The creator of cURL, Daniel Stenberg, has raised barriers against the avalanche of security reports produced by or with the help of generative artificial intelligence. In addition to the volume, he points out that they are often useless: “We have yet to see a single valid security report made with the help of AI.”
Most of the inappropriate uses of AI were already possible before. What changes with AI is the scale.
As soon as you open the site allow.webcam, it requests permission from your browser to access your webcam. If you grant it, the site takes a picture of you and displays the pictures of all the other people who have also allowed themselves to be photographed. If you decline, you’ll be left with a black screen.
As we become promoters of our own lives in the digital realm, new social dilemmas emerge. (At this point, they may not be so new, but they are still challenging to navigate.)
In this solitary post (the first and only one on the blog), the author reflects on the situation where someone posts photos of themselves on Instagram, and a third party, known to both, becomes aware of their gathering:
Over the past few months, it has struck me multiple times how people know more about my life than I tell them or likely hear from others. Like: where we travelled last weekend and with whom. How can they know? Instagram. A post from someone else on that trip about that trip. Of course. You don’t have to be on Instagram, to be on instagram.
How do you meet the expectations of such a diverse audience, even if it consists of people from your own circle? Travel photos or pictures from a party are interpreted differently by your family, friends, coworkers, and boss.
I believe there are two paths: ignore the consequences (sociopathy?) or “pasteurize” the content in an attempt to please everyone (impossible, but you can get close).
And even then, you can’t escape other dilemmas:
Imagine a friend you were on a weekend trip with. This friend talks with another common friend. This common friend could have equally well been on that weekend trip because you like him or her but, due to circumstances, as is life, you did not invite him. You probably would feel uncomfortable with that first friend talking about that trip as if it was the most awesome trip ever, that everyone had non-stop fun and now everyone who was on that trip are best friends for life.
Yet this is the kind of impression an Instagram post or story typically evokes. It’s probably the content most of the first friends’ followers love to see. Except for maybe the few people who wonder why you didn’t ask them to join the trip.
They proposes, as a solution, a new etiquette that disapproves of posting about social gatherings beyond those involved. Instead of sharing a story for all followers on Instagram, one could restrict it to “close friends” or even share it in a group on WhatsApp/Signal.
No Instagram, no privacy
blog.wouterjanleys.com
Dark Visitors, a service for monitoring and blocking bots from artificial intelligence companies, has revamped its plans and now offers a very generous free tier, with a cap of 1 million “events.”
You can use the free mode indefinitely or register your credit card to access paid features without charge, as long as your site does not exceed the 1 million events limit. After that, the cost is USD 0.00005 per event.
Last year I had canceled my use of Dark Visitors here when the trial period expired. Now, I’ve reactivated it. It’s almost therapeutic to see the traffic from non-humans around here.
Behavioral changes have been happening at such a rapid pace that patterns and assumptions that were common one or two decades ago completely elude me. W. David Marx’s article reminded me of one of them: the aversion to the mainstream, or the idea of not being a “sellout.”
In the last three decades, youth culture has moved from a deep suspicion of commerce to a passionate defense of anti-anti-commerce to an entire generation of “creatives” who leverage the commercial market… to do even more commerce
At what point did becoming a salesperson on Instagram (aka an influencer) become a life goal, a childhood dream? Or working proudly for large corporations? When did the all-consuming nature of mass-produced, canned culture (the “franchises”) take over the imagination of the masses?
The 20th century taboo against selling out was, at its heart, a communal norm to reward young artists who focused on craft and punish those who appropriated art and subculture for empty profiteering. Now the culture is most exemplified by people whose entire end goal appears to be empty profiteering.
Any hypothesis?
The age of the double sell-out (em inglês)
culture.ghost.io
Support for Windows 10 will end on October 14th, 2025, just a few months away. A group involved with Linux distros has launched the website End of 10 to assist those who want to switch from Windows to Linux, instead of following Microsoft’s guidance to discard a functional computer and buy a new one with Windows 11. End of 10 gathers instructions and information about locations and events where volunteers install a Linux distro on computers for those who are not familiar with the process.
End of 10
Switch from Windows 10 to Linux
I’ve been thinking of ActivityPub more as an extra layer for existing websites to become “social,” eliminating the middleman (like Twitter, for example), rather than a direct replacement for social networks like Twitter. Instead of posting on a blog and then writing a tweet (to follow the example) announcing the blog post, the blog post itself is published directly to the timelines of those who follow you on Twitter. This is impossible on Twitter/X, but perfectly feasible with ActivityPub.
The idea of larger instances than just a handful of people who know each other, where you adhere to the admins’ decisions (and emotions), tends to lead to drama. Just look at the Fosstodon case, or the various conflicts led by Mastodon.art (tell me about a troublemaking crowd!) or among Brazilian instances since… forever?
What would such an alternative approach look like, where ActivityPub is “sprinkled” over an existing site instead of being a destination in itself?
You don’t have to look far for an example, because you’re in one. With the awesome WordPress plugin, this Manual do Usuário has become its own instance, findable in the fediverse at @feed@manualdousuario.net. Posts and podcasts are propagated through the fediverse, and comments made there appear here. And perhaps most importantly: zero #fedidrama.
And it goes further. It’s possible to create user profiles within WordPress using the ActivityPub plugin. This feature is still experimental and relies on additional plugins, but it already works — and there are people using it. Support for migrating profiles from Mastodon started to be implemented in version 5.3.0. In the future, who knows, I might migrate my personal profile over here…?
Tiny Emulators brings together a handful of emulators for classic operating systems and games, running directly in your browser. To play the games, use the arrow keys and the spacebar. Some OSs have special commands, which are listed here. I just spent a good few minutes playing the original Prince of Persia.
The first time I spoke with Filipe Gontijo was in 2015. He had just directed a virtual reality film, at a momento when big techs were promising that the future of entertainment lay in virtual reality packaged in a piece of cardboard with a phone stuffed inside.
Fast forward to 2025, and this time, still in the same email conversation, Filipe is innovating behind the scenes. His first feature film, Capitão Astúcia, was released directly on YouTube, for free, without ads. The business model? Anyone who enjoys the film can contribute with a Pix donation of any amount. And by “Pix” I mean the Brazilian instant money transfer systems.
Firefox 138, released this Tuesday (29th), introduces the long-awaited profile manager. The official documentation explains that “creating multiple profiles allows you to keep separate browsing data, themes or settings for different purposes, such as work and personal use.”
There are also new contrast options focused on accessibility, and in Windows 11, context menus now have that translucent (“acrylic”) look that is standard in the OS. Release notes and download.