Wise words from Illinois governor JB Pritzker.
Click PLAY or watch it on YouTube.
ReTrumplicans do the opposite. Like Trump, they attack anyone and everyone who is not MAGA.
Category: ethics
‘Enshittification’ of the Internet
Cory Doctorow is without question one of the smartest and most eloquent of Tech pundits.
… an activist in favour of liberalising copyright laws and a proponent of the Creative Commons organization, using some of their licences for his books. Some common themes of his work include digital rights management, file sharing, and post-scarcity economics. …
HERE IS HOW platforms die: First, they are good to their users; then they abuse their users to make things better for their business customers; finally, they abuse those business customers to claw back all the value for themselves. Then, they die. …
I call this enshittification, …
Amazon, Facebook, Tiktok. All of them.
The Google search engine app on my phone is totally ‘enshittified’ — nobody could appreciate so many inappropriate advertisements.
Wikipedia is not enshittified.
Why?
It’s not based on advertising. Ads are the main reason the internet is getting enshittified.
I don’t suffer much because I have every ad blocker known to man working in the Chrome browser. I rarely see ads, except on my phone.
Facebook ads are hardest to avoid.
I pay for YouTube Premium to avoid ads in the middle of my videos.
Click through to read the article for yourself:
The ‘Enshittification’ of TikTok
WOW ➙ Demon Copperhead by Barbara Kingsolver
An awesome book.
Demon Copperhead is a 2022 novel by Barbara Kingsolver. It was a co-recipient of the 2023 Pulitzer Prize for Fiction, and won the 2023 Women’s Prize for Fiction.
Though Kingsolver lives in southern Appalachia, I can’t fathom how effectively she puts herself into the mind of the boy — Demon Copperhead. It’s a coming of age story.
Ground zero of the opium epidemic. Demon is born to a drug-using teenage single mother in a trailer in Lee County, Virginia.
Since his mother is in and out of rehab, Demon is partly raised by the sprawling, warm-hearted Peggot clan.
Almost everyone in this dirt poor place is drastically hurt by the Sackler family’s killer drug OxyContin.
“I don’t know a single person my age that’s not taking pills,” Demon says at one point.
The Sacklers paid a $6 billion settlement to avoid civil lawsuits. It’s fair to call them killers.
I listened to the audio book. Recommended, as the reader has the right accent and tone of voice.
Click PLAY or watch it on YouTube.
Click PLAY or watch it on YouTube.
“Do not go gentle into that good night”
Some of the most famous lines in poetry:
Do not go gentle into that good night,
Dylan Thomas
Old age should burn and rave at close of day;
Rage, rage against the dying of the light.
Fight on to the end.
Read the full poem.
Dylan’s father was going blind when DT wrote this poem. Some suggest that dying of the light is a reference to darkness and being blind.
For me it’s always urged not to capitulate in the face of evil and wrongdoing.
If you see something wrong, take ethical action. Do something. Do not ignore it.
In the context of social media I often get the comment … “Why are you so negative?”
Typically from friends who don’t like me challenging some statement they’ve made that I consider wrong. (I’ll unfriend if you insist the world is only 5000 years old, by the way. 😀 )
Click PLAY or listen to the poet read it on YouTube.
I Voted NDP by Mail
As I was going to be out of town on Alberta election day — May 29, 2023 — I voted by mail. Early.
And It was easy to vote by mail. I could write in the candidate running in my riding, or the Party.
I was voting against the unelected premier Danielle Smith as she’s untrustworthy and a rightwing whacko. The NDP is the only alternative that MIGHT form the next government so I voted for Rachel Notley.
I joined the provincial Party, as well.
IF unelected whacko Danielle Smith manages to lose in historically conservative Alberta, she’ll certainly claim a BIG LIE as she’s a fan of Trump and DeSantis.
Of course Trump voted by mail multiple times in recent years, while simultaneously claiming mail fraud in any state he lost. 😀
Here’s my putting my ballot in the mailbox.
WHY so much poverty in the USA?
I feel the GOP USA has only one overriding goal ➙ make the rich, richer.
To that end they don’t want to improve education, health care, nor raise the minimum wage.
Greedy Americans are why there’s so much poverty in the most affluent nation of the world.
The Pulitzer Prize–winning, bestselling author of Evicted, Matthew Desmond, reimagines the debate on poverty, making a new and bracing argument about why it persists in America: because the rest of us benefit from it.
The United States, the richest country on earth, has more poverty than any other advanced democracy.
Why?
