Web-based Document Editor?
Hi all,
What fast but functional document editor do you recommend? I would like to add custom fonts and do some page layout work, but otherwise nothing too fancy.
Suggestions?
TIL the NSA created SELinux and various other FOSS projects
Home | Open Source @ NSA
THE FOLLOWING OPEN SOURCE SOFTWARE was developed within the National Security Agency and is now available to the public.code.nsa.gov
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- What's the issue with their official website?
- A Github link is easier to impersonate than an official .gov address.
Thank goodness for selinux. Without it Linux would not be a secure OS.
And no AppArmor does not do the same thing. You need the mandatory part for mandatory access controls to work.
Solaris was beautiful. But it could have been more secure if it had Mandatory Access Controls. One compromised app running as root, or one privilege elevation exploit and without mandatory access controls you’re done.
Even with user contained exploits without MAC you expose way too much.
Edit: Turns out Solaris had a MAC enabled variant called Trusted Solaris! I could have seen myself using this if Sun was still around and OpenSolaris had panned out.
en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Truste…
In conclusion Solaris was not junk.
Solaris was great until they insisted on keeping their crappy CPU for way too long before adding x86 support and lost their market share and their company.
It was a terrible gamble and they lost hard to Linux as a result.
I like the fact that it is a solid mandatory access control system. With SELinux you are substantially more safe than without.
For example. Let’s say you are running a compromised version of OpenSSH. Threw a XZ style back door a hacker gets in as OpenSSH (which runs as root).
Without SELinux the system is fully owned. With SELinux the attacker can only access what OpenSSH needs to access even if they have root. They can’t just chmod files and folders wherever. That means your photos and application data are still secure. With the pre written SELinux policies this applies not just for OpenSSH but for every piece of software installed on your system. Everything is limited to the exact folders, ports, and system capabilities that it needs and no more. Even stuff like seperate websites being served under Nginx. You can have Nginx-subgroup-1 and Nginx-subgroup-2 where the applications can’t see each other even though they are being run as the Nginx user.
I don’t trust any Linux distro without this security layer.
It’s a little difficult to learn and master, but it’s totally worth it if you care about security.
Redhat put out a comic about it a few years ago explaining the basics. people.redhat.com/duffy/selinu…
If you are building a static system, SELinux is amazing. You need a few lines of policy per application to label things appropriately, then you can see what accesses programs made and decide if you want to allow them or not.
Taking a full Linux system and adding a locked down SELinux policy can be done in less than a week. If you are starting with an SELinux enabled system and just want to lock down your application, it can be done in less than a day.
Once you know what you are doing, there is also a pretty powerful policy analysis tool that lets you see what a given domain can do; including transitive things like "domain sandbox_t can launch a program in Domain vim_t, which can write a file in Domain sshd_config_t, which can be read by domain sshd_t" which may indicate that your sandbox has a hole allowing it to compromise your sshd configuration. Although, to be fair, doing this level of analysis is not simple, even with the tooling. And you very quickly notice issues that are inherent in how Linux works.
The problem with SELinux comes when you try applying it to general purpose systems, because you do not know ahead of time what the user will want to do. To be effective, policy needs to be written for the specific system it will be running on.
An example I like to use is Android. Android makes great use of SELinux, and is a general purpose system. But the SELinux policy itself does not protect the general purpose Android system. It protects the special purpose system that is the Android runtime. All apps run with the same policy that says things like "cannot access the filesystem at all, unless given access by the Android runtime", then the actual security policy users see is all implemented in use space by Android. SElinux is just a means of preventing apps from bypassing the Android permission system.
Also, AppArmor might not exist without SELinux.
When the NSA first implemented SELinux, they did so directly, but were not able to get that merged into mainline because there was concern that SELinux was not the correct solution.
What they ended up doing was creating the Linux Security Modules (LSM) framework, which is just a bunch of hooks in the kernel that a module can implement. SELinux was then rewritten as LSM module. This allowed other solutions like AppArmor to be implemented without any invasive work; they could just plug into the same system SELinux used.
Some time later, the ability to run multiple LSMs at once was added.
Incidentally, Linux capabilities are also implemented as an LSM.
Trump says some white South Africans are oppressed and could be resettled in the US. They say no thanks
Summary
Trump proposed offering refugee status and U.S. resettlement for white South Africans amid alleged oppression and rights abuses, claiming protection for Afrikaners.
Leading Afrikaner organizations, including Solidarity and AfriForum, rejected Trump’s offer, stating their commitment to remain in South Africa and build a future locally.
The U.S. executive order cut aid to South Africa and accused its government of enabling attacks and enforcing a law seizing white-owned farmland.
South Africa’s officials dismissed Trump’s claims as misinformation, noting that Afrikaners remain economically privileged and integral to the nation’s recovery from apartheid.
Trump says some white South Africans are oppressed and could be resettled in the US. They say no thanks
Groups representing some of South Africa’s white minority have responded to a plan by U.S. President Donald Trump to offer them refugee status and resettlement in the United States by saying: thanks, but no thanks.GERALD IMRAY (AP News)
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Hate to tell you this, but state health services in SA can be pretty shocking. You’re better off with the hideously expensive private health insurance companies over there…
Nothing like the cost of healthcare in America, but not exactly socialized medicine like in Europe either :(
Fuck Trump and musk, but isn't there actually a class of marginalized, white South Africans? I remember watching a (legit) documentary on that. They live in poverty and are frowned upon by a lot of rich white South Africans for their poverty and hated by a lot of black South Africans for their descent, if I remember correctly.
Does anyone have the complete picture and how it relates to this situation now? Are those the same two groups?
Let me guess. It works the other way around, too?
Suddenly the black population of the United States are oppressed and get deported to South Africa.
Linux Mint Audio Question
Is it easy to assign apps to audio outputs on Linux Mint? Currently on Windows 11 I can assign an app to an audio output and it saves it permanently until I change it in Windows audio settings. I do this to have discord over my Bluetooth earbuds and media audio via my TV.
Is it that simple in Linux Mint? Does it save the settings persistently through boot?
Pixelfed's first plateau in progress
pixelfed.fediverse.observer/da…
Looks like Pixelfed's growth spurt is slowing down. Absent any new external stimuli I'm guessing it'll stabilize around 200K to 300K monthly active users -- over a hundredfold order of magnitude from what it was just a month ago.
Fediverse Observer checks all servers in the fediverse and gives you an easy way to find a home.
Pixelfed Servers Status. Find a Pixelfed server to sign up for, find one close to you!pixelfed.fediverse.observer
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I think you're on to something.
I also think there's a difference in where the network effect kicks in for different types of social media. IMHO, Lemmy has just enough activity to not feel empty, and even then I wish there was more comments to interact with and more niche communities. With Pixelfed, I feel like as long as there's enough interesting posts it makes sense for people to visit regularly.
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Obviously I’ll go once every few weeks to check out cool photography but I’m really not an active user there.
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I've been trying to set it up for 2 weeks now, the docker containers. There are so many backwards decisions, it's pretty clear he doesn't understand docker unfortunately. The entire app could be a snap to set up, but it's such a convoluted setup that it scares a lot of people away. (It pretty much is scripted assuming you will run it on a VM, and a high cost one at that).
The fact that it's built on PHP and Laravel in 2025 says a lot, and the fact that he started Loops this year on the same architecture also says a lot. It just doesn't scale, it's locked to a single host, and he's finding that as the servers are tipping over.
Haven’t tried self hosting Pixelfed. Just mostly been trying it out on the main instance. I’m really shocked that it’s a mess to deploy with docker if it’s on PHP/Laravel.
