Julian Oliver

Critical Engineering, tech art, techno politics, infosec, system administration, FLOSS, resilient infrastructure, survivalism, environmental defense, planetary futures.

Bows, arrows & rainforest conservation when I can.

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Last Notes

2025-04-07 22:35:52

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@nprofile…s06p Thanks, I've been using OnlyOffice for years, but since they started setting arbitrary simultaneous user limits (20, last time I looked) I got tired of patching and workarounds each update. Some groups have dozens working on a doc at once during campaigns, project development. Nextcloud slowly started steering away from OO anyway, and so when doing deployments for orgs/groups it started to become too nonstandard and hairy for junior sysadmins to manage.

2024-10-30 12:18:51

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@npub1m0v…du9y without wanting to sound the Horns of War, I will also add:
vim

2024-10-21 04:38:34

A 10yr old just now, on discovering with great disappointment that some of his favourite breakcore on Pixabay is 'AI generated':
"AI is just remixing without credit. I don't want to listen to this anymore."

2024-10-18 03:06:59

cable management
https://files.mastodon.social/media_attachments/files/113/326/201/670/807/412/original/8ae46edc44b08315.jpg

2024-10-17 07:51:47

It's only the middle of the month, but I'm putting all my cards on 'microplastics found in dolphin breath' for the title of Peak Anthropocene October
https://www.newscientist.com/article/2452155-dolphins-breathe-in-microplastics-and-it-could-be-damaging-their-lungs/

2024-10-15 10:45:49

I've been a free & open source software advocate since the mid to late 90's. Stallman's contributions in this space have been foundational, but his poor behaviour has been long known. Sadly it's worse than many knew of, outlined here:
https://stallman-report.org/
The authors are not engaging in character assassination. Rather they recognise the harm this highly influential person's views may actively affirm & enable. No free pass when it comes to empowering abuse.
I agree, he should leave the FSF

2024-10-13 18:44:27

Interesting piece on the 'liberation' narrative around the Israeli gov's military agenda in the ME. It provides important context, for instance Israeli government's decades-long support for Hamas in an effort to undermine any attempt by the PLO to create a strong and secular government.
"Anyone who wants to thwart the establishment of a Palestinian state has to support bolstering Hamas and transferring money to Hamas,”
- Benjamin Netanyahu, 2019
https://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2024/oct/13/israel-is-not-saving-western-civilisation-nor-is-hamas-leading-the-resistance

2024-10-09 09:14:40

The low level of understanding as to the functioning of LLMs and ML continues to allow 'AI' to be publicly imagined as an entity, a being - an idea bolstered and proliferated through countless works of popular fiction and shoddy journalism. This is a vulnerable state for the public imagination, ripe for abuse, especially when coupled with the still prevalent myth of computational neutrality. As such I believe the unchecked spread of 'AI' needs to be fought as much with education as regulation.

2024-10-08 19:23:42

When your IDS is the backdoor #infosec
https://files.mastodon.social/media_attachments/files/113/273/417/353/174/020/original/b175a348f963af7a.jpg
https://files.mastodon.social/media_attachments/files/113/273/421/010/027/165/original/7526246d1b4e5437.jpg
https://files.mastodon.social/media_attachments/files/113/273/424/769/775/981/original/2e317be62e2f5ee8.jpg
https://files.mastodon.social/media_attachments/files/113/273/428/242/318/963/original/eeadcbce149109c5.jpg

2024-10-07 16:39:34

https://files.mastodon.social/media_attachments/files/113/267/107/636/839/488/original/c1d8621ac905189b.jpg

2024-10-04 07:59:17

Incredible image.
https://files.mastodon.social/media_attachments/files/113/248/072/936/329/586/original/6b3487ca44d795e8.jpg

2024-10-03 09:38:07

Wildfires are proving to be among the most potent trajectory shifting self-reinforcing feedbacks unaccounted for in IPCC models, and subsequent global carbon budgets. According to research cited in the article, we're now a part degree away from a “critical temperature threshold” whereby forests shift en masse from carbon sinks to carbon sources:
https://www.theguardian.com/world/2024/oct/03/wildfires-are-burning-through-humanitys-carbon-budget-study-shows

2024-10-01 19:36:45

Kicking back refreshing news feeds to see if nuclear winter will be this year due to the stupidity and selfishness of a tiny handful of AWOL men.

