Update 1: Purism states on their website in a March blog post that there is one production run that covers the entirety of late 2019 – mid 2021. So, it is actually possible to accomplish. https://puri.sm/posts/where-is-my-librem-5-part-3/ This also makes some of the production timing mentioned below much more innocent even if calling it “In Stock” …
Continue reading “Sorry Purism, I’m not investing. It’s (possibly) not even legal. (updated once)”
If you’re going somewhere anonymously, or attending a politically unpopular protest, or visiting a sensitive client, you might want to turn Location Services to Off in your smartphone’s settings. Great – now you can go and do whatever it is without worrying. Well, that would be the case if we lived in an ideal world, …
Continue reading “The “Location Off” switch on your phone is a lie.”
Note: I am not a lawyer – but hear me out. Considering the recent squabble between Pointcrow and Nintendo, almost everyone has heard of the “DMCA Takedown.” The DMCA is a huge (and arguably unconstitutional and 70% stupid) law that has a ton of sections, with Section 512 dealing with takedowns. However, there’s another section …
Continue reading “Nintendo Switch modding is illegal in the US, full stop.”
Here’s yet another theory that could partially explain why Windows 11 doesn’t support anything below Intel 8th Gen: Something’s really borked in Skylake (Intel 6th Gen), and operating systems are eager to get away from it. And, when possible, the refresh (7th gen). Consider: There are good alternative motives for all of those events (Windows …
What would happen if the internet suffered a prolonged and serious outage, reason irrelevant (cyberattack, zero days, P = NP with a simple and fast algorithm, solar superstorms, major vendor compromise, AWS KMS shredded from attack or mistake, total BGP meltdown, take your pick), but we still had electricity, gas, mail, mostly functioning government, and …
Continue reading “Tech’s over-reliance on the internet is a preventable national security issue”
Recently, I had to set up a Windows 10 computer for one specific application in a semi-embedded use case. Anything else that Windows does or comes with is unnecessary for this. While there are plenty of internet scripts and apps for de-bloating Windows, I have found the easiest (and little known) way to debloat Windows …
Continue reading “Debloating Windows 10 with one command and no scripts”
I saw the news by Bloomberg (a questionable source) about how Apple was getting ready to comply with the European Digital Markets Act, at last, by allowing sideloading among other things. However, this quote caught my eye: If similar laws are passed in additional countries, Apple’s project could lay the groundwork for other regions, according …
Continue reading “Open Question: How will Apple keep sideloading in Europe?”
Right to Repair: Almost everyone supports it, it will make our devices more repairable, but if you look closely: the definition of what Right to Repair actually is and entails constantly changes based on who you talk to. Note: This table is an oversimplification of their definitions of R2R and does not include all necessary …
Continue reading “Nobody agrees what “Right to Repair” actually means”
In the past few months, there have been a surge of AI projects that allow generating images and text: These AI programs are amazing – but they were also trained with publicly-available material; and the owners of that material almost certainly did not opt-in to having their material used for AI training, and have occasionally …
Continue reading “My unlawyered opinion on why AI will legally survive in the US”
Remote attestation has been a technology around for decades now. Richard Stallman railed about the freedom it would take in 2005, A Senator presented a bill asking for the required chips to become mandatory, and Microsoft prepared Palladium to improve “security” and bring remote attestation (among other things) to the masses. Then it all fell …
Continue reading “Remote attestation is coming back. How much freedom will it take?”