Art.

Also: Vote!

#nyc

Announcing: https://justaqrcode.com.

Tired of "free" QR code generators that are full of ads and trackers, that share your data, and that want to sell you something? Me too. Here's my act of resistance: I made a one-page site that works entirely in your browser to generate a simple QR code. And that's all it does. You can download the HTML page and run it locally, even. Read the source; nothing up my sleeves. Just a QR code.

My offer to you -- I will continue to pay for the domain name and web hosting for it, myself. If you find it valuable, you can pay it back by creating your own useful thing for the world and releasing it for free. Let's take back the friendly web, one vexingly-monetized utility at a time!

#QRcode #Free #FriendlyWeb #Resistance

"A caller to WNYC’s The Brian Lehrer Show earlier in January told the host that his wife, who takes an express bus from Bay Ridge, Brooklyn, to Lower Manhattan and back for work, has seen fewer delays every day. 'She’s getting home earlier every night,' he said. 'I mean, we love it.'"

https://www.fastcompany.com/91272434/a-million-cars-have-disappeared-what-nyc-is-like-after-one-month-of-congestion-pricing

Heads up, due to last night's plane crash, the Frederick Douglass Bridge, Hains Point, parts of the Mount Vernon Trail are closed to bike and pedestrian traffic. We haven't confirmed that the 14th Street Bridge is closed but we would not recommend relying on it.

While I appreciate DC working to clear ❄️ from some of the bike lanes, it leaves a bit to be desired. At least we rarely get snow that sticks around? #bikeDC #bikeTooter

2024 GGWash Picks: At 8:00 am and 3:00 pm every school day, volunteers shut down the street in front of Bancroft Elementary School in Northwest DC to keep kids and parents safe from drivers. Here’s how they made it happen.: https://ggwash.org/view/97916/2024-ggwash-picks-how-dc-neighbors-got-a-dangerous-street-closed-in-front-of-bancroft-elementary

While the magnitude of the challenge is “indisputable”, there are “abundant opportunities for accelerating mitigation”, the report says. It finds that global emissions could be cut by 54% by 2030 and 72% by 2035 at a cost of less than $200 per tonne of CO2.

This indicates that the gap between commitments and current policies is a result of a lack of policy support rather than more fundamental barriers to decarbonisation: https://www.unep.org/resources/emissions-gap-report-2024

First ride down the new Mt Olivet Protected #BikeDC lanes!
Once 17th St is completed, fully protected ride from Lincoln Park -> Langston Carver -> Ivy City -> Union Market will be possible #NetworkEffect @bikedc

@mkristensson I bought a front/back light set last year and one uses USB-C and one is micro USB. Makes absolutely no sense.

It's bribery, and there's video.
https://www.justice.gov/usao-dc/pr/dc-city-councilmember-arrested-bribery-charge

Some lovely news to share this morning: Blue Machine has been shortlisted for the #WainwrightPrize24 for Conservation :)

Hooray for the ocean! We need more people thinking about what the blue of our blue planet really is, rather than seeing it as a mysterious void, or just where the fish live. We are all citizens of an ocean planet and it's time to learn what that really means.

More here: https://wainwrightprize.com/

If you want to support local news in #WashingtonDC, the former DCist news team is fundraising launch The 51st. https://givebutter.com/The51st

#BikeDC #WalkDC does anyone know the right 311 category for construction blocking a bike lane and sidewalk with no safe accommodation? Florida Ave NE at 3rd St is blocked eastbound.

It’s county fair season! No car? No problem: In the Washington region, you can enjoy these all-American festivities via transit, farm animals and all -- starting August 9! Here’s where: https://ggwash.org/view/96557/its-transit-oriented-county-fair-season

Here's a weird consequence of our societal shift from capitalism (where riches come from profits) to feudalism (where riches come from rents): increasingly, your rights to your actual property (the physical stuff you own) are trumped by corporations' metaphorical "intellectual property" claims.

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If you'd like an essay-formatted version of this thread to read or share, here's a link to it on pluralistic.net, my surveillance-free, ad-free, tracker-free blog:

https://pluralistic.net/2024/07/29/faithful-user-agents/#hard-cases-make-bad-copyright-law

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Best analysis I've seen of the disastrous failures at Microsoft and Clownstrike" that took down so many vital services: https://www.wheresyoured.at/crowdstruck-2/?ref=ed-zitrons-wheres-your-ed-at-newsletter

"What we're seeing today isn't just a major fuckup, but the first of what will be many systematic failures — some small, some potentially larger — that are the natural byproduct of the growth-at-all-costs ecosystem where any attempt to save money by outsourcing major systems is one that simply must be taken to please the shareholder."

Ministry of Interior Spaces new album Grieftopia is really good. https://ministryofinteriorspaces.bandcamp.com/album/grieftopia

This is what the internet was made for.

Genealogical and genetic ancestors aren’t the same thing. A DNA match − or a lack of one − may not tell you what you imagine it does about your family tree.

Our story on Live Science:
https://www.livescience.com/health/genetics/you-probably-didnt-inherit-any-dna-from-charlemagne-what-it-means-when-your-dna-matches-a-historic-persons

#DNA #genealogy