@koen_hufkens@mastodon.social
@koen_hufkens@mastodon.social avatar

koen_hufkens

@koen_hufkens@mastodon.social

Founder of BlueGreen Labs | addressing #climatechange through data driven methods in #ecology #remotesensing #phenology #foodsecurity

#rstats developer | maker with duct tape and a hammer | #academic omnivore | move fast and fix things

There is a crack, a crack in everything
That's how the light gets in

  • Leonard Cohen

Personal account | #politics, #science & #foss software | he / him

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koen_hufkens, to random
@koen_hufkens@mastodon.social avatar

On the slow decline of universities as places of education.

"Universities aren't institutions of knowledge anymore. They're assets. They're revenue streams. If they're not generating money for the top, then they only pose a threat, and they have to be weakened and destroyed."

https://www.okdoomer.io/im-a-professor-heres-why-im-walking-away-from-my-tenure/

mcc, to random
@mcc@mastodon.social avatar

Just opened my ThinkPad and for the second time in three days the act of closing the laptop to sleep it, then opening it again had caused Ubuntu to hardlock. This time I got a very brief small printout about "amd ring 0 error", then it went back to a black screen and I had to hold down the power button again.

I thought getting a ThinkPad, getting AMD cpu/gpu and picking the Linux distro Lenovo lists as supported would mean I got a minimally functioning computer but I guess not.

koen_hufkens,
@koen_hufkens@mastodon.social avatar

@mcc New one or old one? My experience is that you need to wait a year for Linux to catch up. I reluctantly bought first gen "fresh" Lenovo P16 for the lab I worked at. Took 6 months for the standard sleep/wake issues to be resolved. It has been like that forever IMO. Also, it being listed as "supported" doesn't mean much. Unless linux comes pre-installed you can bet it is broken at some level.

hrbrmstr, to random
@hrbrmstr@mastodon.social avatar

🚨Looks like was not immune to deserialization bugs after all https://hiddenlayer.com/research/r-bitrary-code-execution/

Watch those R Data files (and, we now shld come up with better ways to ensure local R library integrity)!!

CVE-2024-27322

koen_hufkens,
@koen_hufkens@mastodon.social avatar

@hrbrmstr I'm rather surprised that not more is out there. Although CRAN isn't a free for all as the pypi or npm I'm fairly sure they wouldn't catch something as crafty as say the latest xz attempt. I'm slowly migrating to a VM sandbox setup just because of it.

koen_hufkens,
@koen_hufkens@mastodon.social avatar

@hrbrmstr Thanks for confirming this, so I'm not feeling like a paranoid freak on this one. I've a huge respect for the CRAN team, don't get me wrong - but much of this is way out of their league IMO. And with R gaining such momentum, in critical industries, it is bound to become a target for exploits.

nixCraft, to linux
@nixCraft@mastodon.social avatar

only old linux desktop users will remember this desktop effect. can you name it?

koen_hufkens,
@koen_hufkens@mastodon.social avatar

@nixCraft No fake water effect at the bottom of the screen. Weak sauce.

parismarx, to tech
@parismarx@mastodon.online avatar

This week in the Disconnect Roundup, I’m thinking about whether it’s feasible to ditch my smartphone. Plus, the usual recommended reads, labor updates, and other news you might have missed.

https://disconnect.blog/roundup-should-we-ditch-smartphones/

koen_hufkens,
@koen_hufkens@mastodon.social avatar

@parismarx I don't think smartphones are bad, as a technology. Their planned obsolescence and average use case however is another thing.

Kicking off every social media app, together with dedicated "news" apps takes care of most of the problems IMO. If you are a purist, don't use email on the device.

koen_hufkens, to academicchatter
@koen_hufkens@mastodon.social avatar

Alternative title should read: Canadian researchers barely lifted above poverty levels.

@academicchatter

https://www.nature.com/articles/d41586-024-01124-2

koen_hufkens,
@koen_hufkens@mastodon.social avatar

@GhostOnTheHalfShell @academicchatter And if you don't like it you are clearly not passionate enough.

carlysagan, to random
@carlysagan@mastodon.social avatar

How might one start an academic institution? Could it be a start-up pitch? Something needs to change. The smartest scientists in the world shouldn’t be leaving academia in droves. We need a route in academia that doesn’t force endless meaningless publications & “mainstream” research. We need a route that actually pursues innovation and discovery. I’d call it “The Science or Perish Institute.”

At least these are my 7am pre-coffee thoughts. Have any VCs hit Mastodon yet?

koen_hufkens,
@koen_hufkens@mastodon.social avatar

@jens @carlysagan I would argue that the current VC mindset in academic administration is EXACTLY why we are in this mess.

koen_hufkens,
@koen_hufkens@mastodon.social avatar

@jens @carlysagan What I'm saying is that people graft business logic onto something that technically a public service.

Teaching people (which is still the primary goal of academic institutions) is at best a break even proposition, you cover your costs + some future investments. It is not a 6% annual return proposition. Sadly, this is expected.

1/

koen_hufkens,
@koen_hufkens@mastodon.social avatar

@jens @carlysagan As to VC. What often happens is that universities only take a small cut from their initial investment.

They host the lab for years, in which many efforts failed, when the golden goose comes around they are rarely included in the spin-off.

