John Lines @[email protected]
Retired Scientist/IT person. Likes: Freedom, Science, Diversity
Joined Dec 2019
John Lines
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John Lines
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The German data protection and freedom of information officer has their own Mastodon instance O_o
John Lines
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The Ambrige Garden Club DNS is registered
My sample Small Organisation Server, the Ambrige Garden Club, is now registered on the DNS. The process is described at https://wordpress.debian.social/jlines/2020/11/13/ambridge-garden-club-registering-the-domain/
Instant Messenger systems used by the military should be based on standards and federated... you can probably see where I am going, but if people with really high security requirements are using the same system, then they have an interest in making sure it is secure. The Internet is built on the back of the ARPANET, a product of the Defence Advanced Research Projects Agency.
Instant Messenger systems used by the banks should be based on standards and federated. People need to trust the system they use to IM their bank manager, but it should not be unique to the each bank, needing is own app. Some may argue that the financial sector has particular security needs, but so does the NHS, the military etc. If the XMPP standard can not meet these requirements then should be improved until it does, working with other interested parties.
Instant Messenger systems used by the NHS should be based on standards and federated. People need to trust the system they use to IM their doctor, but it should not be unique to the NHS, needing is own app. Some may argue that the NHS has particular security needs, but so do banks, the military etc. If the XMPP standard can not meet these requirements then should be improved until it does, working with other interested parties.
John Lines
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Worried about WhatsApp
I distrust things, particularly big things, which exist without any obvious means of financial support, so wrote 'Who pays for WhatsApp' at https://wordpress.debian.social/jlines/2020/11/10/who-pays-for-whatsapp/
Green Woodpecker in our garden, just turned away from admiring one of my wife's glass sculptures
John Lines
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Key systems are not a game.
For a computer game, or other software used for entertainment, and End User Licence which says 'Any attempt to disassemble .... is illegal' is fine, but if lives are going to depend on it then the people responsible for purchase should use this as a danger flag to walk away (unless it is accompanied by something like 'We (software vendor), will guarantee that this works exactly as specified and will be responsible for any consequential damage, injury or death)
John Lines
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Infrastructure should be open or interchangeable
Software, or hardware that we depend on should Open Source, i.e. we should be able to, if needed find out exactly how it works, or interchangeable, so that we (the big we - national institutions, governments, education, health, the military), can swap out a component with one from another, independent vendor and the overall system should still work.
Diversity, working together is stronger. Thinking of a rugby team, made entirely of players with the build of Forwards, for example, even if they were the best Forwards in the world, they would not be as good as a team of Forwards, Backs particularly the essential scrum-half
In this age of increasing unreason I wrote 'The reasoned feedback loop' - although I am hoping reason will prevail on both sides in the US Election.
https://blog.wp.paladyn.org/2020/11/07/the-reasoned-feedback-loop/
I really like what Mark Nottingham says about 'RFC8890: The Internet is for End Users' at https://www.mnot.net/blog/2020/08/28/for_the_users
I would like it even more if I could comment via ActivityPub rather than Twitter.
John Lines
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1984 should be a warning, not an instruction manual
Many people think of George Orwell's 1984 mainly in terms of 'Big Brother', but Newspeak is as important and here today. When most people's only word for a concept is a product then the dangerous bit of 1984 is here. Almost everyone uses - and thinks - Excel instead of spreadsheet, Zoom instead of Video Conference, PowerPoint for Presentation Software. People might use the word Hoover for Vacuum Cleaner, but here their concept is broader.
Like most viruses Covid19 mutates, and at present these muatations are not revevant to the vaccine development as they are not on the parts of the virus used to iddntify it. They are even helpful in allowing epedimiologists to track strains . Once a vaccine is devoloped will introduce selection for strains with more resistance, so I hope thix is being considered in the modelling. On the plus side, with many teams working on development there should be a choice of vaccines too. #coronavirus
John Lines
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Youtube-dl getting taken down is bad, and a zillion mirrors instantly springing up is good and necessary, but how about:
-> stop using youtube
-> stop using github
-> stop giving money to RIAA members
John Lines
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This is pretty cool. The University of Alberta has launched a free online course on Science Literacy.
Learn to tell the difference between real and pseudoscience. https://www.ualberta.ca/admissions-programs/online-courses/science-literacy.html
John Lines
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it takes effort to build community these days. re-decentralising is increasingly important.
this is the lame (though partly valid) excuse of people using f***book, whatsapp, other centralised "platforms".
I didn't miss the point so much as willfully assign it very little value :)
John Lines
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covid19 aerosol transmission
"A room, a bar and a classroom: how the coronavirus is spread through the air.
Here is an overview of the likelihood of infection in three everyday scenarios, based on the safety measures used and the length of exposure":
Diaspora vs ActivityPub is like Betamax vs VHS.
The Diaspora protocl does look technically superior in many respects, but availability of clients, servers, content and users is the key.
Retired Scientist/IT person. Likes: Freedom, Science, Diversity
Joined Dec 2019