2024-09-27 08:59:46

And there it was, resplendent, the name and album cover of the IDM music project I'll never start.
https://files.mastodon.social/media_attachments/files/113/208/655/161/870/199/original/a6a2a29a51be9511.jpg

2024-09-15 02:44:05

Interesting sister piece to Aram Bartholl's (@npub1plm…y8hz) 'Map', by a local artist:
https://www.rnz.co.nz/news/national/528036/fundraisers-seeking-380k-to-install-5-point-5m-sculpture-near-wellington-s-waterfront

2024-09-11 20:45:37

Another PSA that Google uses its fonts to track traffic to other people's websites. Google has no business knowing who visits other people's websites. If you want to use Google hosted 'free' fonts in your site, let your visitors know, or learn to host them locally on your server.
For instance:
https://webdesign.tutsplus.com/how-to-self-host-google-fonts--cms-34775t
To use Big Tech is to feed it. There are other ways.

2024-09-08 22:12:47

This is completely irresponsible, and frankly stupid. Heads need to roll. https://www.rnz.co.nz/news/business/527419/inland-revenue-giving-thousands-of-taxpayers-details-to-social-media-platforms-for-ad-campaigns #aotearoa #nz

2024-09-01 22:51:31

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@npub1qu5…4evr Song titles speak to me.

2024-08-18 23:04:00

Nestlé says most of its GHG emissions are from agriculture, and that cow milk from Aotearoa NZ is in many of its products, including KitKat, Milky Bars etc. It also says it's drawing down its GHG's in part by buying 'regeneratively' farmed products - Nestlé's
big #climate success story.
The problem is farming corporates all over are selling them greenwash, a lie they are probably in on.
https://www.rnz.co.nz/news/in-depth/525503/fonterra-accused-of-greenwashing-to-impress-big-foreign-buyers-keen-on-regenerative-agriculture

2024-08-08 06:05:03

The endemic application of 'AI' was never "inevitable", just as it has not made its way into our lives as the result of a public assessment of needs.
It's important to be vigilant as to the creep of Technological Determinism, especially in this critical time; what we call 'AI' is not some natural expression of socio-technical progress. It is being pushed upon us by private companies wholly in the interest of profit & capture, without regulation, without care for the human & environmental costs

2024-07-31 08:04:11

Monbiot not holding back in this great piece on Brazil's bold yet completely sane and sensible plan to implement a global tax on billionaires.
"Billionaire wealth impoverishes us all: astonishingly, each of them produces, on average, a million times more carbon dioxide than the average global citizen in the bottom 90%. Billionaires are a blight on the planet."
https://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/article/2024/jul/31/brazil-global-tax-billionaires-super-rich

2024-07-23 21:23:05

A new branding direction of the Far Right is as a 'movement' rising up against a 'system' for liberty, justice and democracy - even if in the same breath they promise to reduce rights for women and minorities. And so we see that the 'system' they speak of is simply one that doesn't prioritise them over all others.

2024-07-22 06:56:50

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A good example as to what I posted here, back in April 14. Guardian Australia staff set up completely blank FB and Instagram accounts for a supposed 24yr old Australian male, and watched the toxic sludge creep in, all on its own.
https://www.theguardian.com/technology/article/2024/jul/21/we-unleashed-facebook-and-instagrams-algorithms-on-blank-accounts-they-served-up-sexism-and-misogyny

2024-07-22 06:48:15

This is a big deal. As a member of my family so astutely put it, "insurers and banks are shaping environmental policy for the better, rather than our own governments."
https://www.insurancebusinessmag.com/nz/news/environmental/major-insurers-withdraw-support-for-deep-sea-mining-498048.aspx

2024-07-20 05:44:37

Who said permacomputing would never go mainstream
https://www.yahoo.com/tech/windows-version-1992-saving-southwest-171922788.html
(if even true ofc)
#crowdstroke #crowdstrike

2024-07-02 02:36:49

These leader cults are so dangerous. People voting for sole individuals, 'figures,' and not collections of good ideas implemented by civil servants.
I wonder how many voting in the US know what the stakes really are.
https://www.buzzfeed.com/michaelabramwell/project-2025-ten-things-you-need-to-know

2024-06-28 10:10:33

This is where the IPCC loses clout. None of the '2050' forecasts, the 2C escape trajectories, could predict nor account for the compounding self-reinforcing feedbacks we are seeing
https://www.theguardian.com/world/article/2024/jun/27/canada-2023-wildfires-carbon-emissions

2024-06-24 02:23:38

The geo-politics of climate geo-engineering is set to become a thing. A good example is the recent finding that tweaking the Californian climate to lower temperatures would likely result in heatwaves in the EU.
It's as though we're running out of different ways to find out we all share the same atmosphere.
https://www.theguardian.com/environment/article/2024/jun/21/climate-engineering-off-us-coast-could-increase-heatwaves-in-europe-study-finds

2024-06-16 21:12:03

Who out there using SimpleX has anything to share as regards UX compared to the likes of Signal/Wire/Briar, esp for non-techie users?

