onfocus

"We have plenty of shower space and time. The metered commodity here is water."

Fascinating slice of life from the land of polar bears.

"...some internet policy experts say the company’s new direction has exposed the drawbacks of public agencies becoming over-reliant on private platforms, and that issues like the D.C. bus system’s mysterious deactivation could pave the way for a more publicly managed alternative."

Fingers crossed, I guess. It seems like public agencies are more than happy to hand off the problem of managing servers and paying developers to corporations. Unfortunately our public infrastructure suffers in the process. If you can only see important public information though a barrage of advertising and misinformation are these agencies still serving the public?

"The post-Twitter platforms like Mastodon and Tumblr are E2E platforms, designed around the idea that if someone asks to hear what you have to say, they should hear it. Rather than developing algorithms to override your decisions, these platforms have extensive tooling to let you fine-tune what you see."

History is repeating in the social media world and Cory Doctorow provides the context. Chokepoint capitalism is a good term for something I didn't have a term for before.

I'm so tired of hearing about crypto scams. This video takes the time to explain why that world of NFTs and crypto is such a wretched hive of scum and villainy. This explainer is well done and worth the time and I hope it can help our collective consciousness move on.

See also: David Rosenthal’s EE380 Talk

"Simple, dependable architectures such as the one covidtests.gov seems to employ are proven at scale. This affords agencies the space to focus on improved user experience and service delivery, rather than consuming large resources keeping sites up and running. This takes operational experience and know-how, though; even with the use of managed services, composing a full, end-to-end digital service experience takes skill."

The free covid tests site is powered by standard AWS components. And it seemed to hold up well under pressure, nice work USPS.

"Detected in an extensively used utility called Log4j, the flaw lets internet-based attackers easily seize control of everything from industrial control systems to web servers and consumer electronics. Simply identifying which systems use the utility is a prodigious challenge; it is often hidden under layers of other software."

Good overview of the log4shell nightmare.

The $1 trillion infrastructure plan that President Joe Biden signed into law Monday has money for roads, bridges, ports, rail transit, safe water, the power grid, broadband internet and more.

[this is good]

"Both at home and abroad, labor is the ghost in the machine. The supply chain is really just people, running sewing machines or loading pallets or picking tomatoes or driving trucks."

This is a good explanation of the seemingly random supply chain disruptions that keep showing up.

"The company paid the hefty ransom in untraceable cryptocurrency within hours after the attack, underscoring the immense pressure faced by the Georgia-based operator to get gasoline and jet fuel flowing again to major cities along the Eastern Seaboard, those people said. A third person familiar with the situation said U.S. government officials are aware that Colonial made the payment."

Facepalm. This should really help stem the tide of infrastructure attacks. We get a gas panic and the criminals get #!?*coin. At least the perpetrators can't buy Teslas with it.

"Small and quick decisions done back then, that would later make a serious impact on and shape my life. curl has been one of my main hobbies ever since – and of course also a full-time job since a few years back now."

curl is one of those ubiquitous tools that all developers use. It's just part of the water we swim in and I forget that tools don't just spring from Earth fully-formed. This is a fun look at where curl came from and where it's going. These hobbyists, amirite?

Helpful single serving site about that ship that's stuck in the Suez Canal. I will never get tired of this story.

Update (3/29): No. Bon voyage Ever Given.

"A thin safety net, an expansive security state: This is the American way. At all levels of government, the country spends roughly double on police, prisons, and courts what it spends on food stamps, welfare, and income supplements."

I’ve seen slogans like ‘abolish police’ on protest signs and that didn’t make sense to me. Now I see that slogan more like a question: what type of society do we want to be?