Some Bits: Nelson's Linkblog about • archive • mastodon • feed
87 links
NIN - Closer But It's Funkytown
The forbidden mashup
2020-06-30 closer • funkytown • funny • mashup • music • nin
Discord vs Nazis
How the social media company got on top of a trust and safety problem
2020-06-30 community • discord • moderation • nazis • tirefire • trustsafety
Contact Tracing in the Bay Area
Update on how this important tool for fighting Coronavirus is going; sort of OK, but not great.
2020-06-30 bayarea • contacttracing • coronavirus • covid19 • disease • health
The Hill is cozy with Trump
Owner of the news publication doing secret backroom deals with the Trump Administration to get his wife a job
2020-06-30 journalism • politics • thehill • trump
Sexuality in WoW
Detailed reading of queerness in World of Warcraft, but you have to look real hard for it. No major LGBT characters.
2020-06-30 games • gay • lgbt • worldofwarcraft • wow
SF's steepest street
A new analysis with appealing video
2020-06-30 hills • mapping • sanfrancisco • sf • streets
29% of San Quentin has Coronavirus
Absolute failure of state responsibility at a major prison
2020-06-29 california • coronavirus • covid19 • disease • prison • sanquentin
Trump talking to world leaders
Major new insider story about Trump's total lack of seriousness or competence when talking to world leaders on the phone
2020-06-29 diplomacy • erdogan • incompetence • politics • putin • russia • trump
Covid testing cost variance
The system of health insurance is opaque, predatory, and 100% antithetical to good health
2020-06-29 coronavirus • covid19 • health • insurance • politics • testing
Black engineers at NPM/GitHub laid off
Microsoft bought GitHub, picked up NPM, then laid off all the Black engineers.
2020-06-29 engineering • github • microsoft • npm • racism • tech
Contact tracing failures
Tracking cases of Covid-19 is failing in the US because of a lack of staff and national coordination
2020-06-28 contacttracing • coronavirus • covid19 • failure • politics
My Body Is a Confederate Monument
Strong essay about the awful history of rape of African Americans through the centuries
2020-06-27 confederacy • genealogy • politics • race • rape
Russians paying to kill American troops
More information from Fox News, of all places. Confirms Trump has known for months.
2020-06-27 america • fox • foxnews • military • politics • russia • trump
Russia paid to kill Americans
And Trump has known. For months.
2020-06-27 afghanistan • politics • russia • soldiers • taliban • trump
About dudes who don't wear masks
An argument for empathy and building understanding with mask denialists. Gotta admit, it's a hard suggestion to swallow, but her analogy to condom-shaming is on point.
2020-06-27 aids • condoms • coronavirus • covid • covid19 • disease • hiv • masks • shame
American Unrest
Satirical Thai column about current politics
2020-06-27 america • colonialism • funny • politics • satire • thailand
Covid death forecasts
Website collecting various forecast models for Covid deaths
2020-06-27 coronavirus • covid • covid19 • death • disease • estimate • model
Trump's atrocities
Meticulous list of 759 awful things Trump has done so far
2020-06-26 corruption • politics • trump
Games Logos in Arabic
Fun project to make typographically matching logos for video games but in Arabic
2020-06-26 arabic • calligraphy • games • language • typography
NYC: no BLM protest Covid uptick
Another city reports no evidence of an increase in Covid-19 cases after the BLM protests
2020-06-26 blm • coronavirus • covid19 • disease • protest
BLM protests and Covid, Bay Area
No correlation found between protests and disease outbreak
2020-06-26 bayarea • blm • coronavirus • covid19 • protest
BLM protests vs. Covid outbreaks
Doesn't look like any significant linkage; if anything, social distancing increased during the protests
2020-06-25 blm • coronavirus • covid19 • disease • politics • protest
Cards Against Humanity investigation
Detailed article about the hostile work environment from accused rapist Max Temkin
2020-06-23 cah • cardsagainsthumanity • games • maxtemkin • metoo • rape • tirefire
Android's OS update problem
Google created a mess where phone manufacturers see no need to ship OS updates
2020-06-23 android • google • ios • phone • updates
COVID-19 Contact Tracing
Coursera course to become a contact tracer, available free
2020-06-22 contacttracing • coronavirus • covid19 • disease • education • training
NYPD Shake Shack lies
Milkshake cops never got sick, a lie made up by senior supervisors and police lobby groups
2020-06-22 cops • lies • nypd • police • politics • shakeshake
Zuckerberg + Trump
Details on a secret meeting and what seems to be a political understanding
2020-06-22 facebook • politics • trump • zuckerberg
K-pop stans
Details on how a group of teenagers have become expert at manipulating social media metrics
2020-06-22 culture • internet • kpop • politics • socialmedia • trump
Europeans on US Covid-19
Horror watching my country fail to manage even basic public health
2020-06-20 coronavirus • covid19 • disease • health • pandemic • politics • us
Golf On Mars
Sequel to the perfect mobile video game, Desert Golf
2020-06-20 android • desertgolf • games • golf
Sridhar's search company
Former senior engineer manager at Google starts Neeva, a search company without ads. Based on Bing
2020-06-19 ads • bing • google • search
Chan Zuckerberg turmoil
Employees of the massive philanthropic fund write an open letter trying to steer the organization in a more just direction
2020-06-18 charity • philanthropy • politics • racism • zuckerberg
England contact tracing failure
How a good measure to fight Covid-19 is badly applied
2020-06-18 coronavirus • covid19 • disease • england • politics • uk
Simon Tatham's puzzle games
Nice collection of little logic puzzle games
2020-06-18 games • puzzles
Trust & Safety Professional Association
New organization to help turn Internet content moderation into a safe, respected profession. Great folks founding it, could have a real influence for good.
