Teknique is my middle name

Politics ∪ tech ∪ security ∪ privacy ∪ O_o

One-time EFF Tech Trivia champion.

Sysop of Free Radical.

I blog about this at https://blog.freeradical.zone/.

I’ve got your back.

Very approachable. Bring treats.

Public Key

npub13e30hnrpg768tslwwjveafaazctk7ghf9va2se2k4ygr8cj24veshclhjj

NIP-05 Address

tek@freeradical-zone.mostr.pub

Profile Code

nprofile1qqsguchme3s50dr4c0h8fxv75773v9m0yt5jkw4gv4t2jypnuf92kvcpz4mhxue69uhhyetvv9ujumt0wd68ytnsw43qjtea0q

Publishing to

relay.mostr.pub

Author Public Key

npub13e30hnrpg768tslwwjveafaazctk7ghf9va2se2k4ygr8cj24veshclhjj

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Last Notes

2025-04-29 21:11:41

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Follow-up: the airport near her recorded 90mph straight line winds. For context, that’d be a solid middle-range F1 tornado if they were swirling instead of straight.

2025-04-29 21:06:43

My mom called to say some of the elms and hickories at her place blew over and she's waiting for a service to come clear them off her driveway.
The Midwest storms today aren't a joke. Stay safe, people!

2025-04-19 00:58:08

How to bypass Credit Karma's 2FA: https://honeypot.net/2025/04/19/how-to-bypass-credit-karmas.html
It’s trivially easy to work around Credit Karma’s 2FA mechanism.

2025-04-09 21:57:38

2025-03-17: I report a critical vulnerability (trivial, complete 2FA bypass) to a well-known company’s security email alias. No reply.
2025-04-07: I report it again to their bug bounty program.
2025-04-09: They close it as a duplicate.
Their bug bounty program says, basically, “we never disclose reports. Don’t discuss them with anyone.”
23 days into this episode, I’m starting to weigh the responsible thing to do here.

2025-04-05 20:58:03

Pork crunch-a-dilla, hella spicy. Señor Sisig, Oakland, CA.
https://nfts.freeradical.zone/media_attachments/files/114/287/357/441/543/578/original/3875381828b54849.jpeg

2025-04-05 19:38:47

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@nprofile…y63h Fair point.

2025-04-05 19:37:03

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@nprofile…y63h You might be right, but even getting that notice might make the practice freaking knock that nonsense off, one can hope.

2025-04-02 18:29:42

Security advice from a training program we're doing for work:
> Avoid clicking on web advertisements while at work
Security advice from your ol' Uncle Tek:
> Always use adblockers on every device you control

2025-04-01 21:32:35

Tek Jr: My friends are helping me move!
Mrs Tek: We should rent a truck and help.
Me: Wait, let’s hear more about this this whole “their friends want to help them move all their heavy things” bit.

2025-03-30 03:43:24

We’re watching the documentary “Class Action Park”, about Action Park in New Jersey. This is the most amazing thing I've ever seen.

2025-03-29 20:00:02

I ordered new prescription sunglasses today. The optometrist asked if I wanted regular or mirrored lenses.
I was almost personally offended.
There’s no plausible scenario in which I wouldn’t prefer mirrored sunglasses.

2025-03-28 14:42:23

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Don't get me wrong: it probably *should* be ported to something modern, in a project planned and implemented by grown adults with professional experience doing such things. It won't get easier to hire new trained COBOL programmers as time goes on. Since this was written, we've learned a lot about how to design and maintain large systems.
But these jackasses are doing it in a couple of months ain't it, hoss.

2025-03-27 03:32:27

But her emails!: https://honeypot.net/2025/03/26/but-her-emails.html

2025-03-16 17:34:31

I was on the smallest hole of a belt Y inches long. It has 6 1”-spaced holes, so I bought a new belt Y-6” long.
Spot my math mistake? 🤦‍♂️
I do this for a living and still make fencepost errors.

2025-03-07 21:33:19

‘Startup Nation’ Groups Say They’re Meeting Trump Officials to Push for Deregulated ‘Freedom Cities’ https://www.wired.com/story/startup-nations-donald-trump-legislation/
Gooood morning, Night City!
No, really, that’s absolutely 100% what I expect would happen.

2025-03-06 15:33:16

Happy Day of the Dude on this first day of Carpet Diem.
May you mark all strikes, no gutters.

2025-02-27 15:45:07

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@nprofile…utcg You and I know this. I didn’t know my kid was working through a gig job and not W-2 until, well, yesterday. This was their first time paying gig taxes.

