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Cracks, Demos, and the Fuzzy Copyright of the Demoscène

2025-03-17

This article explores the long-standing ambiguity surrounding copyright within the demoscene. Since the heyday of Amiga and C64 game cracking in the 1980s, a complex relationship has existed between cracking groups and demo production groups. While cracking was commonplace, even seen by some as a rebellion against expensive games, the demoscene itself has a zero-tolerance policy for plagiarism among its members. Using examples like Unit A and The Movers' cracktros, the article highlights this paradoxical culture, discussing how former crackers coexist with game companies in commercial game development, and how to view originality, code sharing, and AI-generated art. Ultimately, the article points out that the demoscene's understanding of copyright is fluid and ever-changing, lacking clear rules, relying instead on unwritten norms and community consensus.

(www.datagubbe.se)

Game cracking

Who Owns AI-Generated Code? Legal Experts Weigh In

2024-12-24

Who Owns AI-Generated Code? Legal Experts Weigh In

The ownership of code generated by AI like ChatGPT is a complex legal grey area. Experts consulted highlight a lack of clear legal precedent, with ownership hinging on both contract and copyright law. While OpenAI disclaims ownership of generated content, in practice, ownership could fall to the user, the AI developer, or even the providers of the training data. Further complicating matters, the copyrightability of AI-generated code itself is debated; the US Copyright Office suggests the code isn't protectable, but the application incorporating it might be. The situation is legally murky and developers are urged to proceed cautiously.

(www.zdnet.com)

AI AI code ownership copyright law legal risks

Mysterious X-ray Flashes Accelerate from Nearby Supermassive Black Hole

2025-01-14

Mysterious X-ray Flashes Accelerate from Nearby Supermassive Black Hole

Astronomers have observed a supermassive black hole, 1ES 1927+654, 270 million light-years away, emitting periodic X-ray flashes that have increased in frequency from once every 18 minutes to once every 7 minutes over two years. Researchers hypothesize this is due to a white dwarf star spiraling dangerously close to the black hole's event horizon. This white dwarf appears to be performing a delicate balancing act, shedding matter to prevent it from falling in. This discovery challenges our understanding of black hole environments and offers a chance to verify the theory using future gravitational wave detectors like LISA.

(news.mit.edu)

Tech X-ray white dwarf

Google Offers Voluntary Exit Program for Platforms & Devices Team

2025-01-30

Google announced a voluntary exit program for US-based employees in its Platforms & Devices group, encompassing Android, Pixel, Fitbit, and more. This follows last year's merger of Pixel hardware and Android software teams. The program offers severance packages and aims to ensure remaining employees are fully committed to the company's mission and focused on efficient product development. It's not a company-wide layoff but rather a response to integration challenges and role adjustments following the merger.

(9to5google.com)

Tech restructuring

PCalc: A 20-Year Journey of a Calculator App

2025-01-07

PCalc, a seemingly simple calculator app, boasts a remarkable 20-year history. It began as a university project, initially designed as a central heating control panel! The author then transformed it into a programmer's calculator, releasing it as freeware in 1992. Through numerous iterations and platform ports, PCalc now graces iOS, Mac, and Apple Watch, incorporating innovative features. The story behind it is filled with passion for technology, connections with Apple, and a tribute to the late science fiction author Douglas Adams.

(www.pcalc.com)

Development app development

Blazing Fast In-Process Event Dispatcher for Go

2025-06-30

Blazing Fast In-Process Event Dispatcher for Go

This Go package delivers a high-performance, in-process event dispatcher ideal for decoupling modules and enabling asynchronous event handling. Boasting speeds 4-10x faster than channels (processing millions of events per second!), it supports both synchronous and asynchronous operations with a focus on simplicity. Perfect for intra-process module decoupling, lightweight pub/sub, and high-throughput scenarios, but not suitable for inter-process communication, event persistence, or advanced routing.

