Books touched on:
- The Death of Privacy and Truth: 1984 — George Orwell
- The Corruption of Power: Animal Farm — George Orwell
- The Golden Cage: Brave New World — Aldous Huxley
- The End of the Deep Dive: Fahrenheit 451 — Ray Bradbury
- Rights Are Made Up: The Handmaid's Tale — Margaret Atwood
- Greed Above All Else: Parable of the Sower — Octavia E. Butler
- A Cruel Game that the Privileged Don't Have to Play: The Hunger Games — Suzanne Collins
We're already living in every dystopian novel — Mr. Beat
Mr. Beat explains how some of those dystopian novels we were forced to read growing up in school have already (partially) come true.Disclaimer: Mr. Beat offers opinions in this video
Uh ok, so this is, like, the description of the video so keep reading. Produced by Matt Beat and Beat Productions, LLC. Filmed by Matt Beat. All images and video by Matt Beat. Additional images used under fair use guidelines or found in the public domain. Music by Electric Needle Room (Mr. Beat's band), Bad Snacks, Kwon, MK2, Otis McDonald, Patrick Patrikios, and Underbelly & Ty Mayer.
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Doughnut Lollipop 【記録係】:blobfoxgooglymlem: reshared this.
Nothing makes you hate cars more than living on a busy street, forced to listen to their din day in and day out. >:(
Cities Aren't Loud: Cars Are Loud — Not Just Bikes
Urban noise is a common problem, and the vast majority of it is created by motor vehicles. Noise is far too often dismissed as a minor nuisance, rather than the legitimate health issue that it is.The book "Curbing Traffic" has a chapter about the health impacts of noise pollution. I explore the research in the book, and visit Delft, the city that is highlighted in the book as being a shining example of what can happen when noise pollution is taken seriously.
This video explores the problem that farting cars, farting motorcycles, and farting mopeds create in our cities.
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From here:
There is no 'free' market, and there never has been. The 'free' market is predicated on the belief that all players will act honestly, and make informed choices based on available information. This is a completely false assumption, and has been proven so time after time.It completely ignores human nature whereby someone will always lie, cheat, and steal to achieve their own ends -- this is what we see here.
Industry players will always form cartels and collude in anti-consumer behavior -- price fixing being the prime example.
Without someone to keep corporations in line, the market would steadily skew to all of the power being in the hands of a few.
There is no such thing as a 'free' market, and there simply never has been. It's a utopian myth which can never be true.
People who go around spouting about the 'free' market are either naive, self deluded, or actively lying.
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damn, so we've had 11 years of this very thing getting worse.
when will people get it?! people keep voting for these pro corporate parties and it's depressing
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well, the same is happening here in the Netherlands. people have been voting the neoliberals into power for decades, despite things going to shit, and other parties being available here.
it's the propaganda that's working; most people still believe that free market capitalism is great, and it will take a lot more downfall before they understand it's shit.
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@bazkie about 10 years ago when I had learned just enough Dutch to read sites where younger folk hung out (and chat to them) I learned a fair few thought all the bicycles, good public transport (which folk in UK often envy!) and the high cost of learning to drive (which is same as UK) was imposed by "big government/EU" and they wanted to have cars just like young people in UK, enjoyed watching Top Gear and thought folk in UK and USA had more "freedom" (and those youths would be 30-40+ by now, many with families of their own)
At least you are highly unlikely to get Nexit as everyone can see the mess the UK is now in 5 years later..
@vfrmedia UK has been a lovely warning sign for us indeed!
..tho people have been voting far right the past few years despite Trump, so maybe most people don't really understand warning signs 😅
and about that dutch youth; keep in mind we've had neoliberal rule for decades now, so the whole "free market good, nationalization bad" has been really hammered in.
not sure if we'll get rid of it in my lifetime tbh. but most of the lovely social policies we have left stem from the more progressive governing we had before I was born 😅
btw why did you learn dutch? (maybe I asked before)
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I love pirate radio!
I don't know if it's actually a pirate station, here's an FM broadcaster near Quinault Lake here that plays all kinds of odds and ends with weird stuff in between. It might fall under LPFM, but I doubt the FCC would hassle them anyway since it's in the middle of nowhere and low power.
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@vfrmedia what's LPFM?
I wonder if maybe the FCC is a bit more relaxed these days since people listen to FM radio less (or well, I imagine that they do)
the "free market" is to economics what the frictionless spherical cow is to high school physics.