I hate PHP these days for dev purposes but I think laravel ought to be able to scale enough to run most Pixelfed instances. Facebook ran PHP when it was much larger than Pixelfed.
user retention
yeah, hard to tell.... Lemmy peaked a little under 70k MAUs and is around 45k now... if pixelfed peaks at 300k it's reasonable to think it levels at 200k (i.e. a hundredfold increase from a month ago).
ofc every situation is different... e.g. pixelfed has tighter Mastodon integration (pro) but may depend more on a network effect (con). also iirc the lemmy MAU count methodology shifted at some point, from post/comment to post/comment/upvote/downvote which is a confound for the lemmy dropoff count...
I'm out of the loop, what happened in January to cause that sudden growth?
I have an account but I'm not active. Just not much of a social media guy in general.
Meta boycott: Facebook, Instagram users delete accounts over policy changes
After Meta and CEO Mark Zuckerberg announced changes that shifted the company and its policies to the right, some users are fleeing the company’s platforms.Kat Tenbarge (NBC News)
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Meta ended their fact checking program and decided that hate speech against queer folks is "freedom of speech"
Then people left in droves
That’s exactly me as well. Tried it, looked at random people’s cats and dogs. Not for me.
I think that's kind of the challange we've got with regards to making social media from a nerds perspective. We're a bunch of nerds that don't understand the appeal of the things we want to make alternatives to, and wouldn't be interested in using them even if they weren't run by horrible evil tech corporations.
It has gotten really, really good for photography. There's a bunch of incredible photographers posting their stuff on the Fediverse these days, and they enjoy the appeal of it that it's closer to what Instagram was before it became an influencer hub.
As for random cats and dogs, I guess some people enjoy that as well.
Pixelfed is definitely a good example of "its what you make it".
Try searching for and following some hashtags that you're interested in. I have an awesome home feed made up of art, design and photography hashtags and artists.
This is usually where these apps stop for me.
I genuinely don't care about what other people have to share.
the more popular places on the Fediverse seem to be stagnating right now
Dunno, from Fediverse Observer, it looks like lemmy and mastodon are growing slowly over the last couple weeks. (the mastodon stats look a little weird tho -- there's a plummet on Jan 30th that looks like a data collection artifact.)
Fediverse Observer checks all servers in the fediverse and gives you an easy way to find a home.
Lemmy Servers Status. Find a Lemmy server to sign up for, find one close to you!lemmy.fediverse.observer
Lemmy and mastodon have been very usable for me.
Peertube and friendica on the other hand...
Frankly, whatever secret sauce it is that makes social media popular is also what drives them to be such shit and be so shit for society. I like Lemmy way more than I like Reddit, and even though I have to go back to Reddit from time to time to fill the needs of my niche interests (which can get no traction where there are not mobs of participants in the greater whole) I never ever look at my interactions there and go "I wish Lemmy was more like this."
It's a conundrum.
Preach brother. The reason I love this space is because it is so small. So much better visibility, so much less one-liners and rwddit garbage to sift through to find a real person. (fe I also choose this guys dead wife! Cue laugh track)
I've seen people in multiple conversations under the same post. It feels more alive and personal than seeing Click to show 3456 more comments
Yeah, all apps advertise "no algorithms" - well those algorithms are what is pulling users back and back again and the more you get people to open your app - the more likely it is that they'll contribute something.
I have to remind myself to open Pixelfed. Which is how I want it to be and how it should be. But I also understand that none of my friends will go there and look at nothing and then check in again a day later.
As per my other comment - the algorithm is only part of it.
A big aspect however is the slickness and ease-of-onboarding for mega-Corp apps. It’s a thing that would relatively easy to begin work on.
I’ve seen first hand the amount of time and money even growth-stage startups spend on onboarding and have lots of first-hand reports from peers at the big girls - it’s a critical part of success. Make it easy to get started and easy to stay using.
It’s missing from most fediverse experiences. Pixelfed being a serious contender for an on-boarding rethink.
“time-to-value” - we want that as low as possible.
I couldn't find anything :( oddly, fediverse.observer actually was logging data before that time but it's only accessible to me via wayback: web.archive.org/web/2024101019…
@diasporg@mas.to any reason fediverse.observer is limited to only a few months? (no clue if this cross-platform ping will work but giving it a shot)
Fediverse Observer checks all servers in the fediverse and gives you an easy way to find a home using a map or list.
Pixelfed Servers Status. Find a Pixelfed server to sign up for, find one close to you!web.archive.org
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Was already weird as a redditor previously.
lmao, so true lol. It especially didn't help when I used to show my friends the most traumatizing posts of /r/shitposting. Now they don't trust Lemmy.
That's how Reddit was in the beginning.
Back then, you used to show someone "the front page of the internet" and it would literally be jailbait and tech news.
Other events will cause additional spikes for Pixelfed, Mastodon and others. Unless the US Oligarchs are going to stop supporting Trump's bat shit crazy policies they will keep pushing group after group off of their platforms.
It will be easier for the next wave to join as their is already content and already people they know and many issues addressed.
github.com/pixelfed/pixelfed/i…
github.com/pixelfed/pixelfed/i…
here's your issue trackers.
I must say though, this seems like a strange feature to draw the line on, is it really that important to you what image format is used?
JPEG XL support · Issue #3102 · pixelfed/pixelfed
Even though it is not yet widely supported, JPEG XL appears to be game-changing and it offers unprecedented quality and compression. If Pixelfed implemented it using the already available PHP libra...GitHub
Yes. JPEG is limited to 8-bit (which works well with rec.709/sRGB) and modern displays and cameras capture much more than that (typically 14).
sRGB has a very limited color gamut, and using a wider/HDR color profile (eg rec.2020) with only 8-bit per subpixel would result in colour banding.
I don't want to limit my photo development with poor color definition.
Thanks for the links (I'm already subscribed).
Like a lot of fediverse experiences - the initial need to pick a server is deeply problematic for new users.
Why pick one server over the other? How do get I, (pretending) as someone with no idea about the fediverse, get informed about this choice.
If I take a gamble, then I can’t log in using my mastodon account. Then the login fails with others.
I was happy to persevere, my partner not so much.
The thing is that picking a sever is kind of neat but it’s so tech-centric at the moment when it should be community-centric. A quick blurb about the community and their vibe/ideology would go a long way. Maybe a quick preview of some random content? Instead we’re playing a guessing game with a url.
But hey, it’s early days and these things will improve because we can all pitch in to help be the change.
Honestly just pick one and use it for a bit. Pick the most popular and learn more about the platform from there. That's exactly what I did with Lemmy.
I joined lemmy.world first then I liked sh.itjust.works and now I'm on SDF. It took a little bit longer to find the instance I really liked but never stopped me from using Lemmy. Just pick one and use it
I think my point was missed. I was using “I” but my writing was a user story.
I’m talking about why adoption for fediverse platforms falters - especially for those coming from very slick, big money, apps with a whole team or teams focused on on-boarding.
IE. It’s not a user-centric experience (yet) - but we also don’t need teams focused on onboarding. Just small tweaks.
The defense of "it's so easy just pick a server" is getting exhausting.
The average person wants something that works.
Okay, are you ready for the pain?
First, we go to pixelfed.org, and click on "Servers." We are treated to a page that says "Find the perfect community server. Signing up on an existing server is the easiest way to get started, let us help you find the ideal server to join!" This alludes to creating your own pixelfed server, which the vast majority of users are not going to want to do. We're talking about a public who has been accustomed to downloading an app, opening an account on the app, and having access to all the content in that app. The idea of hosting their own server at this point shouldn't really be an idea we're bringing up here.
We tehn get filters for "sign-up process", because you have to apply for and be approved to some servers, filter by country, and filter by language. I mean, okay. Then we get Server Catagories: All (87) Art (1) General (8) Regional (13) Adult (4) and Uncategorized, (61). I suppose this is more honest than defaulting everyone to "General" but it's also lazier than a dead house cat. When the vast majority of them are categorized as "Uncategorized" it gives me the feeling that the people running this shitmound don't care about it, so I absolutely shouldn't.
Then we get a section called Network Health, which has data that is not pertinent to choosing a server, including total photos shared, total users, active servers, and average users per server. Neat stats I guess, not relevant to choosing a server to sign up on.