(github.com)

Development Event Dispatcher

QR Code Generator for Linux Kernel Panic Messages

2025-07-04

QR Code Generator for Linux Kernel Panic Messages

Kernel panic traces are notoriously difficult to copy and paste into bug reports, hindering debugging. The `panic_report` project solves this by embedding a QR code generator written in Rust directly into the Linux kernel. This allows users to easily scan and share the encoded panic information. The project, which prioritizes memory safety thanks to Rust, has been merged into Linux kernel v6.12-rc1 and is soon to be enabled in Arch Linux. A web frontend simplifies decoding the QR code. The main author is Jocelyn Falempe.

(rust-for-linux.com)

Development

BorrowChecker.jl: An Experimental Borrow Checker for Julia

2025-01-18

BorrowChecker.jl: An Experimental Borrow Checker for Julia

BorrowChecker.jl is a Julia package that simulates Rust-like ownership and borrowing semantics through a macro-based system, performing runtime checks during development and testing to flag memory safety issues. It doesn't guarantee absolute memory safety but aids in writing safer code. The library uses macros like `@own`, `@move`, `@clone` to manage object ownership and `@lifetime` blocks to manage reference lifetimes, while also offering an `@managed` block for automatic borrow checking. While not perfect, it's a valuable tool for developers aiming to improve memory safety in their Julia code.

(github.com)

Development

When the Rule of Law Fails: The Return of Tribalism

2025-06-28

When the Rule of Law Fails: The Return of Tribalism

This article explores the resurgence of tribalism in the Western world as the rule of law weakens. The author argues that when a privileged class rises above the law, older, more brutal tribal rules re-emerge. Tribalism prioritizes power dynamics over morality, aiming for advantage rather than justice. Modern society is presented as a fragile exception, built on a precarious trust in institutions. When the impartiality of these institutions is compromised, tribalism exploits this, using the law itself as a weapon to consolidate power. The author calls for understanding tribalism not to emulate it, but to better protect and preserve the rule of law that underpins modern society.

(sustainableviews.substack.com)

Misc

Android Gets a Native Linux Terminal: Your Phone, Your Desktop?

2025-03-08

Android Gets a Native Linux Terminal: Your Phone, Your Desktop?

Google's March 2025 Pixel Feature Drop finally delivers a native Linux terminal to Android! This means running Linux programs, like Doom, directly on your phone. Currently limited to the latest Pixel devices with Android 15, Android 16 will expand compatibility. It's based on a Debian Linux VM, providing shell access and allowing you to download, configure, and run Debian. While GUI support is absent for now, Android 16 promises to change that, hinting at a future of smartphone-desktop convergence.

(www.zdnet.com)

Tech Smartphone-Desktop Convergence

US Govt Cracks Down on Crypto Privacy, Bitcoin's Institutionalization Marches On

2025-09-12

US Govt Cracks Down on Crypto Privacy, Bitcoin's Institutionalization Marches On

The US Treasury and FinCEN are reportedly planning to outlaw CoinJoin, atomic swaps, and other Bitcoin privacy-enhancing techniques, drawing criticism for severely infringing on financial privacy. Simultaneously, Bitcoin is undergoing institutionalization, experiencing decreased volatility but also reduced upside potential. The article also briefly mentions a new bill for strategic Bitcoin reserves, an upcoming SEC crypto roundtable, and a proposal to use Bitcoin as a Martian trade standard.

(www.tftc.io)

Tech Bitcoin Privacy Institutional Investment

Arch Linux Added to url.town Directory

2025-08-04

Arch Linux Added to url.town Directory

url.town, a web directory curated by the omg.lol community, has added Arch Linux. Arch Linux is a lightweight, flexible DIY general-purpose GNU/Linux distribution where users only get what they install. The directory also features a wide range of other resources, spanning blogs, games, art, tech news, and much more.

(url.town)

Development Linux Distribution

Optimizing WMMA Kernels on AMD RDNA 4 Architecture

2025-07-21

Optimizing WMMA Kernels on AMD RDNA 4 Architecture

AMD RDNA 4 architecture GPUs, featuring 3rd-generation Matrix Cores, significantly improve Generalized Matrix Multiplication (GEMM) performance. This article delves into optimizing matrix operations using WMMA (Wave Matrix Multiply Accumulate) intrinsics within HIP kernels on RDNA 4 GPUs. It explains WMMA's functionality, the use of new intrinsics like `__builtin_amdgcn_wmma_f32_16x16x16_f16_w32_gfx12`, and key differences from RDNA 3. A simplified Multilayer Perceptron (MLP) implementation example showcases efficient matrix computation on RDNA 4.