The very existence of corporations means there is no free market. Corporations are a legal construct of governments that grants a business (and later even a mere collection of assets) status as a district entity separated to some degree from the owners and workers within.
As such, there is no choice between "government vs corporations" because they are *two sides of the same coin*...it is all one big hegemony.
We have all been thoroughly conditioned to think otherwise for a couple of centuries now. It is thoroughly ingrained the minds of everyone in the "free world" that corporations are the capitalist free market and government is the socialist planned economy but that is pure BS.
The biggest economies in the world have arrived in the same place from two different directions...the US being a corporatocratic regime and China practising state capitalism.
As such deregulation just means re-regulation.
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https://www.cbsnews.com/news/pam-bondi-rescinds-ban-doj-employees-partisan-events/
Pam Bondi rescinds policy banning politically appointed DOJ employees from attending partisan events
Attorney General Pam Bondi has rescinded a policy that prohibited political appointees at the Justice Department from attending campaign events or fundraisers, according to a memo seen by CBS News.Sarah N. Lynch (CBS News)
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https://thehill.com/homenews/administration/5766912-kristi-noem-dhs-coast-guard-housing/
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"Courage does not mean not fearing or not grieving. It does mean recognizing and resisting terror management right away, from the moment of the attack, precisely when it seems most difficult to do so."
Timothy D. Snyder
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https://www.cbsnews.com/minnesota/news/minnesota-lawsuit-ellison-oz-rfk-medicaid-funding/
Minnesota sues Dr. Oz, Robert F. Kennedy Jr. over $243M in deferred Medicaid funding
Minnesota on Monday sued Trump administration officials Dr. Mehmet Oz and Robert F. Kennedy Jr. in an attempt to stop them from withholding $243 million in Medicaid spending, warning it may have to cut health care for low-income families if the fundi…CBS Minnesota
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Fascism says what you and I experience as facts or what reporters experience as facts are irrelevant. All that matters are impressions and emotions and myths."
Timothy D. Snyder
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"The Constitution is worth saving, the rule of law is worth saving, democracy is worth saving, but these things can and will be lost if everyone waits around for someone else.
Timothy D. Snyder
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Yeah, given with what happened last week with LLM providers, I'd reckon it can get you on a terrorist list (if you're not a billionaire).
Because I've said it 50 times this week:
If you don't define your success criteria, someone else will define them for you, and you will 100% fail to meet them.
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When a U.S. Citizen Was Wrongly Arrested by ICE…
This story could be told again and again. George Reyes was on his way to work. He is a citizen and a veteran. ICE agents stopped his vehicle, smashed his windshield, dragged him away, and jailed hi…Diane Ravitch's blog
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Iran’s internet blackout could worsen human toll of war, say rights groups | World news - EUROPE SAYS
As US and Israeli bombs continue to rain down on Iran, civilians are enduring the bombardment in the dark – cut off from comprehensive information about whereEUROPE SAYS
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TIL that cats can and do apologize to their owners. Headbutting and bringing toys are one of the ways they're apologizing.
https://cats.com/how-do-cats-say-they-are-sorry
#til #todayilearned
https://www.reddit.com/r/todayilearned/comments/1rll1cc/til_that_cats_can_and_do_apologize_to_their/
How Do Cats Say They Are Sorry?
Cats get bad press when it comes to their behavior. Many pet owners will have you believe that cats go out of their way to do objectionable things around the... Read more »Dr. Emma Chandley BVetMed PGCertSAS MRCVS (Cats.com)
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https://kingcountymetro.blog/2026/03/05/turn-your-clocks-ahead-1-hour-this-sunday/
#KingCountyMetro #News
Turn your clocks ahead 1 hour this Sunday
Daylight Saving Time officially starts at 2 am on Sunday, March 8, 2026. If you ride the bus Saturday night, including very late-night trips that operate from downtown Seattle or designated termina…Metro Matters
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This case shows how Open Source will die. With anyone just being able to pipe existing code and tests through an LLM and claiming that to be "clean room" (which is hogwash) no licensing can protect your work from being accumulated and monetized by anyone. The commons are actively being shredded in front of our eyes.
https://github.com/chardet/chardet/pull/322
chardet 7.0: ground-up MIT-licensed rewrite by dan-blanchard · Pull Request #322 · chardet/chardet
Summary This PR is for a ground-up, MIT-licensed rewrite of chardet. It maintains API compatibility with chardet 5.x and 6.x, but with 27x improvements to detection speed, and highly accurate suppo...GitHub
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The Death Valley Superbloom is happening!!
