal-vetting dossier on JD Vance. It?s pretty widely
accepted that the document was obtained via hacking by Iranian agents and had
been shopped around to US news sites for months. Klippenstein, who will do
pretty much anything for attention, finally bit.
In response, Elon immediately banned Kens ExTwitter account and blocked any and
all links to not just the document, but to Kens Substack. He went way further
than anyone ever did regarding the original Hunter Biden laptop story and the
content revealed from that laptop. We noted the irony of how the scenario is
nearly identical to the Hunter Biden laptop story, but everyone wants to flip
sides in their opinion of it.
Elon being a complete fucking hypocrite is hardly new. It seems almost to be
expected. That combined with his public endorsement (and massive funding) of
the Trump/Vance campaign means it is noteworthy, but not surprising, that he
would do much more to seek to suppress the Vance dossier than old Twitter ever
did about the Hunter laptop story.
So, what about Meta and Google? After all, literally a week earlier, top execs
from each company said in a Senate hearing under oath that they would never
seek to suppress similar content this year.
And yet?
That is the link to the dossier on Threads with a message saying ?This link
can?t be opened from Threads. It might contain harmful content or be designed
to steal personal information.?
Ah. And remember, while Twitter did restrict links to the NY Post article for
about 24 hours, Meta never restricted the links. It only set it so that the
Facebook algorithm wouldn?t promote the story until they checked and made sure
it was legit. But here, they?re blocking all links to the Vance dossier on all
their properties. When asked, a Meta spokesperson told the Verge:
?Our policies do not allow content from hacked sources or content leaked as
part of a foreign government operation to influence US elections. We will be
blocking such materials from being shared on our apps under our Community
Standards.?
Yeah, but again, literally a week ago, Nick Clegg said under oath that they
wouldn?t do this. The ?hacked sources? policy was the excuse Twitter had used
to block the NY Post story.
Does anyone realize how ridiculous all of this looks?
And remember how Zuckerberg was just saying he regrets ?censoring? political
content? Just last week, there was a big NY Times piece arguing, ridiculously,
that Zuck was done with politics. Apparently it?s only Democrat-politics that
he?s done with.
As for Google, well, Walker told Senator Cotton that the Biden laptop story
didn?t meet their standards to have it blocked or removed. But apparently the
Vance dossier does. NY Times reporter Aric Toler found that you can?t store the
document in your Google Drive, saying it violates their policies against
?personal and confidential information?:
As we?ve said over and over again, neither of these things should have been
blocked. The NY Post story shouldn?t have been blocked, and the Vance dossier
shouldn?t have been blocked. Yes, there are reasons to be concerned about
foreign interference in elections, but if something is newsworthy, it?s
newsworthy. It?s not for these companies to determine what?s newsworthy at all.
While it was understandable why in the fog of the release about the Hunter
Biden story both Twitter and Meta said ?let?s pump the brakes and see?? given
how much attention has been paid to all that, including literally one week
before this, it certainly raises a ton of questions to then immediately move to
blocking the Vance dossier.
Of course, the hypocrisy will stand, because the GOP, which has spent years
pointing to the Hunter Biden laptop story as their shining proof of ?big tech
bias? (even though it was nothing of the sort), will immediately, and without
any hint of shame or acknowledgment, insist that of course the Vance dossier
must be blocked and it?s ludicrous to think otherwise.
And thus, we see the real takeaway: embarrassing stuff about Republicans must
be suppressed, because it?s doxxing or hacking or foreign interference.
However, embarrassing stuff about Democrats must be shared, because any attempt
to block it is election interference.
Filed Under: content moderation, hunter biden laptop, hypocrisy, jd vance, jd
vance dossier, ken klippenstein, nick clegg, tom cotton
Companies: google, meta, twitter, x
105 Comments Leave a Comment:
https://www.techdirt.com/2024/09/30/big-techs-promise-never-to-block-access-to-politically-embarrassing-content-apparently-only-applies-to-democrats/
--
------------------------------
Message: 2
Date: Tue, 1 Oct 2024 10:44:10 +0000
From: Stephen Loosley <[email protected]>
To: link <[email protected]>
Subject: [LINK] digiDirect customer data missDirect
Message-ID:
<sy5p282mb44096cffe85fa60bfa49c39dc2...@sy5p282mb4409.ausp282.prod.outlook.com>
Content-Type: text/plain; charset="Windows-1252"
Australian e-tailer digiDirect customer info allegedly stolen and dumped online
By Jessica Lyons Tue 1 Oct 2024
https://www.theregister.com/2024/10/01/australian_digidirect_info_leak/
Data allegedly belonging to more than 304,000 customers of Australian camera
and tech e-tailer digiDirect has been leaked to an online cyber crime forum.
digiDirect, a prominent Australian consumer electronics retailers, did not
immediately respond to The Register's inquiries. We will update this story if
and when we hear back.