The choices of server are a grid of choices that look like this:
The name/URL of the instance is at the top, with an $8 checkmark next to it which is a different glyph from the check marks in the left column talking about all the evil stuff they don't do, so I think we're just used to seeing check marks after names on social media, so we put them there. I can't find one that doesn't have that check mark so it's completely meaningless.
Then we get a cover photo, which 9 times out of 10 is a variant on the Pixelfed logo so here's yet another opportunity to distinguish severs squandered.
Just below that is the name/URL of the server again in a different color, just in case you didn't read it the first time. This is just 100% wasted space.
Below this is the first 80 characters of a description that was almost certainly written to go somewhere else and has been echoed here. Several of them read "Pixelfed is an image sharing platform, an ethical alternative to centr..." Which must be some kind of default text. Many also use an identical cover image to Pixelfed.social, the instance run by the creators, so I'm assuming this is also a placeholder default. The dead cat is at it again. Those that don't use the default boilerplate often have a description that starts with their instance name, for example "Pixelfed.art is a community driven platfrorm designed to showcase and c..." So including the cover image, pixelfed.art's entry contains the string "pixelfed.art" a total of four times, and nearly no other information is conveyed.
Below this is a button that either says "Create Account" in white on bright lilac, or "Apply to Join" in subdued purple on dark purple, which makes the option look greyed out. People will already be unlikely to click there, and the change in shade further discourages people from trying to sign up. I suppose telling you this here in the main directory will prevent "Oh dammit you have to apply to join" but there's just something wrong with making it look greyed out or unselectable.
There's another button that says "More Details," which leads to another very sparse page which shows a large version of the useless and uninformative cover image, information you probably don't care about like the server location and establishment date, and a link that frustratingly says "More Details." We just clicked on that, why do you want me to click it again? When you click it, you don't get more details about the server, it scrolls down to a list of general features of the Pixelfed platform. Marketing cockshit that people's eyes just glance off of because this is where marketing departments put all the lies.
Oh, did I mention when you click on the uppermost of the many copies of the server name, the top one in white, it takes you to the same place that the More Details button does?
This page promises to help you find the perfect server, and then offers virtually no information that would help a newcomer choose gram.social over pixey.org.
I would suggest removing a lot of the redundant details such as the More Details button and the second copy of the instance's name below the cover image. That would free up room for a couple more lines of description for each here on the index page.
Eliminate the Uncategorized category, maybe add a few more like "Arts, Crafts and Photography" "Lifestyles and Activities" "Fashion and beauty" "Casual, Food and Pets". "I want to upload pictures of my cat, which category do I choose?" "I want to promote my paintings. Which category?" "I want to show off my travel pictures."
Add a text search bar so that people could search by keyword.
As this is a list that instance admins have to apply to be on, I would suggest some requirements and/or heavy suggestions for that process:
- Do not allow default boilerplate cover images or descriptions. Make them post something. You're an image hosting platform, you should be able to find an image the defines your community. !woodworking@lemmy.ca runs contests with their members to pick theirs, I won it once. Do that.
- Strongly suggest against using a variant of the Pixelfed logo unless that variant describes what your instance is about. Like if you have a sports-oriented instance, the Pixelfed speech bubble P logo appearing inside a sports ball is more acceptable than a P with "pixelfed.sports" next to it. Better yet, an action shot of a sportsball player making an exciting sportsball play with maybe a logo in the corner.
- Require admins to choose a category, to eliminate "Uncategorized."
- For descriptions, provide a style guide that warns against things like mentioning the name of the instance again in the description, and steer away from all the bleeding heart hyphenated marketing wank.
BAD: Example.lol is a community-driven, open-source, cage-free, low-gluten, carbon-offset, high-estrogen, no-pressure, fuel-injected, tax-free, non-mandatory place to share photos.
GOOD: Share photos of your arts and crafts projects with our avid community of painters, woodworkers, blacksmiths, seamstresses and more!
The aim here is to present INFORMATION that can help someone new understand why they should - or should not - sign up for your instance. We're almost perfectly failing to achieve that.
(This is a serious question)
Are Pixelfed communities generally accepting of cannabis related content, or is that seen as a no go on most servers/connections made with an account?
I recently started using Instagram again here and there because of cannabis related communities and such, which they seem rather relaxed with at the moment (just to connect with folks), and a transition could start for me granted there is an opportunity for sensible cannabis communities to exist - I'm a medical user and it has to be a part of my life due to the required usage for my conditions, I hope this is understandable.
Regardless of if the answer to my query isn't favourable to me, I hope this platform expands and continues to gather a larger userbase.
To me it is MAU that is more interesting. And this doesn't stabilise if people stop using it.
On the other hand, the Kickstarter campaign should be an interesting push. It should improve retention.
Israel’s channel 12 airs video of Israeli officer issuing order to withdraw from Netzarim
Channel 12 Israel has aired a video showing an Israeli military officer issuing instructions to his soldiers to withdraw from the Netzarim Corridor.
“We are preparing for the final exit from the Netzarim. The order of exit is the same as the entry,” the Israeli army officer says.
“We will return here, do not worry. Hamas is preparing, but we are also preparing. We will return and we will recover all the kidnapped. God willing, the Trump plan will go into effect and we will return to settlement here and build all the settlements. Please confirm receipt.”
LIVE: Israel releases 183 Palestinians after 3 captives freed in Gaza
A total of 183 Palestinians released after 3 Israelis – Ohad Ben Ami, Eli Sharabi and Or Levy – were freed in GazaUsaid Siddiqui (Al Jazeera)
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DeviantArt Premium Galleries
Ahoy my fellow pirates.
Is there any site like Kemono for DeviantArt Premium Galleries? I found this one creator on the platform but all his good stuff is behind a 10$ (!) paywall for every "Gallery" of his. Bad is that they aren't only images but videos that I need, so there is that. Does anyone here know of some site of this kind?
P.S. The author also doesn't have a patreon or anything like that. He only posts to DA.
Edit: He also locks 95% of his stuff behind a 20$ (!) subscription on top of these galleries. You can't even access the old premium galleries if you buy the sub.
Pirating content from creators especially indies is typically discouraged.
Pirating from corporations however🤘🤙
For some people piracy is also about archival and preservation.
yea, preserving deviantart is not a focus like anywhere as far as I know, and hopefully the artist themselves do, but it's vague. It does match with how historically art has usually been a big job to try and preserve once the artist is dead.
For preserving music (since you mention bandcamp) I recommend supporting your local library; an here's a list of some US music libraries. american-music.org/page/Librar…
Most nations do have some type of music archive as well, and it's not like software which faces legal issues for historical preservation.
I gave an example, I don't necessarily think that's the case here. Just not a fan of portraying piracy as a general "bad thing" that is only reserved for corporations.
I'm not from the USA, and I do support my local library :)
But there's barely any music there and even then it's mostly local.
RED and OPS has things that are currently impossible to find anywhere else.
Piracy, is a reaction to corpo greed. It challenges the notion that essential tools, education, and entertainment should be locked behind paywalls many can't afford. It pushes back against monopolies that exploit consumers with inflated prices, restrictive DRM, and predatory subscription models. When corporations prioritize profits over people, piracy becomes a form of resistance--a way to reclaim access to what should be available to all regardless of economic background or means.
Piracy isn't about harming small indie creators or stealing their work. To call it virtue signaling is to completely miss the point, lil bro. If that's the way you think you're not a Pirate you're just a thief.
EDIT: The reading comprehension here seems incredibly low. Corporations aren't people--piracy isn't theft because you can't steal IP from corporations. My post doesn't remotely suggest that Piracy is theft from corporations. Piracy from indie creators, however, is theft because it harms a person, not a corporation.
It's not a difficult concept.
Just like everything else in life, it's not a binary situation. You can't say "either it is, or isn't stealing! Circumstance doesn't matter!" because circumstance always matter.