(gpuopen.com)

Hardware

MTG-S1 Launch: A Forecasting Revolution for Europe

2025-07-05

MTG-S1 Launch: A Forecasting Revolution for Europe

On July 1st, 2025, EUMETSAT successfully launched MTG-S1, a geostationary meteorological satellite ushering in a new era for European weather forecasting. Equipped with an infrared sounder and the Copernicus Sentinel-4 spectrometer, MTG-S1 provides high-frequency data on atmospheric temperature, humidity, and trace gases. This allows for earlier detection of severe weather, extended warning times, improved forecasting accuracy, and ultimately, better protection of lives and property. The successful launch, a testament to European collaboration, significantly enhances Europe's capacity to address the challenges of climate change.

(www.eumetsat.int)

Tech weather satellite

AtomVM: A Lightweight Erlang VM for IoT

2025-05-31

AtomVM is a lightweight Erlang virtual machine (VM) for IoT devices. It's a subset implementation of the Bogdan Erlang Abstract Machine (BEAM), executing bytecode compiled from Erlang or Elixir. Optimized for microcontrollers, AtomVM supports a functional programming approach with an actor-based concurrency model, simplifying IoT application development. It boasts features like process spawning, monitoring, message passing, preemptive scheduling, and efficient garbage collection. AtomVM interfaces directly with peripherals (GPIO, I2C, SPI, UART) and even supports WiFi on compatible devices like the ESP32—all on hardware costing as little as $2!

(www.atomvm.net)

Development

Sugary Drinks Linked to Millions of Heart Disease and Diabetes Cases

2025-01-12

Sugary Drinks Linked to Millions of Heart Disease and Diabetes Cases

A new study reveals a shocking link between sugary drinks and millions of new cases of diabetes and heart disease annually. Over 2.2 million new diabetes cases and 1.1 million new heart disease cases are attributed to the consumption of sugary beverages each year. The problem is particularly acute in low- and middle-income countries, where these drinks are aggressively marketed and often more accessible than healthier alternatives. Latin America and the Caribbean saw nearly 24% of new type 2 diabetes cases in 2020 linked to sugary drinks, while sub-Saharan Africa experienced the highest percentage increase in diabetes cases over three decades, with sugary drinks contributing to 21% of new diabetes cases and 11% of heart disease cases. The health risks stem from the high sugar content and lack of nutritional value, leading to blood sugar spikes, weight gain, insulin resistance, and increased risk of type 2 diabetes and cardiovascular diseases. Solutions include public health campaigns, taxes on sugary drinks, and stricter advertising regulations, as seen in Mexico's successful sugar tax implementation in 2014. However, much more action is needed, especially in regions like Latin America and Africa where the impact is most severe.

(bgr.com)

Tech Sugary Drinks Heart Disease

Woolly Mammoth Revival: Ecological Claims Questioned

2025-04-05

Woolly Mammoth Revival: Ecological Claims Questioned

Colossal's ambitious plan to resurrect woolly mammoths rests on claims of their positive ecological impact, particularly on carbon sequestration. However, existing research on the effects of large herbivores on carbon sequestration is mixed: African forest elephants may enhance it, while savanna elephants reduce it. While one study suggests increasing large herbivore populations lowers permafrost temperatures, the feasibility and cost-effectiveness are questionable. Furthermore, warmer winters due to climate change could mean mammoth trampling accelerates soil warming. Ecosystems are complex and unpredictable, making it challenging to assess extinct species' impact on modern ecosystems. Colossal's narrative leverages this uncertainty, but this doesn't make their claims more likely to be true.