2024-06-15 06:46:41

So former NSA head Paul M. Nakasone is appointed to OpenAI's board of directors.
Bah, probably nothing.
Regwalled link: https://www.washingtonpost.com/technology/2024/06/13/openai-board-paul-nakasone-nsa/
Screenshot of txt
https://files.mastodon.social/media_attachments/files/112/619/286/600/570/973/original/167a71fdbccabe52.png

2024-06-14 08:06:44

I descend from white European settlers to Aotearoa New Zealand, which is to say immigrants - boat people. While living abroad for many years, I too was an immigrant, so named myself as such.
If you are of white European descent and are living away from your home country, one of the most useful things you can do right now to push back against the tide of the Far Right is to refer to yourself as an "immigrant" or "migrant". Drop the 'ex pat' distinction white folk so often reserve for themselves.

2024-06-09 06:18:53

It seems Instagram and FB users have until June 26 (?) to opt out of their posts/(incl images/voice/words etc of people not on those platforms) being used to train/feed their 'Meta AI' behemoth. I have no account with either so cannot confirm this howto works, but here you go.
Skinny bet they make good on their word. In any case, if not for you, do it for the rest of us.
https://beebom.com/opt-out-meta-ai-training-instagram-facebook/

2024-06-08 10:37:51

Still a lot to fight for aye
https://files.mastodon.social/media_attachments/files/112/580/533/577/179/358/original/c28b79556b439d60.jpg
https://files.mastodon.social/media_attachments/files/112/580/533/574/569/581/original/e64bda958f4233dd.jpg
https://files.mastodon.social/media_attachments/files/112/580/533/589/223/591/original/4a27b5933fdc9c7e.jpg
https://files.mastodon.social/media_attachments/files/112/580/533/588/258/770/original/326c029dc6f51876.jpg

2024-06-02 01:31:08

This is just the beginning. In not too long - on our current path - it will soon be other islands like Tuvalu, then countless coastal communities world wide, then whole cities of millions like Bangkok, Shanghai, Miami.
Huge change is coming.
https://www.rnz.co.nz/news/world/518474/panama-prepares-to-evacuate-first-island-in-face-of-rising-sea-levels

2024-05-31 07:52:37

Re-posting here for the good..
Very glad to announce the first 72hr Collapsible writing sprint - The Collapsathon!
Pls share widely. Let's do this!
https://wiki.collapsible.systems
https://files.mastodon.social/media_attachments/files/112/534/563/989/107/157/original/bc69caa059161bba.png

2024-05-05 06:40:47

The very sharp and studied Teresa Ribera on the future of the EU, in lieu of the forthcoming parliamentary elections:
"I think it’s been shown that it’s a huge error – and historically always has been – to think that looking for common territory with the far right is a way to pacify the far right [...] That never works."
https://www.theguardian.com/world/article/2024/may/05/eu-at-risk-of-implosion-as-far-right-seeks-scapegoats-minister-warns

2024-04-20 05:45:49

Look I do think it's worth mentioning that the Moon is drifting away from the Earth 3.8cm each year and that this just so happens to be around about the amount our fingernails grow in the same period.

2024-04-19 21:53:52

Some incredible Late, Late Anthropocene grimness, researchers found that ocean spray along the North South transect of the Atlantic emits more PFAAs ('forever chemicals') than any sole industrial source. So, standing on the Atlantic coastline (presumably elsewhere too), enjoying the ocean breeze, you are loading up on PFAAs. The ocean is now skinned with the stuff, its primary transporter.
What have we done?
https://www.science.org/doi/10.1126/sciadv.adl1026

2024-04-14 07:58:57

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Important not to fall for the free speech neutral-platformism argument as regards this content. It's not 'the other side of the debate'. It's structured and intentional, organised hate and discrimination. It celebrates the very practice of these. Harvesting ad revenue from the process of disseminating this garbage is morally abhorrent, innately antisocial (as in the psychological sense of the term) and should be fiercely challenged on such grounds.