If you come at me with the intent to kill me, and I kill you in self defense, that's not murder. It would be wholly ignorant to say "well you tried to kill the guy who was trying to kill you, so it's murder! Circumstance doesn't matter!" That would be the answer of a child.
The argument of Piracy has never been one of "oh, well, it's not theft." Of course its theft. You'd have to be in deep denial to make that argument. It's not your IP. The argument of Piracy is that taking shit from corpos doesn't fucking matter--no one is getting hurt. As soon as you stop taking from corpos and taking from the little guy, like indie artists, you're just a fuckin' thief. And that's not moral.
You arent stealing but you are also not paying yet still consume it.
How would you feel if I'd copy a cake recipe you inherited from your grandmother and sell the cake without giving you any royalties.
I just copied the recipe that was standing on the table.
You havent lost anything but could still gain.
We support small/indie creators because they actually need it. Big corpos will be just fine with the money the normies or those that can't be bothered pay.
Piracy isn't theft though.
That's exactly what corporations want people to think about piracy.
In addition to what you wrote, piracy is also a form of dissent against copyright laws.
Piracy isn’t theft though.
Why would you reply without reading my entire post? Like why? What do you get out of it?
I read your post and understood it.
Why would you reply without trying to understand what I wrote?
Piracy/copying isn't theft.
Not all countries see copying as theft.
And neither does the platform we're currently using (Lemmy).
Piracy isn't about harming small indie creators or stealing their work. To call it virtue signaling is to completely miss the point, lil bro
Yea you have to be 12. Like the others said, what exactly am I stealing? Anyways it's clear you are a newgen and are quite reactionary. Keep reacting.
A few years back there was some kind of url trick where you could directly download every file with some string manipulation... But that doesn't work anymore and there isn't any new hack/workaround to bypass paywalled files.
My guess would be that there isn't any kind of "hack" floating arround anymore, cause it involves the site's security measure and would leave a very bad image of DeviantArt if the creators only way to market their art has some loophole to get freestuff.
Your best chance is either someone who paid/share the stuff you're a looking for or someone who has the technical skills to do what you're looking for without leaving a trace.
Is making user interaction between instances easier even possible in current state of fediverse and the protocol?
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Lemmy Federate
Lemmy Federate is a tool to federate new communities in the Lemmyverse.lemmy-federate.com
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The current solution is for bots on participating instances to automatically perform the search + subscribe song-and-dance routine. This is pretty surprising to some people[1], and it requires someone to set it up in addition to the instance itself, but it does work.
[1]: I tried to translate an explanation into Japanese for some folks experimenting with Mastodon/Lemmy interaction yesterday -- they thought Lemmy had a ton of spam accounts following groups instantly...
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Copying URL into search bar? That is really repelling.
I wonder if Lemmy should have the search bar always visible, like Mastodon does
or at least if your window is wide enough to fit it, otherwise it can collapse to the icon, I've got plenty of room up here
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Thing is, search bars are for typing in keywords, not urls.
Certain other federated reddit clones just have a 'add remote community' button on the communities list.
The first time I learned you could fetch a remote post by searching for its URL, my mind was blown.
I'm still pretty sure the majority of people here aren't aware of this.
Bug: Lemmy instances on 0.19.4 are no longer included · Issue #184 · tgxn/lemmy-explorer
Possible cause: From what I can understand of this crawler's code, it looks for "http://nodeinfo.diaspora.software/ns/schema/2.0" in the response to /.well-known/nodeinfo Lemmy 0.19.4 included a ch...GitHub
Its absolutely an issue that can be solved. The issue is that activpub is push based so their is no sing e source of truth. U could do a atproto style collector service that provides a search interface. U could also probably get a good but imperfect search by using the concept of n degrees of separation. Ie u search ur instance then search other instances who then search other instances.
Also some of the larger instances avoid the search issue by having a bot from their own instance subscribe to communities on other instances so that the content federates.
Use web-based protocol handlers to make following across instances easier · Issue #19679 · mastodon/mastodon
Pitch Use web-based protocol handlers to automatically direct follow requests to the users instance. When the User logs in to their instance for the first time, they are given an opportunity to reg...GitHub
Go buy a linux book at a charity shop or a library sale!
Merz’s gamble: Germany’s centre-right leader splits voters by flirting with hardline AfD
Summary
Friedrich Merz, the leader of Germany’s center-right CDU/CSU alliance, is attempting to regain control of the migration debate by courting support from the far-right Alternative für Deutschland (AfD) party.
This gambit has backfired, failing to attract AfD voters and instead sowing doubt among mainstream voters about Merz’s ability to govern effectively.
Many Germans fear that this political polarization could lead to a repeat of the Weimar era, where extremist parties gained power.
Merz’s gamble: Germany’s centre-right leader splits voters by flirting with hardline AfD
Would be chancellor Friederich Merz breaks post-war convention of no political deals with far rightDeborah Cole (The Guardian)
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It is almost like a bunch of wealthy people are orchestrating all this around the world. It is like pre-WWII all over again. I suppose this is the ultimate reason wealth inequality is so bad for society. For some reason when people are worth so much more than others monetarily it goes to their head.
I hope the German people can get through this.
Mexico authorities order factory cleanup after Guardian toxic waste investigation
Summary
Mexican environmental regulators found 30,000 tons of improperly stored hazardous material at the Zinc Nacional plant, which recycles toxic waste from the U.S.
The investigation followed a report by The Guardian and Quinto Elemento Lab, revealing potential contamination. Authorities ordered the material moved within 15 days and shut down unauthorized equipment.
Tests found high lead, cadmium, and arsenic levels near the plant. Officials are assessing community risks, while Zinc Nacional claims compliance.
Experts stress independent testing to evaluate health threats from the toxic waste.
Mexico authorities order factory cleanup after Guardian toxic waste investigation
Inquiry uncovered health problems in neighborhood near Monterrey-area plant that processes US hazardous wasteVerónica García de León (The Guardian)
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Oofnik likes this.
The penalty for this always needs to outweigh whatever additional profit was made for cutting corners.
It won't, but it should.
What is everyone using as a HTPC?
Exclusive: Zelenskiy says 'Let's do a deal', offering Trump mineral partnership, seeking security
- In interview, Ukraine's Zelenskiy offers mineral partnership to US
Zelenskiy emphasizes need for security guarantees in any deal
Ukrainian president keen to speak to Trump before Putin does Ukraine proposes using its gas storage for U.S. LNG supplies
KYIV, Feb 7 (Reuters) - Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskiy pored over a once-classified map of vast deposits of rare earths and other critical minerals during an interview with Reuters on Friday, part of a push to appeal to Donald Trump's penchant for a deal.
The U.S. president, whose administration is pressing for a rapid end to Ukraine's war with Russia, said on Monday he wanted Ukraine to supply the U.S. with rare earths and other minerals in return for financially supporting its war effort.
"If we are talking about a deal, then let's do a deal, we are only for it," Zelenskiy said, emphasising Ukraine's need for security guarantees from its allies as part of any settlement.----
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in theory, profits from the minerals could get turned right around into aid for ukraine. it could work i suppose, but the startup and turnaround are too long.
how it would play out, though, profits from the minerals end up in lord diaper's and his comrades' pockets, while ukraine gets nothing and loses everything.
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Maeve likes this.
Neat. Dude hiding in caves and basements to stay alive has somehow been extorting and dealing.
Yeah, that seems to track. Or, maybe not at all.
Receipts or GTFO.
But you've done all the vetting of quality of sources with your galaxy brain. Show us your citations so we can bask in the authoritative and judicious glory!
But you wont because your source is newsmax or faux news.
Dude hiding in caves and basements to stay alive has somehow been extorting and dealing.
Wait, I thought he asked for ammunition and was ready to fight?