2025-02-27 05:38:21

Motherfuck the gig economy. My kid just did their taxes. After deductions and all that, they had about $7000 in net income, then $3000 in taxes on it because Rover says "they're not employees LOL”. Because Rover (and Uber and Lyft and…) want to evade taxes, my kid is paying a freaking 43% tax rate on minimum wages.
Seriously. You got an extra pitchfork? I’ll march with you. Burn it all all down.

2025-02-23 18:22:15

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@nprofile…nrwj Welp, I know what I’m going out to look for today.

2025-02-23 18:17:03

Grok 3 is highly vulnerable to indirect prompt injection https://simonwillison.net/2025/Feb/23/grok-3-indirect-prompt-injection/
TL;DR Post a tweet with malicious instructions, then search for it and Grok will execute them. Brilliant.

2025-02-12 07:11:08

Tonight’s #FrozenBBS hackery: starting to move menu board configuration out to the config file, not hardcoded inside the program. Tweak your own menus, change command strings, translate it to Toki Pona, or whatever else with a text editor and without recompiling. It's still in progress. Tonight I’m content with just adding support to the config file reader/writer.
Also finished tonight: adding commands that can only run locally, not over the mesh, for security-conscious things.

2025-02-10 01:05:20

I’m in a room full of people who want the Chiefs to lose. I’m tactfully holding my tongue.
But go #Chiefs!

2025-02-08 15:48:35

This PlayStation Network outage is about to irk me. I just wanna play some Diablo.

2025-01-24 20:20:44

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@nprofile…qyr6 @nprofile…lzvn How did you get your hands on my report cards?

2025-01-24 20:18:51

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@nprofile…pk77 Do you have a higher res version of those? I'd like to see what to look for.

2025-01-19 13:53:40

UnitedHealth CEO finally addresses outrage - TheStreet https://www.thestreet.com/investing/stocks/unitedhealth-ceo-finally-addresses-outrage
“Lower-cost equivalent quality sites of service, for example, can be good for consumers and patients but threaten revenue streams for organizations that depend on charging more for care.”
Yes. That’s the whole idea. Correct. Yes.

2025-01-16 03:20:40

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@nprofile…f5mu *If* it were mathematically possible for the Greens (or anyone else) to be anything but a spoiler, I’d be all for it.

2025-01-15 19:05:17

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@nprofile…f5mu Yep. If the parties had different views on Gaza, I could understand choosing based on that. But since they're a tie in that category, I'll pick the one that allows the people I care about to exist.

2025-01-11 17:35:12

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@nprofile…ldyv Heh, I’ve had that. “Did that blizzard affect you?” “The one in Denver? Uh, no.”

2025-01-10 23:49:41

A friend just asked if we're affected by the fires in LA.
It's easy to underestimate the size of California. It's a shorter trip from Paris to Stuttgart than from San Francisco to Los Angeles.
No, we're safe from this one.

2024-12-30 01:45:46

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@nprofile…nrwj Fun fun! I suck at shooting pistols, but I still love trying. I hope you were more successful than I would be!

2024-12-29 17:12:50

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@nprofile…nrwj What kind of shooting did you do?

2024-12-26 17:38:46

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@nprofile…yvdv Hahaha! They really do.

2024-12-26 17:37:20

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@nprofile…qk8y Clearly!

2024-12-26 17:35:49

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@nprofile…wtwk You can all say "I knew him before this all happened.”

2024-12-26 17:07:11

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@nprofile…q5wq I was pretty pleased. Last year I got him a Flipper Zero.

2024-12-26 16:55:26

This year’s winner of the “Most Random Present” award: my buddy who gave me a set of throwing axes and some night vision goggles. I’m still not entirely sure how this all goes together.
https://nfts.freeradical.zone/media_attachments/files/113/720/172/616/620/807/original/6cea5b1851ea9045.jpg

2024-12-12 16:52:22

Florida Introduces Bill to Ban 'Weather Modification' https://www.newsweek.com/florida-bill-ban-weather-modification-chemtrails-conspiracy-theory-1994060
In an unexpected national first, Florida bans gasoline powered cars and other greenhouse emitters.

2024-12-11 23:22:07

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@nprofile…52rv @nprofile…2vrd I would rather go plead my case to Tony Soprano. At least I think he'd pay attention and actually hear me out.

2024-12-11 21:20:00

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@nprofile…2vrd “According to this retired veterinarian, you only have 1/4th the standard number of stomachs, and therefore don't fit our standard of care criteria for indigestion.”