2024-04-14 06:26:07

Last night I opened up YT in a private window, & clicked on an unrelated video to that of the one I had just watched. It was a video on arctic ice melts that turned out to be 100% denialist.
One click & there I was in endless fetid scroll of Jordan Peterson, climate change denial, 'what is woke' explainers, 'lol snowflakes' shorts, Trump propaganda, knife fights, & misogynistic, racist garbage.
Don't tell me Big Tech aren't culpable for the hate out there. They're farming it, on a vast scale.

2024-04-05 20:59:12

A most spectacular #opsec fail https://www.theguardian.com/world/2024/apr/05/top-israeli-spy-chief-exposes-his-true-identity-in-online-security-lapse

2024-04-02 06:23:06

Google fesses up to spying on people's browsing habits in Chrome's not-so-Incognito mode, promising to destroy billions of records tracking U.S. citizens. Sadly it was not out of the goodness of their electric hearts - it took a formidable class action lawsuit (that they'd probably already prepared for):
https://apnews.com/article/google-chrome-privacy-lawsuit-settlement-203cc5063f1a1d4013de1900d9376814 #infosec #privacy

2024-03-31 20:55:17

Test case: You get a voice msg from a friend in the middle of the night. They're in a local park and they need your help right now.
Soon, we will not know whether to act.
Time to work on 'code words' with family and friends, to help filter people from their simulations #opsec
https://www.theguardian.com/technology/2024/mar/31/openai-deems-its-voice-cloning-tool-too-risky-for-general-release

2024-03-30 08:10:25

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@npub1phw…pggg 😭

2024-03-30 03:26:26

The newly launched Copernicus Climate Change Atlas puts the chance of my region warming to 5.69C by the end of the century at the 90th percentile. How about you guys?
https://atlas.climate.copernicus.eu/atlas

2024-03-20 06:06:03

In the last 10 years 'delete' has increasingly shifted to mean leave, unfriend or remove, whereas 'cancel' has come to mean delete, block or censor (data or access). So common is this new usage I wonder when dictionaries will begin to reflect it.

2024-03-08 20:34:02

Incredible image.
https://files.mastodon.social/media_attachments/files/112/061/971/348/046/707/original/a82ca89f54daaf5e.jpg

2024-03-07 23:46:26

No need to paraphrase. First paragraph says it all:
"Claims that artificial intelligence will help solve the climate crisis are misguided, with the technology instead likely cause rising energy use and turbocharge the spread of climate disinformation, a coalition of environmental groups has warned."
https://www.theguardian.com/technology/2024/mar/07/ai-climate-change-energy-disinformation-report

2024-03-02 20:41:10

Antarctic research expedition, comprised of Aotearoa New Zealand and Italian scientists, finds sea ice melting at rate far faster than expected.
"The changes to the sea-ice indicate that in the coming decades coastal cities will need to be reconfigured because of sea level rise." - Dr. Craig Stevens, leader of NZ research team.
https://www.rnz.co.nz/news/national/510696/signs-found-of-worryingly-fast-antarctic-ice-melt-new-zealand-expedition
https://files.mastodon.social/media_attachments/files/112/028/013/233/758/662/original/493018d6b46eb06f.jpg

2024-02-07 07:06:58

Intense and very beautiful dawn conservation mission today, checking out bush health in a rarely visited part of the Remutaka ranges. Tracing a knife-edge ridgeline through some regenerating rainforest, we were on the lookout for invasive species that might stunt its growth.
On the climb in, our redlight headlamps lit up the young canopy,an armada of clouds setting sail in the distance. #notai
https://files.mastodon.social/media_attachments/files/111/888/897/183/194/677/original/46cb7790c96a1ab3.jpg
https://files.mastodon.social/media_attachments/files/111/888/897/240/050/100/original/3624c2df6e3f1399.jpg

2024-01-28 22:35:59

This should never be normal.
https://files.mastodon.social/media_attachments/files/111/835/946/633/493/355/original/6cd6ca5dbe391849.png

2024-01-28 21:47:23

If our planet was a spaceship, the Amazon would be a mission-critical subsystem; we would need it to be in good working shape to support life onboard.
Here's a good piece on the state of the Amazon, written from the engine room, under Lula's government
https://www.motherjones.com/politics/2024/01/amazon-brazil-lula-policies-environment-indigenous-rights-crisis/

2024-01-15 04:16:53

Little surprise, but nonetheless interesting to hear it from a money mouth:
"[...] in most scenarios, AI will likely worsen overall inequality." - Kristalina Georgieva, Managing Director IMF
https://www.bbc.com/news/business-67977967

2023-12-12 10:58:05

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We are together alive at an incredible time. We are witnessing the decisive sabotage of the fundamental right to a habitable planet, the homeworld every cell in our bodies has evolved to thrive within. We are witnessing the active, conscious choice to cast the world into centuries of compounding suffering and chaos, as the Hothouse Earth scenario takes hold, so a tiny handful of people can hoard more money than they already have, right up until the point money ceases to matter.