This sounds like Zelenskiy's reply is exactly what Trump strokes his cock to. And I think it's a great move. I think there is a chance the Putin narrative will change this Trump term compared to the last. Not in any way from a good decision sense. Rather from Trump's ego making him think Putin is below him. Most agree Trump in term one either looked up to Putin or Putin had dirt on him. This term tho, Putin lost a ton of global clout. With all this in play its possible this could inadvertently turn out for the best. Trump flexes to Putin striking deal with Ukraine for resources. Ukraine gets military support. The move could carry massive weight at the global level that Putin can't even control his prized pawn.
This is all a fantasy in a vacume scenario prolly. Not a fantasy in the sense of a win for Trump but as a blow tp Putin. There are tons of ways this won't happen most of which being Trump doing a ton of dumb as fuck shit in the time it takes to make a deal. But w/e one can hope.
All this aside, I think this is a very savy move by Zelenskiy and adds some more admiration to my opinion of him as a leader.
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Maeve likes this.
Exactly.
"I'm sorry about the slow pace of developing the mine for extraction, but we still need"
- electricity
- effective mass housing
- clean water
- reliable (ie wired) communications
- food distribution
- healthcare
- police
- lasting military (because you know those evil coward dems will pull out if they get back in; or some similar shit story)
"So you see, oh smart and savvy business leader, we're very close. Not long now"
would be a pretty big ego stroke, I’d venture.
did I hear big stroke?:)
America coming to its senses or something reasonable happening in the future at which point he can renegotiate
The flip side is if this doesn't happen, then we're all super fucked anyway.
I can't really criticise Zelenskiy, but I think it's disgustingly exploitative to hold Ukraine over a barrel and say "Give me your wealth or I won't help you".
Next time I see someone drowning I'll be sure to take their wallet before I throw them a rope.
"Swim to the other side, I will save you no matter what".
"Actually give me your wallet and then I will save you".
Kyiv delayed minerals deal with US to let Trump take credit, NYT reports
Ukrainian authorities twice delayed signing the agreement, officials on both sides of the negotiations said. The delays offer the opportunity for Trump to claim an early victory at the start of his term.Abbey Fenbert (The Kyiv Independent)
Ukrainian president keen to speak to Trump before Putin does
Good luck with that. Zelinskiy getting in between BFFs
It's incredible because
- Ukraine ceded their nuclear weapons in exchange for security by the US and other allies
- Ukraine is already the best deal for the US to destroy an historical enemy currently hungry for other people's lands
But Trump wants even more.
Zotac is selling RTX 50-series GPUs directly to customers to thwart scalpers
Zotac is selling RTX 50-series GPUs directly to customers to thwart scalpers
This is a fair way of ensuring that everyone gets a chance to buy a new GPU.Jowi Morales (Tom's Hardware)
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Lasslinthar and bizarroland like this.
I was in the fray for a 3000 during 2020 for cyberpunk. Glad to see they haven't changed anything on the storefronts. Newegg, best buy, Nvidia, none of them cared to fix anything. They got their money, what do they care.
I'm not a day one persona anymore. Hell there aren't any games out right now that I want those sick graphics for. More than happy to wait.
Same for me. I wanted to upgrade from 3070 to 5080, but missed it. I was too afraid to wait for the 5070 TI release, so I instead bought one of the last 4070 Ti Super at MSRP.
I will stop trying to upgrade on day one. Just buy the previous gen a few months before the new one, and it will be perfectly fine.
I do not understand how such practice is still legal. No one care, and it is a plague in more and more fields (I really hope Nintendo will produce enough machines to avoid the PS5 launch fiasco which lasted 2 years).
I explicitly moved off my one foray into Nvidia-land, went AMD due to better Linux support, but I have to say that I'm pretty sure that AMD still doesn't have transformers support. Most of the LLM software I've used doesn't require it, but some does, like tortoise-tts.
If I expected to be doing a bunch of LLM work with it, I'd probably be careful to make sure that whatever I intend to use will run on AMD hardware.
🤗 Transformers
We’re on a journey to advance and democratize artificial intelligence through open source and open science.huggingface.co
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massive_bereavement and sickday like this.
Why don't more companies do what Steam did with Steam Deck or Evga used to do of putting people in a queue so they can buy without having to fight scalpers at brick and motor stores or bots online?
It has been the best system I've experienced, since whether it takes days, weeks, or months I know that when my time comes I can buy my product without having to beat out other people.
Scalpers doesn't exist if we not create situation that demanding something at extreme level like some people ready to sell it soul for something weird. We learn this when COVID19 still a thing, everyone hoarding hand sanitizer, mask, & toilet papers like bunch of monkeys because PANIC.
The real questions why people panic buy a GPU like there's no other day to get it ? Are they just follow hypetrain or something ? and why GPU corporation make scarce of their product that will sell so well ?
CMIIW i believe consumer GPU never been so scarce before 2018 ish
Thing is even if people are in queue with the intention of scalping with multiple IDs or whatever the nice part of a queue system is that all you have to do is wait for your queue to come up.
When I put in my queue for evga and steam deck I just forgot about it until my time came up months later. Didn't have to keep refreshing or wait in line or care about stock.
That's the beauty of queue for people who care less about getting it immediately but that they can guarantee themselves one without having to actively search the product out.
Because at the end of the day it's not worth it for the company, they don't have enough reputation loss out of not having the product available to Warrant the effort to put the system like that. They're not losing any money because the scalpers are still buying, Plus for some reason users aren't putting two and two together that if they didn't buy the scalpers products the scalpers would stop scalping and therefore the cycle just continues
If people would just stop buying cards at or above MSRP from third-party sellers, this problem would have been done away with 5 years ago
[From !fedibridge@lemmy.dbzer0.com] Picture to promote Lemmy in a meme format
!fedibridge@lemmy.dbzer0.com
Repo: codeberg.org/LibbIsHere/Tired-…
Tired-of-Reddit
A (silly) meme image to promote Lemmy to Reddit users. Feel free to use and edit however you like.Codeberg.org
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If someone wants a backup account you can try my unbackupped server lemmy.mindoki.com too.
It's backuped but it might take time if something breaks, just so you know.
But this product is called BridgyFed, there isn't any community about it, and most of the people on Lemmy don't like Bluesky or ATProto
Most discussions are happening on !bluesky@lemm.ee , so confusion should be minimal
"Owned by its users?"
Come on man, how many of us pay for the servers, and how many admins do we actually elect?
This is another reddit, with the benefit that we can jump to a neighbouring clone to stop the admins from getting too uppity.
That's it, and I love it.
Come on man, how many of us pay for the servers
Depends on your instance. feddit.uk is 100% funded by donations, as are most medium to large instances that accept them.
That's an inevitable part of community, it requires trust. Users need to trust admins not to mess around with the service and admins need to trust users to not make maintaining the service untenable.
Federation also helps balance the dynamic here as admins can't hold the community hostage like they can on closed systems.
I was just talking about the funding. A number of users do pay for the servers, because of the relatively low cost of running an instance a small percentage of them cover all the bills.
On ownership, that's the way of the beast on what usually start out as hobby instances. I'm sure as things mature and grow a lot of us will move to establish nonprofits.
Worth noting that, for feddit.uk, I run the server and GA runs the domains, so we'd both have to agree to a sell-out. Also we didn't start the instance, just took it over when the original Admin went AWOL, so we've successfully transferred the assets before and, if Lemmy lasts long enough, we'll do it again as we get too decrepit to keep things going.
The funding is key to this as it is all done through Open Collective, so it isn't in an Admin's bank account and so changing Admins is straightforward on that front.
Ehhh… if you mean one can port their post and comment history to another instance, then, no ^[1][1.1]^. If you mean one can port their account settings to another instance, then yes ^[2][1.1]^.
::: spoiler References
1. Title [Issue]: "Allow instance migration for communities and users" #3057. Author: Popkornium18. Publisher: LemmyNet/Lemmy. GitHub. Published: 2023-06-13T05:37:30.000Z. Accessed: 2025-02-08T02:35Z. URI: github.com/LemmyNet/lemmy/issu….
