It looks like your opinions about Linux are outdated and need an update.

Okay then. Thank you for resolving the dilemma of remaining ignorant or having “wolf erotica” in my search history.

Indeed. But cups-browsed isn’t necessary in order to be able to print things, it’s for automatically discovering new printers on the network.

cups-browsed <= 2.0.1 binds on UDP INADDR_ANY:631 trusting any packet from any source

Well that would explain why I didn’t have it installed (although I did have other parts of cups until jwz coincidentally reminded us two days ago that it can all be removed if you don’t have a printer.) I clear out anything that opens ports I don’t need to be open. A practice I would recommend to anyone.

It’s the “always will” where I disagree. This society we’ve built isn’t anything close to sustainable no matter how much lip service is given to the idea that it should be. What can’t go on forever, won’t.

Wait, what? You think they’re not planning on getting paid for providing this data to advertisers?

P.S. It looks like Mozilla’s Data Privacy FAQ is going to need updating. It doesn’t even mention this stuff. As the noyb complaint points out:

20. The Respondent does not provide any information at all in its privacy policy with regard to “PPA”. Neither in the general privacy policy (enclosure 9) nor in the privacy information for Firefox (enclosure 10) is any relevant information apparent.

21. The last update of the Firefox privacy policy took place on May 13, 2024.

I would say it’s more of a desperate attempt to continue the current paradigm of online advertising which deems indispensable the kind of data about conversion rates to which the industry has become accustomed, despite the recognition that their current means of collecting it must come to an end.

But either way, it’s incompatible with the principles of free software. Users are not meant to put up with features that are there for the sole benefit of someone else; someone they might normally consider an adversary. The only incentive we’re given to participate in this scheme is one that resembles blackmail. Except it isn’t even advertisers saying “do this, or we’ll spy on you like usual” — it’s Mozilla saying “do this, and maybe we can persuade a few of them not to spy on you as much, and to give us a cut.”

They are selling behavioural data about their users to advertisers. People are not going to be happy with that no matter how they try to spin it.

They added a feature to track conversions among Firefox users for online advertisers. Selling it as a “paradigm-shifting boost to online privacy” while accusing others of pushing a misleading narrative is absurd.

There certainly are many people who seem suspiciously eager to find fault with Firefox. But it’s not really a surprise when its authors do things like this. They chose not to make this feature opt-in because they know that nobody in their right mind would opt into it. There is no benefit to the user in it, only risk. Mozilla seems to be leaving us to go off and join the advertising industry instead. People feel betrayed, and it feeds the cynical nihilism that comes so easily to social media users under the conditions of late capitalism.

Fucking garbage article and headline.

You got me to read the thing, just to see what could possibly be so offensive about it. It’s a pretty good summary of the situation for an audience that might not be too familiar with Canadian politics. Don’t blame the messenger.

It’s still operating for now, right? Because if I look at random government pages in a browser that profile that doesn’t block the social media widgets I can see links to facebook, twitter, instagram, whatsapp, youtube, and threema. There seems to be no mention anywhere that a mastodon server exists.

They’re complaining about the low number of users. Did they bother to tell people that it exists?

The consequences for users of this thing in itself are fairly minimal for now. It’s the consequences for Mozilla which are something of a disaster.

I am fine with that.

Okay, but I imagine that you being fine with it will have very little bearing on the decision of the Data Protection Authority as to whether or not it violates articles 5, 6, 12, and 13 of the GDPR.

Maybe some day after we’re done replacing X11 people will collectively find the will to do something about systemd before it gets too much worse. I wonder which will be easier: Throw it all out and start again, or split it up into parts of more manageable size with well-defined interfaces between them.

Dogshit, yes. Authoritarian, no. Word choice matters.

As I’ve only just recently written here, blog comments are not social media, and I think such things should remain separate.

So it’s definitely not social media but it is the social web? I don’t see any comments section at all over there. Some of these “indieweb” guys are pretty weird.

https://www.newegg.com/kensington-k72436am-usb-wired/p/N82E16823155065

“more sympathetic” to conservative values than Europe

Oh look, it’s another foreign land that hasn’t yet developed any immunity to the infectious diseases coming out of Europe.

Self-censorship working a little too well.

It can be done with simple regex of the kind proposed in various answers there iff the html is known to be limited to the subset of html where that sort of thing can easily be made to work. The question does not tell us whether or not that is the case, so everyone is free to make their own assumptions and argue as if they know what’s going on.