Pluralistic: 22 Jul 2020

Today's links

Ukrainian steampunk masks: The gorgeous work of Dmitriy and Aleksandra Bragin.
OTF spared (for now): Trump's administrative incompetence saves the US Agency for Global Media from becoming Global Breitbart.
Insurers are secret, powerful police reformers: Money talks, bullshit walks.
Ohio GOP leadership arrested for racketeering: Largest corruption scandal in Ohio history.
Little Brother as a role-playing game: Notes from the Fiction & RPG Podcast.
Anti-facial recognition tool: Fawkes will alter your images in ways that are invisible to humans but confounding for algorithms.
Kentucky AG sues top GOP donors: Kentucky's Republican lawmaker is the best kind of class-traitor.
This day in history: 2010, 2015, 2019
Colophon: Recent publications, upcoming appearances, current writing projects, current reading

Homeschool to prison pipeline: Michigan judge jails Black teenager with a learning disability for not doing lockdown homework.
Spain has been an NSO customer since 2015: Whistleblower leaks the receipts.
McKinsey waxes fat off coronavirus failures: McKinsey got $100m (and climbing!) for its role in the disastrous US coronavirus response.
Biden's $2T climate plan: It's at least an order of magnitude shy of what's needed.
PE's three kids in a trenchcoat fraud: How private equity bilked PPP for hundreds of millions.
Leakypick: Probing smart speakers for covert audio exfiltration.
Poesy slays: Praise for "Poesy the Monster Slayer."
This day in history: 2010, 2015, 2019
Colophon: Recent publications, upcoming appearances, current writing projects, current reading

Homebrew dongles let hospitals fix ventilators: You forgot Poland.
Teddy Ruxpin and the Haunted Mansion: Ken Forsse's miniature Sid and Marty Krofft haunted house.
Dataminr helped cops spy on protesters with Twitter: And then they split the most idiotic hairs imaginable over it.
Police militarization has a business-model: The unstoppable force of excess rents and Beltway Bandits.
How Finspy protects itself from security researchers: Despots' malware, wrapped in spaghetti code and VMs.
Clamshell currency: Pismo Beach's solution to the bank holiday of 1933.
Macron demands national database of porn preferences: Comment dit kompromat en Français?
This day in history: 2010, 2015, 2019
Colophon: Recent publications, upcoming appearances, current writing projects, current reading

A grifter's border wall is about to fall into the Rio Grande: Who knew the Rio Grande was such a big river?
Hong Kong law threatens people all over the world: China claims the right to kidnap anyone, anywhere.
1000+ accidental trigger-phrases for smart speakers: You bugged yourself.
Roller derby's brilliant re-opening plan: A template for global sport.
Unauthorized seat: BMW drives you straight to the Internet of Shit.
Don't Believe Proven Liars: The absolute minimum standard of prudence in merger scrutiny.
This day in history: 2010, 2015, 2019
Colophon: Recent publications, upcoming appearances, current writing projects, current reading

SF anthology to benefit covid charities: With Neil Gaiman, Chelsea Quinn Yarbro, Robert Silverberg, Jonathan Maberry, Seanan McGuire, Andrew Mayne, Scott Sigler, Orson Scott Card, Alan Dean Foster, A.C. Crispin and me.
Politics and sf: Highlights from my Torcon panel with Nnedi Okarafor.
Robots aren't stealing your job: Your boss is destroying it and blaming it on automation.
Earbuddy: "Enabling On-Face Interaction via Wireless Earbuds."
The Worm: 1975 National Aeronautics and Space Administration Graphics Standards Manual, NHB 1430.2 January 1976, Section 2.1 "Reproduction Art, Logotype."
CDA230: Americans don't trust Big Tech to moderate their communities.
Hue and cry, posses, sheriffs: What did we do before cops?
This day in history: 2005, 2010, 2015, 2019
Colophon: Recent publications, upcoming appearances, current writing projects, current reading

Australia caves on "robodebt": Dialing down the automated performative cruelty by a single notch.
Locus Award shortlist: Some of my 2019 favorites made the cut.
Why I haven't written about CDA 230: Life is too short.
Bus drivers refuse to take arrested protesters to jail: And they're unionized, so they don't have to.
AI has been stagnating for a decade: "The high-water mark was set in 2009."
This day in history: 2015, 2019
Colophon: Recent publications, upcoming appearances, current writing projects, current reading

Pickled 2001 computer store: Deadstock ahoy!
A farewell to APIs: Greed, spam and entropy killed mashups.
Machine learning model performs butthole recognition: Peak Internet of Shit.
Covid loteria cards: Cabronavirus.
California's fiber for all bill: Tell your senator to support SB1130.
1978 Doonesbury stereotype: Come for the Indochina political humor, stay for the printer's lore.
LA crime plummets: Down 23% (domestic violence is down 11%).
US stimulus is one week's cash: Deflation ahoy.
Private equity blinks on cuts to health workers' wages: Speeding up slow destruction makes it impossible to ignore.
Virtual greenscreen: Incredible computer science paper from the 2020 IEEE Conference on Computer Vision and Pattern Recognition.
Landlord changes church's locks: The pastor of Cross Culture Christian Center in Lodi, CA refused to stop holding services.
This day in history: 2010, 2019
Colophon: Recent publications, upcoming appearances, current writing projects, current reading