1. [Comment]: Author: Nutomic. Published: 2023-10-20T11:30:45.000Z. URI: github.com/LemmyNet/lemmy/issu….
This is implemented for users via export/import settings feature. […]
2. Website: sh.itjust.works. Lemmy. Accessed: 2025-02-09T06:18Z. URI: sh.itjust.works/.
- Profile Menu>"Settings">"Import/Export Settings"
:::
Allow instance migration for communities and users · Issue #3057 · LemmyNet/lemmy
Did you check to see if this issue already exists? Is this only a single feature request? Do not put multiple feature requests in one issue. Is this a question or discussion? Don't use this, use ht...GitHub
The main point is being able to still access all of the communities if your admin goes rogue (similar to what Reddit is doing). That's possible on Lemmy, you export / import your settings and you're set.
Keep the same username, add a link to your new and old profiles and the bio, and you just moved instances. You may have lost your comments history, but there is no karma anyway, so why care? And it's still accessible on your old account.
I think the issue is that there's choice. People want the simplest, most streamlined route.
If there was one signup that in the background picked your Lemmy World based on signup questions (IE location and Subs you are interested in), plus a main app to go with it, then it would be more tempting.
Also, Lemmy also looks identical to Reddit which is great for people who want to decentralise. But to the majority of users...it's just a Reddit clone with a smaller userbase. Why switch?
Keep it simple, whilst introducing something fresh
Trump cuts aid to South Africa over ‘racial discrimination’ against Afrikaners
Trump cuts aid to South Africa over ‘racial discrimination’ against Afrikaners
US president also offers asylum to Afrikaners and criticises law that allows land seizures without compensation in some circumstancesRachel Savage (The Guardian)
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How longs it got to be for someone to be indigenous?
Or is it just based on skin colour?
Loads of black tribes moved into south Africa.
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Pebble_Clef likes this.
I'm not sure I've ever seen such blatantly and unapologetically racist government policy in my life time.
Don't get me wrong, we've come close, but this genuinely might just take the cake.
I have. It was called apartheid-era South Africa.
Someone remind me who was running things then...
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AmidFuror likes this.
Incorrect. If all black people were killed, then discrimination would end. Your scenario involves Afrikaner corpses, which are white and therefore worth 10^N with N -> \infty of "the blacks". Thus, you cannot trivially cancel 0 dead Afrikaners with anything except a similar number of Israelis.
Excuse me while I puke after typing that, but I live in SA.
There is a sizeable "Lost Cause" myth among racists for both South Africa and Zimbabwe/formerly Rhodesia. In talking about these countries and seemingly caring about them, it makes them seem more worldly and less racist.
They'll often try to deny that these regimes were apartheid at all by pointing out that the military was desegregated, despite that having little to do with how the native Africans were actually treated both under the law and outside of it. Their fascination also crosses over with anti-communist sentiment because many of their adversaries were communist if not directly USSR-backed. And killing communists is BASED.
It's all "right of play" rhetoric that one quote about arguing with Nazis talks about, it's either intellectually lazy or intentionally dishonest. When you get down to brass tacks with this Myth, the hypothesis they put forth is "Africa can only ever prosper if Whites are in charge."
I have news for you. His legal team already argued that Native Americans are actually not US citizens since they belong to sovereign nations.
Meta (facebook) torrented 87.1tb of pirated books to train AI
”Torrenting from a corporate laptop doesn’t feel right”: Meta emails unsealed
Meta’s alleged torrenting and seeding of pirated books complicates copyright case.Ashley Belanger (Ars Technica)
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Previous discussion lemmy.blahaj.zone/post/2164958…
'Meta Torrented over 81 TB of Data Through Anna's Archive, Despite Few Seeders'
'Meta Torrented over 81 TB of Data Through Anna's Archive, Despite Few Seeders' * TorrentFreak
Freshly unsealed court documents reveal that Meta downloaded significant amounts of data from shadow libraries through Anna's Archive.Ernesto Van der Sar (TF Publishing)
Meta also allegedly modified settings "so that the smallest amount of seeding possible could occur,"
Big tech taking without giving back to the community once again.
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imecth likes this.
You think Meta will just roll over and hand out whatever penalties the publishers demand of them?
Meta isn't going to be defending us. It's going to be defending itself. Because it is now one of us.
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FaceDeer likes this.
Secret out-of-court settlement is an option.
Also known as "bribing your way out of the law"
They'll compare the amount the publishers are demanding against how much it would cost them to lawyer up to prevent that and any future payments. Meta's heavyweight enough that they can use "lobbying their way out of the law, aka changing the law so that they're not violating it at all" as a strategy.
If they do simply pay the publishers off, oh well, at least it's just the status quo. But I don't see a reason to assume that's the way this is going to go. Other countries have already carved explicit exceptions to copyright for AI training, Meta would be in favor of that kind of thing.
Yeah they'll lawyer up, but only for themselves. They have no reason to to do anything that benefits the rest of us.
Maybe the torrenting community could see some legal benefits, but only if incentives align. Which they very well may not because Meta is not one of us and their interests don't really align with anyone else's.
- YouTube
Auf YouTube findest du die angesagtesten Videos und Tracks. Außerdem kannst du eigene Inhalte hochladen und mit Freunden oder gleich der ganzen Welt teilen.www.youtube.com
Meta also allegedly modified settings "so that the smallest amount of seeding possible could occur," a Meta executive in charge of project management, Michael Clark, said in a deposition.
Douchebags.
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atro_city and gonzo-rand19 like this.
Wow Russia has more sensible Copyright legislation than most of Europe?
Rare Russian W
After doing terrible crap for so long without much, if any, punishment leads to brazen and absurd tactics...
Soon I expect something akin to them running their own marketplace scams or similar fraud just because it's so profitable vs expense/penalty.
As you say, it's like a bad caricature of the stereotype.
If we (people in general) do it, we're being filthy thieves and the reason why everything is bad. But when it's a megacorpo, it's suddenly a-OK?
Screw this shit. Information should be like the air, free for everyone. Not free for the GAFAM chaste and paid for us untouchables.
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atro_city and Someplaceunknown like this.
The sad thing is that corporations have more rights (quantitatively) than humans.
- Can offset tax liability through complex structures
- While they cannot vote, they can effectively hide their identity behind Super PACs
- Any criminal liability results in fines, never jail time for anyone in charge
- in fact, all corporate executives benefit from liability shield, so long as their actions can be tied back to benefit the company in any way
- Can own just about anything a human can own, with the added benefit that they belong to the company. Digital rights (e.g. books, movies, etc.) legally belong to an entity that cannot die.
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Someplaceunknown likes this.
Any criminal liability results in fines, never jail time for anyone in charge
That just applies to American based companies like Purdue Pharma or GM, if you're working for a foreign companie like VW you're absolutely going to jail and get a way bigger fine
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massive_bereavement likes this.
Zuckerberg’s corporate piracy era is peak hypocrisy. Stealth mode torrenting on company hardware while scrubbing traces to avoid accountability? Classic. Meta’s obsession with “data” apparently includes swashbuckling for copyrighted material—just don’t let the plebs do it.
”Smallest amount of seeding possible”? Pathetic. Even leechers have standards. But why bother with ethics when you’re a billionaire playing digital privateer? The courts will shrug, the bourgeois judges will yawn, and Zuck’ll sail into the sunset with his ill-gotten datasets.
Yo bro, maybe invest in a VPN next time. Or just buy a legislature.
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Aaron Swartz does it for educational journals and gets the hammer brought down on him. Zuck n' Co do it and get government funding.
Boo.
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Luccajan
in reply to ☆ Yσɠƚԋσʂ ☆ • • •don't like this
☆ Yσɠƚԋσʂ ☆ doesn't like this.
Memes reshared this.
🍉 دانیال بهزادی
in reply to Luccajan • • •Memes reshared this.
