Darn, I have to go now. Apologies for the considerable latency there might be getting back to you on this, haha!
Thanks for the effortpost! Scuttlebutt in particular is similar in spirit, although I agree with the blog post that the implementation sounds funny. One conceptual difference, I think, is Scuttlebutt sounding fully decentralised, which necessarily introduces an O(n2) kind of overhead. Hubs could operate more like the content distribution networks that already exist in really locked-down countries, which are proven to work, just with the new protocol as a lower risk way of getting to the end user. Their own page is loading blank for me, unfortunately.
Public keys were identities, and were bound to devices; unfortunately people may have multiple devices, or change devices over time, so this was a hindrance.
I'm not sure why even they added that, haha. How hard is moving a private key? I'm also imagining it would be pretty routine to just discard a key-identity and make a new one, for anonymity's sake.
I mention all these because, in an extreme censorship environment, any local state (session history on paper, an app on a smartphone, an odd device) might not be good to have around. So usability may require reducing the total amount of state that a command carries. The current working directory at the time a command is run changes the meaning and outcome of the command; you may not remember that directory in a day or two. The vocabulary and syntax of command-line switches are easy to look up in online manuals - but are there offline manuals? I don’t know if this avenue of inquiry helps you, but it’s interesting to think about for a moment.
Some local state is probably necessary for usability. I mean, at the very least you need to have the software, which is probably illegal itself. The trick, as always with contraband, is either hiding it or not getting searched in the first place. In emergency situations having a way to securely delete everything quickly is the best that can be done, I think.
I don't expect the average user wouldn't be writing shell scripts themselves. There should be user-friendly frontends for common tasks like email messaging, but that doesn't help developers. A certain level of statelessness at the hub end would be good, just to avoid unwanted interactions like that. Maybe execution always starts with the same environment variables in the same directory, and your payload bootstraps other shell scripts or actual programs needed to add context.
I mean, I guess you could just programmatically insert a > after every command. That's actually a pretty good idea. It's kind of obvious now that you mention it, haha!
It would be better if the tools expected to be used this way, but as a quick kludge for a project about something else it's probably sufficient.
Probably Rust, although I'm not married to it. I'm just at the planning stage right now, though.
One open question is if you can use a fairly standard transceiver like a Bluetooth chip, or if you need an SDR. Obviously they weren't designed with this in mind, by maybe there's a profile that's close enough.
Packets should have a few kilobytes of payload so you can fit a postquantum cryptographic artifact. Thankfully, even with a BCH code, it seems doable to fit that much in a 1-second burst in a standard amateur radio voice channel, for testing. (In actual clandestine use I'd expect you'd want to go as wide as the hardware can support)
As envisioned there would be someone operating a hub, which might have actual network access through some means, and on which the containers run. They would send out runners to collect traffic from busy public spaces which might serve as hubs for burst activity, and dump outgoing packets, all without giving up any locations.
Accounts with their own small container would be opened by sending in a public key, and then further communication would be by standard symmetric algorithm - except in testing, because that's an amateur radio no-no, so just signed cleartext. ID would be derived from signature fingerprint, as I have been thinking about it. I have a lightweight hash scheme in mind that would allow awarding of credit for retransmitting packets in a way that couldn't be cheated.
You'd want to have some ability to detect and move around jamming, or just other people's bursts. That's more hardware research, basically.
Is there a chance Macron would lean towards the FN? My impression was that even the conservatives are slightly reluctant to be associated with racists like that.
You can do all those things while also not supporting FAANG
Depends. If you can find another employer that's more ethical (which is not guaranteed just because they're smaller) and pays as much with as flexible a work schedule, yeah, you should probably do that. Otherwise it might indeed be necessary.
I don't know, are we doing concequentialist ethics here, or deontological? I feel like we've reached the level of splitting hairs where we need to decide. For the purpose of actual advice people reading might follow, I'd say just try and be a good person, and don't let perfect be the enemy of better.
I mean, a lot of companies do stuff like that, and yet you still need money to live. Just working there doesn't necessarily make it your fault; by that logic it would be a sin to work checkout at Walmart, because you'll have the same blood on your hands as the Waltons.
I don't really like talking about capitalism as if it's a well defined concept, but, no ethical consumption under.
I’m not ignoring the other two things listed, I’m realistic.
I didn't mean you, FYI. I mean someone who does work for a FAANG and is looking for more justification to do nothing for the common good.
Theoretical computer scientists, historians of mathematics.
I'm not sure where I heard the term exactly, but I know I have multiple times.
West Ed is still dope. I don't know about submarines, but they have a 10/10 water park in there, and a bunch of other stuff.
Man, I wish that became more of a thing here. I'm good enough at being a weird shut-in without the architecture pushing me to do so.
Yeah, that's probably worth a look. Good suggestion. There's also delay-tolerant protocols for space and similar, but I don't know if any of them define an endpoint, as opposed to just a transport layer.
Why not? Unlike Schindler you don't have to worry about how many beatings are necessary to keep up appearances, and you might have a specific role that exposes you to very little evil at all. Meanwhile, you can donate some of that big wage to people like EFF, or volunteer using the flexible schedule.
I was kind of assuming that, since FAANG are American, but I'd guess they probably have foreign employees as well.
Canadians make pretty much the same as Europeans, I think. The Americans have a bunch of monopolies, and are characteristically weird and nationalist about who they share the spoils with. (I know, it's not all of you guys, but it's definitely some)
Government agencies, in my experience, tend to believe in security through obscurity; even the ones that don't worry about spies as much as NASA. That said, maybe it's worth a shot. I'll have to figure out who's the best person to bug.