(arstechnica.com)

Tech

fd: Blazing Fast File Finder (23x Faster than find)

2025-03-19

fd: Blazing Fast File Finder (23x Faster than find)

fd is a faster and more user-friendly alternative to the find command. It boasts intuitive syntax, parallelized directory traversal, and smart case matching, defaulting to ignoring hidden files and .gitignore entries. Supporting both regular expressions and glob patterns, fd offers extensive options to customize searches, including specifying root directories, file types, sizes, modification times, and more. It integrates seamlessly with other commands such as `ls`, `rm`, `rg`, and `fzf`. Benchmark tests demonstrate fd's significant speed advantage over find in large filesystems, achieving up to 23 times faster performance.

(github.com)

Development file finding

RubyUI: Blazing Fast Rails UI Component Library

2025-04-01

RubyUI: Blazing Fast Rails UI Component Library

RubyUI (formerly PhlexUI) is a Rails UI component library built on Phlex, boasting speeds up to 12x faster than traditional ERB templates. It offers a collection of reusable, customizable components that you can copy and paste directly into your applications. RubyUI emphasizes clean design, well-organized components, and extensive customization options, with comprehensive documentation and examples. It uses custom-built Stimulus.js controllers, minimizing dependencies, allowing for the easy creation of efficient and beautiful Rails application interfaces.

(github.com)

Development UI component library

Sci-Fi Author Buys Abandoned Church for $75,000, Turns It Into Office Space

2025-03-14

Sci-Fi Author Buys Abandoned Church for $75,000, Turns It Into Office Space

Sci-fi author John Scalzi purchased a defunct Methodist church for a surprisingly low $75,000 and transformed it into office space and a multi-purpose venue. The 1919 building had been abandoned due to declining congregation numbers. The Scalzis weren't motivated by religious reasons; instead, they needed space for their growing company, Scalzi Enterprises, and to accommodate future employees. After two years of renovations, the church boasts a new roof, wiring, flooring, and HVAC system, as well as a library and spaces for events. Scalzi plans to host community events there, making it a hub for local life.

(whatever.scalzi.com)

Startup renovation

Zig vs. Rust: A Deep Dive into Memory Safety

2025-05-13

This article delves into a detailed comparison of Zig and Rust regarding memory safety. Rust, with its powerful compile-time proof system, virtually eliminates memory safety vulnerabilities. While Zig improves upon C with features like slice types and bounds checking, it remains susceptible to memory safety issues such as use-after-free and buffer overflows. The author uses personal experience and project data to demonstrate Rust's memory safety advantage in large projects, but also suggests Zig's potential use in specific scenarios, such as within Wasm sandboxes. Zig's future success may hinge on the development of inexpensive runtime mitigations.

(www.scattered-thoughts.net)

Development

Credit Card Inequality: The Rich Get Richer, the Poor Pay More

2025-03-20

Credit Card Inequality: The Rich Get Richer, the Poor Pay More

The US credit card market is deeply divided: wealthy 'transactors' enjoy lavish rewards, while poorer 'revolvers' are trapped in a cycle of high-interest debt. Soaring living costs push more people into credit card reliance, resulting in record-high debt of $1.2 trillion. The rich not only benefit from their spending but indirectly subsidize reward programs, costs ultimately passed on to all consumers through high swipe fees. This structural inequality, the article argues, requires legislative intervention, such as caps on interest rates and swipe fees, to alleviate the financial strain on the poor. Recent economic slowdown and rising delinquency rates suggest the system is unsustainable.

(www.theatlantic.com)

Startup credit card debt economic inequality financial regulation

Musk's DOGE and a $400M Armored Tesla Deal: A Conflict of Interest?

2025-02-13

Musk's DOGE and a $400M Armored Tesla Deal: A Conflict of Interest?

Elon Musk's self-proclaimed "Department of Government Efficiency" (DOGE) is aggressively cutting government spending, yet his own companies continue to rake in lucrative federal contracts. A recent report revealed a $400 million State Department plan to purchase "armored Tesla" vehicles, raising significant conflict-of-interest concerns. While a State Department spokesperson denies any contract has been awarded to Tesla, the procurement plan initially mentioned Tesla before being amended. This incident highlights Musk's influence within government and potential favoritism, sparking questions about the true efficiency of his DOGE.

