teawrecks

teawrecks , 8 days ago to Technology in Windows 11 is now automatically enabling OneDrive folder backup without asking permission

You're right, they weren't a "household name" yet. But they were probably more than a little worried about surviving at the time. Turns out they picked the winning strategy.

teawrecks , 10 days ago to Technology in Windows 11 is now automatically enabling OneDrive folder backup without asking permission

Google was the first example I thought of, because they were founded in 1998, solidly before the dotcom crash. They survived because they hoarded data.

My point was that every company going into the bubble thought they had a product they could monetize, but virtually all of them failed in favor of just hoarding everyone's data. Amazon and eBay were competing for ecomerce supremacy, but now even they are just privacy violators for various reasons (amazon via AWS and Alexa, eBay in the interest of detecting malicious account behaviour).

MySpace is an example of another unsustainable social media model in the vein of many dotcom era services. They died out as soon as Facebook realized they could hoard everyone's data.

All roads lead to privacy nightmares. It's the fossil fuel of the internet, and enshitification is the climate change.

teawrecks , 10 days ago to Technology in Windows 11 is now automatically enabling OneDrive folder backup without asking permission

That describes the business model of basically every internet company that survived the dotcom bubble.

teawrecks , 15 days ago to Technology in Pornhub to leave five more states over age-verification laws

There's gotta be a solution that leverages their unwavering support for the 4th amendment here. I mean a penis is basically a naturally occurring gun, already. You could almost certainly get a congressman to endorse porn in schools this way.

teawrecks , 19 days ago to Selfhosted in Suggest me a secure chat platform for my family

Simplex is the first platform I've heard of that doesn't use IDs (which doesn't make much sense to me, practically, but sure). So would you say everything is less secure than simplex?

teawrecks , 19 days ago to Selfhosted in Suggest me a secure chat platform for my family

What makes session less secure? This is the first I've heard of it.

teawrecks , 20 days ago to Technology in Mozilla defies Kremlin, restores banned Firefox add-ons in Russia

Far more success than I'd care to see, imo

teawrecks , 22 days ago to Technology in 'LLM-free' is the new '100% organic' - Creators Are Fighting AI Anxiety With an ‘LLM-Free’ Movement

I think the first half of yours is the same as my first, and I think a lot of artists aren't against AI that produces worse art than them, they're againt AI art that was generated using stolen art. They wouldn't be part of the problem if they could honestly say they trained using only ethically licensed/their own content.

teawrecks , 22 days ago to Technology in 'LLM-free' is the new '100% organic' - Creators Are Fighting AI Anxiety With an ‘LLM-Free’ Movement

So this could go one of two ways, I think:

1. the "no AI" seal is self-ascribed using the honor system and over time enough studios just lie about it or walk the line closely enough that it loses all meaning and people disregard it entirely. Or,
2. getting such a seal requires 3rd party auditing, further increasing the cost to run a studio relative to their competition, on top of not leveraging AI, resulting in those studios going out of business.

teawrecks , 23 days ago to Technology in Firefox Browser Blocks Anti-Censorship Add-Ons at Russia’s Request

That's how it would work for a country where the laws actually mean something. In this case, the law is just whatever the Kremlin says.

teawrecks , 27 days ago to Technology in Nvidia is now worth $102M per employee

Stock movement is always speculative with or without options. The difference that derivatives makes is the ability to price in speculative value at some point in the future as well. The price of a share is reflective of what traders think a company is worth today; but an option is a reflection of what traders think the shares will be worth at some point in the future, which people can then look at and use to re-adjust their estimation of what they think the underlying share price is worth today. It's a recursive feedback loop that (theoretically) results in share prices closer approximating a true value. A sort of predictive smoothing function.

teawrecks , 27 days ago to Technology in Nvidia is now worth $102M per employee

Or more accurately, it's a clear illustration of how overvalued they are right now.

But as the saying goes, the market can remain irrational longer than you can remain solvent.

teawrecks , 28 days ago to Technology in NewsBreak: Most downloaded US news app has Chinese roots and 'writes fiction' using AI

there was also zero evidence provided by the US government of CCP-guided interference by Huawei or TikTok

There were a couple decades of direct evidence that Huawei was cooperating with the CCP.

Disinformation on TikTok and data collection via the app are both well documented, but doesn't seem any different from other social media platforms. The TikTok ban seems mostly politically motivated to me. I suspect whatever happens, their lawyers will fight it and win, until the govt finally cracks down on data collection in general, and we finally get something like GDPR.

You are suggesting that we should refer to China as "the CCP", the USA as "the Democrats", Australia as "Labor", etc.

No, I'm literally saying the opposite. We should refer to the CCP as the CCP, and China as China. My last paragraph was intended to highlight the difference, but perhaps you didn't read that far.

The rest of your comment is ad hominem, which doesn't interest me.

teawrecks , 29 days ago to Technology in NewsBreak: Most downloaded US news app has Chinese roots and 'writes fiction' using AI

Yes, the examples I cited were used multiple times. And yes, I am aware of national news in the US concerning China, it was not overlooked context.

The relevant context you might be overlooking are the Red Scare and Japanese internment. It's not the first time the US has had the looming threat of international espionage, and it's also not the first time that using a person's/company's nationality to infer their true intentions was misguided.

It is not an outrageous thing to say: being Chinese does not make you a CCP operative.

The most popular news application in the US having links to China is highly relevant...when the services themselves are being used to spread misinformation and, potentially, disinformation.

To quote the article,

Reuters found no evidence that NewsBreak censored or produced news that was favourable to the Chinese government.

To echo the sentiments above, most of the article is great journalism. The Chinese job listings, the former connection to Yidian, their use of AI and statements from Pearlstine. All important info to see reported. I just wish they would stop saying "China" or "Chinese" as shorthand for "CCP". All I can hear is Trump annunciating CHYAI-NA.

I wish the best for the Chinese. I want Chinese people to feel safe when living abroad, without their govt breathing down their neck. I want China to prosper ethically and sustainably.

teawrecks , 29 days ago to Technology in NewsBreak: Most downloaded US news app has Chinese roots and 'writes fiction' using AI

It regularly uses descriptors like "Chinese roots" and "engineers based/born in China" and just leaves them hanging. On it's own, being from China is superfluous information...unless the reader has a bias against things from China. Ties to the Chinese govt/CCP is a separate matter entirely, and if that's the connection they're making they should just say that.

It would be no different from talking about Isreal's war crimes, but instead of saying "X party is affiliated with Isreal's govt" you just said "jews".