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Comment Re:What permission groups do these cover? (Score 1) 69

If all they want is to cheat at some online game, all they need is an HDMI capture device along with an Arduino to emulate a USB keyboard / mouse / gamepad. No driver signature bypass, temporary boot state, disabling SecureBoot / TPM, or signed exploit required. If they've got the money, a good locally-run LLM can mostly replace the need for a DMA card. (If ESP is your thing.)

Comment Re:No... (Score 2) 69

If Bill brought us a pizza, he'd be hearing from my lawyer and several state's attorneys. /s

Also, no. Linux doesn't intentionally go out of it's way to engage in security theater. UAC is nothing more than an elevation prompt that was made mandatory because Microsoft wanted to kick people out of "their" directories and force app developers to use different (read: newer) APIs. A ploy that didn't even work all that well, BTW. As there's still plenty of apps made today that don't behave properly when their directories are made read-only, and plenty of people still use admin accounts to avoid typing in their password constantly. (Or just disable UAC where possible.)

Linux simply makes new paths when needed, and the newer APIs they make are recommended, but don't require an admin login at every turn. Of course, most Linux-native apps don't write to system folders / their install directories by design. So there's that too, and most things are handled with relatively few roadblocks. Sudo is typically all you have to use, but Polkit and friends can turn that into a simple UAC style prompt that doesn't require a three finger salute and desktop switching round trip.

Nor does Linux make a huge show about how some driver that you can never touch to fix an actively-used exploit being SIGNED is the end all be all of trust. It's the exact opposite. A signed contract can still have loopholes exploitable by others, just like a signed driver can be exploited by a hacker. Both require time and effort by the original parties to fix and during that time the attacker / hacker can make off like a bandit with impunity.

Don't believe me? Played Genshin Impact? No? Well too bad, because even if you haven't your system is still vulnerable to their SIGNED anti-cheat kernel driver, verified by Microsoft's SIGNED kernel, verified by Microsoft's SIGNED secure boot attestation, verified by your motherboard manufacturer's SIGNED UEFI firmware, verified by Intel's / AMD's / ARM's / etc. SIGNED microcode, disabling your anti-virus, encrypting your files, and extorting you with ransomware. The only sign those signatures give is one of incompetence at best and pay to play extortion at worst.

you people doing mental gymnastics

How about you stop with the delusional breaks from reality because someone said something you didn't like?

Grow the fuck up.

Says someone still white-knighting for a flawed king.

Comment Re:Nope (Score 3, Insightful) 69

Smartphones were just quicker to deal with the problem of unwanted app behaviors, because they didn't have the decades of historical software that had to keep working.

Nope. Smartphones are just as willing to violate the user's wishes as PCs. It was Custom ROMs that offered permissions managers first. Google was forced to provide it in the stock Android OS by inertia, and even then not fully. (Lots of apps from Google and the device manufacturer get a special pass that the user can't override without rooting, or using xposed. Worse some of those apps get access to things that no other app is allowed to even go near. Like accessing the audio of other apps.) It was only after Google realized they could use "permissions" as whitewashing for their blatant abuse that they really started pushing it. Hence all of the endless permissions for basic crap that people get tired of. That's intentional so that people get used to clicking "Allow" on reflex, so their apps can harvest anything they want with the user's "blessing."

I have no desire to see such crap in Windows, or any PC OS for that matter. It's no different than all of the popups we get for cookies. More opportunities for them to throw up shrinkwrap you have to click through in order to get to the thing you need done, all the while forfeiting your legal rights, to major annoyance, and disruption at every turn.

App developers these days have ZERO regard for honoring the wishes of users.

They have you by the balls. Of course, they don't give a shit about you. You're an ATM to be only withdrawn from and nothing more. Until your governments start bringing them to heel over their behavior that is.

Comment Re:The poor Korean low-paid artists (Score 1) 64

They won't, and then when the current cream of the crop retires the corps will have no replacements. But don't worry, I'm sure AI will fix that by then. Or at least that's what the CEOs of the time will be hoping for. The CEOs making these decisions today will be long gone by then. If it goes tits up and bankrupts what little economy you have left? That's someone else's problem. (GOD, I hate these assholes.....)

Comment Re:Why is this different (Score 1) 87

Fair use would disagree. What's being challenged here is the ability to download a file from youtube, which has fair use considerations. (Ripping a clip for reporting / transformative purposes.) The judge here is an idiot. He may as well go tell the local news that they can't reuse footage from others in their reporting.

Look forward to this judge's opinion getting slapped down, even if Google tries to throw their weight behind it. (The news media won't stand for it, and they'll be more than happy to take this to the Supreme Court. I'd imagine the EFF will want in too.)

Comment Re:Why is this different (Score 1) 87

It's worse, if screen capture is illegal then so is using your eyeballs. As they both fundamentally do the same thing: Convert image info into a format that something else can understand.

Keep in mind the MPAA / RIAA claimed in court that if someone wanted to continue using the analog hole, that they should point a camera at the screen. So this is basically a case of "Oh, but we didn't mean for you to actually do it....." To which I say: "So, you didn't want me to actually pay for the content...." (No point in paying if the act of viewing / consuming the content is illegal. I can't read encrypted bytes.)

