Remember to share positive posts, memes, etc. about open source things you use and like. A simple “I like this” or “thanks for working on this” can go a long way!
Happy people carry on using things quietly while negativity gets shared, memed, and shoved in front of folks who work on your favorite projects. One negative comment too often outweighs ten positive ones, because human brains are dumb.
In that light here's a shout out to @stux who runs my Mastodon server. I really appreciate it!
And to anyone who hasn't already done so, throw a few dollars/pounds/euros or whatever currency you use to your Mastodon server so that we can keep this great network alive and strong in the future!
i have worked with, worked on, supported FOSS for over 30 years. the folks that work in it are why we have an internet and why microsoft/google don't own everything we run on our devices.
For people working on actual privacy-preserving technologies like sandboxing apps from one another and your data, it’s pretty infuriating that Google is steaming ahead with the extreme misnomer “Privacy Sandbox”.
It’s a system that tracks everything you do on your device or browser—the opposite of privacy—then gives a profile of you to any app or site that asks—the opposite of a sandbox.
It’s telling that it’s mostly adtech companies who are on board.
Stop linking to Twitter; it is intentionally broken without creating an account and signing into it, even just to see a tweet, now.
• No thread context: Link to a tweet in a thread, and visitors cannot read the other tweets in the same thread, including the immediate parent in the thread. So context is entirely broken
• No replies: If you link to a tweet, visitors cannot see any replies to said tweet
• Aggressive prompts to create an account when trying to find more context/clicking anything
Instead, if you have to link to something that happened on Twitter for some reason, I recommend:
• Reproduce the content locally! If embedding on a blog, just… quote the text inline. Style it up nicely if you want, but the content is more important than the tracking-laden embed code that could break at any time
• Nitter.net; replace twitter.com with nitter.net in links; it works like an archive version that includes important context
Only include a Twitter link as proof/a primary source imho
@cassidy I have just given up on clicking Twitter links, the likelyhood of getting any usable information out of the transaction is not worth the effort. If there is no preview I ignore it outright.
@cassidy if anyplace in the world needed it's worldview on colonialism shaken by art, Vail Colorado would be it. Danielle SeeWalker did this with their art without even painting anything in the town. So, mission accomplished. Disappointed they lost the residency opportunity. But hopefully it opens up other opportunities.
I feel like I’m always poking journalists and other public figures to get verified on Mastodon… part of this is a lack of knowledge around the topic and the fact that joinmastodon.org kind of buries the details of “how” in the docs.
@cassidy Brilliant, yet also very easy to understand explanation! The only reason I haven't verified any of my links is because I don't have a proper website.... yet, and I don't want to link to something like my GitHub profile instead.
@cassidy good thing I’m triple verified, wouldn’t want these verified people outshining me 🤣
The details of how should probably be part of the add-a-url-to-your-profile UX, since it could special case sites like GitHub with a known, easy-ish way to add the reciprocal link. 🤔
Do you work on GNOME or adjacent stuff? Do you want to help improve the GNOME desktop around usability, reliability, safety, digital well-being?
GET PAID TO DO IT!
The @gnome Foundation is offering a one-year contract (with potential to extend) to work on the above on behalf of the Foundation. You’d probably interact with me, the GNOME design team, and core maintainers of GNOME components.
Well this thread went absolutely nuts. Thanks to everyone who tested things out! I’ll have to write an update or a follow-up post, but after a way-too-late-night hacking session, my implementation now supports:
• Better configuration options
• More reusable OP/verified badging
• Link cards
• Spoilers/content warnings
Unfortunately, it appears to be an intentional, undocumented limit for unauthenticated API calls to the context endpoint… however, including an authentication token would require me making people sign in to view more comments, or leaking a token that would enable people to read my private statuses.
Web developers: when you say, “your browser does not support this site,” what you REALLY mean is that YOU don’t support the browser. Don’t turn it around on the user because you chose not to stick to well-supported standards, or worse, are doing user agent sniffing.