IMO It is not that these things don't happen, it is that the people involved rather cash out big than have the institutions take a larger cut (credit) where due. This is just greed and politics.

2/

koen_hufkens,
@koen_hufkens@mastodon.social avatar

@jens @carlysagan Example:

"Originally, Oxford intended to donate the rights to manufacture and market the vaccine to any drugmaker who wanted to do so, but after the Gates Foundation urged Oxford to find a large company partner to get its COVID-19 vaccine to market, the university backed off ... An initially not-for-profit licensing agreement was signed ...
"

The university traded what it should have done for the potential future funding by the Gates Foundation.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Oxford%E2%80%93AstraZeneca_COVID-19_vaccine

fj, (edited ) to random
@fj@mastodon.social avatar

GitHub Pages are useful, but be careful to not set it up with a DNS Wildcard.
It allows anyone on GitHub to host content on your subdomains, and it's actively being used, by paid GitHub accounts, to host scams

https://www.fredericjacobs.com/blog/2024/04/11/DNS-GitHubPages/

koen_hufkens,
@koen_hufkens@mastodon.social avatar

@fj First line of defence is to verify your domain. This excludes first level attacks.

https://docs.github.com/en/pages/configuring-a-custom-domain-for-your-github-pages-site/verifying-your-custom-domain-for-github-pages

koen_hufkens, to environment
@koen_hufkens@mastodon.social avatar

I really like this perspective by @pvonhellermannn. You have a deeper connection with the natural near to you then you will ever have to a billionaire.

I would like to add:
Vote accordingly.

[This goes along the same line as you are close to the gutter than becoming a millionaire]

https://mastodon.green/@pvonhellermannn/112251447989671548

erinnacland, to science
@erinnacland@fediscience.org avatar

"Fewer U.S. scientists are pursuing postdoc positions, new data show" 📉

"The trend underscores concerns that the academic community is facing a postdoc shortage and that early-career scientists are increasingly favoring higher paid positions outside academia."

“It’s not a situation that’s good for the country.”

@academicchatter via @klangin https://www.science.org/content/article/fewer-u-s-scientists-are-pursuing-postdoc-positions-new-data-show

koen_hufkens,
@koen_hufkens@mastodon.social avatar

@erinnacland @academicchatter @klangin Hurray, my timing seems about right to go private with my consulting business, offering academic services on my terms (not the crappy terms of short-term post-doc contract).

koen_hufkens,
@koen_hufkens@mastodon.social avatar

@moritz_negwer @erinnacland @academicchatter @klangin Having been on the hiring end the past year, yes it is. Certainly a downturn in turnout for positions.

koen_hufkens, to ai
@koen_hufkens@mastodon.social avatar

So much of the industry is precariously floating on a sea of cheap labour in the global south. The curtain has been pulled back for at least one service. The wizard is not a sophisticated machine, but a merciless boss whipping people clicking frantically at consoles.

https://futurism.com/the-byte/amazon-abandons-ai-stores

koen_hufkens, to LateStageCapitalism
@koen_hufkens@mastodon.social avatar

"Monopolist publisher objects to free dissemination of science funded through a tax evasion scheme"

It doesn't get much wilder than this I fear.

@academicchatter

https://www.science.org/content/article/bold-bid-avoid-open-access-fees-gates-foundation-says-grantees-must-post-preprints

koen_hufkens,
@koen_hufkens@mastodon.social avatar

@academicchatter Ironically, this time you do have to side with the philanthropists - because they are right to demand this.

koen_hufkens,
@koen_hufkens@mastodon.social avatar

@brembs @albertcardona @academicchatter Did I mention that I once got a runner up price by Elsevier, for trying to improve the peer-review infrastructure.

What did we get, Publons, i.e. more baseless metrics. 🤷‍♂️

https://www.elsevier.com/en-in/connect/peer-review-challenge

koen_hufkens,
@koen_hufkens@mastodon.social avatar

@brembs @albertcardona @academicchatter Some of this was actually covered by Hypothes.is. Which is actually open source, but nobody bothers. I think only the AGU journals use this for peer-review comments.

For reference, this has been possible for a good 10 years (as I didn't -invent- things for my submission, I only pointed out the obvious).

koen_hufkens,
@koen_hufkens@mastodon.social avatar

@albertcardona @brembs @academicchatter This has been my point for a long time. The problem with that are perverse incentives. Everybody wants the eat their cake and have it, too. So there is a lot of open washing, but little systemic change in institutions because of it.

koen_hufkens,
@koen_hufkens@mastodon.social avatar

@brembs @albertcardona @academicchatter Thanks. But to be fair, I'm not going to claim the idea as such either. At the time the infrastructure was there to do this consistently, even when still dealing with PDFs on the backend (flawed as that "standard" might be). I was merely trying to point this out, in a idle hope of adoption (we're now a decade later, and I've given up is the norm I fear).

koen_hufkens,
@koen_hufkens@mastodon.social avatar

@academicchatter Ooooh, I was wrong, it isn't a good faith move by the philanthropist after all (I should have known better). It is a move to capture market share in the pre-print business, pushing some nonsense.

@jonny

https://neuromatch.social/@jonny/112217497889784880

koen_hufkens,
@koen_hufkens@mastodon.social avatar

@jonny @academicchatter Won't hold my breath on this one I fear.

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