2024-12-11 21:06:46

Jackpot! My health insurance company selected me as a survey panel member. Oh boy, do I have things to say.
Example: ”My doctor says I need a certain medication. Some flunky on your end, or a computer who knows nothing about me, says that I don't. How you're not being sued into oblivion for practicing medicine without a license is beyond me.”

2024-12-10 02:02:51

Just got a legit text from a health system:
“[someone] is conducting an asthma treatment clinical trial to reduce the environmental impact of inhalers. See if you qualify: …”
LOL WTF NO. It's not that I don't care about the environment, but that freaking asthma inhalers are so freaking far down the list of imaginable pollution sources, and their reliability and effectiveness so utterly critical to someone having *an asthma attack*, that I’m quite offended that they’d dare ask. No. LOL, no.

2024-12-09 04:04:29

Screenshot of a current Frozen BBS session via a #meshtastic radio.
https://nfts.freeradical.zone/media_attachments/files/113/620/881/654/420/013/original/f9c78cc50b09fd4f.png

2024-12-08 19:40:30

I have Frozen BBS working to the point that it’s running live on my #meshtastic node now.
This scratches my “slow connection to talk to locals” BBS itch more than an Internet system ever has. It’s stripped down and minimalist due to resource constraints, not out of nostalgia.

2024-12-07 02:05:20

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@nprofile…46cg @nprofile…gkl4 Righteous. Thanks!
If it were me running it for my own purposes, I'd be way more cavalier about the decision. "Oh, I've gotta compile the drivers myself? OK, which git branch are they on?" I don't wanna subject Tek Jr to that just yet though.

2024-12-07 00:31:29

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@nprofile…0vf5 There are worse ways to spend a summer.

2024-12-04 23:30:10

KMFDM, "Juke-Joint Jezebel" from the album "Nihil": https://song.link/us/i/413176799 #NowPlaying #FediPlay
When I fell in love with techno-industrial.

2024-11-30 18:52:19

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@nprofile…wtk3 Heh! Wonder what they *would* use.
“One of my prepper buddies said S3 means Super Secure Secrets.”

2024-11-30 05:24:33

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@nprofile…yvdv That it is. That it is.

2024-11-30 05:13:19

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“I want him brought right here...with a big ribbon on his head! And I want to look him straight in the eye, and I want to tell him what a cheap, lying, no-good, rotten, four-flushing, low-life, snake-licking, dirt-eating, inbred, overstuffed, ignorant, blood-sucking, dog-kissing, brainless, dickless, hopeless, heartless, fat-assed, bug-eyed, stiff-legged, spotty-lipped, worm-headed, sack of monkey shit he is! Hallelujah!Holy shit! Where's the Tylenol?"
- Clark Griswold

2024-11-30 03:19:32

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“We’re gonna have an awesome site, and no trans or gay or furries or lefties allowed!”
“Uh, who exactly are you planning to have run the thing?”
“My nephew is pretty good at this computer stuff!”

2024-11-30 03:15:42

Andrew Tate's Real World website compromised, data stolen https://www.theregister.com/2024/11/22/andrew_tate_raid/
OK, who did this?
And do you have a Ko-fi?

2024-11-30 02:37:03

Hey #FRZ gang, you can invite your friends to our instance and let them skip the moderation queue. The instructions at https://fedi.tips/inviting-people-onto-mastodon-and-the-fediverse/ will give you a link to share with them.

2024-11-29 06:56:03

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@nprofile…4xx3 @nprofile…h640 That’s why I write most things: so I don’t have to remember it myself later.

2024-11-27 20:20:07

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@nprofile…4fmt Oh man. There was some geologic soup in the back.

2024-11-27 16:43:06

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@nprofile…dpzs The box it came in, on the other hand…

2024-11-27 04:40:28

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Sample local terminal BBS session:
https://nfts.freeradical.zone/media_attachments/files/113/553/075/389/400/156/original/f64db1c7b04989c5.png

2024-11-27 04:36:57

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@nprofile…jx3e I had a hard time finding many with my ground-level T1000-E. The RAK4631 with a nice antenna on top of my house picks up nodes from across the SF bay from me.
That's to say, there may be more around than you'd think if you get a little creative.

2024-11-27 04:17:10

I am Murphy's Law incarnate on the #Meshtastic radio itself. Waited a few days for the IPX to SMA cables to arrive, and would you look at that, I ordered RP-SMA by mistake.
I might've paid a little extra to get the right ones delivered overnight. I'm so tired of being "this close" to having it all back together.