Cowbee [he/they]
in reply to Luccajan • • •Tja
in reply to Cowbee [he/they] • • •Cowbee [he/they]
in reply to Tja • • •You're actually understanding why Communism makes sense. If centralization is an assured result of Capitalism, it makes more sense to publicly own and plan, and open up control to democratic measures. Industry will advance, and centralization will occur, so it is better to have the people own and plan this process rather than unaccountable Capitalists.
This was the entire reason behind Marx's predictions for Communism.
Tja
in reply to Cowbee [he/they] • • •Monopolies are forbidden in (functioning) capitalist economies, they are not an assured result. So that kind of breaks the whole premise.
Plus the documented failure of planned economies, leading to famines and mass deaths.
Cowbee [he/they]
in reply to Tja • • •You can't forbid the passage of time. Monopoly is the end result of Capitalism, firms beat others and absorb them. Simply "banning" them or breaking them up a bit does nothing to actually prevent them from forming and weakening the power of the state to do so, the state after all serves business.
Secondly, I don't know what you're genuinely getting at with planned economies and famines and mass deaths. In all AES countries, life expectancy rose dramatically, and previously common famines ended. Tsarist Russia and China under the KMT had regular famines until the Soviets and CPC respectively improved agriculture and stopped famine. It wasn't an overnight fix, but it was fixed because of the planned economy.
I think you haven't done any research at all, honestly.
Tja
in reply to Cowbee [he/they] • • •What's a holodomor or two between friends, right? How many of your familiy members died in one? Or is your research just limited to dictators' propaganda?
Any source on those monopolies, btw? Banning them (again, in countries there the law applies, so not the US) works just fine. Any service or product I can think of I can get at least 3 different sources to offer it, sometimes hundreds. Unlike behind the iron curtain, which was either one or very often zero.
Cowbee [he/they]
in reply to Tja • • •The famine in the 30s was indeed the last of its kind, outside of World War II when Nazi Germany took Ukraine, the USSR's breadbasket, famine was over and food stabilized in a country that had regular famines for centuries. My research includes primary sources and contemporary sources from after the opening of the Soviet Archives, I can link some books if you'd like.
As for Monopolies, look at the stock market. The state serves business, breaking up monopolies is done with the consent of larger businesses. Further, combination of firms is a necessity to combat the Tendency for the Rate of Profit to Fall, by controlling more of the supply chain for any given commodity you can streamline it and improve production capacity. This is an ever-increasing scale.
Today, wealth concentration is the highest it has been in history in some of the fewest hands possible. Monopoly is a fact.
Tja
in reply to Cowbee [he/they] • • •So yeah, "what's a holodomor between friends" is indeed your argument? A small oopsie of 5M deaths. Other than that, and the purges, the gulags, the ethnic cleansing, the police state, the corruption, the mass murders and a few invasion of neighbors, everything was perfect. Oh, and the monopoly of everything.
But yes, tell me more how capitalism, some day, maybe, perhaps, if the stars align, will create some monopoly.
Cowbee [he/they]
in reply to Tja • • •The famine in the 1930s was the last major famine outside of wartime in Russia, when it was previously regular. Famine wasn't so much caused by Socialism as it was ended by it. Socialism isn't magic, when revolution happens there remains decades and centuries of building towards a new and better future. I'm curious what you think the purges entailed, or the GULAG prison system, both in scope and in character, ie quantity and quality.
I really doubt you've given any thought at all towards the Soviet Union, to be honest, outside of learning about it in presumably some western school. I recommend Dr. Michael Parenti's Blackshirts and Reds if you want a realistic critique of the Soviet Union, and not one concocted by the authors of the now long-debunked Black Book of Communism.
The fact of the matter, is that the Soviets democratized the economy, doubled life expectancy, pushed women into politics and fields previously he
... show moreThe famine in the 1930s was the last major famine outside of wartime in Russia, when it was previously regular. Famine wasn't so much caused by Socialism as it was ended by it. Socialism isn't magic, when revolution happens there remains decades and centuries of building towards a new and better future. I'm curious what you think the purges entailed, or the GULAG prison system, both in scope and in character, ie quantity and quality.
I really doubt you've given any thought at all towards the Soviet Union, to be honest, outside of learning about it in presumably some western school. I recommend Dr. Michael Parenti's Blackshirts and Reds if you want a realistic critique of the Soviet Union, and not one concocted by the authors of the now long-debunked Black Book of Communism.
The fact of the matter, is that the Soviets democratized the economy, doubled life expectancy, pushed women into politics and fields previously held exclusively by men such as the scientific area, provided free and high quality healthcare, education, and childcare, lowered working hours while maintaining one of the highest growth rates in GDP in the 20th century, had retirement at 55 for women and 60 for men, over tripled literacy rates to 99.9% (higher than the US and Western Europe), went from semi-feudalism to space in 44 years, and dramatically lowered wealth inequality.
The stars don't need to align, Monopoly is already here. Presuming you live in a western country, you enjoy vast benefits from acting as the Global South's landlord through Imperialism, funded through brutal IMF loans and export of Capital.
Blackshirts and Reds — Comrades Library
comlib.encryptionin.spaceTja
in reply to Cowbee [he/they] • • •Up is down, cats are dogs and they ended famine by creating famine? Sure... What's 5 million Ukrainians here, 20 thousand poles there, minor details. Just some light ethnic cleansing, the important thing is that schools had a dentist. And that invading, occupying, opressing and exploiting 20+ other countries is good for GDP, line must go up after all. Also tell me more about how many women were First secretary? Or generals? Or any position of power?
I have spent time in the Soviet union, no need for western books, but show me more graphs and recommend more books! But not the ones you dislike, those have been apparently magically discredited by your favorite discord guru or lemmy mod.
Cowbee [he/they]
in reply to Tja • • •retrospective fondness for USSR
Contributors to Wikimedia projects (Wikimedia Foundation, Inc.)Tja
in reply to Cowbee [he/they] • • •Well documented, you mean by some single polls, 30 years after it happened, and even then only half of the countries have a barely positive retrospective? That's quite well documented indeed... en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Rosy_r…
And you know that there's nothing preventing them from forming it again, right? If they miss it so much they could recreate it. Remind me, how many of them are in CIS and how many in the union state? Oh, only two dictatorships, Russia and Belarus? But they have so much popular support! Look at those two surveys!
tendency to view past events in a positive (often unrealistic) light
Contributors to Wikimedia projects (Wikimedia Foundation, Inc.)Cowbee [he/they]
in reply to Tja • • •The number regretting its fall most goes up when only polling those old enough to have lived through it. "Rosy Retrospection" alone doesn't cut it, it's also the tremendous decline in social safety nets and quality of life metrics like life expectancy.
There's actually quite a lot preventing them from forming it again, and it's the same thing preventing Russia from forming it until finally going through Revolution: the Capitalist state.
Seriously, consider cracking open a book once.
Tja
in reply to Cowbee [he/they] • • •Yeah, it goes up for those, but it still barely cracks half and you have examples like Estonia, Turkmenistan and Uzbekistan where single digit people support it.
The communist party is not banned in most Eastern European countries (what a novel idea, not banning parties and not throwing political opponents in jail!) and they get single digit vote share. This evil capitalist state, preventing communism by checks notes giving people freedom, and prosperity...
Cowbee [he/they]
in reply to Tja • • •like this
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Tja
in reply to Cowbee [he/they] • • •Just forgot to add, I love how you talk about "brutal IMF loans". Brutal was when Soviet soldiers invaded my country, raping, pillaging and occupying it for almost 50 years. I assure you, taking a loan is slightly less brutal. Just a bit.
My country isn't anyone's landlord, barely regained independence not that long ago.
Cowbee [he/they]
in reply to Tja • • •Not sure where you live, nor do I need to. It's a known fact that countries like the US, France, Germany, Britain, and so forth essentially act as parasites on the world and ruin those who go against them. The Soviets have historically been far better for the world than any of the Western powers.