If you truly use some feature shipped by one browser and not everyone, at least say, “We use x standard feature, which is unsupported in this browser.” But even then, the web is all about progressive enhancement.
@cassidy Or be like me, test only in Firefox and when Chrome users complain about the site looking wrong, you just go like "you should upgrade to a proper browser" ;p
“AI” as currently hyped is giant billion dollar companies blatantly stealing content, disregarding licenses, deceiving about capabilities, and burning the planet in the process.
It is the largest theft of intellectual property in the history of humankind, and these companies are knowingly and willing ignoring the licenses, terms of service, and laws that us lowly individuals are beholden to.
It’s a shame that the industry is in the midst of such a circlejerk around the term “AI,” too, because I think a lot of machine learning is genuinely incredible and is the most underappreciated (and often invisible) aspect of a bunch of technology we use: our cameras, keyboards, copy/paste, voice recognition, smart homes, and more are often powered by machine learning models.
But let’s call everything “AI” now because a bunch of billion dollar companies decided it’s a fun space to compete in.
I guess we wait this one out until the “AI” bubble bursts due to the incredible subsidization the entire industry is undergoing. It is not profitable. It is not sustainable.
It will not last—but the damage to our planet and fallout from the immense amount of wasted resources will.
I'll keep saying it, because it keeps coming up. If you're working in the FreeDesktop, Linux, or Flatpak spaces, you need to understand this, even if you don't personally care about gaming or Steam Deck.
@cassidy Personally I've heard about immutable distributions for some time but never tried any. Now that I own a Steam Deck I realized how viable they are with flatpak!
Your company's two-factor app is NOT the only choice; carefully consider how you refer to it!
For example, every Google login still says to get a code "from the Google Authenticator" app. I've never used that app, and yet I can sign in just fine; because I use a different authenticator. But you'd never even know that's an option, which could trip some folks up.
In Google's case it also smells anti-competitive, but this advice applies to everyone.
Authenticator apps don't just run on phones, you know.
This one's pretty universal; Mastodon, Fastmail, and more services I use daily tell you to get your authentication code "from your phone". That's just inaccurate in the age of browser plugins, password managers, tablets, desktop apps, and keyring syncing.
Authenticator codes are not tied to a phone, even if mobile apps are a common way to use a second factor. Instead, ask for the code from their "authentication app or password manager".
Reminder that Apple uses a technology literally invented in 1984 to brainwash their users into thinking anyone using a non-Apple device is poor.
This lie is rampant and reinforced by the billionaire CEO of Apple, the richest company to ever exist.
Apple intentionally makes their devices bad at communicating with other devices because it means kids without Apple devices might get bullied into giving Apple more money. Apple knows this, and plays into it.
Meanwhile, outside of the Apple bubble, $2k Samsung phones more powerful than most computers with 10× periscope optical zoom lenses and 7" folding screens can send 4K HDR video to a $50 Nokia burner phone, and it works fine on both sides. The burner phone can give that video a 👍 and see when the other person is typing. And their whole conversation is end-to-end encrypted, even if they create a new group with a third person who has a midrange Google phone.
Today I had an iPhone user send me a video and the format was just hilariously broken, like I haven’t seen from an Android user in a decade. Actively worse than even a normal MMS video!
Apple still pillboxes vertical video inside a 320×240 pixel file, and sends that. This is not even a limitation of MMS or Android—it is Apple intentionally sabotaging your video when you send it.
The #Flatpak is a community effort, automated from the official release. That feels a bit off for your password manager; the thing that holds all your secrets.
A community post from 2021 asking them to maintain it only got 211 votes, 117 likes, and 46 comments but over 10k views. I and other #OpenSource folks commented and said we'd be happy to help, but never heard back.
@cassidy@micahilbery I'm torn between making use of this just to raise awareness of Mastodon and adding an adblock rule similar to the one I use to make those awful "click to tweet" buttons go away.