In what looks increasingly like a protection racket, Meta has agreed to pay Donald Trump $25 million to settle a lawsuit that multiple courts had already indicated was completely meritless. The settlement, which directs $22 million toward Trump’s presidential library, comes after a dinner at Mar-a-Lago where Trump reportedly told Zuckerberg this needed to be […]
Last year the Biden FCC passed a new rule that would help bring Wi-Fi access to school kids who struggle to do their homework online. More specifically, the rule allowed schools to leverage the FCC’s E-Rate program funds to pay for mobile hotspots in things like busses, making it easier for kids who lack broadband […]
While most of our conversations about Nintendo recently have focused on the somewhat bizarre patent lawsuit the company filed against Pocketpair over the hit game Palworld, traditionally our coverage of the company has focused more on the very wide net of IP bullying it engages in. This is a company absolutely notorious for behaving in […]
As we mentioned on Saturday, this is the final week of our public domain game jam, Gaming Like It’s 1929! The clock is ticking, and now there’s just barely more than two days left to get your entries in. The jam closes at this Friday, January 31st, when the clock hits midnight Pacific Time. We’re […]
Well, we can go ahead and erase “perhaps” from this not-all-that-prescient-actually-given-the-circumstances headline: DOJ Issues Perhaps The Last Law Enforcement Investigation Report We’ll See For The Next Four Years It was inevitable. Trump’s DOJ kicked the Civil Rights Division to the curb faster than Trump cycled through Attorneys General during his first term. Trump promised the […]
While “AI” (language learning models) certainly could help journalism, the fail upward brunchlords in charge of most modern media outlets instead see the technology as a way to cut corners, undermine labor, and badly automate low-quality, ultra-low effort, SEO-chasing clickbait. As a result we’ve seen an endless number of scandals where companies use LLMs to create entirely […]
After years of Meta insisting its content moderation was essential for platform health, Zuckerberg’s sudden embrace of fake “free speech” is having exactly the consequences anyone paying attention would expect. Just as advertisers fled ExTwitter when Musk decided “brand safety” was for wimps, Meta’s advertisers are getting nervous about their own brands being associated with […]
The Cybersecurity Projects Bundle offers a hands-on program featuring five real-world cybersecurity projects, totaling 35 tasks. Participants start with an introductory video for each project, detailing objectives and requirements, followed by task completion that mirrors real cybersecurity challenges. Support from industry professionals ensures personalized feedback and guidance. Upon completing the program, participants gain practical experience, […]
It’s amazing how many things just don’t look bad until, you know, you actually look at them. I mean, we’ve always known civil asset forfeiture programs are hot garbage, but the government at large was never really interested in this take. Some officials and legislators may have had their suspicions, but the easiest way for […]
The 2021 infrastructure bill earmarked $42.5 billion in broadband subsidies that will be coming to the states starting this year. But it also tasked the FCC with creating rules surrounding “digital discrimination,” or the practice of big telecoms refusing to evenly deploy next-generation broadband to low income and minority neighborhoods (despite receiving untold billions in […]
Ah, Steve King. Not the famed author of horror fiction, of course. I’m talking about the former representative from Iowa who authored all kinds of political horror, instead. This fucking guy was perhaps best known for wanting a fence on our southern border to be of the electrified variety, for keeping a Confederate flag on […]
You might remember that Sonos was the golden child of “smart,” internet-connected home hardware a decade or so ago. But that reputation has been steadily tarnished by a long line of bone-headed decisions, ranging from their 2020-era choice to brick still useful speakers and hardware, to their choice last year to release an app update […]
You may recall a few years back that then Rep. Devin Nunes went on a SLAPPtastic suing spree, filing a bunch of highly questionable defamation lawsuits against a variety of people, including someone pretending to be a cow owned by Nunes. The lawsuits, generally, have not gone well. One of the dumber lawsuits was the […]
Because we’re all just riding Mr. Trump’s wild ride down the greased slope towards fascism, the nation just has to keep getting worse day by day until the rot has set in permanently. Trump’s first term in office unleashed a lot of latent censorial desire in like-minded Republicans, who soon started assaulting constituents’ sensibilities and […]
Charge your device or illuminate your desk with this innovative 6-in-1 Wireless Charger. It’s easy to use with its touch buttons and Qi wireless charging for Qi-enabled devices. Beautifully made with a modern look, it can quickly charge your device and is touch-sensitive allowing you to show the digital clock. This charger comes with an […]
For the past couple of years, Elon has tried all sorts of ways to publicly claim that things are going great since his purchase of Twitter, even as basically everyone knows that he’s the emperor with no clothes on that one. He’s been claiming that traffic and usage are at “all-time” highs, despite little outside […]
To be clear up front, AT&T is a predatory telecom monopolist. It works tirelessly to lobby (and sometimes bribe) government for favorable treatment as it works tirelessly to undermine competition and eliminate state and federal oversight. It then miraculously exploits that lack of competition and oversight in the form of shoddy, sluggish, and very expensive […]
The facts are all up there in the headline, so let’s deal with the lies first. Lots of places reported on this incident, but we’ll go to the original source, WESH TV. Body cam footage recovered from Lake County (FL) Sheriff’s Office deputy Tristan Macomber’s body cam showed him driving southbound before hitting a stopped […]
As you may have noticed, the tech world is full of news about TikTok, its ban, its reprieve and possible sale, and whether it represents a security threat to the US and its citizens. Of course, the question of whether TikTok is spying on its users and sending data back to China is broader than […]
It’s a grind. But it’s been worth it. Last week, the court that’s been handling Agron Hasbajrami’s case for nearly a decade finally said what plenty of people have been saving for nearly as long: the FBI’s warrantless searches of NSA collections to target US persons’ communications and data violates the Constitution. Here’s Andrew Crocker […]
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