Pluralistic: 20 May 2020

Today's links

Hackers on Planet Earth, in the cloud: HOPE will not be cancelled.
Climate and machine learning: Machine learning is roasting the planet.
Seeking Fitbit owners' stories: Help EFF explain why the Google takeover is wrong.
Software secrecy: Code is (bad) law.
Grocer won't show employees results from mandatory temp-checks: Coronavirus theater, class war edition.
Bill Clinton sings "Baby Got Back": Speech synthesis is just sublimely weird.
Webinar on Controlled Digital Lending and the pandemic: Talking about the Internet Archive, this Friday.
Google vows no custom AI for oil and gas: Reversing its 2018 position, which was garbage.
Re-positive coronavirus cases are not infectious: Finally, we catch a break.
Ifixit's medtech repair manual trove is full to bursting: Right to Repair, pandemic edition.
This day in history: 2005, 2010, 2015, 2019
Colophon: Recent publications, upcoming appearances, current writing projects, current reading

The right's theories about human behavior are bankrupt: Immortan Joe is a shitty behavioral economist.
Adjacent, similar NYC neighborhoods with wildly different outcomes: Early warning saved Flushing, Queens.
Honey in a glue dispenser: Easy spreading ahoy.
Iceland's world-beating coronavirus app didn't help much: Shoe-leather contact tracing beats automated exposure notification.
Thunderspy: a devastating attack on Thunderbolt: Evil Maid, 2020 edition.
Talking Canada Reads and Radicalized: My chat with Canada Reads American Style.
Plane ticket refunds (without airline cooperation): Call your credit card issuer.
This day in history: 2005, 2010, 2015, 2019
Colophon: Recent publications, upcoming appearances, current writing projects, current reading

US public health officials on apps: "Meh": Exposure notification is no substitute for labor-intensive contact-tracing.
Volcano gods demand workers: Reopening is only possible under threat of starvation and homelessness.
Animal Crossing Haunted Mansion: Needs more AOC.
This day in history: 2010, 2015, 2019
Colophon: Recent publications, upcoming appearances, current writing projects, current reading

100 Ideas for Dungeon Masters: Based on the Pathfinder Bestiary, readily adaptable for other systems.
Attack Surface author's note: My latest podcast is the afterword from the third Little Brother book.
Trump admits voter suppression: Proving intent was never easier.
Reality endorses Sanders: Pandemics have an obvious leftist bias.
Amazon fires walkout organizer: Low waged workers, doing the most important work in America, exposed to lethal risk.
Monopolists stole your respirator: Dying a gasping death is pareto-optimal.
Corporate welfare vs food stamps: A billion here, a billion there, pretty soon it adds up to real money.
How viruses experience social distancing: XKCD mixes atavistic satisfaction with science communications.
Scarfolk pandemics: This isn't the worst timeline after all.
This day in history: 2005, 2019
Colophon: Recent publications, upcoming appearances, current writing projects, current reading

EFF's videoconferencing backgrounds: With a deep cut from the NSA's secret listening post.
The ideology of economics: Economics doesn't have "laws" it has "policies."
LoC plugs Little Brother: Open access FTW.
Canada nationalizes covid patents: An Act respecting certain measures in response to COVID-19.
Exponential Threat: Trump threatened to sue media outlets that aired this spot.
Sanders on GOP stimulus cruelty: "Millions for plutes, but not one cent for workers."
Record wind-power growth: Covid stimulus could start a Green New Deal.
Social distancing and other diseases: Do we trust IoT thermometer companies, though?
Badger Masks: UW Madison's open facemask design.
This day in history: 2005, 2010, 2015, 2019
Colophon: Recent publications, upcoming appearances, current writing projects, current reading

The worst Democrat in Congress just lost his job: Dan Lipinski primaried by the amazing Marie Newman.
Canada Reads documentary on Radicalized: The Great Canadian Book debate is indefinitely postponed, but here's an hour on my book!
Africa's Facebook modders are world leaders: Technological self-determination through adversarial interoperability.
Imagineering in a Box: Interdisciplinary theme park design lessons from Khan Academy and Disney.
Data is the New Toxic Waste: It was never "the new oil."
How to structure a fair covid bailout: Stimulus, not private jets.
Fox News is a suicide cult: Telling your elderly viewers to perform tribal loyalty by engaging in high-risk behaviors is a career-limiting move.
Grocery supply chains are resilient: One less thing to worry about.
Magic in the time of coronavirus: Never let a good crisis go to waste, card-trick edition.
This day in history: 2010, 2019
Colophon: Recent publications, current writing projects, upcoming appearances, current reading