I suppose they meant that it slows down their internet, not the internet

Clueless MBA parasites ruining shit for everybody again?

Must be a day that ends in Y

Obligatory

The Usenet post I linked to claims it’s originally from the 1st quarter of 1990, but who knows if that’s accurate or not. I actually can’t find a good source for whether Stumpf is the original author or just the one who posted it to rec.humor.funny.reruns, but it’s usually attributed to him at any rate.

But yeah, fairly ancient by internet standards. I remember first running into it in the 90’s

Well, no. The originally German / Nazi tactic called Lügenpresse aka. “Lying Press” is more about just claiming that the press is lying – like how conservatives latched onto calling everything “fake news” after US Republicans and Trump started doing it after their bullshit was called out with that term.

The idea with the “firehose of falsehood”, like the page I linked to explains, is to saturate media with so much high volume and continuous bullshit that people start to doubt whether it’s even possible to know anything about objective reality in the first place. The point isn’t to proclaim that the media is lying, but to simply lie so much that people start to think that all media is just lies. The tactic originated in Russia and has been in use since Soviet times and the internet has allowed them to take it to a completely new level.

And yes, Nazi-controlled media was obviously also full of total fabrications, but that doesn’t mean that these two tactics are the same thing.

The WHO hopes its latest declaration, that mpox is a public health emergency of international concern, will trigger greater support to the areas most affected.

lol, good one

Known as the “firehose of falsehood”

They think they’ll be tortured because that’s what they do to others.

I’m definitely getting pickier as I get older. Back in my 20’s I went through all the Dune books, including the ones written by Frank’s son which are… well, even worse. Doubt I could do it now. Probably the same with Foundation too if I tried reading them again.

Cavemen generally didn’t have alarm clocks

1374. I look really good for my age

Because ADHD I usually have at least 4 books underway at the same time.

• I’m just about to finish Years of Rice and Salt by Kim Stanley Robinson.

• I just started Piranesi by Susanna Clarke.

• I’m also reading A City on Mars, a nonfiction book by Kelly and Zach Weinersmith.

• I started re-reading the Area X trilogy by Jeff Vandermeer, I think I’m still in Annihilation.

• I also started re-reading Dune by Frank Herbert, but honestly it’s such a slog that I think I got halfway through before getting frustrated. The worldbuilding may be interesting but holy shit is Herbert’s writing turgid.

Apple’s OS updates – whether iOS or macOS – haven’t been very good for years now

“The narrative” that everybody should have voting rights?

Oh no, the horror!

A rotary notary, if you will

The Phase II clinical trial is evaluating the safety, tolerability, pharmacokinetics and efficacy of Incel administered intravenously

Mainlining incel, damn that doesn’t sound great at all

Agh, figures that the Russian Volunteer Corps was apparently in on the action. It just never fails to boggle my mind that the majority of the anti-Russian militias that are fighting in Ukraine are so far right that they think Putin isn’t fascist enough.

Like, yeah, it’s great that they’re fighting Russia, but holy fuck is it this hard to find people in Russia who aren’t complete pieces of shit and are also willing to fight Putin?

Well that’s… weird. Why on earth would they do that?

Assuming any of this is true, at any rate.

I think it’s interesting is that so many autocracies keep up the pretense of democratic and rules-based governance; even North Korea has elections. Same with political trials like you see in so many authoritarian regimes, from modern Russia or China to Nazi Germany – it’s like autocrats need to be able to pretend to themselves that the system they run is fair and just, and that they’re not just tyrants who govern with impunity and enforce rules arbitrarily.

What I don’t get is why? Why bother when it’s immediately obvious to everyone that it’s all a sham? Why not drop the pretense, which everybody knows is just a pretense?