Article note: Ugh, this looks nightmarish.
Single-provider from the trust root through all the software components.
The UKI blob of "all your boot stuff" isn't the worst idea, though if I'm reading correctly, it more or less means you _have_ to bundle all your modules and device tree and such in the image stored on the EFI partition, which causes it's own collection of problems related to size and inflexibility... and the whole blob has to be built and signed upstream unless you do the hostile blood-ritual to enroll your own keys and possibly brick your machine.
Article note: Björn Ståhl's stack (Arcan/Durden/and now this Lash#Cat9 project) is such an interesting "alternate universe" system. Lot of good out-of-the-mainstream ideas in there.
Arcan sub-project reinvents command lines and GUIs at once
Lash#Cat9 is a new type of typing-driven UI, which moves beyond terminal emulators. Cat9's power comes from its close interaction with its display server, Arcan. This picks up some of the ideas from X11 and Wayland then goes much further.…
Article note: Product whose sole feature is allowing rent-seekers to collude through a intermediary sued for enabling collusion.
Medical billing and HR departments seen sweating.
This is what "Data Driven laissez faire capitalism" actually means, technocrat fuckwits.
Article note: That kind of intrusive crapware is the norm on smartphones - which are the dominant species of consumer computer - and has been trying to take root in general-purpose computers that still resemble personal computers since the 90s.
I remember in the 2000s the standard advice of "Do a fresh install on any new computer, because trying to safely remove the crapware is more difficult."
It's still shocking that we tolerate it as a soceity to such a degree.
Article note: U-Boot is one of those pieces of tooling that sits mostly-invisibly underneath a huge fraction of devices, and has done so going back decades.
Respect.
Article note: It's a pretty good take, though my favorite two bits are attributed to others;"There’s no longer anything being promised to us by tech companies that we actually need or asked for. Just more monitoring, more nudging, more draining of our data, our time, our joy." (Shannon Vallor) and the turn of phrase "Felony Contempt of Business Model" (Jay Freeman).
Article note: A company so famous for their obnoxious licensing practices and inflated prices that cracking it using it is a routine joke, who have sprung significant competition in the last few years (at least Ghidra and the whole radare family on the FOSS side, Hopper and Binary Ninja on the commercial side).
I'm not sure what an investment company hopes to get from it, it seems likely maybe the last of the original team is just cashing in on their way out.
Article note: SEL4 Microkernel with a Rust userland is an obvious current direction for building something where correctness and robustness are the top priorities.
Hopefully the resources that go into it produce something widely reusable.
Article note: Telecom companies and bribing governments for regulatory advantage.
Name a more iconic combination.
Illustration by Alex Castro / The Verge
AT&T Illinois will pay $23 million after it admitted to making payments to former Illinois Speaker of the House Michael J. Madigan’s political ally in return for his “vote and influence over a bill,” according to a Friday press release from the Department of Justice (via Ars Technica). The company will also have to cooperate with the government’s investigation into the alleged misconduct and will have to set up a compliance and ethics program that the government will receive reports on. If the company keeps up its end of the bargain, the government will dismiss its prosecution.
According to the DOJ, in 2017 AT&T paid one of Madigan’s allies $22,500 through a lobbying firm that it worked with. AT&T employees tried to make it seem as if...
Article note: This is the dumbest solution-looking-for-a-problem bullshit.
In exchange for ... not needing an envelope and stamp every year or so... you get an expensive fallible electronic device provided by a useless rent-seeking middle-man which has a bunch of unnecessary connected features to turn it into a privacy problem, a hacking problem, a counterfeiting/veracity problem...
Enlarge/ Reviver's e-ink license plate works with a smartphone app. (credit: Reviver)
Digital license plates that can display information other than a car's license plate number are now legal for all vehicles in California. At the end of September, Governor Gavin Newsom signed AB 984 into law, which makes the e-ink displays a legal alternative to the traditional metal plate. The move comes after a successful 2018 pilot program—one that Ars tested out at the time.
The revised legislation sets out the conditions for using an e-ink plate (referred to in the bill as an "alternative device"). For example, a malfunctioning digital license plate would be a correctable violation—the law also requires "a process for frequent notification" if the digital plate breaks or needs replacing. And altering, forging, counterfeiting, or other hacking of the plates will be a felony.
"As a member of the California Legislative Technology and Innovation Caucus, I am thrilled to build upon the past successes of the Legislature that first implemented this program. AB 984 strikes a necessary balance between innovation and privacy while digitizing the only thing on our cars today that remains antiquated, license plates," said California Assemblymember Lori Wilson, who co-authored the bill.