AccuWeather
The Death Valley superbloom is underway! 🌸🌼 Colorful flowers are blanketing parts of the hottest place in North America. Park officials say it's the best superbloom since 2016.www.facebook.com
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The grisly discoveries of three bodies in south central Utah have spurred a multi-county manhunt, prompting schools to shut down and businesses to shutter while an unknown killer is on the loose.
Authorities received a call Wednesday afternoon about “two deceased females located on a hiking trail” in Wayne County, the Utah Department of Public Safety said.
“During the course of the investigation, a third victim was located deceased at a residence in Wayne County.”
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The three women were in their 30s, 60s and 80s. Their names have not been publicly released as authorities try to notify their relatives, DPS said.
Wayne County is sparsely populated with about 2,500 residents, according to the US Census. But the area is popular with hiking and outdoor enthusiasts because of nearby Capitol Reef National Park, Canyonlands National Park and Fishlake National Forest.
Investigators are asking for the public’s help in finding a 2022 white Subaru Outback with license plate U560YF. Anyone who sees the vehicle should not approach it and instead call 911.
EOF
The former Indian FM:
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Seeing Donald Knuth sing praise of Claude and be swooned by it for seemingly fuzzing a solution to some problem he was working on while:
- Having no formal proof it is correct
- Claude immediately lost the illusion of cohession as their session continued
I'm growing convenced these things are a siren song to the human brain. It's creepy how fast people will resign themselves to these text generators just cause they can brute force and correctly predict a few solutions.
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more lanes -> more traffic
more housing -> more people housed
Radical stuff. But where are they going to park?
Urban Truth Collective: Straight Talk About The Joy Of Cities In An Age Of Disinformation
The Three Tenors of Urbanism explain their latest effort: The Urban Truth Collective.Grant Ennis (Streetsblog USA)
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March 05,1958
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At $47M per mile, not buying property or laying new track?
How electrifying a Bay Area rail system made trains faster, cleaner, and more frequent
A $2.4 billion upgrade to Caltrain is shaving time off trips, boosting ridership, and reducing riders’ exposure to toxic diesel pollution.Benton Graham (Grist)
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There are a lot of reasons for the downfall of the #USA but a big one is the purchase of traditional #media by plutocrat goons
Look at this fucking shit:
EDIT: some people are angry that i am potentially misleading because this isn't a recent headline. i am trying to make a point about the decay of traditional media and our current state of things. but yes, this is is from 2014, after #bezos bought WaPo. my point still stands, and you should follow my account for commentary, not breaking news
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Judge orders MN’s U.S. Attorney to appear at contempt hearing Tuesday over violations in immigration cases
In a rare move Feb. 18, U.S. District Judge Laura Provinzino found Special Assistant U.S. Attorney Matthew Isihara in civil contempt of court over failures by the U.S. government to return identification documents to an immigrant previously ordered released in Minnesota. Provinzino ultimately purged the civil contempt but issued a stern warning to the U.S. Attorney’s Office that its repeated claims of low staffing and crushing caseload has “worn out its welcome.”backup: https://archive.ph/TOZC0
PSA
If you have a weak stomach or, like me, traumatic images replay over and over involuntarily in your brain after seeing them just once, I strongly recommend you *do not* watch the videos going around right now of the protesting marine's arm being broken by security and senator Sheehy. You can plainly see the moment it happens, and it's very unsettling.
Consider this an independently proffered content warning.
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Air to Ground Message:
WAS NOT COMFORTABLE WITH MAN SPEAKING ARABIC. YES 21C DEPLANE
Area: Jersey Shore, NJ, USA
A: #a9e0dddea3b
F: #f4ad64de9a5
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I get it:
He's letting Hegseth do whatever he wants in the Middle East in furtherance of that freak's psychosexual Crusades fantasy, and he's letting Rubio do whatever he wants in the Western Hemisphere so that worm can try to get his family's slaves back
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bazkie 👩🏼💻 bitplanes 🎵
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Daniel
in reply to Neil E. Hodges • • •every time I contemplate "upgrading" the stock exhaust on my bike, I remember it's already louder than a car exhaust.
Most car exhausts, anyway. Not the M3 that my neighbour across the road drives.
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Mira
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