@jgkoomey unless our bodies are so choked with microplastic by then that other pollution seems a bit inconsequential 😬

Just thinking what a useful command line utility `z` is - I use it all the time. (`z foo` navigates to a frequently accessed directory that best matches "foo").

https://github.com/rupa/z

2023 was the warmest year on record globally by a large margin. Another dark red stripe gets added, though I think I need a new colour.
#ShowYourStripes

New Year’s Eve: Musings on Y2K
At 3pm PST on 31 December, 1999, I sat down at the computer in my home office in Yakima, Washington. I logged remotely into the network at HQ and started monitoring our systems. The most critical moment would come at 4pm local time. We were in Pacific Standard Time (PST), -0800 UTC. In other words, at 4pm in Yakima, it would be midnight in Greenwich, England, where the time zone aligns with Coordinated Universal Time. (Coordinated Universal Time is abbreviated as UTC, not CUT, because there are actually other languages in the world besides English, and… never mind. Look it up if that story interests you).

Anyway.

The GPS satellites run on UTC, and our entire multi-state operation depended on GPS timing. My first hint of system failure because of a Y2K bug would occur at midnight, UTC.

Beginning at 3:55pm I began testing the major system once a minute. At 4:05pm I sent out the notice to corporate management that all was well.

I tested hourly, then, but the next critical moment wasn’t until 9pm PST, which was when midnight occurred on the US East Coast. Our equipment was all in MST and PST, but some of our many telecom providers might have systems with local time coordination in some other US time zone. (They’d all be using GPS now, but – this was 1999, and US telecommunications had plenty of legacy systems with other clocking methods).

In the end, nothing failed. Our entire system worked.

This wasn’t because Y2K was overblown.

It was because we replaced our billing system, which wasn’t able to generate an invoice after the date flip.

It was because we did software updates on several proprietary systems that would have failed.

It was because we did firmware updates, too.

Equipment inventories.
Application inventories.
Operating system inventories.
Software version inventories.
Firmware version inventories.

The reason January 1, 2000 seemed like such an ordinary day is because of the MASSIVE amount of work and money spent to make it ordinary. There are unsung heroes around the world who put in the work to update or replace systems that would’ve failed otherwise.

If you’re one of those people, I would love to hear your story.

#newyear #y2k #informationsecurity #gps

https://www.theguardian.com/uk-news/2024/jan/01/black-man-shot-with-stun-gun-by-london-police-allowed-to-appeal-in-damages-case?CMP=Share_iOSApp_Other each additional detail in this story makes it even more disgraceful

What does reading on codex do to our brains? Does packaging text up into discrete pages reduce our attention span? Have we lost the immersive flow of the scroll, the social experience of oral text? https://youtu.be/zyyuGYiPwUs?si=QwnsSmhTxPsfk5J-

"rather than providing a solution to the threat plastics pose to aquatic life, the tiny creatures known as rotifers could be accelerating the risk by splitting the particles into thousands of smaller and potentially more dangerous nanoplastics" https://www.theguardian.com/environment/2023/nov/09/microplastic-eating-plankton-worsening-crisis-oceans-plastic-pollution

‘Insulate Britain’ activists trial delayed after heating problems left the courtroom too cold to proceed…

https://www.brightonandhovenews.org/2023/11/06/insulate-britain-trial-delayed-as-hove-courts-heating-fails/

How much of people's reluctance to support climate policies† is due a background perception that the wealthiest have a free pass to pollute with private jets, mega yachts, helicopters, etc?

https://petition.parliament.uk/petitions/641289

†This isn't to say all climate policies are unpopular, but some essential policies are less wildly popular than would be ideal.

This is the least that a country taking emissions seriously and tackling them fairly would do:

Tax private jet flights fairly and phase out kerosene private jets

https://petition.parliament.uk/petitions/641289

1 in 10 flights from UK airports are private jet flights, but they pay almost no tax.

https://youtu.be/1-Uz0LMbWpI?si=QYn9YqfUqeRnzOwL better than I expected!

If you're making a TV show for a largely US audience, featuring a character who is a chef, fine, but don't then cast him with a cockney accent and have him say oREgano and "egg plant" all the time.

This is such a horrible heartbreaking story.

https://www.theguardian.com/uk-news/2023/oct/23/son-tells-of-anger-after-finding-mother-dead-in-flooded-chesterfield-home

@albertcardona Nice. Is the recipe you used online?

Does he wish he hadn't fired the moderators, or is he just grateful for the ad revenue at this point?

@Ruth_Mottram
"The Alfa Nero motoryacht cannot go two days without air conditioning due to her hardwood interiors"
“These boats, from the day they launch to the day they die, are burning fossil fuels.”

Ok #climate folks, it's not just the #PrivateJets , it's also the #PrivateYachts...

The scale of billionaire overconsumption is a little galling when you consider all the ways everyone else has been trying to #SaveEnergy....
https://infosec.exchange/@littlealex/111172019626642782

U.K. leading the world in climate protest crackdown https://www.theguardian.com/environment/2023/oct/12/human-rights-experts-warn-against-european-crackdown-on-climate-protesters?CMP=Share_iOSApp_Other

> Consumers need to shift their habits, too, he points out. “It’s the consumer who contributes to increasing CO2 emissions, not the producer.” I point out that this is the logic of a drug dealer.

https://www.theguardian.com/environment/2023/oct/07/meet-the-oil-man-tasked-with-saving-the-planet-cop28

“Shell Ultimate Road Trips,” encourages Fortnite players to use a new map made by six different Fortnite creators who were “invited” by Shell to participate in the project. To promote the map, Shell sponsored popular gamers to test it out. The campaign is meant to promote the company’s “new and improved” premium gasoline. https://www.mediamatters.org/climate-deniers/after-decades-climate-deception-shell-uses-fortnite-court-demographic-most