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Google says Chrome's new AI creates risks only more AI can fix


'User Alignment Critic' will review agentic actions so bots don't do things like emptying your bank account





in reply to SpontaneousCombustion

This post is anti-Israel propaganda. Israel has been working hard to reduce hospitalization rates by leveling the hospitals and murdering the children before they can starve.
This entry was edited (6 days ago)
in reply to SpontaneousCombustion

But nobody is willing to force Israel to hold to the "ceasefire" and allow in the agreed upon aid.


The “Combatting Hate Act” is part of a wave of anti-protest legislation in Canada


in reply to NightOwl

This is not the Canada I immigrated to...
This entry was edited (2 days ago)
in reply to NightOwl

I live in Calgary, and these laws come down to enforcement, and it will not be enforced evenly by CPS. We already have a Charter that CPS will just ignore on a regular basis because it will protect groups CPS brass doesn't want to protect.

They never have a problem restricting the actions of groups that threaten the status quo, while refusing to enforce rules on groups they sympathize with.

I don't think these laws really help because of that disparity with enforcement.

This entry was edited (5 days ago)


Grub and the Microsoft Ransomware


in reply to Moonrise2473

This entry was edited (5 days ago)
in reply to data1701d (He/Him)

a nation state can probably find a way


There's no "probably", they can surely find the way, because the decryption key is saved on Microsoft servers, they just need a subpoena for getting it

in reply to data1701d (He/Him)

IMO, this does nothing because it only gives Microsoft full access to your device. And if you're special enough to get the attention of someone capable and willing to physically steal your laptop, install a bootkit on it and give it back to you without you even noticing, then it's just easier to just download the decryption keys from Microsoft at this point. It could have made all of this local like storing it in the TPM, a secure area of the CPU.

Full disk encryption is cool, but not when tethered to Microsoft. With that, they brought themselves into a nasty position even if they didn't want to. Just like when Apple made themselves the sole source of installing programmes on the iPhone devices. China gladly used that and is gladly using that.

in reply to ZkhqrD5o

I was talking less install a bootkit and giving it back to be and more just straight-up stealing the laptop and seeing if they can get any personal info they can sell before formatting it and eBaying it.

Still, your points are totally valid.

in reply to data1701d (He/Him)

Is it possible to use LUKS with a password with a Windows NTFS partition and just have GRUB decrypt it to let Windows boot? Don't intend to dual boot Windows ever but just curious.

Frankly I trust a password stored in my brain way more than whatever keys the TPM is storing. No way something being pushed this hard by Westoid tech corporations doesn't have a backdoor that just unlocks everything for "approved" parties.

This entry was edited (5 days ago)
in reply to HiddenLayer555

The password thing is pretty based, honestly. What you say is probably not possible, as the NT kernel would have to support LUKS, I'm pretty sure, which it doesn't.
This entry was edited (5 days ago)


in reply to NightOwl

And it has the same problem as every other current solution.

Yes coops can keep prices from rising over time, but they do nothing to make units affordable up front.

Where the fuck are you going to get the capital to build/buy enough units to make it do anything?

The entire government budget looks tiny compared to the current value of the real estate market. The government couldn't even realistically fund building or purchasing 1-2% of the units in the country as coops, let alone enough units to make a difference in the market.

There are other better policies.

in reply to BlameThePeacock

Don't let perfect be the enemy of good.

CMHC already has programs available to fully fund non-market housing initiatives as long as you can meet certain requirements. One of the biggest issues is that nearly everybody sees housing as an investment and not simply a shelter so if there's no money in it then they aren't interested.

in reply to apprehensively_human

Go grab the total amount they have funding for, then grab the number for the total value of the Canadian housing market.

Then tell me again that their programs are anything but PR bullshit so they can pretend they're doing something.

It's not that people see it as an investment, it's that the government allows it to be an investment. It doesn't have to be that way. They could fix it overnight with a new tax policy. It would just destroy the retirement plans of millions of people because the government let this go on too long. We'd have affordable housing overnight though.

in reply to njm1314

You don't fix a breaking dam with scotch tape.

You put in the effort to fix it properly, or you let the fucking thing collapse and deal with the consequences.

This is where we're at for housing.

in reply to njm1314

Certainly not with a bunch of small patches.

You bring in the big guns and move the fucking earth.

How does that apply to the housing market? You bring out financial policy that makes homes worthless as investments, even for regular home owners, and destroy the asset value of homes almost completely.