2023-12-12 10:44:06

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Al Gore is a tad more blunt. From the dumpster fire formally known as Twitter:
"COP28 is now on the verge of complete failure. The world desperately needs to phase out fossil fuels as quickly as possible, but this obsequious draft reads as if OPEC dictated it word for word. It is even worse than many had feared. It is “Of the Petrostates, By the Petrostates and For the Petrostates.”"

2023-12-12 10:40:09

Dr Bill Hare, the climate scientist and chief executive of Climate Analytics, who has been to 27 Cops in person, says of the draft text at COP28:
"Iwould say it’s giving every fossil fuel exporter on the planet everything they need to expand fossil fuel production. They might not say it, they might have crocodile tears, but I think any country involved in exporting coal, oil or gas would be privately very happy.”
(Source: The Guardian)

2023-12-09 00:06:14

Concludng 22hrs of heated discussion, the EU agrees on clear rules for the use of AI, the first continent to do so.
A good start.
https://apnews.com/article/ai-act-europe-regulation-59466a4d8fd3597b04542ef25831322c

2023-10-24 07:46:59

A tyranny of so many map projections is that they distort area in favour of preserving shape and distance, the Mercator Projection being perhaps the most well known. Such distortion can visually inflate some regions, a power of its own.
And so I have been especially enjoying playing with this map tool by Josh Horowitz that maintains area/scale across two views as you zoom and pan:
https://joshuahhh.com/projects/same-scale/#3.73/55.96/-6.27/-40.60/173.20/Map
Here is my home country of Aotearoa New Zealand, compared to both Japan & the UK.
https://files.mastodon.social/media_attachments/files/111/288/677/106/203/355/original/9ef6659ac196f94f.jpg
https://files.mastodon.social/media_attachments/files/111/288/864/853/305/495/original/69b3fde9beb9db80.jpg

2023-10-21 09:40:37

Fascinating and sophisticated MiTM ('man in the middle') at Hetzner (DE) and Linode, targeting Russia's largest XMPP/Jabber (civilian) chat service. The authors of the article make a reasonably compelling case that "this is lawful interception Hetzner and Linode were forced to setup."
https://notes.valdikss.org.ru/jabber.ru-mitm/
Excellent mitigation walkthrough here:
https://www.devever.net/~hl/xmpp-incident
Sure gets me thinking.
#infosec #sysadmin #forensics

2023-10-18 20:23:32

Very useful list, The Eight Stages of White Settler-Colonial Denial.
This very process is playing out with precision to this day in countless colonised lands, as seen recently with the Indigenous Referendum in Australia, in right wing and center-right political rhetoric in LATAM countries, North America, and sadly also here in Aotearoa New Zealand
https://files.mastodon.social/media_attachments/files/111/257/846/448/901/208/original/8bebc2bb045c7355.jpeg

2023-10-14 19:29:43

Slightly worse result for Labour than expected. They gave the centrists to Nat, running a weak campaign championing no recent successes nor core values. Blurred their identity. It'll be a tough 3 years, damage and disillusion. Peters a possible undoing for Right if special votes play out.
On the upside, glorious wins for Greens and TPM. Wellington flipping to Tamatha is huge, Nats will not be playing on home turf. Seems there will be much more critical fire in the Beehive this time round.