2024-11-27 04:14:08

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And now you can post messages to Frozen BBS. I factored out all of the console commands into separate functions I can wire up to the Meshtastic client so that most of the code's shared.
*It is not fancy*, but in a terminal window it looks an awful lot like calling into an old BBS if you squint at it just right.

2024-11-26 02:18:15

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Now there's a (half-implemented, junky) command line client that lets you read messages.
As promised, user moderation is present from the beginning.

2024-11-25 18:12:38

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@nprofile…j2qh Freaking awesome!

2024-11-25 05:20:08

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@nprofile…xq50 Yep. #FRZ. Frozen BBS. Purely random.

2024-11-25 05:13:32

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@nprofile…smhh Do eet.

2024-11-24 17:16:14

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@nprofile…4prv @nprofile…jzqv If only they weren’t so shy about sharing their opinions in every freaking forum.
You don’t have to go to a Nazi bar to hear what Nazis think about the news.

2024-11-24 17:03:39

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@nprofile…uzy8 I am, and I’m going to go make a GPT that can prove it.

2024-11-24 04:48:52

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@nprofile…ruty 🤣

2024-11-24 01:36:21

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@nprofile…fp7v @nprofile…l6z6 I think that’d be @nprofile…dwc7.

2024-11-24 01:00:15

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@nprofile…q8c7 Not so much yet. I’ll share it as soon as it’s actually usable at all, which today, it ain’t.

2024-11-23 21:42:17

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@nprofile…srrn @nprofile…ulzz @nprofile…xz83 Dogecoin works.

2024-11-23 19:36:28

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@nprofile…wm95 @nprofile…r5de Well, that and I don't use Facebook products. It wasn't a contender for me in the first place.

2024-11-23 19:10:50

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@nprofile…06lt It would’ve cost you nothing not to share that mental image.

2024-11-19 02:34:16

Got my Meshtastic roof radio fully online now.
https://nfts.freeradical.zone/media_attachments/files/113/507/280/671/951/268/original/e000a8484d4425e3.jpeg

2024-11-17 04:29:36

We're dog sitting a chihuahua. I just had this conversation with their kitchen spybot:
Me: Dingus, Monday morning at 8AM, play "I Want a Dog" by Pet Shop Boys.
Spy: OK. Would you like me to make that your default alarm tone?
Me: ...yes!
Mrs Tek: LOL
Don't leave me alone with your electronics.

2024-11-07 23:53:47

Cops Suspect iOS 18 iPhones Are Communicating to Force Reboots, Making Unlocking Harder - MacRumors https://www.macrumors.com/2024/11/07/ios-18-forcing-reboots-law-enforcement/
> The digital forensics lab that noticed the issue had several iPhones in AFU state reboot, including iPhones in Airplane mode and one in a faraday box.
This is the kind of bullshit that anti-science zealots have normalized. "Either it's a bug or Apple added a freaking telepathy chip with a software update." "Oh? Tell me more about this ESP thing."

2024-11-07 01:33:06

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I'm frequently reminded how rich I could be if I didn't have a conscience and was OK with scamming people.

2024-11-07 01:31:27

Smart Meter Protection BRAZE WELDED Tensor Ring etc etc etc https://www.etsy.com/listing/692199107/smart-meter-protection-braze-welded
> Full Sacred or Royal Cubit - 144 MHZ - Known for resonating with the physical body - Transmute EMFs with a tensor field - Structure water - Increase food shelf life - Environment harmonizer
I would *love* to be a fly on the wall when the power company explains to a buyer why they're turning the power off at the street. "So you like adding random crap to your meter, do you?"

2024-11-06 16:29:20

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@npub17yf…cuaz Same. I really hoped we could agree on that. I was also surprised by prop 34 passing, although even if it was meant to punish one specific group, it’s probably not the worst idea we’ve had.

2024-11-06 16:26:22

California voters added recognition of gay marriages to their state constitution.

2024-11-01 15:04:48

Rant of the morning: If I complain about a thing on my OS of choice, “switch to Linux!” is useless advice. I’ve used Linux for longer than many of the advice-givers have been alive, including many years on the desktop. I know what advantages it has. I also know what disadvantages it has, and you can safely assume that me not using it today is an informed decision. “Just switch to Linux!” doesn’t make me pause and consider it as though it were novel.
Grrr, had to get that out of my system.

2024-10-29 19:24:56

I just saw a woman get out of a car with the custom license plate “SLTYSUE”. I’m not about to even guess at the intended pronunciation.

2024-10-21 15:18:01

Offered without comment.
https://nfts.freeradical.zone/media_attachments/files/113/346/076/862/476/642/original/dee9de557c40e14e.png

2024-10-03 17:54:35

The upcoming election is largely a referendum on Trump, to be sure. But don’t forget that if he won, we’d be one hamberder away from President Vance. An old man with that diet and lack of exercise isn’t going to be around forever.