Why does this land of plenty allow one in every eight of its children to go without basic necessities, permit scores of its citizens to live and die on the streets, and authorize its corporations to pay poverty wages? …
Private opulence, public squalor: How the U.S. helps the rich and hurts the poor
Click PLAY or watch it on YouTube.
Strike season 5 – Troubled Blood
Quite good. Better than I expected.
I’ve not yet cancelled J.K. Rowling though her legacy won’t be Harry Potter — it will be her weird transphobic attacks on transgender people.
I say weird because for most of her life Rowling has advanced philanthropic causes. The charity Lumos. She worked for Amnesty International documenting human rights issues.
In fact, 95% of her works have been for the greater good.
Why ruin that attacking transgender people?
Weird.
I’ve read some of Rowling’s complicated statements claiming she’s not attacking and harming trans people. Clearly she is ➙ Is J.K. Rowling transphobic? Let’s let her speak for herself.
I thought the book Troubled Blood was least good of the first five.
But the 6th book — Ink Black Heart — was dreadful. I didn’t finish it.
So … how is the TV adaptation of Troubled Blood?
Dark. But quite watchable, actually.
Strike is marginally less annoying. Robin is lovely, as always. Nobody can understand what she sees in Strike.
There is some good acting from the rest of the cast, many of them elderly.
Some touching moments.
The cold case murder mystery didn’t do much for me. Though the ending was well done.
Click PLAY or watch it on YouTube.
Independent – Strike: Troubled Blood review – This drama should be cherished. It’s the BBC at its best
Reality TV – The Climb
I’m not a fan of reality TV — but this show is good.
10 amateur climbers competing for a cash prize of $100,000 and $100,000 prAna sponsorship.
Less hype, more reality than similar shows. Plenty of respect. Not much faux outrage. No phoney drama.
No psychological warfare or sabotage.
The elimination round each episode is entertaining.
If you can only watch 1 episode, watch the last ➙ #10.
It’s upbeat and positive. I recommend it even for those who have no interest in rock climbing.
This show is presented for the non-climber. I learned a lot.
In fact, as I hiker my tendency is to dismiss climbers — especially mountain climbers — as egomaniac masochists. They get far more media attention than hikers.
Jason Mamoa is 6 ft 4 in (1.93 m) — 250 pounds. Not really the right build. But the man loves climbing anyway. He makes celebrity appearances. And this show is Jason’s baby.
Host Chris Sharma is legend in the sport. And they brought in another legend, Meagan Martin, to assist him. Meagan’s famous for American Ninja Warrior, Pole Vault, and Climbing.
Cat Runner, one of the competitors, is small. Light is good. But short doesn’t help in climbing. Cat identifies as transgender, one reason he’s a climber — an activity where gender doesn’t matter.
I was cheering for him before finding out he was trans. I was cheering for Cat because he was shortest in a sport where it helps to have long limbs. Reach.
Cat’s from Kentucky, one of the many U.S. states where ReTrumplican politicians are proposing anti-LGBTQ and/or anti-trans legislation in an effort to prove they are more horrible human beings than their next GOP primary challenger. Intolerant A-holes all.
Cat organized the Queer Climber’s Network.
Click PLAY or watch it on YouTube.
related:
I love Mr. Beast
Mr. Beast is a 24-year-old normal guy from Kansas.
A University dropout.
His YouTube channel reached 112 million subscribers on November 17, 2022, making it the fourth-most-subscribed on the platform, and the highest as a non-corporate identity.
Aside from his philanthropy, everyone studies his simple but effective VIDEO storytelling.
Click PLAY or watch it on YouTube.
The World Needs MORE People
In 1798, Thomas Malthus predicted a global overpopulation apocalypse.
I’ve always assumed he was right. That more people meant more pollution and — ultimately — depletion of fixed resources.
But Professor Galloway argues the opposite:
- population density has no correlation with food insecurity
- the number of people older than 80 is expected to increase sixfold by 2100
- while being less productive, seniors also consume substantially more public resources
- USA already spends 40% of total tax dollars on people 65 and up
China, Japan, Germany, Italy, Greece, Portugal, and many Eastern European nations are shrinking in 2023. Researchers project the global population will peak in 2064.
Net population growth requires a fertility rate slightly greater than two births per woman. America’s fertility rate is 1.8; the average for high income countries. And dropping.
It’s increasingly difficult for young people to be able to afford to get married, buy a house, and have kids.
The obvious solution is to increase immigration of young people. Galloway feels increased immigration still won’t be enough to solve the problem.
Read the full post:
Rick McCharles 