2023-10-05 23:32:39

"September 2023 beat the previous record for that month by 0.5C, the largest jump in temperature ever seen. September was about 1.8C warmer than pre-industrial levels. Datasets from European and Japanese scientists confirm the leap."
To think this is just the beginning.
https://www.theguardian.com/environment/2023/oct/05/gobsmackingly-bananas-scientists-stunned-by-planets-record-september-heat

2023-09-20 06:18:14

Because there is still life. A lot of it.
https://files.mastodon.social/media_attachments/files/111/096/006/032/502/755/original/9216a1a51e0fc705.jpg

2023-08-24 19:38:05

Worldwide fossil fuel subsidies jumped to $7 Trillion last year, or about $13.3M a minute. This is more than all government support for education, and countless other things that make the world better rather than worse.
https://www.imf.org/en/Blogs/Articles/2023/08/24/fossil-fuel-subsidies-surged-to-record-7-trillion

2023-08-18 04:57:10

Excellent short article by an ecologist on how the biophysical demands we have placed on this planet make 'degrowth' inevitable, whether we like it or not.
"Access to fossil fuels has allowed us to temporarily overshoot biophysical limits. This lifted our population and demands on the biosphere past the level it can safely absorb. Barring a planned reduction of those biosphere demands, we will experience the same "adjustments" as other species."
https://www.rnz.co.nz/news/on-the-inside/495938/critics-of-degrowth-economics-say-it-s-unworkable-but-from-an-ecologist-s-perspective-it-s-inevitable

2023-07-09 01:06:25

Great overview of the personal data collected by Threads, Twitter, Bluesky, Spill, Hive Social, and, errm, Mastodon https://www.wired.com/story/meta-twitter-threads-bluesky-spill-hive-mastodon-privacy-comparison/

2023-07-08 00:42:46

Indeed Mastodon does not have to "win". It has already succeeded in becoming home for vast numbers of us that want to build and share without the pretense of exploitation, and for whom the principles of free and open software, community-ownership and resilience are important.
Let the BigTech continents go to war and cannibalise each other. Let those that want to participate in that do so. Our Fediverse archipelago is wild, free and has no part in that war. It will continue to thrive regardless.

2023-07-05 07:15:09

The widely told hero story that Britain innovated the technique to make wrought iron from scrap, propelling it in the Industrial Revolution as a powerhouse, turns out to be false.
Named after the British entrepreneur that capitalised upon it, the 'Cort Process' to make wrought iron was in fact stolen from 76 black metallurgists near Iron Bay, Jamaica. Cort patented it in the 1780's, claimed to be inventor, & forcibly shut down the Jamaican foundry.
New research:
https://www.tandfonline.com/doi/full/10.1080/07341512.2023.2220991

2023-06-22 21:57:35

Global ecological collapse likely far sooner than previously anticipated, based on new findings modeling planetary-boundary tipping points.
Prof Simon Willcock, co-leader of the study, says “We could realistically be the last generation to see the Amazon.”
The more cautious IPCC, whom does not model for complex self-reinforcing feedbacks, previously put it at the end of the century.
https://www.theguardian.com/environment/2023/jun/22/ecological-tipping-points-could-occur-much-sooner-than-expected-study-finds

2023-05-25 06:09:28

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Worth mentioning that folk often assume climate change is the primary culprit of terrestrial extinction. While atmospheric warming is indeed a new stressor on the block, it is habitat loss & land change that is doing the most harm to the wild. And it so happens the primary driver of habitat loss is animal agriculture & its feedcrops (Living Planet Report, 2022).
In other words, the 6th Extinction event on our home planet cannot be averted wiithout changing what we eat, and how we produce it.

2023-05-25 05:44:59

It turns out that the Sixth Mass Extinction event is not only well underway, but happening at a scale and pace far worse than previously thought.
New research has found that "48% of [all] species have declining populations and just 3% have rising populations. They also found evidence showing that 33% of species currently classified as nonthreatened on the IUCN Red List are actually spiraling toward extinction."
https://phys.org/news/2023-05-anthropocene-sixth-mass-extinction-event.html

2023-05-05 08:02:06

A fine example of tactical decolonialism implemented in software:
Pikari Mai! is a browser plugin that replaces news and gossip about the UK royals with indigenous news. It was written by Māori artist Hāmiora Bailey to "switch off the toff", quoted (Guardian) as saying:
“People are sick of it – they don’t care about how much a diamond costs and who’s wearing what dress [...] “Across the globe, Indigenous folk are tired of [this] rhetoric around frivolity and class.”
https://www.pikarimai.co.nz/

2023-05-04 07:42:38

Great piece in the Guardian revealing the US Beef Industry's heavily-funded strategy to mass engineer public opinion into believing that beef isn't the environmental disaster that it is.
To study their game, the author took their training program, learning how to spread disinformation in the form of 'scientific sounding' arguments on behalf of the industry:
https://www.theguardian.com/environment/2023/may/03/beef-industry-public-relations-messaging-machine