One policy could literally drop housing prices by 80% by itself, it just can't get passed by out government because voters don't actually want affordable housing. The vast majority of Voters are invested in the market and have no interest in throwing away hundreds of thousands of dollars to make things affordable for others.

in reply to BlameThePeacock

We made real estate a tax haven for Boomers who refused to save. No politician will touch that model until the Boomers are all dead.
in reply to SaveTheTuaHawk

It really doesn't have to do with Boomers, just home owners in general. Politicians won't touch it until home ownership rates drop to a point where they aren't the majority of voters anymore.
in reply to BlameThePeacock

1-2% of the new housing investment can be a heck of a lot more than 1-2% of the bedrooms if you arent building the median oversized single detached.
in reply to Jason2357

There are already more bedrooms in Canada than people by quite a margin, and that doesn't even take into account that most couples share a room.

It's fairly easy to do the math, stats Canada has released numbers of units by bedroom count a few times. You just do a little multiplication and realize there are 50 million bedrooms for 45 million people.

The problem is not supply, it's demand. Theoretically demand could be overcome with supply, but realistically it cannot.

The easiest way to fix this whole mess is to reduce demand. It could literally be done overnight with tax policy. It would crash a good portion of the economy, and wipe out the retirement plans of millions of people, but it would result in affordable housing immediately.

in reply to BlameThePeacock

It would crash a good portion of the economy


it will lead to Canada as a failed state. 80% of all the wealth of Canada is tied up in real estate.

in reply to SaveTheTuaHawk

It definitely wouldn't lead to a "failed state" situation.

Wealth tied up in real estate is almost entirely unproductive. Losing it would cause some downstream problems for certain things and specific real estate based holding companies but it's definitely not the end of the economy or anything.

If my house was worth 50% less tomorrow morning, not much would change for me except I'd need to start adjusting my long term plans for retirement. I wouldn't (just barely) even be underwater on my mortgage.

in reply to BlameThePeacock

No, it doesn't.

In Canada, housing coops get grants and tax exemptions to get major capital projects done, even more to start one. Governments like coops because they ease social housing burden.

The reason they aren't more popular is that a developer can't extract nearly as much profit from building them vs private builds.

I know this because I ran the board of a co-op for almost a decade.

in reply to non_burglar

You aren't disagreeing with me.

If nobody wants to fund them, they won't exist, and as I mentioned the government can't fund them itself.

So... Useless idea.

in reply to NightOwl

Usually, when I hear housing coops, they already have the home built. Is there a site or organization that lists coop projects that need more members or list of people who want to form one?
This entry was edited (6 days ago)

in reply to NightOwl

things could start improving if we did the same thing to our billionaires
in reply to NightOwl

This is the “authoritarianism” that capitalist states and corporate media—and the “human rights” NGOs that they fund—are actually concerned about. They’re concerned about the freedom of capital, not people.


More sabotage, Western patronage: what is known about terrorist acts prevented by Russia




in reply to jackeroni

i wish that there more shareable sources; but the other spy agencies like the cia won't let this be known for atleast another 25 years.



What programming language would you recommend for teaching to non-technical people that use a variety of different OSes?


This entry was edited (1 week ago)
in reply to communism

I would suggest taking a look at Scheme or Clojure for somebody who has no development experience. The big reasons being that these are high level languages so you can focus on learning the actual concepts without all the incidental complexity of imperative languages. Scheme in particular was designed as a teaching language. The other aspect is interactivity, Lisps have a tight integration between the editor and the REPL and you can evaluate functions as you write them. This is incredibly helpful for learning as you can write a function, send it for evaluation, and see the result immediately. So you can play with code and get an intuition for how things work.
in reply to ☆ Yσɠƚԋσʂ ☆

That's a really interesting suggestion. I've not used either. I had the impression that those languages are kinda esoteric, but maybe I'll have a look.
in reply to communism

in reply to ☆ Yσɠƚԋσʂ ☆

My university chose to teach a pure functional lisp-like language without for loops as they very first programming course in the computer science program lol. Everyone who "already knew" how to program in Python/Java/JS/etc hated it (including me at the time) because it knocked us from the peak of the Dunning-Kruger curve into the valley of despair like everyone else.

Took me years to understand the method to the madness and appreciate learning it.

This entry was edited (6 days ago)
in reply to HiddenLayer555

It's very frustrating to be in a situation where you know how to do something one way, but you can't do it like that and you have to learn a completely different way to do it. Feeling like a beginner again makes people feel stupid, and most people don't like that. But it really just means you're learning a new way to approach problems.
in reply to ☆ Yσɠƚԋσʂ ☆

Speaking of Scheme, I would suggest Racket, which comes battery included and ready to go in ONE installer.
Easy to install on any system, and has a decent text editor/IDE provided.
Also, the documentation is great, but can be daunting at first.


Book review: "Flint And Feather" by Tekahionwake / E. Pauline Johnson