Yeah, I do worry someone will read the "work for a FAANG" part, and ignore the other two things listed. It's absolutely not enough to go "welp, I'm just a little cog following orders".
Maybe a one-man boycott is the wrong way to put it. Multi-person boycotts are obviously built from individual people. I guess my real point is that there's not a one-size-fits-all solution; you actually have to look at the world, look at how you want it to be, and figure out how you can help make that happen from your place in it.
Agreed. Just working for somebody bad doesn't necessarily mean you've given up, though. I mean, they made a movie about Schindler, and we all know who he worked for.
Yeah, I want not real time. The goal of having containers in the first place is to enable as much as possible without needing to put a human in the loop, since you have no idea how long each packet will spend in transit.
If I could emulate Curiosity's onboard computer that would be a decent starting point.
There is no other way, that's the point. Used the right way Tor hides you.
Freedom is a "double-edged sword", just like control. If you want political dissidents to be able to hide, so will pedophiles.
Is there a precedent for a really delay-tolerant command line interface? (A bit off-topic)
I've been playing with an idea that would involve running a machine over a delay-tolerant mesh network. The thing is, each packet is precious and needs to be pretty much self contained in that situation, while modern systems assume SSH-like continuous interaction with the user.
Has anyone heard of anything pre-existing that would work here? I figured if anyone would know about situations where each character is expensive, it would be you folks.
What's the chance the "traitor MPs" the news is going on about are literally just Han Dong?
We have no idea how many there are, and we already know about one, right? It seems like the simplest possibility.
Nature Podcast: Living on Mars would probably suck — here's why
Kelly and Zach Weinersmith talk to Nature about the hurdles facing humans living in outer space.
A pedestrian elevator that goes up and over something.
(I hope it's okay if I just keep posting stuff here)
This version of the multidirectional elevator is neat because it's not an exotic modern solution or just a concept, but an actual practical machine that's widely used. It's not quite fresh content but it holds up.
I assume this sort of thing also counts?
The comments say it can run a lot faster, as you'd expect for the added complexity, but they don't usually use the full speed for liability reasons. I wonder if a version could be made that's fully enclosed.
What's the issue, specifically, with Lemmit federation?
Example: On here vs. on Lemmit itself.
I don't know if this is our end or theirs, but nobody seems to have commented about it on their meta community, which makes me think it's not broken for users on bigger instances.
Prolog-based Japanese education hardware sported an early touch-panel, speech synthesizer.
What are your opinions of Guix?
Reposting because it looks like federation failed.
> I was just reading about it, it sounds like a pretty cool OS and package manager. Has anyone actually used it?
Recent developments in systems chemistry have shown how the molecular building blocks of life could have arisen from plausible prebiotic feedstocks. This Perspective argues that we remain a long way from a full picture and speculates on what pieces of the puzzle are still missing.
Great info if you're interested in the state of the art on how abiogenesis might work.
I also didn't realise LUCA was so sophisticated already until I read this. The story it tells is that very basic life was already widespread in the Hadean era, and when the late heavy bombardment hit and the Earth was resurfaced, only life around a hydrothermal vent (or vents) survived, with one long-term survivor going on to become the sole ancestor of modern life.
(If you don't have institutional credentials, there is a pirate website by the name of "sci-hub", with the dash. No endorsement but it's not like you were ever going to pay 40 bucks to read this)
Was I temp banned for anti-Zionism?
I can't see what other issues there could possibly be with this. It wasn't even spicy as anti-Zionism goes, and all the factual content was accurate.
I can see how the comment from months ago could be seen as insensitive, although my intention was more to point out the inherent racism in the opposite position. That's not the one that did it, though.
A worried Washington prods Israel to define its military objectives - CBC
An interesting look at how America thinks about the conflict when cameras aren't pointing at them. TL;DR they see themselves 20 years ago, and are trying to figure out how to convey all the lessons that experience taught them, including "branches" and "sequels", which is jargon I haven't heard mentioned before. Israel is not terribly receptive.
Aaand of course, Tom Cotton is at the end basically describing a genocide, which he would support.
New TB window size update
It opens maximized by default now, and I can't figure out how to turn that off. Does anybody know? I don't need the window to be nearly that big (this is not a small display) and I've become used to looking at things next to it.
How would I make my own bubble memory?
It's a good candidate since it sounds like there's no precision mechanical components like there would be in a hard drive. Does anyone have ideas for how I'd go about this? Is there a barrier I'm not considering?
I know how to make basic semiconductors already, so that's not an issue.
Edit: I've got an answer written down in the comments now. TL;DR you'd still need lithography to do it the OG way, because of the patterned magnetic material that directed bubbles around the medium, but material requirements are actually pretty flexible.
A test of artificial intelligence - Nature
As debate rages over the abilities of modern AI systems, scientists are still struggling to effectively assess machine intelligence.
I feel like this explains a lot more of how I think about the the geography of the world today than any other map I've seen recently. This is why Australia seems strange and distant while China is familiar, despite the much higher language and culture affinity I have with post-colonial Australia.
[META] What are the demographics of this community?
Am I the only Zoomer? I see a lot of "I remember"-type responses, so I have to wonder.
RAND on the benefits and limitations of the F-16 for Ukraine
After months of publicly lobbying to acquire U.S.-made F-16 fighter jets, it appears that Ukraine may receive them later this year. However, there remains a long road ahead before the F-16s would see service in Ukraine—and it is an open question how much they would affect the outcome of the war.
A few months old now, but it was news to me. Basically, the F-16 will allow Ukraine to keep doing the same thing they are now, but are just as limited for the purpose of providing support on the front lines.
If Ukraine doesn't manage to breach Russian fortifications in this offensive, the West will have to find a different way of giving them an edge, if we want to avoid a war of pure attrition.