2020-06-17 content • internet • moderation • tirefire • trustandsafety
Loglo
A spreadsheet-like programming environment for laser cutters, etc
2020-06-16 glowforge • graphics • lasercutter • logo • programming
Hell Is for White People
Interesting reading of a 1515 painting as a depiction of the sins of white people as they began to colonize other continents
2020-06-16 arthistory • colonialism • portugal • race • racism • via:metafilter
Fake Black Lives Matter group
Fraudulent organization gets donations meant for someone else entirely
2020-06-16 blacklivesmatter • blm • charity • donations • fraud
NOAA's integrity was compromised
Internal investigation finds NOAA's director compromised their scientific integrity while following Trump's inane lead during the whole Sharpiegate hurricane thing
2020-06-15 corruption • hurricane • noaa • politics • science • sharpiegate • trump
Indie.vc profile
Update on the unusual tech funding company
2020-06-15 bryce • indie • indievc • investment • oatv • startups
eBay executives cyberstalking
Bizarre, disturbing case; federal charges against 6 eBay executives for sending death threats to a couple. Includes their Director of Safety and Security.
2020-06-15 ebay • harassment • natick • stalking • threats • tirefire
Reconstruction vs Denazification
Comparison of post-war experiences in the American South and Germany.
2020-06-14 civilwar • confederacy • germany • history • nazis • politics • racism • south
Nudity filters vs history
Facebook white washes Australian history by blocking sharing of photos of Aboriginal men in chains
2020-06-14 aborigine • ai • australia • facebook • filter • history • nudity • prudery • tirefire
Compton Cowboys protest
BLM horseback ride / march
2020-06-12 blm • compton • horses • politics • protest
Jepsen on Postgres
Kyle takes his database consistency testing tool to Postgres and comes away with one bug (now fixed) and one documentation problem. Not bad!
2020-06-12 aphyr • consistency • database • jepsen • postgres • postgresql • transactions
Digital maps and BLM protests
Roundup of how various online maps were made and responded to BLM protests
2020-06-12 blm • cartography • map • politics • protest
The Mis-Education Of White Folks
Excellent essay on the perpetuation of white supremacy in the United States
2020-06-11 education • history • racism • via:metafilter • whitesupremacy
Marion Springer, Gyrocopter Queen
Choctaw woman also a pioneer in aviation. And flies gyrocopters, to which all I can say is "Respect".
2020-06-11 aviation • choctaw • flying • gyrocopter • native • nativeamerican • women
The Confederate Flag
The last flag of Confederacy, its surrender
2020-06-10 civilwar • confederacy • confedrate • history • politics • surrender • treason
Georgia voting fiasco
Long history of voter suppression and incompetence meets Covid-19 with very poor result
2020-06-10 atlanta • coronavirus • covid19 • georgia • politics • votersuppression • votingrights
Google stealing billions of page views
Analysis of how much traffic Wikipedia has lost because of Google's aggressive display of copyrighted information inline rather than sending the user to a destination page
2020-06-10 google • traffic • via:hackernews • wikipedia • zeroclick
Gay Wrath Month
Good unicorn skeleton chaos art
2020-06-09 art • funny • gay • lgbt • politics • unicorn
Tesla Coronvirus cluster
Musk illegally reopened the plant and workers got sick
2020-06-09 coronavirus • covid19 • disease • elonmusk • musk • tesla
Strategic tire slashing
Bad cops argue that they slashed journalist's tires for strategic reasons. Fire and sue them. Also jail them for vandalism. What else could you do?