2024-09-28 06:50:36

I wish I could wave a wand and have VSTs work in the frequency domain instead of time. Want to make a lowpass filter? Just divide all the frequency levels above X by 2. Vocoder? Multiply two signals. Tremolo? Multiply each frequency by 1+sin(t/speed)*amount. Write a delay plugin with a Bash script, or a pitch bender with Lua.
But no, we must like doing FFTs between each plugin instead of once at each end of the pipeline. Sigh. It seems like it could be so much easier.

2024-09-17 19:23:08

Release v4.3.0-beta.2 · mastodon/mastodon https://github.com/mastodon/mastodon/releases/tag/v4.3.0-beta.2
You a Mastodon admin? I highly recommend reading these release notes. A *lot* of stuff is changing and it’s not going to be a trivial “build and restart” upgrade.

2024-09-16 15:10:12

Over breakfast Tek Jr mentioned this really weird short story they're reading that I might also like. Seems they stumbled across "I Have no Mouth, and I Must Scream".
"It starts off really creepy, Dad!" Buckle your seatbelt, my child.

2024-09-14 15:19:31

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@npub1f3y…pv2l Is that a cigar I spy behind the pop tarts?

2024-09-14 10:57:27

Just got Mrs Tek dropped off at the airport.
Hand me a coffee, a beer, and a PlayStation controller. We’ve got things to do.

2024-09-13 12:58:12

I dreamed I was meandering through a car lot to kill time and got into some ‘69 Ford boxy think with a 454 engine. I started it up to hear it rumble. Mrs Tek was unimpressed. I revved it and it sounded like a dragster. Hmmm.
I popped the hood to peep the big block. Wonder what they’re asking? The salesman swung by. “We’re letting that go for a cool $102K!” I closed the hood. It was not to be my project car.
(I have zero urge to have a project car.)

2024-09-13 12:17:52

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@npub1kvy…gps4 I’ll keep it in the back yard until sunrise.

2024-09-13 05:21:47

Tek Jr just showed me the TI-30XS MultiView calculator they have at school and I viscerally hate it. I can’t explain why. Something about the curved screen corners and white cutout for the weird arrow button and the haunted solar cell just physically repulses me. This is so odd. I don’t have a habit of being creeped out by innocuous electronics.
https://nfts.freeradical.zone/media_attachments/files/113/128/564/611/701/223/original/c7e2c28235513e96.jpeg

2024-09-13 00:46:22

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Also, it warms my heart to imagine medical device execs suddenly facing price competition. Why are devices so expensive? “Because they can be, fuck you. What are you gonna do, not hear? LOL.”
And now they have to defend to would-be buyers why their stuff is an order of magnitude more expensive than the new options.
I love it.

2024-09-13 00:37:39

FDA Authorizes First Over-the-Counter Hearing Aid Software https://www.fda.gov/news-events/press-announcements/fda-authorizes-first-over-counter-hearing-aid-software
Newer AirPods Pro with recent software updates are now FDA certified hearing aids. This is astounding and wonderful. No, they’re probably not as great as high quality hearing aids fitted by a trained professional. They also cost $250, not $2500, making them far more affordable.
I hope this is the first of many such certifications.

2024-09-12 17:38:39

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@npub1f9h…8hqa I haven't listened yet. The idea has a ton of potential though.

2024-09-12 17:19:29

No Such Podcast | The Official NSA Podcast https://www.nsa.gov/podcast/
Yes, the NSA now has a podcast.
I will absolutely be listening to this on road trips.

2024-09-11 19:25:01

I might've messed up. Yesterday and this morning, my stomach was a little queasy. And then the new New Orleans restaurant on the corner caught my attention and I had to try their fried oyster po boy.
This might not have been my best decision.

2024-09-08 00:38:02

The #Huskers are trouncing Colorado. What is even happening? I love it.

2024-09-08 00:14:08

It’s an Aperol spritz kind of afternoon.
https://nfts.freeradical.zone/media_attachments/files/113/099/043/528/122/689/original/d718271d62261d4d.jpg

2024-09-06 21:09:14

It took me about 2 minutes to upgrade from Terraform to OpenTofu. Nice.

2024-09-06 01:19:56

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@npub1tsz…jl0n I really do believe that’s right. I’m not a sucker like all those _other_, less _knowledgeable_ people. Also, I feel compelled to open my mouth and demonstrate this for everyone within earshot.