The loans are only one small part. When you go against the Western powers, you end up like Iraq, Vietnam, Korea, Cuba, Cambodia, and Afghanistan. Butchered and pillaged by the US.
BrainInABox
in reply to Tja • • •By who? God?
Most communist revolutions led to massive increase in life expectancy and a massive reduction in hunger. That's just a empirical fact.
davel
in reply to Tja • • •I think you’re confusing socialist planned economies with capitalism & imperialism (A.K.A. monopoly capitalism), because the vast majority of famines and mass deaths have occurred in the later[1].
Amartya Sen’s work shows us the human cost of capitalist development | MR Online
Editor (MR Online)like this
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☆ Yσɠƚԋσʂ ☆
in reply to Luccajan • • •Tja
in reply to ☆ Yσɠƚԋσʂ ☆ • • •don't like this
☆ Yσɠƚԋσʂ ☆ doesn't like this.
☆ Yσɠƚԋσʂ ☆
in reply to Tja • • •Tja
in reply to ☆ Yσɠƚԋσʂ ☆ • • •davel
in reply to Tja • • •👆That’s your entire argument so far, that and equating Edward Herman & Noam Chomsky with L. Ron Hubbard.
1988 book on mass media by Edward S. Herman and Noam Chomsky
Contributors to Wikimedia projects (Wikimedia Foundation, Inc.)Tja
in reply to davel • • •Ah, so you want me to prove a negative? Right on!
PS: rebuttal of appeal to authority with more appeal to authority. Noice.
davel
in reply to Tja • • •BrainInABox
in reply to Tja • • •☆ Yσɠƚԋσʂ ☆
in reply to Tja • • •BrainInABox
in reply to Tja • • •davel
in reply to Luccajan • • •- Competition is for losers. — Peter Thiel[1][]
- George Carlin: It’s a big club, and you ain’t in it.
- [Princeton & Northwestern] Study: US is an oligarchy, not a democracy
- "Bourgeois Democracy": What Do Marxists Mean By This Term?
"Bourgeois Democracy": What Do Marxists Mean By This Term?
Scott Cooper (Hampton Institute)like this
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BrainInABox
in reply to Luccajan • • •Tja
in reply to ☆ Yσɠƚԋσʂ ☆ • • •Pup Biru
in reply to Tja • • •start a business: you’re still being exploited, and now you’re an exploiter
emigrate: okay and now you’re in a different place and have ended back at the original choices
social support: which usually require ending back and the original choices
retrain: okay you retrain and now… you find yourself back at the original choices
admin
in reply to Pup Biru • • •foxlore
in reply to ☆ Yσɠƚԋσʂ ☆ • • •Kalcifer
in reply to ☆ Yσɠƚԋσʂ ☆ • • •Cowbee [he/they]
in reply to Kalcifer • • •☆ Yσɠƚԋσʂ ☆
in reply to Kalcifer • • •BrainInABox
in reply to Kalcifer • • •samus12345
in reply to ☆ Yσɠƚԋσʂ ☆ • • •admin
in reply to ☆ Yσɠƚԋσʂ ☆ • • •☆ Yσɠƚԋσʂ ☆
in reply to admin • • •desktop_user
in reply to ☆ Yσɠƚԋσʂ ☆ • • •like this
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☆ Yσɠƚԋσʂ ☆
in reply to desktop_user • • •Mangoholic
in reply to ☆ Yσɠƚԋσʂ ☆ • • •Or you are working solo and selling your own goods those are choices.
Cowbee [he/they]
in reply to Mangoholic • • •Mangoholic
in reply to Cowbee [he/they] • • •Cowbee [he/they]
in reply to Mangoholic • • •Fredthefishlord
in reply to ☆ Yσɠƚԋσʂ ☆ • • •ngn
in reply to ☆ Yσɠƚԋσʂ ☆ • • •☆ Yσɠƚԋσʂ ☆
in reply to ngn • • •ngn
in reply to ☆ Yσɠƚԋσʂ ☆ • • •if you argue that big corrupt governments are a product of the capitalist system, then ill argue big oppressive governments are a product of the communist system
at the end of the day, i think both of these systems can work in theory, the problem is that neither one of these systems are implemented properly
as long fundamental human values such as ethics, morality, justice, equality and democracy are not valued, it doesn't matter which system you choose, it's not gonna work
☆ Yσɠƚԋσʂ ☆
in reply to ngn • • •ngn
in reply to ☆ Yσɠƚԋσʂ ☆ • • •☆ Yσɠƚԋσʂ ☆
in reply to ngn • • •Peter G
in reply to ☆ Yσɠƚԋσʂ ☆ • • •☆ Yσɠƚԋσʂ ☆
in reply to Peter G • • •Peter G
in reply to ☆ Yσɠƚԋσʂ ☆ • • •☆ Yσɠƚԋσʂ ☆
in reply to Peter G • • •Peter G
in reply to ☆ Yσɠƚԋσʂ ☆ • • •☆ Yσɠƚԋσʂ ☆
in reply to Peter G • • •The only naivete here is thinking that number of parties has anything to do with how well the government represents people. Yes, I seriously believe that the party represented the interests of the working majority. In fact, this isn't some theoretical debate. We can look at how people feel now that they've got a test of capitalist freedom:
... show moreThe only naivete here is thinking that number of parties has anything to do with how well the government represents people. Yes, I seriously believe that the party represented the interests of the working majority. In fact, this isn't some theoretical debate. We can look at how people feel now that they've got a test of capitalist freedom:
Now, go spread your bullshit somewhere else Peter.
75% of Russians Say Soviet Era Was 'Greatest Time' in Country’s History – Poll
The Moscow TimesPeter G
in reply to ☆ Yσɠƚԋσʂ ☆ • • •don't like this
☆ Yσɠƚԋσʂ ☆ doesn't like this.
☆ Yσɠƚԋσʂ ☆
in reply to Peter G • • •ngn
in reply to ☆ Yσɠƚԋσʂ ☆ • • •or maybe they are scared to say that they are oppressed because they know that the app you are talking about is heavily moderated by the government? see en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Xiaohong…
also see en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Human_…
i didn't grow up in ussr, however another user who did apparently didn't have the same experience with you and there's also a wikipedia page for human rights in soviet union which also contradicts your experience: en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Human_…
human rights compliance and violation in the Soviet Union
Contributors to Wikimedia projects (Wikimedia Foundation, Inc.)☆ Yσɠƚԋσʂ ☆
in reply to ngn • • •Ah yes, everybody in China is afraid to speak their mind. Imagine being a grown ass adult and genuinely believing that. I guess I shouldn't be surprised given that you evidently form all your opinions based on wikipedia.
Weirdly, pretty much every western study on China shows that people actually living in China see their country as being more democratic than people living in US do.
Maybe there is no conspiracy here and vast majority of people in China genuinely live happy lives, and you just can't accept that because of your biases.
Meanwhile, the user who is disagreeing with me is listing absolute nonsense as examples of supposed oppression which I already addressed in my other reply.
Studies have shown that China is more democratic than the United States, Russia is nearby, and Ukraine is “at the bottom”
ignatova (English News front)dumblederp
in reply to ☆ Yσɠƚԋσʂ ☆ • • •☆ Yσɠƚԋσʂ ☆
in reply to dumblederp • • •dumblederp
in reply to ☆ Yσɠƚԋσʂ ☆ • • •☆ Yσɠƚԋσʂ ☆
in reply to dumblederp • • •dumblederp
in reply to ☆ Yσɠƚԋσʂ ☆ • • •Cowbee [he/they]
in reply to dumblederp • • •This implies
Essentially, your argument doesn't actually make any real analysis of the material makeup of different societal structures, it's a form of analytical nihilism that, when presented with a question, refuses to answer at all.
dumblederp
in reply to Cowbee [he/they] • • •