2020-06-09 blm • cops • minneapolis • police • vandalism
Black Lives Matter in ASL
A Sign interpreter talks about signing words related to racial justice
2020-06-08 america • asl • blacklivesmatter • blm • language • race • sign
How Apples Go Bad
Helen Rosner just barely on the metaphor
2020-06-08 apples • blm • police • politics • protest • rosner
Anita Sarkeesian on Max Temkin
A condemnation of the Cards Against Humanity founder
2020-06-08 abuse • cardsagainsthumanity • games • maxtemkin • racism • sexism
50 LGBTQ in Hollywood
Decent short bios of 50 folks working in film and TV for LGBTQ inclusion
2020-06-08 culture • gay • hollywood • lgbtq • movies • tv • via:metafilter
America has given up on Covid-19
This article is confusing because it mixes two major topics: risk from the police brutality protests vs. the general public health project just kind of giving up on pandemic containment
2020-06-07 america • coronavirus • covid19 • health • politics
US no longer gay proud
Embassies prevented from flying Pride flags in June
2020-06-07 america • embassies • gay • lgbt • politics
Cops slashing tires
Truly stupid and outrageous behavior in Minneapolis
2020-06-07 acab • blm • minneapolis • police • protests • vandalism
Brave hijacking sleaze
Unethical browser company does something new unethical
2020-06-07 ads • brave • browsers • business • ethics
Small town BLM protests
All of America is fed up
2020-06-06 america • blm • politics • protest • rural • smalltown
Retired generals' role
We are very lucky in the US to have a culture and history of political calm and neutrality in our military
2020-06-05 america • mattis • military • politics • trump
Unidentified police in DC
Third world dictatorship tactic applied to American protestors
2020-06-05 america • civilrights • dc • police • politics • protest • trump
Defund the Police explainer
Vox's take on various things meant by "Defund the Police"
2020-06-04 blm • defund • defundthepolice • police • politics
Defund the Police
Call by BLM to radically rethink police's role in the United States
2020-06-04 blm • defund • defundthepolice • police • politics
James Mattis Denounces Trump
Former Trump defense secretary has finally had enough
2020-06-03 ethics • mattis • military • politics • trump
2020 protest map
Protests for BLM, George Floyd
2020-06-03 blm • georgefloyd • maps • politics • protest
Trump's personal voter fraud
His vote-by-mail registrations are super fishy
2020-06-03 politics • trump • votebymail • voting
Will Trump go?
A scary but realistic assessment of the danger Trump refuses to honor a close election
2020-06-03 america • civilwar • election • politics • trump
Facts about Voting by Mail
Tweetstorm as FEC publication by an FEC commissioner
2020-06-03 fec • politics • votebymail • voting • votingrights • weintraub
Sweden screwed up
Sweden's epidemiologist admits their approach got more people killed than necessary. Also not clear it helped the economy.
2020-06-03 coronavirus • covid19 • death • sweden
Police hiding badge numbers
Really creepy smug tweet
2020-06-03 civilrights • newyork • nypd • police • politics • violence
The Lincoln Memorial, with troops
Monument to Lincoln surrounded by military
2020-06-03 lincolnmemorial • politics • protest
LA to Beijing in Covid-19
Absolutely miserable international flight
2020-06-02 america • aviation • china • coronavirus • covid19 • flying • quarantine
Contact tracing in Germany
How a competent country is managing to keep Covid-19 under control
2020-06-02 contacttracing • coronavirus • covid19 • disease • germany
Trump's Hate House
Tight 60 seconds of agitprop
2020-06-02 agitprop • hate • politics • trump
Police escalation of violence in protests
Thoughtful essay from 50 years of study about how to handle protests
2020-06-02 police • politics • protest • violence
Christo photos
Excellent collection of works from the installation artist
2020-06-02 art • christo • installation • obituary
Trump bible photo op
Most awkward fucking thing
2020-06-02 awkward • bible • church • politics • stjohns • stupid • trump
Test and Trace
Which US states are set up to test and trace Covid-19 cases?
2020-06-02 coronavirus • covid19 • disease • tracing
Obama on protest and change
Calm, conservative essay on a path to social justice via voting in local elections
2020-06-01 blm • floyd • obama • politics • protest
Money for Nothing CG
1985 music video contained some very early computer character animation
2020-06-01 animation • cg • direstraits • graphics • moneyfornothing • mtv
Boogaloo Bois
A very detailed history of the accelerationist movement that started on 4chan /k/ and graduated to Facebook
2020-06-01 accelerationism • anarchy • boogaloo • facebook • nihilism • politics
Police violence in protests
A roundup of some of the bad actions from cops during the protests
2020-06-01 brutality • police • politics • violence
Tara Reade profile
Detailed research on the life of the woman accusing Biden of sexual assault
2020-06-01 biden • politics • tarareade