(www.rollingstone.com)

Tech Conflict of Interest

Negative Carbon Emission Acetylene Production: A Breakthrough Based on Barium Looping

2025-07-22

Traditional acetylene production relies on the energy-intensive calcium carbide method, producing significant carbon dioxide and waste slag. This study proposes a novel green acetylene production process based on barium looping, using barium carbide instead of calcium carbide as an intermediate. The research finds that barium carbide formation exhibits faster kinetics, lower formation temperature, and no carbon dioxide release. Lab-scale barium recovery experiments validate the feasibility of this process, achieving negative carbon emissions. This environmentally friendly process is easily scalable and promises to be a key chemical platform for sustainable development, offering new insights into carbon-to-chemicals conversion.

(pubs.rsc.org)

Tech acetylene production negative carbon emission

arXivLabs: Experimental Projects with Community Collaboration

2025-07-28

arXivLabs is a framework enabling collaborators to develop and share new arXiv features directly on our website. Individuals and organizations involved embrace our values of openness, community, excellence, and user data privacy. arXiv is committed to these values and only works with partners who share them. Got an idea for a project that will benefit the arXiv community? Learn more about arXivLabs.

(arxiv.org)

Development

LA Sues Airbnb Over Price Gouging and Unverified Listings After Wildfires

2025-07-20

LA Sues Airbnb Over Price Gouging and Unverified Listings After Wildfires

The Los Angeles city attorney's office filed a lawsuit against Airbnb, alleging price gouging and unverified hosts and addresses at over 2,000 rentals following January's wildfires. The lawsuit seeks to prevent price hikes during the emergency and compensate affected consumers. Airbnb disputes the claims, highlighting its $30 million in aid to fire victims. However, the lawsuit also alleges inadequate verification processes, leaving users vulnerable to crime. The case involves fake hosts and addresses, and locations miles from advertised ones. If price gouging is proven, Airbnb faces up to $7.5 million in fines.

(www.latimes.com)

Tech

Google AI Killed Me (and Then Brought Me Back to Life)

2025-07-20

Google AI Killed Me (and Then Brought Me Back to Life)

Author Dave Barry discovered Google AI had marked him as deceased and incorrectly identified him as a political activist from Dorchester. Despite repeated corrections, the AI system wavered, declaring him dead and alive multiple times. This humorous account highlights AI's limitations and inaccuracies in handling factual information, prompting reflection on the reliability of AI technology.

(davebarry.substack.com)

Misc

Modelica Association: Efficiently Modeling Complex Systems

2024-12-16

The Modelica Association promotes the Modelica language and its associated tools. Modelica is an object-oriented language for modeling and simulating complex cyber-physical systems, particularly adept at acausal modeling of reusable components governed by mathematical equations. The association provides language specifications, tools, libraries, and community support to enable users to efficiently model systems.

(modelica.org)

Development system modeling object-oriented

The Evolution of PuTTY's Icons: From Hand-Drawn to SVG

2025-03-12

This article chronicles the evolution of PuTTY's icons from hand-drawn images in the 1990s to today's scalable SVG vectors. The author initially created 32x32 pixel icons using the MSVC icon editor, constrained by the 16-color palette and display technology of the time. Over time, to accommodate higher resolutions and the needs of various tools, the author refined the process, eventually developing a script that auto-generates icons in multiple sizes and formats. This culminated in SVG versions, achieving true scalability. The design philosophy remains simple and clear, reflecting PuTTY's 'reassuringly old-fashioned' style, and continues to be used to this day.

(www.chiark.greenend.org.uk)

Development Icon Design

Canonical Unveils 12-Year LTS for Kubernetes

2025-02-11

Canonical Unveils 12-Year LTS for Kubernetes

Canonical announced a 12-year security maintenance and support commitment for its Kubernetes 1.32 LTS release. This long-term support covers bare metal, public clouds, OpenStack, Canonical MicroCloud, and VMware. The release boasts ease of installation, operation, and upgrades, integrating best-of-breed open-source networking, DNS, gateway, metrics server, local storage, load balancer, and ingress services. Businesses can choose between frequent updates (every four months) or the 12-year LTS for stability. It also offers FedRAMP compliance and integrates with Ubuntu Pro for comprehensive open-source stack security.

(canonical.com)

Development

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