My latest Locus Magazine column is DRM Broke Its Promise, which recalls the days when digital rights management was pitched to us as a way to enable exciting new markets… Read the rest of the article: They told us DRM would give us more for less, but they lied
Hong Kong's democratic uprising has been a long masterclass in high-tech protest tactics (and the hits keep coming).
You know what's great about putting wifi-enabled, Turing-complete computers into things like lightbulbs? Not. A. Single. Fucking. Thing.
For decades, architectural critic and photographer John Margolies obsessively documented roadside attractions: vernacular architecture, weird sculpture, odd businesses and amusements. By his death in 2016, his collection consisted of more… Read the rest of the article: Library of Congress releases 11,700 freely usable photos of "roadside America," taken by John Margolies
California's Assembly Bill 5 isn't radical: it merely affirms the obvious fact that Uber and Lyft drivers (and other "gig economy" workers) are employees, something that the California Supreme Court… Read the rest of the article: Rideshare companies' effort to kill California employment bill is failing miserably
One of the most obvious facts I've learned in covering the unfolding scandal of the secret deals between Amazon's Ring surveillance doorbell group and hundreds of US police departments is… Read the rest of the article: Ring: "We don't use facial recognition"; also Ring: "We have a head of facial recognition research"
Apple was at the vanguard of the massive corporate spending that killed Right to Repair bills in 20 state legislatures last year, and while the company claims that it wants… Read the rest of the article: Apple led the campaign to kill Right to Repair, now it's supplying parts to (some) independent repair shops
Supermajority's Gender Equality, the Status of Women and the 2020 Elections surveys likely 2020 voters (N=1912), finds a strong correlation between opposition and broad misogynistic beliefs, such as opposition to… Read the rest of the article: Survey: Self-identified "pro lifers" are generally contemptuous of women
One of my favorite genres of book is the popular engineering book, a rare breed that combines physics and engineering to establish the full range of ways to address a… Read the rest of the article: HOW TO: XKCD's Randall Munroe finds the humor in taking silly questions very, very seriously
[I ran a review of this in June when the UK edition came out — this review coincides with the US edition's publication] Rob Smith is an eminent computer scientist… Read the rest of the article: Rage Inside the Machine: an insightful, brilliant critique of AI's computer science, sociology, philosophy and economics
Even though I'm at Burning Man, I've snuck out an extra scheduled podcast episode (MP3): Barlow's Legacy is my contribution to the Duke Law and Tech Review's special edition, THE… Read the rest of the article: Podcast: Barlow's Legacy
On the Under the Knife show, Dr Lindsey Fitzharris elucidates the weird history of "anthropodermic bibliopegy," the weird practice of binding books in human skin, including the doctor who bound… Read the rest of the article: Anthropodermic bibliopegy: the grotesque history of books bound in human skin
Amsterdam's Bibliotheca Philosophica Hermetica (AKA "The Ritman Library) houses more ths 25,000 occult texts, covering "Hermetics, Rosicrucians, Theosophy, alchemy, mysticism, Gnosis and Western Esotericism, Sufism, Kabbalah, Anthroposophy, Catharism, Freemasonry, Manichaeism,… Read the rest of the article: The world's largest occult library has a public online archive
Last week, the Modern Monetary Theory Podcast ran part 1 of my interview with co-host Christian Reilly; they've just published the second and final half of our chat (MP3), where… Read the rest of the article: My MMT Podcast appearance, part 2: monopoly, money, and the power of narrative
Ted Suhl was serving his third year of a seven-year sentence for bribery and Medicaid fraud when Trump commuted his sentence and sprung him, at the request of Mike Huckabee;… Read the rest of the article: Debullshitifying Trump's get-out-of-jail statement for Medicaid scammer Ted Suhl
The queue area at the Haunted Mansion at Disneyland features a row of changing portraits wherein paintings everyday scenes are revealed as sinister and haunted (originally the effect was done… Read the rest of the article: "The Stab": a forgotten nearly-was Haunted Mansion changing portrait
This is my last day at my desk until Labor Day: tomorrow, we're driving to Burning Man to get our annual dirtrave fix! If you're heading to the playa, here's… Read the rest of the article: Where to catch me at Burning Man!
Heirs' property is a relic of post-Reconstruction law, which allows white developers to exploit the diffuse ownership of Black family homes to steal them and kick out the people who… Read the rest of the article: Elizabeth Warren has a plan to reform "Heirs' Property," which allows wealthy white property developers to steal Black family homes
One of the major contributors to greenhouse gases is the methane that cows belch up as they break down cellulose, but five years ago, research from Australia's Commonwealth Scientific and… Read the rest of the article: Adding pink seaweed to cow feed eliminates their methane emissions
Tim Qian, a "full stack developer and open source activist," has published chart.xkcd, a free/open tool that lets you create interactive, "hand-drawn" charts in the style of XKCD comics. It's… Read the rest of the article: A free/open tool for making XKCD-style "hand-drawn" charts