According to a BreachForums post, a crook who goes by ?Tanaka? allegedly swiped
a database containing customers' full names, email addresses, phone numbers,
billing and shipping addresses, and company names.
The criminal also posted a sample of the stolen data ? which has not been
verified by The Register - and issued an apparent shoutout to another cyber
crook ? "very thanks to Chucky" ? who may or may not have also been involved in
the digital break-in, if it indeed happened.
There has been no word yet from digiDirect, nor from the Office of the
Australian Information Commissioner or the Oz Federal Police as to whether they
have received a breach report from the electronics shop, or if they are
investigating. The Register has asked both government agencies for comment.
Still, anyone who has recently purchased electronics from the shop would be
wise to keep an eye on their digital identity and bank accounts to ensure that
fraudsters aren't using personal and financial information for shopping sprees
or other nefarious purposes.
In 2021, digiDirect was fined AU$39,240 ($27,100) by the Australian Competition
and Consumer Commission for allegedly misleading consumers about "storewide"
sales, which the consumer protection watchdog claimed weren't really storewide
at all.
The breach, if the report turns out to be true, follows a rough several months
for Australians. Their sensitive info has been stolen ? and then posted online
? from Ticketmaster, prescriptions provider MediSecure, and Nissan Oceania,
among others.
TEST
--
------------------------------
Message: 3
Date: Tue, 1 Oct 2024 11:28:56 +0000 (UTC)
From: Stephen Loosley <[email protected]>
To: "[email protected]" <[email protected]>
Subject: [LINK] Ruby on Rails devs happy to go their own way
Message-ID: <[email protected]>
Content-Type: text/plain; charset=UTF-8
Survey: Ruby on Rails devs happy to go their own way, now prefer Stimulus.js
over React
By Tim Anderson September 25,
2024?https://devclass.com/2024/09/25/survey-ruby-on-rails-devs-happy-to-go-their-own-way-now-prefer-stimulus-js-over-react/
Survey: Ruby on Rails devs happy to go their own way, now prefer Stimulus.js
over React
A community survey of Ruby on Rails developers shows stimulus.js, a lightweight
JavaScript framework from Rails company 37signals, is now the top choice,
displacing React.
The 8th edition of this annual survey was conducted by Rails consultancy Planet
Argon, with around 2,700 respondents from 106 countries. This is fractionally
more respondents than last year and makes it the biggest yet.
Rails developers prefer monolithic applications over microservices, according
to the survey, and that trend is increasing, from 62 percent in 2009 to 77
percent today.?
This is an example of how Rails developers are happy to go against industry
trends, perhaps inspired by Rails inventor David Heinemeier Hansson who
advocates self-hosting over cloud, loves the vi editor and suggests that
developers use Linux rather than Windows or Mac.?
However, at least when it comes to operating systems, Rails devs have yet to
take this advice. 77 percent develop on macOS, according to the survey, though
the 19 percent on Linux exceed the small 4 percent using Windows.?
Another area where Rails devs are glad to be different is in JavaScript
frameworks, with Stimulus.js at 31 percent usage versus React, last year?s top
choice, now only 24 percent. As is often the case, the statistic may be
misleading since React-based Next.js is counted separately; but still shows
enthusiasm for what 37signals describes as ?a modest JavaScript framework for
the HTML you already have.??
Stimuls.js is the most popular JavaScript framework among surveyed Rails
developers, ahead of React
The philosophy behind Stimulus.js is that the server-side application generates
HTML and the JavaScript exists to manipulate rather than generate that HTML.
Like Rails itself, Stimulus.js is controller-based. HTML elements are connected
to controllers, which are JavaScript objects that respond to actions trigged by
events such as button clicks.?
Stimulus is written in TypeScript and is open source on GitHub under the MIT
license.
Other survey responses include that the majority of respondents use Nginx (41
percent) or the Ruby-based Puma (37 percent) as the production web server or
proxy, with the venerable Apache only used by 6 percent.?
70 percent favor GitHub over GitLab (13 percent) or other source code
repositories.?
CloudFlare (35 percent) has overtaken AWS CloudFront (28 percent) as the most
popular content delivery network (CDN).?
PostgreSQL is by far the preferred choice (86 percent) for the database
manager, with MySQL at just 8 percent, though the figure for MySQL currently in
production is higher than that for legacy reasons.
When it comes to code editors, Visual Studio Code is top choice (44 percent)
but Vim-based editors are next (20 percent) followed by JetBrains RubyMine (19
percent).
Rails is more than 20 years old but remains popular, claiming around 5 percent
of the market according to StackOverflow surveys. Rails developers are also
relatively content: according to the survey, upwards of 80 percent agree or
mostly agree that the Rails core team is moving the project in the right
direction, and over 90 percent would recommend Rails to new developers.
Although Rails commands a smaller market share than other options such as
Spring Boot, ASP.Net, Django or Flask, it does have some well-known users
including GitHub and Shopify.
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