Comment Initiate self-destruct sequence. (Score 4, Insightful) 130

Even if you did get the thing back, no sane person who actually cares about OpSec would use it. It's compromised. Even if they couldn't access the data, there's no telling what else they did succeed in doing to it. Hell, attempting to use it might allow them to finally access that data, complete with automatic transmission to their analysts.

Lockdown mode is better than nothing, but in reality the best option would be automatic, instant, and silent destruction of any data that the adversary might want to get their hands on. After all, adversaries rarely allow you to get the device back anyway. (And there's typically a ploy at work for them if they do.)

Comment Re:Hyperbole (Score 4, Insightful) 70

And why was that an effective punishment? Because the US offloaded it's entire manufacturing base to China so that a bunch of greedy assholes in the US could make a buck off of it.

So yes, the average American has a reason to hate China. China literally took their jobs, and they've never recovered from it. Worse, the "global market" means that any attempt to revive the dead industry in the US will always be out gunned. The average American has been forced to pay the thieves for everything ever since, and anyone who's tried to make a new product in the US has had to deal with never-ending hordes of Chinese knock-offs appearing on Amazon the second they get an initial manufacturing quote.

Globalization was a mistake, and the reason China made that threat isn't because of the asshole in the White House throwing a temper-tantrum. That was just a good PR excuse. The real reason is because China now has a similar problem to the US circa 1980. Their standard of living has gotten too high for the global owner class' tastes and they are at risk of losing their manufacturing base to other countries. (Malaysia, etc.) So much to the point that the CCP is now trying to ban high level workers from leaving the country to train their replacements. (Because China knows how this works out, having been a previous beneficiary.) China doesn't want to speedrun the US's downfall, and the CCP has no intention of being replaced. They might make a good show of being "cooperative" in the short term, but long term, they'll be forced to compete against cheaper countries, will suffer industry losses and currency inflation, and will gradually follow the same path as the US. Becoming "hostile" towards other countries as they work towards insulating themselves from the global market's whims.

Meanwhile the rest of the world is on-board with some of what China is doing, especially the stuff that cuts the US out of things like international banking

As if China won't follow the same playbook? They've already done the rare earths bit, and as you've alluded to, want to axe the US out completely. What makes you think they'll stop at just the US? It's a powerful weapon. There will be immense internal pressure to use it with or without permission from the rest of the world. Europe's preferences be dammed. Note: The same would apply to the Europeans, or anyone else, given that power. It allows collapsing a country you don't like without firing a single bullet. No country is immune to that temptation.

If there is a cold war, it's because the US seem to want one.

The average American in fact does not want a war, but that matters very little given the massively corrupt government that they have. Their government represents them in name only. (Unless they just so happen to be the small, loud, fraction of them that actively supports pedos.)

Conservatives there need a Big Bad to justify what they are doing.

Conservatives need nothing. They've had something to legitimately rail against ever since the owner class shipped all of their jobs to China. The problem is the owner class, who's convinced them that immigrants, LBTQ, etc. are responsible for it, instead of the owner class wanting to take more of their money. The Conservative's politicians, need no justification either. Might makes right is their justification. As they've already demonstrated with C-COT, killing Americans for protesting, terrorizing progressive cities, withholding congressionally mandated funds, blatantly defying court orders, threatening nationalization of elections, etc.

Comment Re:Hyperbole (Score 1) 70

They're Chinese, they literally snatched the literal halo and ran off with it to make a knock-off copy. Literally.

This. Sony has nothing of value, (since when has China ever cared about IP?), TCL now owns their branding and makes the sets. Sony has effectively exited the TV market, and the article is delusional if they think Sony has any remaining value there.

If you see a "Sony" TV in a store from now on, remember: It's Chinese.

Comment Re:and you all doubted Trump's infrastructure bill (Score 1) 94

You mean the same asshole who got several factories under construction completely canned because he publicly humiliated those running the construction on the International stage?

Or the asshole who slapped so many tariffs on anything and everything, that no-one wants to invest in the USA anymore due to market instability?

Or the asshole who pissed off so many of our allies that they are now actively cutting the US out of global trade anywhere they can?

Or the asshole who arrested and sent to concentration camps without trial anyone who didn't match the Family Guy chart, that the best and brightest no longer consider the US a destination for work or education?

Or the asshole who has allowed foreign nationals to die in the custody of his gestapo for the crime of *checks notes* freedom of speech? Killing our tourism industries across the country?

Or the asshole that actively promotes LLMs as the savior of mankind as they axe jobs left and right?


Yeah, I'll sympathize, with his victims, the asshole can go fuck himself. Without a minor.

Comment Re: Whistling past the graveyard (Score 1) 66

I've seen and benefitted from AI's capability. I'm not hiring because of it. I'm not outsourcing because of it.

And eventually, you'll be paying for it.

Whether that be through lower returns on your advertising dollars. (More ADs in ChatGPT for people who have no money to spend.)

Higher electricity bills. (Already here and growing.)

Higher AI subscription costs. (AI isn't profitable, now. They'll need to fix that before the VC funding runs out, and you're the ones who will pay.)

Lower units sold. (B2B or B2C, doesn't matter. No-one's getting paid a living wage, so even the B2Bs are going to suffer when the B2Cs run out of money.)

But yeah, keep pretending that UBI is going to magically fix everything, or that everyone is suddenly going to get employed by some other company so it won't be your problem. Your next quarterly review depends on it.

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